Child poverty in rich contexts: The example of Sweden

Abstract

In international comparisons, Sweden is one of the countries with the lowest number of children growing up in poverty; its material standard is high, and welfare services are extensive and heavily subsidised. How child poverty can be understood in that context is interrogated in the article. The point of departure for the discussion is Swedish Save the Children’s 2013 anti-poverty campaign Fattigskolan [Poverty School]. The campaign presents child poverty from the vantage point of a welfare state and is informative for understanding normative discourses on childhood. Childhood is investigated as a social imagination that both structures children’s and parents’ everyday lives and organises society. It is argued that the dominant social imagination is based on a middle-class fantasy permeating the organisation of the welfare state. The elements of this fantasy are critical to understanding child poverty.