(Author’s note: this post does not attempt to in any way
deal with all the violations of human rights of the Sami in Sweden.)
“Who here has ever
studied about the Sami?” – that was the question a classmate asked in a history
class during my 2nd year in high school. In a class of 32, from many
different secondary schools around the Gothenburg area, not one of us raised
our hand. I remember thinking that maybe it was a bit odd, but I didn’t give it
any more thought at the time. But in the last few years this memory has
bothered me more and more.
During my LLM I took a class on the Inter-American system of
human rights. It was the first time I had studied anything about Latin America
and the first time I learned about indigenous rights and the many different
indigenous people of the Americas – how their rights have been violated and how
the Inter-American Court of Human Rights has repeatedly held states accountable.
I remember coming to the realization that if Sweden were in the Americas, we
would’ve had our wrists slapped hard for our treatment of the Sami. I also remember
talking to one of my best friends once about how much I liked the class and she
asked me, “well what are the Sami like?”. She assumed I had something to offer since
they are the indigenous people my home country Sweden. “I don’t know”, I
answered, feeling slightly stupid and uncomfortable. “Well what’s their culture
and faith and stuff?” she asked. Once again I had to reply with “I don’t know.”
Of course I knew that the Sami come from the north of Sweden
and that some are reindeer herders and I also knew sort of what their
traditional costumes look like and that there had been some past abuses on the
part of the Swedish State. This I had learned from a children’s news program
when I was a child. But that was the extent of my education about the Sami
growing up in Sweden – and none of it came from my 12 years in school. It was
then that I started to ask around: had
my friends, family members, younger brother, or nieces ever studied the Sami in
school? I have continued to ask this question of colleagues and other Swedish
people when the topic comes up and the answer has always been “no”. This
made me start wondering about the silence on this topic in Swedish society.
There has been much more about the Sami in the news and media lately but growing up I was never confronted about my
country’s history regarding the colonization of Sami lands and oppression of
our indigenous people. I personally feel robbed by my government of this
very important knowledge and feel incensed that my government not only won’t
guarantee the Sami their rights, but won’t even apologize for what happened in
the past. I am also appalled at the
non-existence of political discussion and debate about the Sami question.
Sweden’s
colonization of Sami lands and historic violations of Sami rights
The Sami are the indigenous people of the North of Europe. I
often compare Sápmi, the land inhabited
by the Sami, to a Swedish Kurdistan. Sápmi covers about half of Sweden and Norway, as
well as parts of Finland and Russia. It is claimed that the Sami came to
inhabit the land at least 2,000 years ago, and the first written document believed to speak about the Sami dates from 98 AD.
It is unclear how many Sami people still inhabit the area,
but one estimate claims that there are 80,000-100,000 Sami in Sápmi (about
20,000-40,000 in Sweden, 50,000-60,000 in Norway, 8,000 in Finland, and 2,000
in Russia). However, it is worth noting that the Swedish census no longer notes
ethnicity so the estimate of some 20,000 Sami in Sweden dates back to 1975. Therefore
we don’t even know how many Sami actually live in Sweden!
Sweden’s colonization of Sápmi started during the 14th
century when Swedish kings began
claiming rights to territory in the north. During the 16th century
the Sami were forced to pay taxes to the
Swedish State and in 1542 King Gustav Vasa proclaimed
that uninhabited land, or land without settlements
belonged to “God, the Swedish crown, and no one else”. The king also tried
to make Swedes move to the vast lands in
the north, but without much success. Thus, colonization
of Sápmi began in earnest in the 17th century when silver was discovered (in 1634). Ever since the Sami have been subjected to
various forms of oppression at the hands of the State.
From an early stage, the
Church was instrumental in the oppression and discrimination of the Sami.
The Sami were forced to convert to Christianity and to attend Church,
where their language wasn’t allowed to be spoken and the traditional joik was forbidden. The Church also used
a number of punishments to force Sami to convert, including fines,
imprisonment, and the death penalty. Holy
Sami sites were defaced and drums used in traditional ceremonies were
destroyed.
In 1913 a new system
of nomad schools was introduced, which was in place until 1962.
The school system was developed
by the Church, as ordered by the State, and was heavily influenced by thoughts of eugenics. There was also a Swedish policy
notion that the “lapp shall be a lapp”.
The word ‘lapp’ stems from the
word Lappland, a
province in Sweden which contains Sápmi, and is what the Sami used to be called
(the term is now considered derogatory). The policy established that the
reindeer herding Sami should live according to what was considered their native
way of living, whereas the settled Sami were supposed to be assimilated into
the majority Swedish population. Therefore, the children of reindeer herding Sami didn’t get an education that was on
par with other State schools. They
were sent to special boarding schools, so-called nomad schools, where
Swedish was the only language of instruction despite the fact that they
didn’t speak the language. These schools also taught fewer subjects than State
schools. The system of segregated schools has been said to have created divisions among the Sami.
Because of the State’s policies in the 19th and
20th century many Sami have
lost both their traditional religion and their language and today less than
half of the Swedish Sami are believed to speak their native language.
The State and the Church of Sweden were also involved in other
racist policies towards the Sami. As was
all the rage in the first half of the 20th century, Sweden was
interested in eugenics. In 1922 a man called Herman Lundborg became the director
of the State Institute for Eugenics. He argued that the idea of equal worth
among people was an illusion and that humans were made up of different races,
whose worth was determined by heritage; lowest were the racially mixed and best
were the racially pure (as can be guessed here, Lundborg became an important
inspiration for a group of German eugenics researchers whose work was the
foundation for the Nazis’ ideas about race).
Herman Lundborg’s research into the people of Sápmi led to
widespread violations of human rights against the Sami. Lundborg traveled north, measuring skulls and faces of Sami and collecting information about
the color of their hair and eyes. He photographed each person, and the
pictures were catalogued in an archive that is still kept by the government. Government representatives made judgments
about whether the Sami in question was intelligent, lazy or insane, making
conclusions about the person’s worth from her physical appearance. Priests
of the Church of Sweden were instrumental in giving Lundborg and his
researchers access to Sami families.
A catalogue of
pictures of Sami people is still being kept by the library at University of
Uppsala. They include 12,000 headshots,
full body pictures and even nudes of Sami men, women and children.
Other institutions, such
as national historical museums, also
keep Sami remains and objects. In 2007, the
Sami Parliament, Sametinget, requested a complete identification of all Sami
skeletal remains held in all national collections and the repatriation of the
human remains to where they belong. The Sami Parliament also wanted to know how
museums and institutions acquired the remains, i.e. if done by way of opening
burial grounds or other. However it appears not much has happened since then.
Towards public
apologies and reconciliation?
Despite the historical struggles of the Swedish State to
recognize and apologize for its treatment of the Sami and for the violation of
their human rights, there have been some positive recent developments that may
constitute the beginning of a slow change.
While the
Church is no longer part of the State, it has taken a lead in redressing the
past, recently making overtures towards the Sami. It finally seems ready to
accept responsibility for its part in the historic violations the human rights
of the Sami
In March 2001 there was a reconciliation service at
the church in Undersåker, which is in southern Sápmi. This was part of a
reconciliation process initiated by the Church. The south Sami language and the
joik were used during the service. The bishop of Härnösand recognized the Church’s responsibility for what happened in
the past and asked the Sami for forgiveness.
The
Archbishop of Sweden, Antje Jackelén, has repeatedly made
public comments about the Church’s involvement in the violations of human
rights against the Sami. The Church is working on a White Paper, which includes
examples of the Church’s participation in violations against the Sami: forced Christianization,
destruction and desecration of Sami cultural sites and objects, active
participation in the looting of graves in the pursuit of Sami remains,
deprivation and oppression of Sami identity and culture, etc. According to the
Archbishop the Church “delivered
theological models of thinking that could justify the colonial system.”
The Church’s recent recognition of responsibility and its
work on reconciliation is a good start. The Archbishop has also called on the State to create a truth commission,
which has been suggested by the Sami parliament Sametinget (which is
confusingly also a State agency), and the Ombudsman for discrimination. Unfortunately the State doesn’t seem to be
getting on the reconciliation bandwagon anytime soon. In 1998 the then minister for Sami affairs,
Annika Åhnberg, apologized for the State’s treatment of the Sami in the past.
However, an official apology from a Prime Minister hasn’t happened yet, nor do
I believe is it likely to happen anytime soon since the ‘Sami issue’ is rarely
debated in public and Swedish governments have always been hesitant to admit
wrongdoing against minorities in Sweden (such as Jews, Roma, etc. but those are
for another post, another time). The current government appears no different
than those of the past when it comes to the Sami; no official apology has been
issued by the State for the treatment of the Sami people – and none appears in
sight.
Current violations
of Sami rights
The lack of respect for Sami rights has long been one of the
human rights issues for which Sweden has been criticized. For example, the Swedish Minerals Act has been criticized
by the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) and the
UN Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples because the law does
not respect Sami special interests and rights.
Human rights experts argue
that the Swedish law and its application run contrary to UN human rights
conventions and the ILO
Convention no 169 in regard to Sami self-determination and the Sami’s right
to own and possess the land they traditionally occupy (Sweden has consistently
refused to ratify the Convention). The rights
of indigenous peoples to approve or veto the use of natural resources within
their traditional territories is one of the key principles of international
indigenous rights. Furthermore, the realization of Sami cultural and
linguistic rights, strongly connected with their land rights, is a central
obligation of states under core human rights conventions. However, these internationally accepted principles
are not reflected in Swedish law or practice.
First of all, the right of Sami to
self-determination and decision-making is limited in Swedish law to reindeer
husbandry. However around 90% of the Sami primarily make their living from
other activities than reindeer husbandry. Thus, Sweden violates international
indigenous law, which applies to the all the member of the indigenous people
and which gives all who are affected by a decision the right of influence.
In February
this year the Sami scored a huge victory against the State in a 30 year long battle for land rights when
the district court of Gällivare granted
the small Sami village of Girjas exclusive rights to control hunting and
fishing in the area. However, the arguments in the case show how the
Swedish State still has serious trouble recognizing the rights of the Sami.
Lawyers for the State claimed that the indigenous status of the Sami was
irrelevant to the case and that “Sweden has in this matter no international
obligations to recognize special rights of the Sami people, whether they are
indigenous or not.”
Secondly, the Sami
don’t have any independent protection of their traditional land or any real
possibility to influence decisions on, for example, mining and excavation.
In Sweden, the relationship between the Sami and the land is ignored, as well
as the importance of use of the land for the survival of the Sami and their
culture. For example, reindeer husbandry is weighed and considered like any
other economic interest and more often than not comes second to other
interests.
The Swedish State has
during the last few years worked to increase the mineral exploitation in Sápmi.
According to Sweden’s new mineral strategy,
the number of mines in Sweden is set to double by 2020 and triple by 2030 as
the government embarks on making Sweden “the world’s leading mining nation.” In this process, Sami representatives claim
that they are routinely silenced and marginalized.
For example, the Swedish government has wanted to give
British mining company Beowulf Mining
(whose CEO Clive Sinclair-Poulton
famously replied
“what local people?” to the question of what the locals thought of the mining
project) access to develop an iron ore mine in Kallak, close to the northern
town Jokkmokk above the Arctic Circle, which is definitely part of Sápmi. In 2014 the project sparked
protests from local Sami and environmental activists. The government argues
that the mine would produce much-needed jobs for the area and prevent
de-population. However, the Sami argue
that the mining operations would destroy their livelihood since it would
destroy the land and thus the possibility for reindeer herding. The issue
is yet to be resolved but similar conflicts between government interest in
extraction industries and local Sami populations exist all over Sápmi and the
sense is often that the government cares about short term income revenue rather
than the respect for Sami rights, and the destruction of land and subsequent
loss of Sami culture.
Thus, while things may have improved for the Sami since the
20th century, the rights of the Sami are still not completely
respected in Sweden and many conflicts between the Sami and the State, and the
Sami and Swedish society, still exist.
Conclusion
Sweden is a country considered, by the international
community and by itself, to be a great champion of human rights. Swedish
governments have a history of standing with oppressed peoples in the world and
have often been critical of how other countries have treated their minorities
and indigenous people. At the same, Sweden
has a long history of oppressing it’s own indigenous people. While the Sami
now have the right to speak their own language and have their own parliament,
the Sami are still subject to discrimination and racism and the Sami question
remains infected. Schools often fail to teach anything about the Sami and many
Swedish people only have a vague idea that they even exist.
If Sweden wants to be taken seriously as a champion of human
rights, we need to look inward and actually deal with our own past and current
treatment of our indigenous people instead of always pointing the finger at
other countries. We need to educate our
population about the Sami and to be honest about the oppression and human
rights violations they have faced at the hands of the State and its
institutions and the continuing denial of their rights as indigenous people.
Sweden should offer
an official apology for the human
rights violations committed by the State against the Sami and should create a
truth and reconciliation commission, as well as undertake other
transitional justice measures, in order to bring forward the full truth about
the past and in order to educate the country about what has happened. Only once the truth has been publicly recognized
can a public apology be appropriate and only then can reconciliation begin.
The government should also immediately ratify ILO
Convention 169, which would put the
Swedish state under clear obligation to guarantee certain rights to the Sami,
including the right to land (article 14), to natural resources pertaining to
the land (article 15), to require the State to obtain informed consent prior to
the approval of any project affecting their land, territories and other resources
(article 30), and to be consulted in matters that would directly affect them
(article 6). The Convention would therefore serve as an important tool for the
protection of Sami rights to their land and from the exploitation of natural
resources on their land without their consultation or consent.
In the meantime I can only offer my own apology to the Sami
population of my country: I am sorry that it took me so long to learn about what
my State did to your people; I am sorry that I never questioned why I never
studied about your people in school; and I am sorry that it has taken me this
long to speak up.
