Feminism and Unionism in Sweden

Politics and Society

Volumn 26, Issue 1, 1998, Pages 69-93

  Curtin, Jennifer ^a   Higgins, Winton ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 0032221715     PISSN: 00323292     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0032329298026001004     Document Type: Review

References (95)

1. Nordic Council of Ministers, Women and Men in the Nordic Countries (Copenhagen: NORD 1994), 83, 92.
2. LO, Förandringar av den fackliga organisationsgraden (Stockholm: LO, 1994), Table 2.
3. Nordic Council of Ministers, Women and Men in the Nordic Countries, 88, 92-93; LO granskar 2 (1995): 2.
4. Nordic Council of Ministers, Women and Men in the Nordic Countries, 88, 92-93; LO granskar 2 (1995): 2.
5. Cf. Joan Acker, "Two Discourses of Reform - Women in the Future Swedish Welfare State" (Sociology Dept, University of Oregon, stencil, 1994): 27.
6. Cf., for instance, Janna Brenner, "The Best of Times, the Worst of Times: US Feminism Today," New Left Review 200 (1993): 101-59; Bianca Beccalli, "The New Women's Movement in Italy," New Left Review 204 (1994): 86-112.
7. Cf., for instance, Janna Brenner, "The Best of Times, the Worst of Times: US Feminism Today," New Left Review 200 (1993): 101-59; Bianca Beccalli, "The New Women's Movement in Italy," New Left Review 204 (1994): 86-112.
8. Yvonne Hirdman, "Makt och kön," in Olof Petersson, ed., Maktbegreppet (Stockholm: Carlssons, 1987): 197-98.
9. In particular, Carole Pateman, The Sexual Contract (Cambridge: Polity, 1988).
10. Anna Jónasdóttir, "Har kön någon betydelse för demokratin?" in Gertrud Åström and Yvonne Hirdman, eds., Kontrakt i kris (Stockholm: Carlssons, 1992), 216. See, in general, Anna Jónasdóttir, Why Women Are Oppressed (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1994).
11. Anna Jónasdóttir, "Har kön någon betydelse för demokratin?" in Gertrud Åström and Yvonne Hirdman, eds., Kontrakt i kris (Stockholm: Carlssons, 1992), 216. See, in general, Anna Jónasdóttir, Why Women Are Oppressed (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1994).
12. Yvonne Hirdman, "Social Engineering and the Woman Question - Sweden in the Thirties,̊ in Wallace Clement and Rianne Mahon, eds., Swedish Social Democracy: A Model in Transition (Toronto: Canadian Scholars' Press, 1994).
13. Ylva Waldemarson, "LO och kvinnorna under efterkrigstiden - en paradoxal historia av vanmakt och möjligheter" (Stockholm: Swedish Institute of Worklife Research, stencil, 1995), 15.
14. Edmund Dahlström et al., Kvinnors liv och arbete (Stockholm: SNS, 1962).
15. Ulla Wikander, "Delat arbete, delad makt - Om kvinnors underordning i och genom arbetet," in Gertrud Åström and Yvonne Hirdman, eds., Kontrakt i kris (Stockholm: Carlssons, 1992), 54.
16. Gunhild Kyle, Gästarbeterska i manssamhället - Studier om industriarbetande kvinnors villkor i Sverige (Stockholm: Liberförlag, 1979).
17. For an illuminating discussion of the gendered social definition of skill, see Jane Jenson, "The Talents of Women, the Skills of Men: Flexible Specialisation and Women," in Stephen Wood, ed., The Transformation of Work? (London: Unwin Hyman, 1989).
18. Gunnel Forsberg, "Kvinnor och män i arbetslivet," in Joan Acker et al., eds., Kvinnors och mäns liv och arbete (Stockholm: SNS, 1992), 109.
19. LO, Röster om facket och jobbet (Stockholm: LO, 1994), Report no. 3: diagrams 10, 15, 17, and 18 and Table 5; Report no. 5: Table 5.
20. Svenska Metallindustriarbetareförbundet, Solidarik arbetspolitik för det goda arbetet (Stockholm, Metall, 1989), 72. To put the point slightly differently, "wherever there are women, men can avoid the dreariest jobs"; Ulla Wikander, "Delat arbete, delad makt," 52. The tacit references to women's "guestworker" status are ubiquitous in the literature.
21. Svenska Metallindustriarbetareförbundet, Solidarik arbetspolitik för det goda arbetet (Stockholm, Metall, 1989), 72. To put the point slightly differently, "wherever there are women, men can avoid the dreariest jobs"; Ulla Wikander, "Delat arbete, delad makt," 52. The tacit references to women's "guestworker" status are ubiquitous in the literature.
22. The Labor Court heard the first sexual harassment case in 1995 and found no specific legal provision against it: the union concerned had to rely on extending the ambit of older, nonspecific legal principles to establish that the offense existed at all. Amy Elman, "Debunking the Social Democrats and the Myth of Equality," Women's Studies International Forum 16, no. 5 (1993): 513-22, points out that successive Social Democratic governments in Sweden have neglected measures against violations of women's physical integrity, a neglect that the women's movement is now giving considerable attention.
23. Annika Baude, "Den interna arbetsmarknaden i sju livsmedelsföretag - aktörerna och deras intressen," in Drude Dahlerup, ed., Kön sorterer - Könsopdeling på arbejdsplatsen (Copenhagen: Nordisk Ministerråd, 1989) and her Kvinnans plats på jobbet (Stockholm: SNS, 1992).
24. Annika Baude, "Den interna arbetsmarknaden i sju livsmedelsföretag - aktörerna och deras intressen," in Drude Dahlerup, ed., Kön sorterer - Könsopdeling på arbejdsplatsen (Copenhagen: Nordisk Ministerråd, 1989) and her Kvinnans plats på jobbet (Stockholm: SNS, 1992).
25. Among many examples, one could take Göran Brulin and Tommy Nilsson's two book-length manifestos for "a new Swedish model" - Mot en ny svensk modell - Arbete och förhandlingssystem i förändring (Stockholm: Rabén & Sjögren, 1991) and Arbetets ekonomi - Om arbete och produktivitet i modern Produktion (Stockholm: Tiden, 1995) - that precisely focus on a supposed democratic renewal of work organization and union negotiating stances. They do so with barely a mention of gender as an issue in these areas, except for an epilogue to the second volume, which, written as it is by a woman shop-floor activist, brings up the very problems that the principal authors neglect.
26. Among many examples, one could take Göran Brulin and Tommy Nilsson's two book-length manifestos for "a new Swedish model" - Mot en ny svensk modell - Arbete och förhandlingssystem i förändring (Stockholm: Rabén & Sjögren, 1991) and Arbetets ekonomi - Om arbete och produktivitet i modern Produktion (Stockholm: Tiden, 1995) -that precisely focus on a supposed democratic renewal of work organization and union negotiating stances. They do so with barely a mention of gender as an issue in these areas, except for an epilogue to the second volume, which, written as it is by a woman shop-floor activist, brings up the very problems that the principal authors neglect.
27. Maud Eduards, "The Swedish Gender Model: Productivity, Pragmatism and Paternalism," West European Politics 14, no. 3 (1991): 169 and her "Against the Rules of the Game: On the Importance of Women's Collective Actions," in Eduards et al., eds., Rethinking Change: Current Swedish Feminist Research (Stockholm: HSFR, 1992), 97.
28. Maud Eduards, "The Swedish Gender Model: Productivity, Pragmatism and Paternalism," West European Politics 14, no. 3 (1991): 169 and her "Against the Rules of the Game: On the Importance of Women's Collective Actions," in Eduards et al., eds., Rethinking Change: Current Swedish Feminist Research (Stockholm: HSFR, 1992), 97.
29. Gunnar Qvist, "Women and the Swedish Federation of Labor," in Norbet Soldon, ed., The World of Women's Trade Unionism: Comparative Historical Essays (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1985).
30. Lena Gonäs, "Kvinnors arbetsmarknad i det framtida Europa," in Joan Acker et al., eds., Kvinnors och mäns liv och arbete (Stockholm: SNS, 1992) provides a valuable discussion of the problems that European integration poses for Swedish women.
31. Yvonne Hirdman, "Genus - arbete. Introkuktion till ett forskningsområde" (Stockholm: Swedish Institute for Worklife Research, stencil, 1995), 17.
32. Swedish blue-collar unions are organized on the industrial principle and have been constantly subject to rationalization and merger. At present, twenty-one unions make up LO, and in recent decades, the number of constituents unions has varied only insignificantly.
33. See Winton Higgins, "Political Unionism and the Corporatist Thesis," Economic and Industrial Democracy 6, no. 3 (1985): 349-81 and "Swedish Social Democracy and the New Democratic Socialism," in Diane Sainsbury, ed., Democracy, State and Justice (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wicksell, 1988).
34. See Winton Higgins, "Political Unionism and the Corporatist Thesis," Economic and Industrial Democracy 6, no. 3 (1985): 349-81 and "Swedish Social Democracy and the New Democratic Socialism," in Diane Sainsbury, ed., Democracy, State and Justice (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wicksell, 1988).
35. See, in particular, LO, 80-rapporten (Stockholm: LO, 1981).
36. For instance, LO, Fackföreningsrörelsen och familjepolitik (Stockholm: LO, 1976), Jämställdhet och solidaritet (Stockholm: LO, 1981) , and Klass och kön (Stockholm: LO, 1990). Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling - LO, kvinnorna och makten," in Gertrud Åström and Yvonne Hirdman, eds., Kontrakt i kris (Stockholm: Carlssons, 1992), provides a balanced account of how LO qua head office has entered the lists to try and effect better outcomes.
37. For instance, LO, Fackföreningsrörelsen och familjepolitik (Stockholm: LO, 1976), Jämställdhet och solidaritet (Stockholm: LO, 1981) , and Klass och kön (Stockholm: LO, 1990). Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling - LO, kvinnorna och makten," in Gertrud Åström and Yvonne Hirdman, eds., Kontrakt i kris (Stockholm: Carlssons, 1992), provides a balanced account of how LO qua head office has entered the lists to try and effect better outcomes.
38. For instance, LO, Fackföreningsrörelsen och familjepolitik (Stockholm: LO, 1976), Jämställdhet och solidaritet (Stockholm: LO, 1981) , and Klass och kön (Stockholm: LO, 1990). Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling - LO, kvinnorna och makten," in Gertrud Åström and Yvonne Hirdman, eds., Kontrakt i kris (Stockholm: Carlssons, 1992), provides a balanced account of how LO qua head office has entered the lists to try and effect better outcomes.
39. For instance, LO, Fackföreningsrörelsen och familjepolitik (Stockholm: LO, 1976), Jämställdhet och solidaritet (Stockholm: LO, 1981) , and Klass och kön (Stockholm: LO, 1990). Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling - LO, kvinnorna och makten," in Gertrud Åström and Yvonne Hirdman, eds., Kontrakt i kris (Stockholm: Carlssons, 1992), provides a balanced account of how LO qua head office has entered the lists to try and effect better outcomes.
40. LO has published a particularly graphic account of these problems in Ann-Sofie Hermansson, Arbetarrörelsen och feminismen (Stockholm: LO, 1993). See also Annette Eriksson, "Kvinnor och jämställdhet - en intervjustudie av nio kvinnor p̊ förbundsnivå inom facket" (Beteendevetenskaplig utredarlinje, Stockholm University, 1995); Gunilla Thorgren, "Facklig kvinnokamp," Pockettidningen R 24, no. 3-4 (1994): 121-28; and Jennifer Curtin, Women and Trade Unions: A Comparative Perspective (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998), chap. 8.
41. LO has published a particularly graphic account of these problems in Ann-Sofie Hermansson, Arbetarrörelsen och feminismen (Stockholm: LO, 1993). See also Annette Eriksson, "Kvinnor och jämställdhet - en intervjustudie av nio kvinnor p̊ förbundsnivå inom facket" (Beteendevetenskaplig utredarlinje, Stockholm University, 1995); Gunilla Thorgren, "Facklig kvinnokamp," Pockettidningen R 24, no. 3-4 (1994): 121-28; and Jennifer Curtin, Women and Trade Unions: A Comparative Perspective (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998), chap. 8.
42. LO has published a particularly graphic account of these problems in Ann-Sofie Hermansson, Arbetarrörelsen och feminismen (Stockholm: LO, 1993). See also Annette Eriksson, "Kvinnor och jämställdhet - en intervjustudie av nio kvinnor p̊ förbundsnivå inom facket" (Beteendevetenskaplig utredarlinje, Stockholm University, 1995); Gunilla Thorgren, "Facklig kvinnokamp," Pockettidningen R 24, no. 3-4 (1994): 121-28; and Jennifer Curtin, Women and Trade Unions: A Comparative Perspective (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998), chap. 8.
43. LO has published a particularly graphic account of these problems in Ann-Sofie Hermansson, Arbetarrörelsen och feminismen (Stockholm: LO, 1993). See also Annette Eriksson, "Kvinnor och jämställdhet - en intervjustudie av nio kvinnor p̊ förbundsnivå inom facket" (Beteendevetenskaplig utredarlinje, Stockholm University, 1995); Gunilla Thorgren, "Facklig kvinnokamp," Pockettidningen R 24, no. 3-4 (1994): 121-28; and Jennifer Curtin, Women and Trade Unions: A Comparative Perspective (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998), chap. 8.
44. Jennifer Curtin, Women and Trade Unions, chap. 8.
45. Rättvisa (Stockholm: LO, 1996), 249; Janeen Baxter and Mark Western, "The Links between Paid and Unpaid Work: Australia and Sweden in the 1980s and 1990s" (Paper presented to the Reconfigurations of Class and Gender Conference, Australian National University, Canberra, August 1997), 18. The latter also point out that men tend to decrease their unpaid work in the home if their hours of paid work go up, but women do not do so in these circumstances (p. 19).
46. Rättvisa (Stockholm: LO, 1996), 249; Janeen Baxter and Mark Western, "The Links between Paid and Unpaid Work: Australia and Sweden in the 1980s and 1990s" (Paper presented to the Reconfigurations of Class and Gender Conference, Australian National University, Canberra, August 1997), 18. The latter also point out that men tend to decrease their unpaid work in the home if their hours of paid work go up, but women do not do so in these circumstances (p. 19).
47. Nordic Council of Ministers, Women and Men in the Nordic Countries, 71.
48. Christina Bergqvist, Mäns makt och kvinnornas intressen (Uppsala: Acta Universitatis Uppsaliensis, 1994), 111, 128, 135, and Table 4.6; Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling," Table 3.
49. Christina Bergqvist, Mäns makt och kvinnornas intressen (Uppsala: Acta Universitatis Uppsaliensis, 1994), 111, 128, 135, and Table 4.6; Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling," Table 3.
50. Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling," 105.
51. Gunnar Qvist, Statistik och politik. Landsorganisationen och kvinnorna på arbetsmarknaden (Stockholm: Prisma/LO, 1974), 126, 97.
52. Varannan damernas. Slutbetänkande från utredningen om kvinnorepresentation (Stockholm: Arbetsmarknadsdepartementet: SOU, 1987), chap. 3.
53. Maud Eduards and Gertrud Åström, Många kände sig manade men få blevo kallade - en granskning av arbeter för ökad kvinnorepresentation (Stockholm: Socialdepartementet, 1993). The Swedish experience of the threat and use of gender quotas lends strong support to Frigga Haug's argument for them as "feminist Realpolitik" in her "The Quota Demand and Feminist Politics," New Left Review 209 (1995): 136-45.
54. Maud Eduards and Gertrud Åström, Många kände sig manade men få blevo kallade - en granskning av arbeter för ökad kvinnorepresentation (Stockholm: Socialdepartementet, 1993). The Swedish experience of the threat and use of gender quotas lends strong support to Frigga Haug's argument for them as "feminist Realpolitik" in her "The Quota Demand and Feminist Politics," New Left Review 209 (1995): 136-45.
55. Quoted in Eva Karlsson, "De kvinnliga livsmedelsarbetarnas historia," in Annika Baude, ed., Rapport om jämställdhet i sju livsmedelsföretag (Stockholm: Arbetslivscentrum, 1981), 16.
56. Cf. Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling," 106. As Joan Acker points out in her "Two Discourses of Reform," 12, the political culture that these principles encapsulated heavily suppressed women's issues.
57. Cf. Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling," 106. As Joan Acker points out in her "Two Discourses of Reform," 12, the political culture that these principles encapsulated heavily suppressed women's issues.
58. Maria Wendt Höjer and Cecilia Åse, Politikens paradoxer - En introduktion till feministisk politisk teori (Stockholm: Academia Adacta, 1995), chap. 3.
59. Maud Eduards, "The Swedish Gender Model," 172; Joan Acker, 1994, "Two Discourses of Reform," 11.
60. Maud Eduards, "The Swedish Gender Model," 172; Joan Acker, 1994, "Two Discourses of Reform," 11.
61. LO, Röster omfacket och jobbet, Report no. 2: diagram 33; Report no. 5: diagram 4.
62. As promised in their 1994 election campaign, the Social Democrats abolished this benefit on their return to government.
63. Joan Acker, "Two Discourses of Reform," 27.
64. As Christina Bergqvist notes in "Women, Men and Political Representation in Sweden," in Beate Hoecker, ed., Handbuch Politische Partizipation von Frauen in Europa (Leverkusen: Leske & Budrich, forthcoming), Stödstrumporna has declined in relative importance as a victim of its own success. Two of its prominent members have become senior advisers to the government on gender equality issues.
65. Joan Acker, "Two Discourses of Reform," 21.
66. Maud Eduards, "The Swedish Gender Model," 172.
67. Maud Eduards, "Against the Rules of the Game."
68. Yvonne Hirdman, "Genus - arbete." The quote comes from p. 5.
69. LO, Klass och kön.
70. The following account builds considerably on Malin Quick, "Tjejligan: LO-kvinnornas motståndsrörelse" (Statsvetenskaplig institutionen, University of Stockholm, stencil, 1994), as well as on interviews with LO officers.
71. Gunilla Thorgren, "Facklig kvinnokamp."
72. The incoming Social Democratic government has adopted the same procedure, requiring all policy committees and other policy makers to account for the implications of their proposals for gender relations: Directive 1994: 124.
73. For a more detailed study, see Winton Higgins, "The Swedish Municipal Workers' Union - A Study in the New Political Unionism," Economic and Industrial Democracy 17, no. 2(1996): 167-97.
74. Joan Acker, "Two Discourses of Reform," 15. Lillemor Arvidsson resigned, ostensibly for health reasons, in December 1995 and has been replaced by Ylva Thorn.
75. Svenska Kommunalarbetareförbundet, Kvinnor i Kommunal och deras villkor i arbetet och på fritiden (Stockholm: Kommunal, 1994), diagram 9.
76. Svenska Kommunalarbetareförbundet, Jämställdhet. Varing;r framtid (Stockholm: Kommunal, 1994), 10.
77. Ann Boman, Arbete i utveckling - på kvinnors vis: Slutrapport från Arbetslivsfondens ALFA-Q program (Stockholm: Arbetslivsfonden, 1995), 8-21.
78. At the metalworkers' 1995 congress, some delegates criticized the leadership of that union for failing to replicate Kommunal's mode of intervention into work life reform.
79. Eg Christina Bergqvist, Mäns makt och kvinnors intressen, chap. 5; Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling," 124-27; and Joan Acker, "Two Discourses of Reform," 28-29.
80. Eg Christina Bergqvist, Mäns makt och kvinnors intressen, chap. 5; Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling," 124-27; and Joan Acker, "Two Discourses of Reform," 28-29.
81. Eg Christina Bergqvist, Mäns makt och kvinnors intressen, chap. 5; Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling," 124-27; and Joan Acker, "Two Discourses of Reform," 28-29.
82. Yvonne Hirdman, Introduction to Kontrakt i kris, 10.
83. Ylva Waldemarson, "Kontrakt under förhandling," 119.
84. Yvonne Hirdman, Genussystemet - teoretiska funderingar kring kvinnors sociala underordning (Uppsala: Maktutredningens rapportserie no. 23, 1988).
85. Joan Acker, "Two Discourses of Reform," 8. For an earlier version, see her "Reformer och kvinnor i den framtida välfärdsstaten," in Joan Acker et al., eds., Kvinnors och mäns liv och arbete.
86. Joan Acker, "Two Discourses of Reform," 8. For an earlier version, see her "Reformer och kvinnor i den framtida välfärdsstaten," in Joan Acker et al., eds., Kvinnors och mäns liv och arbete.
87. Cf. Maud Eduards, "Against the Rules of the Game," 103.
88. Svenska Metallindustriarbetareförbundet, Solidarisk arbetspolitik.
89. Rianne Mahon, "From Solidaristic Wages to Solidaristic Work," in Wallace Clement and Rianne Mahon, eds., Swedish Social Democracy - A Model in Transition (Toronto: Canadian Scholars' Press, 1994), 299-300.
90. In particular, Christian Berggren, Alternatives to Lean Production (Ithaca: ILR Press, 1992) and Åke Sandberg, ed., Enriching Production: Perspectives on Volvo's Uddevalla Plant as an Alternative to Lean Production (Aldershot: Avebury, 1995).
91. In particular, Christian Berggren, Alternatives to Lean Production (Ithaca: ILR Press, 1992) and Åke Sandberg, ed., Enriching Production: Perspectives on Volvo's Uddevalla Plant as an Alternative to Lean Production (Aldershot: Avebury, 1995).
92. As prominent author and industrial relations journalist Björn Elmbrant has shown in a feature article in LO-tidningen 30, no. 6 (October 1995), the Social Democratic government has since its election in September 1994 subjected LO leaders in particular to regular and pointed snubs.
93. Dagens nyheter 29.4.95.
94. Maud Eduards, "The Swedish Gender Model," 171.
95. Joan Acker, "Two Discourses of Reform," 29.