School politics in Sweden has recently moved in a conservative direction, emphasising the importance of conventional school subjects, stronger teacher authority and more discipline in the classroom. At the same time, consensus on the utility of such measures is lacking in the school debate. The conservative approach is often criticised as misleading and behind the times in relation to contemporary knowledge demands. This article examines and discusses the relevance of this critique. The main argument is that the conservative approach has a better matching with a previous phase in the history of Swedish school politics and that conventional schooling is difficult to combine with two of the major goals of schooling today À the diffusion of democracy and multipurpose skills. From this perspective, the political notion of schooling seems decoupled from the broader domain of public demands on education. To alleviate this problem school politics should draw less on the pedagogical ideas of essentialism and more on the historical legacy of progressivism in the Swedish education system.
This paper explores the activities of Swedish state supported ethnic associations (most of which are immigrant organizations), thus shedding empirical light on how immigrants organize with the help of state support, both nationally and transnationally, in a welfare state context. The paper is based on a study of annual reports of 52 state supported national associations, representing more than a thousand (1046) local immigrant organizations, as well as 17 interviews with representatives of the said organizations. The findings indicate that the welfare state did not crowd out civil societal integration-promoting initiatives, but the state supported immigrant organizations came to occupy a niche in which they primarily offered complementary services with the aim of helping members to navigate the public welfare system. Neither did state support directly shape the content and direction of the political activities of the said organizations. However, the state support seems to have generated welfare channeling effects, in that more immigrant organizations came into existence than would have been the case in the absence of grants. The paper comes down in favor of the thesis that state support in some circumstances can promote political incorporation through immigrant organizations (with a few caveats). Finally, the paper proposes a hypothetical mechanism, homeland-oriented integration, for political incorporation through immigrant organization.
In line with recent trends in sociology of migration, the paper presents major research findings on Swedish immigrant organizations (SIOs) and their labor market integration activities. Analyses of engagement in these activities are particularly important as Sweden wrestles with significant problems of labor market marginalization, particularly among non-European migrants. Drawing on official data and interviews, we find surprisingly low incidence in direct labor market support but quite active indirect support. Our regression model shows significant correlation between region of origin and labor market activities, and further analyses using regional typologies indicate that SIOs’ activities are partly driven by members’ different modes of incorporation and relative integration, where Middle-Eastern SIOs stand out as particularly active. Our findings further indicate potential for scale-up of SIO-assistance in the Swedish Government’s efforts towards increased immigrant labor market integration.
Artikeln undersöker svenska etniska organisationers verksamheter i syfte att belysa hur detta organisatoriska fält har förändrats under de senaste decennierna. Studien bygger på en totalundersökning av de 52 riksförbund som fått bidrag från Myndigheten för ungdoms- och civilsamhällesfrågor (MUCF). Den visar att det etniska organisationsfältet kännetecknas av både kontinuitet och förändring. Kulturella aktiviteter var i särklass vanligast och arrangerades ofta i samverkan med olika studieförbund, vilket tyder på att folkrörelsemodellens inflytande över fältet är fortsatt stark. Det förekom större variation ifråga om integrationsfrämjande verksamheter, vilket dels antyder att organisationerna svarar mot skilda medlemsbehov, dels att några organisationer tycks ha iklätt sig rollen som välfärdsproducenter, främst för att bistå medlemmar att orientera sig i relation till olika myndigheter. Studien visar att utvecklingen inom det svenska etniska organisationsfältet uppvisar tecken på spårbunden kontinuitet, samtidigt som fältet innehåller nya inslag och tydliga tecken på förändring, i form av ett ökat inslag av transnationella samverkansformer, liksom indikationer på att det skett en transnationalisering av de etniska organisationernas politiska förhållningsätt och opinionsbildningsfunktion, exempelvis genom att webplattformar kan rikta sig mot en internationell publik.
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