170 Project Day Session The Outcome of the Minority and Language Policy in Sweden Lars Elenius, Assoc. Prof. in History Department of Social Sciences Luleå University of Technology Sweden An important aspect of democracy concerns the treat- largest group, followed by the Torne Valley people, see ment of national minorities and their position in soci- Table 1. This is also refl ects the diff erent minority back- ety. It raises questions about their citizenship, infl uence grounds within the nation state project of Sweden. In in society, right to be treated in the same way, positive this article the Swedish case of the implementation of kind of favouritism and legal security, all examples of the European minority language legislation will be in- basic democratic values. The rights of minorities, as part vestigated. This will be done by taking a closer look at of basic democratic values, is a relatively new issue to the infl uence that Swedish minority policy had on the which there is no political agreement; neither concern- implementation of minority legislation. ing the principal issue of minority policy, nor concern- Minority Estimated pop. ing its implementation (Rawls 1971 & 1993; Dworkin Territorial minorities 1977; Walzer 1983; Taylor 1985 & 1999; Kymlicka 1998). Sami people 17 000–20 000 From the middle of the 70s there was a radical change Sweden-Finns 450 000 in the minority policy of Sweden, which followed in Torne Valley people 50 000 the wake of corresponding international changes.This Non-territorial minorities change infl uenced the ethnic minorities in diff erent Jews 15 000–20 000 ways. The main change was the introduction of im- Romanies 15 000–20 000 migrant language teaching and the recognition of the Table 1. The national minorities of Sweden 1 Sámi people as an indigenous people. A similar devel- (Source: KU 2004/05:RFR3. Nationella minoriteter och opment occured in Norway and Finland. minoritetsspråk. Stockholm. (Rapport från Riksdagen)). There are fi ve ethnic minorities in Sweden, which af- The fi ve national minorities have diff erent minority sta- ter the year 2000 were regarded as national minorities tuses. The Sámi people, Sweden-Finns and Torne Valley within the legal framework of the European Council. It people all belong to the Finno-Ugric language group. is the Sámi people, Sweden-Finns, Torne Valley people, Jews They have a common history going back to the 13th cen- and Romany (Hyltenstam 1997; Elenius 2006). The Sámi, tury when the Swedish nation state was created as a Finnish and Swedish speakers have been living side by centralised power. In the Swedish minority convention side in the county of Norrbo en since at least the 14th from the year 2000 they are categorised as “territorial century, and in the case of the Sámi and Finns consider- minorities”, and the Jews and Romany as “non-territo- ably longer. The Finno-Ugric minorities had a similar rial minorities”. socio-economic status and have been dealing with the same kind of linguistic problems concerning contacts The territorial minorites have be er protection for with authorities. The change in their minority status their languages than do the non-territorial minorites. has caused a new kind of culture among authorities to Since the year 2000 two national laws concerning the 2 develop. Another result is that the culture of minorities use of Sámi, Finnish and Meänkieli minority language has exploded in postmodern expressions where old and are valid in Sweden. These are national laws, but only new elements are mixed. valid in some selected municipalities in the northern- most county of Norrbo en, see Map 1. The Finno-Ugric The immigrants from Finland, the Sweden-Finns, is the part of the population has always been very large in the Project Day Session 171 Leg al Chall eng es in the Ar cti c Map 1. The application of the minority language legislation in Norrbotten county. They still occupy three fourths of the County of vention for the Protection of National Minorities, and Norrbo en, as is shown on the map, even if the Swedes also the European Charter for Regional or Minority are a majority. Languages. Second, two new national laws took eff ect in order to support, maintain and make easier the use Source: Elenius & Ekenberg 2002. All grey coloured ar- of Sámi, Finnish and Meänkieli languages as those of eas depict the municipalities in the county of Norrbot- minorities within the society. ten where the minority language legislation is in use. The dark grey areas show municipalities involved in an The two laws are national laws, but with an explicit investigation done by Luleå University of Technology regional application in the county of Norrbo en. The in 2002. The place names signify birthplaces of persons law considering the use of the Sámi language is valid interviewed. in the municipality of Arjeplog, Jokkmokk, Gällivare and Kiruna. The law considering the use of Finnish and It is important to put the present minority policy into Meänkieli languages is valid in the municipality of Pa- a post-colonial context. We are today living in a post- jala, Övertorneå, Haparanda, Gällivare and Kiruna. The colonial world which is obviously globalised. The other laws give the right to every individual, in those local side of the coin is that the power of the nation state has municipalities, to use Sámi, Finnish and Meänkieli lan- weakened and national minorities have strengthened guages orally in contact with courts and administrative their positions within the nation state. The implementa- authorities, and also the right to have wri en resolu- tion of the European minority legislation is part of this tions interpreted to their mother tongue. Minorities can context. also use their language in contact with any regional and national courts or administrative authority, if there is The Application of the Swedish an established connection with the administrative dis- Minority Language Legislation trict where these laws are valid. The ma er in question must concern the exercise of authority, not all aspects The new kind of protection for minority language, of activity. The laws also allows minorities to engage in which was launched at the 1st of April 2000, changed preschool activities and care for the elderly using their the ethnic map of Sweden in a profound way. First of languages, within the actual areas. all the Swedish Parliament ratifi ed the Framework Con- The 1990s were a breakthrough for the national minori- 172 Project Day Session ties in Sweden, also in cultural ma ers. A strong cul- It appeared that among the 103 inteviewed Sámi, Swe- tural development has occurred among the minorities. den-Finns and Torne Valley people 87 percent used This development is especially visible among the Sámi their mother tongue at home and 85 percent used it in and Torne Valley people within cultural activities like the community. When communicating with authorities theatre, literature, music, fi lm, media and art. only 30 percent used their mother tongue. The most frequent obstacle mentioned, for the realisation of the The carrying through of the new legislation has been legislation were diff erent kinds of linguistic obstacles, evaluated in three diff erent investigations. The fi rst especially among the Sámi and Torne Valley people. investigation was done by the county administrative About one fi V h within all three language groups men- board of Norrbo en in the year 2000, the same year the tioned psychological reasons as obstacles for the reali- legislation was launched. A great number of authorities sation of the legislation. answered questions about how minority languages had been used before the legislation, compared to aV er its An important explanation of the low degree of use of launching. The outcome of the investigation showed the statutory rights in the legislation is the fact that the that the minority languages were used quite oV en in Swedish language has for such a long time dominated the lower Torne Valley, but less so in the upper mining the public sphere. It has created a split language iden- district and the Sámi area (Finska, meänkieli etc 2000). tity among the Sámi and Torne Valley people. On one The point of view of the language users’ did not appear hand there has been a private minority language iden- in the investigation, only the authorities’ view. tity, on the other hand a civic identity in Swedish. The split identity, in turn, has sped up the regression of the Therefore the county administrative board in 2002 or- use of minority languages, since there have been no civ- dered a new investigation from Luleå University of ic incitements for developing one’s minority language. Technology. The aim was to examine how the minority The split identity seems to be associated with a likewise language users themselves had experienced the realisa- split authority policy. tion of the two laws. The investigation was made in the form of interviews and inquiries. It showed that a high Many Sámi people gave witness to the frustration they share of the interviewed used their minority language felt when realising that the legislation could not be used in the home environment and in diff erent offi cial con- in reality, because they knew there were only a few per- texts. In connection with authorities, however, only a sons in service who could speak Sámi. They also felt third used their minority language (Elenius & Ekenberg that the Sámi language was subordinated in an author- 2002). ity context, and also that many Sámi people could not in a satisfying way speak their mother tongue. The situ- The third investigation was done by Luleå University ation in this ma er was considerably be er for Finnish of Technology in 2004, this time at the request of the and Meänkieli.