Mobilising the Racialised 'Others'

Postethnic Activism, Neoliberalisation and Racial Politics

Suvi Keskinen

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN: 9780367432461
• eBook ISBN: 9781000594065
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

This book provides an original approach to the connections of race, racism and neoliberalisation through a focus on 'postethnic activism, ' in which mobilisation is based on racialisation as non-white or 'other' instead of ethnic group membership.

Developing the theoretical understanding of political activism under the neoliberal turn in racial capitalism and the increasingly hostile political environment towards migrants and racialised minorities, the book investigates the conditions, forms and visions of postethnic activism in three Nordic countries (Denmark, Sweden and Finland). It connects the historical legacies of European colonialism to the current configurations of racial politics and global capitalism.

The book compellingly argues that contrary to the tendencies of neoliberal postracialism to de-politicise social inequalities the activists are re-politicising questions of race, class and gender in new ways. The book is of interest to scholars and students in sociology, ethnic and racial studies, cultural studies, feminist studies and urban studies.

The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

1

Introduction

DOI: 10.4324/9781003002031-1

We met with Hibo on a summer day in 2015 in an outdoor café in Malmö, a city in southern Sweden, to talk about activism. She was engaged in an antiracist feminist group that consisted of mostly young but also a few middle-aged feminists racialised as non-white. We talked about the activities of the group, its ways of organising and relations to other local activist groups. After an outburst of drizzly rain, we moved inside the café to continue the discussion amidst music and noise from the coffee machine. When the interview was over and we were saying our goodbyes, Hibo returned to the question of what activism meant for her, saying: “It is about survival and love.” These words crystallise the sentiments of many other activists too, with whom I talked during the following years about their participation in activism by those racialised as ‘others’ in the Nordic countries. This activism is about personal and collective survival but also about creating communities of social support and shared political agendas in order to work for social justice and futures beyond racial, gender and class hierarchies.

The group in which Hibo was active is part of the broad spectrum of civil society organisations and activist groups that mobilise on the basis of the shared position of being racialised as ‘others’ by the surrounding society, which I conceptualise as ‘postethnic activism’ in this book. Such activism has spread throughout the Nordic countries and profoundly altered public discussions on racism, antiracism and national belonging. While previous decades saw the establishment of many migrant and multicultural organisations, current activism differs from these in many ways. The recently formed groups are not focused on ethnic group membership or diasporic organising; instead, their focus is on the Nordic societies and the processes of racial, gender and class inequalities taking place within these, while connected to global raciality and neoliberal capitalism. A few of the organisations have a history dating back several decades, such as Afrosvenskarnas Riksorganisation (The Afro-Swedish National Organisation) established in 1990, but the overwhelming majority of the activist groups and organisations mobilising on the basis of a shared position as racialised ‘others’ have developed within the last decade. The upsurge has been fostered by the development of digital technology and social media, but its driving motor is the younger generation who were raised and (often) born in the Nordic region but are still treated as non-belonging to these countries.

This book examines the emerging forms of such political activism. Based on extensive interview, fieldwork and media data, it investigates the conditions, forms and visions of postethnic activism in three Nordic countries – Denmark, Sweden and Finland. In addition to providing empirical analyses of the activist scene and its organising, the book seeks to develop a theoretical understanding of the conditions of political activism in a time of neoliberal capitalism and an increasingly hostile environment towards migrants and racialised minorities. It examines the changing configurations of racial politics and efforts to articulate futures beyond racial, class and gender hierarchies, drawing upon theorising on the neoliberal turn in racial capitalism and the contextually specific histories of colonialism and racial thinking in different parts of Europe.

In the last two decades, European politics has been characterised by retreat from multiculturalism and an emphasis on ‘core values’ that migrants and racialised minorities are demanded to accept (e.g. Lentin and Titley, 2011; Kundnani, 2014). Moreover, authoritarian nationalism has been on the rise in the form of electoral support for right-wing populist parties and the presence of extreme right movements in the streets and on social media (e.g. Bhattacharyya et al., 2020; Norocel et al., 2020). This book analyses how, in this increasingly hostile environment and frequently occurring racist attacks, political activism is emerging that politicises race, class and gender in new ways. I argue that due to its border position connecting antiracist, feminist and class-based politics, postethnic activism can develop political agendas and social imaginaries that resonate beyond its immediate target groups and provide a basis for broader social justice politics.

The studied activism complicates, and to some extent questions, ongoing scientific discussions over the effects of neoliberalism on political mobilising and understandings of racial, classed and gendered inequalities. Many scholars have argued that race, gender and class-based inequalities are constructed as individual failures under neoliberalism, resulting in the de-politicising of social and economic powers (Winant, 2004; Brown, 2005, 2015; Goldberg, 2009, 2015; McRobbie, 2009; Roberts and Mahtani, 2010; Lentin and Titley, 2011; Boulila, 2020). This creates hindrances for political mobilisation, which is seen to be at risk of both fragmentation and co-optation by neoliberal ideologies. In her study on young activists in Canada, Jacqueline Kennelly (2011, p. 8) argues that “forces of neoliberalism are in many ways the antithesis of political engagement, premised as they are upon an ideology of individualised consumerism and meritocracy and the erosion of collective ties.” She investigates the implications of neoliberal ideologies for young people’s activism, emphasising state responses that distinguish ‘good citizens’ from ‘bad activists’ and the pressures of young activists to incorporate themselves into the criteria of ‘active citizenship.’ My argument in this book is that while such processes characterise the public sphere and mainstream politics, new spaces of resistance, questioning and insurgence are simultaneously emerging, through which postethnic activists re-politicise questions of race, class and gender.

Connecting recent political changes to the long tradition of European colonialism, racial exclusions and global capitalism, this book discusses the specificities of the Nordic region and the implications of the countries’ self-perceptions as champions of human rights, gender equality and egalitarianism for the way racism and racial inequalities are discussed in the studied countries. Nordic countries are usually viewed as outsiders to colonialism, defined by ‘innocence’ in relation to overseas colonialism and racial taxonomies (Keskinen et al., 2009; Loftsdóttir and Jensen, 2012). Recent scholarship has, however, shown that such ‘innocence’ is based on a widespread ignorance of the histories of colonialism, assimilation and repression of Indigenous people and racialised minorities, such as the Roma (Höglund and Burnett, 2019; Keskinen et al., 2019). I introduce the concept ‘racial nordicisation’ to refer to such historical legacies, as well as to the central role that welfare nationalism and gender equality ideologies play for the construction of national identities and the related othering of racialised minorities.

This book seeks to answer the following questions:

• What kind of communities of belonging are created in postethnic activism and how is the ‘common’ defined?
• How does neoliberalisation shape the contours of activism? How are neoliberal rationalities of individualisation and entrepreneurialism navigated, negotiated, questioned and resisted in postethnic activism?
• What kind of politics, organising and coalitions are developed in postethnic activism?
• How are notions of belonging, history, nation, and community featured in the activities and social imaginaries created by the activists? Can these, and to what extent, provide alternatives to the exclusionary nationalism and the (now embattled) liberal multiculturalism that characterise the public sphere?

Postethnic activism

In this book, I develop the concept ‘postethnic activism’ to cover different forms of activism in which mobilisation is based on being racialised as non-white or ‘other’ by the surrounding society. The notion ‘postethnic’ refers to how specific ethnic group membership is rendered irrelevant in the racialisation processes that cluster people as ‘non-European,’ ‘immigrant’ and ‘different’ based on phenotypic characteristics, culture¹ and religion, despite the fact that they were born and raised in the Nordic region. Thus, the activism that develops to challenge and transform such categorisations and exclusions is not based on ethnic origin, but sees the common ground in the processes of being racialised as non-white or ‘other’. Nevertheless, postethnic activism as a concept acknowledges that different groups are racialised in different ways and that the forms of mobilisation are multiple. ‘Postethnic’ as a concept also refers to politics that seeks to move away from community building based on nationality and ethnicity towards new configurations of belonging that acknowledge the importance of questions of race and racism in current societies, yet are not confined to racial logic. Instead, postethnic politics challenges racialising frames and seeks ways to move beyond them. It opens up a political space in which communities are created in action and through shared struggles.

In developing my understanding of postethnic activism, I have been inspired by Fatima El-Tayeb’s (2011) study of European Others and the postethnic identity she sees emerging among queer of colour collectives and other minoritarian subjects in the urban neighbourhoods of Europe. El-Tayeb draws attention to the

peculiar co-existence of, on the one hand, a regime of continent-wide recognised visual markers that construct non-whiteness as non-Europeanness with on the other [hand] a discourse of colour-blindness that claims not to ‘see’ racialised difference.

(2011, p. xxiv)

Although Europe invented and exported the ideology of race to other parts of the world during the colonial era, today’s European societies are characterised by colonial amnesia and reluctance to address the continued relevance of racial categorisations. Instead, most European countries have adopted the language of ethnicity to define national identity and belonging through ideas of shared culture and origin. Racialised minorities are perceived as ‘immigrants’ and outsiders to the nation even when several generations have been born and settled in these countries. El-Tayeb examines the emergence of ‘postethnic identity’ among young racialised minority and queer cultural activists, who question ethnicity as the basis of national belonging and create communities that depart from notions of purity and origin to instead focus on a mixing of genres, styles and belonging. According to El-Tayeb, this ‘queering of ethnicity’ creates new understandings of European identity and challenges the raceless understandings of European past and present.

I use the notion of ‘postethnic’ to refer to processes in which groups treated as racialised ‘others’ question the exclusionary notions of nation and national (un)belonging built on ethnic origin and cultural homogeneity, as well as create multiethnic and sometimes multiracial communities in an effort to tackle racial hierarchies and move towards a more socially just future. Moreover, by using the concept ‘postethnic’ I refer to the process of challenging the use of ethnicity as a euphemism for the unspoken racial differentiation that lies at the heart of Nordic national self-images (see Chapter 2). Unlike El-Tayeb (2011), I do not discuss postethnicity as an identity but approach the phenomenon as ‘postethnic activism.’ Rather than presuming a single identity shared by all the activists, I have been interested in the different ways the activists name the ‘common’ and create communities of belonging around these understandings. The shared activities and coming together of different groups are based on coalitional politics that build on an understanding of being racialised as non-white or ‘other,’ but this process involves multiple and sometimes tension-filled identifications. Presuming a ‘postethnic identity’ could result in the bypassing of such differences and the work that is done (and needed) to establish coalitions. Furthermore, my approach to postethnic activism is less focused on cultural mixing and more attuned to the materialities of everyday struggles against racial, class and gender hierarchies.

The need to critically engage with the language of ethnicity lies also in its central role in the post-WWII tradition of antiracism, developed by international organisations such as UNESCO. In this tradition, the concept ‘race’ was declared unscientific and replaced by notions of ‘ethnicity’ and ‘culture,’ albeit not breaking with the idea of human differences (Lentin, 2004, pp. 74–85). The replacement provided ground for continued reifying of groups, now based on cultural distinctions. Many European states, including the Nordic countries, designed their policies and legislative measures to follow the UNESCO tradition. Therefore, ethnicity has substituted race as the commonly used term and educating people about different cultures is often presented as the main way to tackle racism. David Theo Goldberg (2009, pp. 154–160) argues that in post-WWII Europe race and racism were reduced to the horrors of the Holocaust and turned into exceptions. Race as a structuring logic and racism as a system were thought to be overcome when Nazi Germany was defeated. Thus, speaking about race in Europe has been and continues to be difficult. However, this also means that making race and racialisation processes visible involves radical potential. Movements that seek to address racism from the perspective of those targeted by it challenge the hegemony of colour-blindness and expose the limits of the language of ethnicity and liberal multiculturalism.

While many studies especially in the Anglo-American context use the concept ‘antiracist activism’ for the kind of mobilising discussed in this book, I find it useful to distinguish this activism from other forms of antiracism by using the concept ‘postethnic activism.’ This is due to the radical potential embedded in postethnic activism to challenge white hegemony and raceless understandings of Europe, as well as to centre the political claims of those racialised as non-white or ‘others.’ In emphasising the specificity of the struggles of Black and Brown communities, I side with the classical work of Paul Gilroy (1987) and the Black radical tradition (Johnson and Lubin, 2017). Nevertheless, it is important to acknowledge Alana Lentin’s (2004, pp. 96–99) argument that anti-colonial movements and self-organised Black and minority organisations have had a huge impact on the whole field of antiracism, and an adequate understanding of antiracism as a phenomenon requires acknowledging these struggles. In this book, I view the impact of postethnic activism even more broadly than Lentin – it ranges from antiracist mobilising to other social and political movements, as well as to mainstream media and social media (see also Keskinen, 2018, 2021). Postethnic activism has affected the public sphere and political discussions in (parts of) the feminist movement, left-wing organisations, media and cultural workers, diversity and non-discrimination authorities, and a range of other civil society and public actors. The radical potential of this kind of activism thus extends the field of antiracism.

Racial capitalism and neoliberalisation

This book is not only an investigation of autonomous self-organising by those racialised as non-white or ‘others’ in the Nordic region, but is also about the changing conditions of political activism under neoliberal capitalism and the ways that activists navigate, negotiate, bend, challenge, resist and ignore the neoliberal...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Endorsements
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Acknowledgements
• 1. Introduction
• 2. Racial nordicisation and racial politics
• 3. Methodological routes
• 4. Creating communities of belonging and naming the ‘common’
• 5. Autonomous spaces, politics and organising
• 6. New representations, cultural work and navigating neoliberal rationalities
• 7. Penal welfare state, neoliberal policies and the insurgence of the suburb
• 8. Histories, stories and imaginaries
• 9. Conclusions
• References
• Index