The Sami question – dealing with Sweden’s colonial past

(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 2^nd 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 14^th century when Swedish kings began claiming rights to territory in the north. During the 16^th 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 17^th 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 19^th and 20^th 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 20^th 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 20^th 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.