The Power of Gender - NIKK

NO. 3 - 2003

NIKKmagasin

NIKK - Nordic Institute for Women´s Studies and Gender Research

The Power of Gender

Power and Care

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This autumn concluded five years’ extensive work on analyses of powerand democracy in both Norway and Denmark. A common feature ofthe mandates of the Norwegian and the Danish government initiatedpower studies was that both displayed little interest in the problems ofgender and power. But in spite of this, important new studies on thechanging patterns of gender i society have been produced during theseyears in both countries, even though the Norwegian study is far moreextensive in this respect than the Danish one. In this annual English edition of NIKK magasin we can present the first comparative analysesof the gender and power studies in Norway and Denmark.

One of the Norwegian gender and power studies shows how muchof the language on gender equality is constructed within the frame-work of a travel metaphor - as a nationally encapsulated “equality jour-ney”. Gender equality is thus seen as a linear process where we all,together, continuously take new steps towards the goal. Gender equal-ity is pasted into a language of concerted action that creates continuedillusions of change in “the right direction” happening continuously.This study also demonstrates how principles of gender equality oftenhave to yield “a little”, and become politics that lack systematic priori-ty. This is the yielding duty of equality: in encounter with freedom ofreligion, the protection against discrimination is partly set aside; inencounter with the freedom of negotiation, the right to pay equity isadjusted; in encounter with the freedom of organisation, the right toequal participation is diminished.

One of the Danish projects investigates the meaning of gender inpolitical negotiations on various types of caring policies.A comparisonof negotiations of fathers’ quotas in Scandinavian parental leavearrangements displays rather different understandings of the issue, par-ticularly in relation to the political significance of gender.While familyand childcare policies are systematically combined in Norway andSweden, there is a tendency in Denmark to separate the two. Here,the two weeks parental leave earmarked for fathers was repealed in2002, despite it being a success judging from the fathers’ use of theopportunity. In Norway the arrangement with fathers’ quota also isconsidered a success, since 80 percent utilize this right. But a new studypresented in this issue, shows that the intention of the fathers’ quota,which was to strengthen the contact between child and father, seemsmainly to be achieved when the father is “home alone” with the child.

Finally NIKK magasin can present some very good news: from nextyear the Nordic Research School in Interdisciplinary Gender Studieswill be established offering PhD courses for students not only in theNordic countries but also the Baltic countries and Northwest Russia.The research school is a result of the successful development and co-operation of Nordic gender research since the 1970s and will provide fertile ground for further research on gendered power andother important topics.

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The Lund ConferenceThe conference Gender and Power in theNew Europe in Lund, Sweden in August wasthe fifth in a row of European feministresearcher conferences. For the first timeresearchers from what we earlier calledEastern Europe really asserted themselves.PAGE 17

New Girls and Old GenderFor both girls and boys the “old” gender roleshave become less distinct. Girls have gainedvisibility in school. How do they find out whothey are in the crossing discourses of stronggirls and attractive babes? Professor HarrietBjerrum Nielsen at Oslo University has followed a school class in Oslo from the firstgrade until graduation in tenth grade. PAGE 26

Queering Me Softly…Can expanding masculinity projects be hid-den behind trendy queer performance? Isqueer thinking an undemocratic theory?Professor Eva Lundgren at University ofUppsala discusses the Norwegian documen-tary film “Alt om min far” (All about myFather) PAGE 30

GENDER AND POWER IN SOCIETYThis autumn several years of extensive work in both Norway and

Denmark on analyses of power and democracy was concluded.Professor Hege Skjeie at Oslo University was one of the two mem-

bers of the Norwegian research group in charge of the study, whoparted company in the final phase. Together with Associate ProfessorAnette Borchorst at Aalborg University Skjeie analyses and compares

the two studies with emphasis on gender and power issues.

PAGE 5

THE INTERVIEW: JILL LEWISHow a college professor in literature became a leading interna-

tional expert on HIV/AIDS prevention work, is the story about anengaged feminist academic and activist who realised that she hadvaluable knowledge and experience that was lacking in the HIV

prevention efforts. Jill Lewis, initiator and co-ordinator of theNIKK Living for Tomorrow project, is portrayed in the Interview.

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”HOME ALONE” FATHERSThe father’s quota of the parental leave has been considered a

success in Norway. But the contact between father and child pri-marily occurs when the father is ”home alone”. When the mother is

there, the child has no independent influence on the father’s carepractices, according to new research findings by Professor BeritBrandth and Professor Elin Kvande at NTNU in Trondheim.

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Pornography and gender in mass cultureThere is a vastly increased imprint ofpornography in mass culture and therevival of stereotypes in the representationof gender, writes Anette Dina Sørensen. PAGE 34

A Nordic Research School in Gender StudiesFrom next year a Nordic Research Schoolin Interdisciplinary Gender Studies willbe able to offer the first three-day PhDcourse of in all 20 training courses over aperiod of five years. Professor Nina Lykke,Department of Gender Studies, Linköp-ing University will be the Director of theSchool and Senior Researcher Susanne V.Knudsen, NIKK will chair the board ofthe School. PAGE 37

NIKK magasin 3-2003ISSN 1502-1521

PUBLISHED BY:NIKK – the Nordic Institute for

Women’s Studies and Gender Research

CHIEF EDITOR:Solveig Bergman, director of NIKK

EDITOR:Trine Lynggard

TRANSLATORS:Marlene R. Edelstein, Heidi Granqvist,

Ann T.Vølstad

GRAPHIC DESIGN:Alien Design

PRINTING:CDDU Repro

PRINTED IN:10 000 copies

COVER PHOTO:Thomas Tolstrup/Samfoto

NO. 3 - 2003

NIKKmagasin


The Powerof Gender

Changing the patterns of GENDERand POWERin society

NIKK magasin NO. 3 - 20034Ph

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Both a Danish and a Norwegian study of power anddemocracy have focused on changes in genderedpower but, characteristically, the Norwegian study ismuch more extensive in this respect than the Danishone. This is related to the research interests amongthe members of the two research groups that have co-ordinated the power studies. It can, however, also beseen in relation to the more limited interest in genderin the general Danish social debate. The studies’ pro-jects on gender make it clear that there is a need fordeveloping a comprehensive and dynamic understand-ing of power, which can capture the complexity of therelations between gender and power. At the sametime, the projects reflect the fact that gender researchhas moved beyond the polarised interpretationsthat often characterised discussions in the 1990’s.

By HEGE SKJEIE

Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Oslo [email protected]

and

ANETTE BORCHORST Associate Professor, Institute for History, International and Social Studies, Aalborg [email protected]

NIKK magasin NO. 3 - 20036

A common feature of themandates of the Norwegianand the Danish power stud-

ies – as they were defined by the coun-tries’ parliaments five years ago – wasthat both displayed little interest in theproblems of gender and power. Genderwas not mentioned at all in the Danishmandate, and only in a subordinateclause in the Norwegian study’s assign-ment: “the study should also take intoaccount that social and cultural divides,age and gender could affect the oppor-tunity of individuals to participate inand influence issues in society”(Parliamentary decision 11.12.97).

The Danish study of power anddemocracy financed three sub-projectson gender and, in addition, attemptedto mainstream gender in the other proj-ects. However, it was realised, in linewith experiences of mainstreaming ingeneral, that gender cannot simply be“added” to projects that do not includea gender perspective to begin with. It isalso obvious that researchers who havenever worked with gender theory find itdifficult to apply a gender approach.Instead, an anthology that focuses on anumber of central aspects of gender andpower, Kønsmagt under forandring(Gendered power in transition), waspublished (Borchorst 2003).

Power research and public debateThe different emphases on gender in thetwo power and democracy studies maybe explained by the general tendency ofDanish research on gender and powerwhich has not been nearly as extensiveas corresponding Norwegian andSwedish research. And the Danish proj-ect Kønsmagt i forandring concludes, onthe basis of this comparison, that specif-ic discourses on gender and power havenot had as extensive an impact on thepublic debate and within the politicalelite, as they have had in Sweden. Thishappened following Yvonne Hirdman’sanalysis of “The gender system” in theSwedish study of power and democracyin 1990. Hirdman’s conclusions were,for example, stated as crucial for theright-wing government’s initiative in

1995 concerning a month’s parentalleave for fathers and for the Swedishdebate on women’s representation afterthe decline in female representation inthe 1991 parliamentary election. Onthe whole, Hirdman’s work has support-ed the extensive impact of the discourseon the discrimination of women in theSwedish debate on gender and power.Correspondingly, Helga Hernes’smetaphor of “The women-friendly wel-fare state” for the Scandinavian welfarestates left its mark on the gender equal-ity discourses in Norway in the 1990’s.Another remarkable difference betweenSweden and Norway on the one hand,and Denmark on the other, is that in thefirst two countries very different inter-pretations of the changes in genderedpower have been presented. Thus, opti-mistic and pessimistic scenarios havealso competed in the attempts todescribe the status of gender and powerin Sweden. In Norway, the thesis onwomen’s integration into “shrinkinginstitutions” has also given rise todebates on interpretations among gen-der researchers. Seen from a Danish per-spective, the competing interpretationshave functioned as a fruitful drivingforce for the research field on genderand power, but they have also polarisedand, in certain cases, locked the debatein the 1990’s (Borchorst, Christensen &Siim, 2002).

Familiar dichotomies inpower analysisMuch research on gender and power hasbeen characterised by two dichotomies:on the one hand, researchers haveemphasized either the perspective ofstructures or that of actors, and on theother, there has been a focus on eithercontinuity or on change in variouspower relations. At the end of the1990’s, one of the theoretical challengesof research on gender and power was toovercome these dichotomies in theunderstanding of power within genderresearch. This required a combinationof a conceptual openness and empiricalflexibility, and a crucial task has been toadopt approaches for understandingpower that points beyond these

dichotomies. An important task on theconceptual level is to emphasize theinterplay between structures and actors,for example, by an increased attentionon organisational and institutional per-spectives – regarded both as arenas forsocial distribution of power and formobilisation and influence. On theempirical level, it is important to showthe various processes between and insidegroups (Borchorst, Christensen & Siim,2002). The analyses in the two studiesof power and democracy have applied aplurality of approaches to the study ofgender and power.

The gender projects withinthe Norwegian power anddemocracy studyIn the Norwegian study, the analyses ofgendered power have concentrated onthe welfare state and labour markets, onelite structures, democratic politics,forms of mobilisation and public genderdebates. A series of books, reports andarticles have analysed gender hegemonyin modern working life (Ellingsæter andSolheim 2002), problems of wage dis-crimination (Høgsnes 2001), policiesand ethics of authonomy, caring andcare work (Vike 2002, Widding Isaksen2003, Christensen 2001, Elvebakken2001), problems of fairness and justicein gender equality policy (Holst 2002),internationalisation of gender equalitypolitics, human rights discourses andreligiously based patriarchy (Ketcher2001, Borchgrevink 2002, Skjeie andTeigen 2003, Skjeie 2003), male domi-nance in Nordic academia (Rogg 2003),voluntary organisations (Berven andSelle 2001), gender policy organisationand minority group lobbying inNorway (Predelli 2003) and trends inthe political history of feminism(Hagemann forthcoming). Most ofthese projects have been organised with-in a separate programme, while analysesof gendered power have also beenincluded in a number of other publica-tions from the Norwegian power anddemocracy study. All are presented on aweb site developed as part of this pro-gramme. The Internet presentations willbe finalized with a “youth” version of


the site in 2004 (see web siteKjønnsmakt: www.kilden.forskningradet.no).

“Equality”: Travel metaphorsand profitability talkAn extensive analysis of structural maledominance, attitudes to gender equality,and developments in Norwegian poli-cies on gender equality during the last30 years, is published in the book Mennimellom. Mannsdominans og likestill-ingspolitikk (Amongst men. Male domi-nance and gender equality policy) byHege Skjeie and Mari Teigen (2003). Itproblematises the “self-evidence” ofequality policy as a stated consensusamong the national elite, and discussesconcrete challenges for Norwegianequality politics following internationaldebates on equality and gender justice.It analyses the distance between a gener-al interest in equality in top-level posi-tions of Norwegian society and a con-tinued extreme male dominance onthose same levels. We call this the prob-lem of benevolent non-committal.Principles of gender equality often haveto yield “a little”, and become politicsthat lack systematic priority. This is theyielding duty of equality: in encounterwith freedom of religion, the protectionagainst discrimination is partly set aside;in encounter with the freedom of nego-tiation, the right to pay equity is adjust-ed; in encounter with the freedom oforganisation, the right to equal partici-pation is diminished. An overwhelmingmale dominance in central positions ofpower often create nothing more thanjust passing embarrassment.

Much of the language on genderequality is constructed within theframework of a travel metaphor - as anationally encapsulated “equality jour-ney”. Gender equality is thus seen as alinear process where we all, together,continuously take new steps towards thegoal. This can be “far ahead”, but stillsecurely within reach; we just have totravel for long and far enough. Genderequality is pasted into a language ofconcerted action that creates continuedillusions of a change in “the right direc-tion” happening all the time.

Alternatively, gender equality isreduced to a question of what womencan contribute. Public debate is charac-terised by persuasion, by strategic argu-mentation on what gender means andhow important equality can be. And arhetoric of profitability adjusted to mar-ket ideology has been the dominantargumentation strategy in much of theNorwegian equality debate during thelast decade. Much of the argumentationfor equality has great difficulty in main-taining a perspective of rights and jus-tice. When paid work free from dis-crimination is emphasized as importantinsofar as it is profitable for the employ-er, the principle of equality is for sale -or when women are to enter board-rooms, judicial offices and professor-ships in order to “save the institutions”,to better serve students, to advance theclimate in the workplace, to improverisk assessments, to enhance the image.When gender equality is argued as ameans to secure competitiveness, thecategory of “women” accordinglybecomes a representation of “means” forcompanies and organisations to use.The rhetoric of profitability puts equal-ity on the defence, as a field that mustbe defended with something else thanits own value. Such discussions circlearound a far too old – and endlesslypatriarchal – requirement that womenshould contribute “as gender” – withtheir collective empathy, their collectivetalent, their collective reason. Do “we”have something to contribute? If not,what are we nagging about?

Both the travel metaphor and therhetoric of profitability add to the con-struction of a seeming consensus ongender equality, this analysis concludes.They simply bypass problems of indi-vidual and structural discrimination andmisrecognition. Thus, they contributeto equality’s yielding duty – as they con-ceal informal power structures, and hidethe fact that equality often is a matter ofconcrete clashes of interests and rights.

Gender justiceSeveral analyses of gendered power inthe Norwegian study seek to initiatenew feminist debates on what gender

justice can mean. What, for example,are the consequences of the new socialrights being so strongly differentiatedaccording to a requirement of paidwork? How can equal paternity leave berealized when the financial circum-stances are so strongly aimed at mater-nity leave? How can freedom of speechbe combined with the right to protec-tion against sexual harassment? Andwhat are the limits of institutional poli-tics in relation to patriarchal forms ofcontrol of women? Such debates ongender justice and freedom do not nec-essarily aim at finding clear political“solutions”. Rather, they imply demo-cratic discussions where perspectives canbe weighed against each other. Such aresought in all seven articles on genderjustice in the book Kjønnsrettferdighetwhich Cathrine Holst (2002) has editedfor the study of power and democracy.

Modern working lifeOne of the central premises in the bookDen usynlige hånd? Kjønnsmakt ogmoderne arbeidsliv (The invisible hand?Gendered power and modern workinglife), edited by Anne Lise Ellingsæterand Jorun Solheim, is that genderedpower in working life cannot be fullygrasped through a politics-centredpower analysis. The editors discuss howpublic equality debate is tied to tradi-tional political power conceptions andhow this framework presents a too nar-row field of reference in relation toworking life. As a discourse on genderedpower, the political debate is of limitedrelevance for illuminating power mech-anisms operating within the field ofworking life. These are not primarilyconcerned with representation or rights,but are connected to the actual way inwhich gender is woven into the organi-sation and operation of work. JorunSolheim uses the concept of genderhegemony to describe the dominatingpatterns of gendering processes. Theyascribe meaning – and value – to and byforms of social practices. Often these aresubtle processes of creating difference.Gender hegemony might be an impor-tant approach for understanding thestrongly gender hierarchical Norwegian


labour organisations, in what is also oneof Europe’s most gender-segregatedlabour markets. Organisation of time,competence, leadership, class, salary,emotional work and new forms of learn-ing activities provide points of departurefor the discussion on gender, power andwork in this book, containing articles by14 labour market and working liferesearchers.

The price of caringHow are different understandings ofpower and gender connected to differentways of thinking about money, marketsand caring – in the interplay betweenfamily, welfare state and labour market?What are the effects of market orienta-tion and globalisation on the care sector?These are important questions in thebook Omsorgens pris - om kjønn, makt ogmarked i velferdstaten (The price of car-ing – on gender, power and markets inthe welfare state), edited by LiseWidding Isaksen. This book presents aseries of projects on the gender dimen-sions of the welfare state that were car-ried out by the Centre for Women’sStudies and Gender Research at theUniversity of Bergen during the man-date period of the study of democracyand power. The lack of sufficient caringresources is becoming increasinglyapparent, and the family institution can-not satisfy all the pressing caring needs.New ideas of femininity and masculini-ty challenge the traditional caring cul-tures. And the market economy think-ing in terms of “production” of welfareand caring services implies new valuepriorities. The significance of care valuesis reduced and caring is objectified. Inthe same way as Maktens samvittighet -Om politikk, styring og dilemmaer ivelferdstaten (The conscience of power –On politics, governance and welfarestate dilemmas) (Vike et al. 2002), thisbook also problematises the way inwhich power and responsibility are sepa-rated in the parallel processes of central-isation and decentralisation. Workers inthe care sector find themselves in doublecommitments – on the one hand to theinstitutions, and on the other to patientsand clients. Their work autonomy con-

tinually diminishes. Nevertheless, thosewho carry out the concrete caring workare, in practice, given the responsibilityto draw the borders of the welfare state.

The gender projects withinthe Danish power studyIn the Danish study, the book Kønsmagti forandring (Gendered power in transi-tion) (Borchorst (ed.) 2002) focused ona number of different aspects of gen-dered power. Bente Rosenbeck’s analysisof the co-operation between women’sorganisations and lawyers in the Nordiccountries concerning changes in mar-riage legislation around the turn of theprevious century reflects the significanceof women and experts as actors. KarinLützen’s analysis of the arguments for amandatory enrollment of women whosupplemented their income with prosti-tution as full time registered prostitutesat the end of the 19th century showsthat the political elite was strongly influ-enced by patriarchal values. However, italso demonstrates that the legislationcould be influenced by organisationsand movements.

The gender profile of elitesUsing various theoretical stances, HanneNexø Jensen (on academics within theministries), Peter Munk Christiansen,Birgit Møller, Lise Togeby (on genderand elites from a general perspective),Lis Højgard (on gender and leadership),and Catrine Hasse, Inge Henningsenand Dorthe Marie Søndergaard (on gen-der in academia) explore the gender pro-file within elites and discuss the explana-tions of the male dominance of these.The last analysis concludes that malegender power penetrates the elite by sub-tle dynamics, which cannot be explainedby existing theories. These chapters alsoshow that there is considerable variationbetween the elite groups. This also per-tains to the perspective of change: insome places, for example, the privatebusiness sector and academia, hardly anychange can be discerned, while there isdevelopment towards a more balancedgender representation in other places,for example, political institutions.

The gender profile of political par-

ties at the organisational level and thefocus on gender equality in their pro-grammes are also investigated. KarinaPedersen’s chapter focuses on the unbal-anced gender profile of party organisa-tions against a background of variousarguments for the presence of women.

Drude Dahlerup’s analysis of theequality discourse within Swedish andDanish parties reveals considerable dif-ferences in the framing of gender andequality. A number of chapters deal withcaring, professions and discourses. SteenBaagøe Nielsen’s analysis shows howfinancial principles have put their markon the area of day-care institutions andtheir gendered rationales. HanneMarlene Dahl’s analysis of the homehelp sector demonstrates that anincreased discussion and valuation ofcaring has taken place within the admin-istrative discourse of this sector. In achapter on ethnicity, Annick Prieurshows how gender, ethnicity and gener-ation interact in the way young immi-grants tackle the forms of power in theireveryday lives in Norway. PernilleTanggard departs from the situation ofyoung female members of the DanishFemale Workers Association in her studyof whether the changed professionalstrategy towards the emphases of partic-ular female values is in accordance witha late-modern identity.

In addition to these analyses, theDanish study on power and democracyhas supported three projects on gen-dered power and democracy. One cross-national project has particularly focusedon discursive and theoretical differencesbetween the Scandinavian countries (theconclusions are presented in the intro-duction of this article). The two othersub-projects have studied democracyand identity, and gender, power anddecision-making.

The political identity ofyoung womenAnn-Dorte Christensen’s project focuseson young women’s political identities.The main results are published in thebook Fortællinger om identitet og magt.Unge kvinder i senmoderniteten (Nar-ratives on identities and power. Young


women in late modernity) (Christensen,2003). The point of departure for theproject is young Danish women’s lack ofaffiliation with the representative insti-tutions of established democracy, such aspolitical parties and trade unions. Usingnarrative interviews with womeninvolved in social movements andwomen who are not active at all, theproject goes beyond figures and high-lights factors that are significant in thecreation of the young women’s politicalidentities. The analysis shows that theyoung women have several reasons forturning their backs on political institu-tions. For radical left-wing feminists itseems as if the break with the institu-tions forms a basic part of their politicalidentities. This means that their dis-identification with the political parties,of which their parents typically havebeen members, is a central factor in theiridentity work. For other women, theinstitutions are less significant. Theytake them for granted. They do not,however, relate actively to them, and,above all, they do not regard the institu-tions as useful or relevant in their identi-ty work. The study also shows that thereare great differences in the women’s atti-tudes to feminist positions and move-ments. One common feature is thatnone of the young women interviewedidentify with the latest feminist trend.Many do not even know this movement,and the radical left-wing feminist dis-miss it as an intellectual upper-classproject.

Women in ethnical minoritiesBirte Siim’s project focuses on a smallgroup of minority women who are lead-ers of voluntary associations that organ-ise minority groups in Denmark. Thepublication Medborgerskabets udfor-dringer – etniske minoritetskvinders poli-tiske myndiggørelse (The challenges ofcitizenship – the political empowermentof ethnic minority women) (Siim, 2003)uses a qualitative study to elucidate thespecific barriers that women in ethnicminorities must overcome in order toget their voices heard in the Danish soci-ety and within their own minority cul-tures. On the one hand, the narratives

express a positive picture of a group ofminority women with self-confidence, astrong political involvement and politi-cal competencies that they use to organ-ise women. On the other hand, they givea dark picture of the discrimination andmarginalisation that these women expe-rience, for example, the lack of opportu-nity to have a voice on the political pub-lic arena or to have their interests repre-sented in the political system. The studyillustrates that minority women live withdouble identities and often experiencestrong cultural conflicts concerning theirdemands for greater self-determinationin their private and public lives. It alsoindicates that it is a central challenge forthe Danish society to combine the dem-ocratic demand for equal participationwith an acknowledgment of cultural dif-ferences. The study illuminates the ten-sion between multi-culturalism and gen-der equality, and the need for a cross-cultural dialogue about different familyforms and gender equality models.

Parental leave in ScandinaviaAnette Borchorst’s project investigatesthe meaning of gender in political nego-tiations on various types of caring poli-cies. The publication Køn, magt ogbeslutninger. Politiske forhandlinger ombarselsorlov 1901-2002 (Gender, powerand decision-making. Political negotia-tions on parental leave 1901–2002)analyses political negotiations concern-ing parental leave over a 100-year-peri-od. This study also adopts a comparativeScandinavian approach. Through thislong historical perspective, it is obviousthat the presence of women in top poli-tics has affected decision-making.Extension of the period for parentalleave, increased financial compensationand strengthened rights against dismissalare expressions of the shifting borderbetween the private and the public. Thisdevelopment has supported the financialautonomy of women. However, theextension of the parental leave is also adouble-edged sword for women, sincethis has resulted in the caring right offathers being developed relatively late. Acomparison of negotiations of daddyquotas in Scandinavian parental leave

arrangements displays rather differentunderstandings of the issue, particularlyin relation to the political significance ofgender. While family and childcare poli-cies are systematically combined inNorway and Sweden, there is a tendencyin Denmark to separate the two. Here,the two weeks parental leave earmarkedfor fathers was repealed in 2002, despiteit being a success judging from thefathers’ use of the opportunity. It ischaracteristic of a dominating discoursein Denmark that earmarking leave forfathers is seen as an expression of a tute-lary state, even though the Danishparental leave period earmarked forwomen is much longer than theNorwegian or Swedish ones (Borchorst,2003).

The power and democracy studiesreflect how discourses on genderedpower and social practices are connect-ed. The emphasis on power mobilisationand empowerment of women inDenmark has presumably strengtheneda discourse claiming that equality has“almost” been achieved in that country.An explanation of the more limitedfocus on gender in Denmark should alsobe seen in relation to the very move-ment-oriented character of the Danishwomen’s mobilisation. But the weaken-ing of the collective extra-parliamentarywomen’s movement in the 1990’s hasmade it visible that gender and equalityalso hold a weaker position within thepolitical institutions and that gender isnot regarded as a legitimate criterion forregulation in Denmark.

REFERENCESBerven, Nina and Per Selle, eds. (2001): Svekket kvinnemakt?[Weakened power of women?]. Oslo: Gyldendal Akademisk.Borchorst, Anette, ed. (2002): Kønsmagt under forandring[Gendered power in transition]. København: Hans Reitzel.Borchorst, Anette, Ann-Dorte Christensen & Birte Siim (2002):”Diskurser om køn, magt og politik i Skandinavien” [Discourseson gender, power and politics in Scandinavia]. In AnetteBorchorst (ed.): Kønsmagt under forandring [Gendered power intransition]. København: Hans Reitzels Forlag, pp. 246–266 .Borchorst, Anette, Ann-Dorte Christensen & Birte Siim (2002):”Kontinuitet og forandring i kønsmagt. Et svar til YvonneHirdmans anmeldelse af bogen ”Kønsmagt under forandring”,Hans Reitzels Forlag” [Continuity and change in genderedpower. A reply to Yvonne Hirdman’s review of the book”Kønsmagt under forandring”, Hans Reitzels Forlag”], Nyhetsbrevfor netværk for nordisk velfærdsstatshistorie, no 19, pp. 19-22.Borchorst, Anette, Ann-Dorte Christensen & Birte Siim (2003):”Magtens kønnede ansigter” [The gendered faces of power]. InPeter Munk Christiansen & Lise Togeby (eds.): På sporet afmagten [The traces of power]. Århus: Aarhus Universitetsforlag,pp. 61-73.


By HEGE SKJEIE and ANETTE BORCHORST

This autumn saw the conclusion of several years’extensive work in both Norway and Denmark onanalyses of power and democracy. Despite the manysimilarities between these two Scandinavian societiesthe two government initiated studies have arrived atconclusions which differ widely from each other.Whilst three of the five researchers in charge of theNorwegian study conclude that democracy is disinte-grating, the unanimous conclusion of the Danishresearch team is that their democracy is healthy andefficient. This variance in the final diagnoses demon-strates how important it is that power researchstates its points of reference and gives an account ofits premises and perspectives. Even the grand diag-nostic ambition of power research when initiated asan official study might profit from problematisation.

The Norwegian study of powerand democracy was roundedoff in August with a broad

presentation of findings; the Danishstudy was concluded with a major hear-ing in October. On the Norwegian side,the research group in charge of the studyparted company in the final phase, whentwo members, Siri Meyer and HegeSkjeie, each wrote individual statements,whilst the Danish steering group was inagreement in the concluding report.

The mandates of the studies The Danish power and democracy studywas motivated by the Danish parlia-ment’s concern that the parliament hadlost democratic influence as a conse-quence, among other things, of interna-tionalisation, decentralisation and theformation of large State-run corpora-tions. The motivation was thus first and

foremost the fear that the nationaldemocracy was in a process of disinte-gration. The mandate for the Norwegianstudy was not as full of apprehensions asthe Danish one was. Here, processes ofchange which “affect and challenge rep-resentative democracy” were listed as fol-lows: internationalisation, new technol-ogy, changes in public opinion-making,environmental issues and new multi-cul-tural issues, and finally, political process-es of decentralisation, deregulation andprivatisation.

Pressure from “supplemen-tary democracy”The Norwegian “majority” report was,however, filled with apprehensions.Baldly and gloomily, it stated thatdemocracy is indeed “disintegrating”.Many processes of change were inter-preted as pointing in the same direction.

Borchorst, Anette (2003): Køn, magt og beslutninger. Politiskeforhandlinger om barselsorlov 1901-2002 [Gender, powerand decision-making. Political negotiations on parental leave1901–2002]. Århus: Magtudredningen.Borchgrevink, Tordis (2002): “Likestilling - det flerkulturelledemokratiets hodepine” [Equality – the headache of multi-cultural democracy]. In Brochmann, Grete, TordisBorchgrevink & Jon Rogstad: Sand i maskineriet. Makt ogdemokrati i det flerkulturelle Norge [Sand in the machinery.Power and democracy in a multi-cultural Norway]. Oslo:Gyldendal Akademisk.Christensen, Ann-Dorte (2003): Fortællinger om identitet ogmagt. Unge kvinder i senmoderniteten [Narratives on identi-ties and power. Young women in late modernity]. Århus:Magtudredningen.Christensen, Karen (ed.) (2001): Kjønn og makt i offentligomsorgsarbeid [Gender and power in public caring work].Oslo: MDU, report no 34.Ellingsæter, Anne Lise & Jorun Solheim (eds.) (2002): Denusynlige hånd? Kjønnsmakt og moderne arbeidsliv [The invis-ible hand? Gendered power and modern working life]. Oslo:Gyldendal Akademisk.Elvebakken, Kari Tove (ed.) (2001): Abortpolitikkens utfor-dringer [The challenges of abortion policy]. Oslo: MDU,report no 35.Holst, Cathrine (ed.) (2002): Kjønnsrettferdighet. Utfordringertil feministisk politikk [Gender justice. Challenges for feministpolitics]. Gyldendal Akademisk.Høgsnes, Geir (2000): Likelønnsproblemet i norsk lønnsdan-nelse [The problem of equal salary in Norwegian salarydevelopment]. Oslo: MDU, report no 16.Ketcher, Kirsten (2001): “Kvinners rettigheter i et nyttrettslig landsskap” [The rights of women in a new legallandscape]. In Bent Sofus Tranøy & Øyvind Østerud (eds.):Mot et globalisert Norge? [Towards a globalised Norway?].Oslo: Gyldendal Akademisk.Predelli, Line Nyhagen (2003): Uformelle veier til makt: Omminoritetskvinners politiske innflytelse [Informal ways topower: On the political influence of minority women]. Oslo:MDU, report no 60.Rogg, Elisabet (2003): Lyst, lidelse og legitimitet. Om kjønns-makt og likestilling i Akademia [Lust, passion and legitima-cy. On gendered power and equality in Academia]. Oslo:MDU, report no 63.Siim, Birte (2003): Medborgerskabets udfordringer – etniskeminoritetskvinders politiske myndiggørelse [The challenges ofcitizenship – the political empowerment of ethnic minoritywomen]. Århus: Magtudredningen.Skjeie, Hege (1999): “Kjønnsmakt og likestillingsprosesser”[Gendered power and equality processes]. In Østerud, Øyvind,Fredrik Engelstad, Siri Meyer, Per Selle & Hege Skjeie: Mot enny maktutredning [Towards a new power and democracystudy]. Oslo: Ad notam Gyldendal.Skjeie, Hege (2003): “Demokrati, makt og men-neskerettigheter” [Democracy, power and human rights]. InNOU 2003:19: Makt og demokrati [Power and democracy].Skjeie, Hege & Mari Teigen (2003): Menn i mellom.Mannsdominans og likestillingspolitikk [Amongst men. Maledominance and gender equality policy]. Oslo: GyldendalAkademisk.Vike, Halvard et al. (2002): Maktens samvittighet. Om poli-tikk, styring og dillemmaer i velferdsstaten [The conscienceof power. On politics, governance and welfare state dilem-mas]. Oslo: Gyldendal Akademisk.Widding Isaksen, Lise (ed.) (2003): Omsorgens pris. Omkjønn, makt og marked i velferdstaten [The price of caring.On gender, power and markets in the welfare state]. Oslo:Gyldendal Akademisk.

SCANDINAVIAN DEMOCRACIES:

Disintegrating


- or in good health?

The traditional majority rule in demo-cratically elected bodies is under pres-sure from new forms of “supplementarydemocracy”: “rights-based democracy,actionist democracy, consumer democ-racy, lobby democracy, barometer demo-cracy”. In the Norwegian majorityreport, the increase in legislation on cit-izen rights was seen as contributing to atrend in which courts take control ofpolitical issues. Human rights conven-tions are incorporated in Norwegianlaw, and the rulings of internationalcourts become increasingly important indefining the limits of national politics.

Healthy, but with flawsWhen the report containing the princi-pal findings from the many differentprojects was published at the end ofOctober, the Danish steering group con-cluded that Danish democracy was insurprisingly good health and functionedrelatively efficiently. The political partieshave been weakened, but the politicalparticipation of the population is higher

than ever. After the publication of thereport, this largely positive state ofaffairs gave rise to critical responses,from both the media and right and leftwing parties. The left wing regretted thatthere had not been a more thoroughanalysis of economic power, and Danishmedia has discussed whether the reporthas painted too rosy an overall picture .

However, in their quest for grandstories of power trajectories commenta-tors have overlooked the fact that thesteering committee of the power studyalso indicated flaws in Danish democra-cy: it was especially stressed that the con-sequences of europeanisation were animportant problem. A democraticdeficit has emerged because the Danishpopulation (like the populations of theother EU nations) do not feel part of aEuropean political community. At thesame time, however, Danes are becom-ing more and more oriented towardsEurope. The problem is, though, thatEU decision-making processes are non-transparent and only to a limited extent

subject to democratic control. At thenational level, the Danish parliamenthas difficulties in controlling processesrelated to negotiations on extensive pro-posals from the European Commission.Another problem for the Danish demo-cracy is that new divisions have arisenwhere some of the least privilegedgroups are subject to serious social rejec-tion. The steering committee also point-ed out that in Danish politics genderequality is frequently not regarded as alegitimate basis for regulation.

The “diagnosis” expressed in theDanish study is still markedly more pos-itive than the Norwegian conclusions.The obvious question is, why? A rela-tively diplomatic explanation was airedat the hearing on the Danish study atChristiansborg, home of the Danishparliament: it was pointed out thatDenmark was hit by economic crisis,which resulted in drastic parliamentarychange, earlier than Norway. The oilcrisis came at the start of the 1970s, fol-lowed by the landslide election in 1973,

The Norwegian Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik receives the final report of the power and democracy study from ProfessorØyvind Østerud who headed the research group behind the study.

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and this resulted in far-reaching changesin the Danish parliamentary system.Both politicians and population haveadapted to these new conditions. Thesame is the case with respect to interna-tionalisation: Denmark has been strong-ly affected by europeanisation for thepast thirty years. Juridification of politicsis connected with a freer style of inter-pretation with respect to both nationaland international courts. This may entaila diminishment of the Danish parlia-ment’s self-determination, but shouldalso be seen in the context of unclear sig-nals in various forms of legislation.

Majority rule and humanrightsIn the Norwegian majority report, therelation to the EU treaty was presentedas part of a general analysis of juridifica-tion, the expansion of rights policies andthe concurrent internationalisation. Thereport states that there is an increasinggap between democracy as a state form,with popular influence exerted via elect-ed channels, and the expansion of indi-vidual and collective rights in variousareas of society.

This construction of a democraticgap between “rights” and “politics” iscriticised by Hege Skjeie in her report ondemocracy, power and human rights.1

Many types of rights policies concernbasic rather than “supplementary” formsof democracy. They address the signifi-cance of the law as a guardian of rights,the rights of minorities to non-discrimi-nation, and the democratic self-commit-ment of majorities. Several contribu-tions to the Norwegian power studyhave discussed in detail the unresolvedrelation between democracy in numeri-cal form, as majority power, and the pro-tection of human rights as these aredefined in international law. Many ofthe study’s gender-power projects arerooted in international feminist debates,and several empirical projects discuss theconsequences of internationalisation forwomen. They have thus provided animportant corrective of focus for thepower study genre, which otherwisetends to invite a vigorous cultivation of“national characteristics”.

The significance of rights-based politics The political meaning of doctrines ofrights is first and foremost about the pos-sibilities for individual and collectiveempowerment. As when the equal right tovote is accompanied by an equal right topolitical presence; when equal opportu-nities legislation is accompanied by fairsocial security. Internationally, politics ofrights thematises with increasing forcewhat can be called parallel discrimina-tion cultures: sexism, racism, and homo-phobia. But at the same time, the poten-tial for conflict between different humanrights guarantees becomes increasinglyevident, for example in the relationbetween religious-based group rights andprotection against gender discrimina-tion. The relation between religious free-dom and women’s freedom is a “multi-cultural headache”.2 In the Norwegiancontext this is manifested in currentexemptions from the EqualOpportunities Act: the Act applies to allareas of society excepting the “internalaffairs” of communities of faith, i.e.questions of teaching and religious prac-tice. Transnationally, however, the UNConvention Against all Forms of Dis-crimination Against Women (CEDAW)does not regard the relation between reli-gion and women’s rights as a legitimatearea of exemption. Rather, it insists thatthe human rights of women apply with-out restrictions. The CEDAW conven-tion has also been an important anchorfor equal rights work within Islamic legalreform. This strives to separate the Koranfrom the concrete historical processes ofinterpretation which produced the patri-archal family law.

The UN human-rights system hasthus become an important point of refer-ence for women’s organisations across theworld in terms of political mobilisation,and in terms of concrete legal demands.The Norwegian parliament wishes toincorporate the UN conventions on bothgender and race discrimination intoNorwegian law in the same way as otherconventions are incorporated throughhuman rights legislation. The incorpora-tion processes raise many importantquestions. But these do not merely, or

mainly, address changes in institutionallybased decision-making power. Theyaddress substantial democratic issues ofjustice and fairness, and both the state’sand international communities’ contin-ued responsibility for securing and bal-ancing individual and collective rights.

The significance of rights politics hasthus triggered quite different interpreta-tions of power and democracy in theNorwegian study. It highlights the im-portance of making explicit the norma-tive and analytical bases of researchers’analyses. The same point is stressed inSiri Meyer’s dissenting pronouncementin the Norwegian study. The distance tothe research majority’s perspectives, shewrites, is only superficially a difference ofopinion or disagreement about certainfacts; the distance is based on differenthorizons of understanding.

The experiences from both powerstudies reveal that power can be viewedand analysed through a variety of lenseswhich produce very different andnuanced versions of the bases of power.An analysis of different approaches andconcepts of power in the many projectsunder the Danish study demonstratesthat analytical and theoretical diversityis strength. However, the multi-facettedapproach to power is generated, to someextent, at the expense of providingunambiguous answers to the question ofthe localisation of power and its paths,which was the starting point for bothpower studies.

REFERENCESChristiansen, Peter Munk & Lise Togeby (eds.) (2003). På sporetaf magten. [On the trail of power] Århus: AarhusUniversitetsforlag.Togeby, Lise, Jørgen Goul Andersen, Peter Munk Christiansen,Torben Beck Jørgensen & Signild Vallgårda (2003). Magt ogdemokrati i Danmark – hovedresultater fra magtudredningen,[Power and democracy in Denmark: the principal conclusions ofthe power study] Århus: Aarhus Universitetsforlag.NOU (2003). Makt og demokrati. Sluttrapport fra Makt- ogdemokratiutredningen, [Power and democracy: the final reportfrom the Norwegian Power and Democracy Study], NOU: 19.Østerud, Øyvind, Fredrik Engelstad & Per Selle (2003): Maktenog demokratiet. En sluttbok fra Makt- og demokratiutrednin-gen.[Power and democracy: the findings of the power anddemocracy study] Gyldendal Akademisk.

NOTES1 This statement can be read in Norwegian on KILDEN’s website under ”Kjønnsmakt”; see www.kilden.forskningsradet.no2 The expression is Tordis Borchgrevink’s, from Sand i maskineri-et – makt og demokrati i det flerkulturelle Norge (2003) (Sandin the machinery – power and democracy in multiculturalNorway)


How a professor of literature became a leading internationalexpert on HIV/AIDS prevention work is the story of a feministacademic with an exceptionally strong social commitment. JillLewis realised that she had valuable knowledge and experiencethat was lacking in the HIV prevention efforts; combining gen-der theory and research with action implementation toapproach young people. So she created Living for Tomorrow,now a model project worldwide.

The

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ewLiving JillJILL LEWIS interviewed by TRINE LYNGGARD

When Jill Lewis lived with her family inNorway she got the opportunity, throughNIKK, to get Nordic funding for a model proj-ect in Estonia that ran from 1998 to 2000. Inthe years after the project has generated a widerange of interaction between both researchersand practitioners, in addition to several publica-

tions. Last year the NIKK Living for Tomorrowresearch and action project was named one oftwo best practice projects by the UNAIDS in areport to the UN General Assembly. The proj-ect was complimented for its gender-focusedapproach, for developing an understanding ofthe importance of gender in relation to

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HIV/AIDS among young people andfor making the young people under-stand the importance of their efforts inhelping to stem the spread of HIVamong young people.

Constantly on the moveTo day Jill Lewis is constantly on themove, being invited to different parts ofthe world to lecture and organise work-shop and training courses based on theparticipatory model developed withyoung girls and boys during the twoyears in the Estonian capital, Tallinn.

We meet for this interview in analmost empty apartment in Oslo inSeptember just as she is moving back toBritain. But since then she has beenanywhere else but in her new home. InOctober she was in Georgia (in formerSoviet Union) on assignment for theNorwegian Refugee Council doing HIVprevention training. Just when the mag-azine goes into printing she is in Congoand Burundi on the same mission. Shehas already explored the gender/HIV/AIDS exercises with young people fromdifferent cultural backgrounds in SouthAfrica and organised teacher-trainingcourses in Uganda, Sierra Leone and inSt. Croix in the Caribbean.

Recently she was one of the keynotespeakers at the Annual Conference ofthe prestigious American Associationfor the Advancement of Science. Butwhat she her self is especially happyabout is that a project based on theLiving for Tomorrow model is beingimplemented in Croatia with a 2-yearfunding from WHO. The trainingmanual Gendering Prevention Practicesdeveloped on the basis of the Estonianproject is now used by internationalorganisations such as UNICEF,UNIFEM and WHO. At NIKK we areconstantly receiving requests from allparts of the world for the three mainpublications from the project1.

Political necessity of feminism– The Living for Tomorrow work hasturned out to be of great interest tomany people in many situations - itworked along a nerve of issues and ques-

tions that many people are interested inexploring and learning about, Jill Lewiscomments modestly.

– I believe in engaging people inchanging their situation, and I havealways had a very strong holding on tothe political necessity of feminism, shecontinues. As a young student atCambridge University in the early sev-enties Jill became active in the women’smovement and the fight to get womenadmitted. At that time only 3 out of the23 colleges at Cambridge took womenstudents! There were a lot of directactions like occuping buildings, streettheatre and blocking the centre of town.

– Cambridge, which was founded inthe 11th century, granted the firstdegree to a woman the year I was born,in 1949. No wonder Virginia Woolf in”Three Guineas” had fantasies aboutburning Cambridge down because shesaw the misogyny linked to patriarchyand also fascism, Jill says.

Her PhD from Cambridge was onthe French left wing surrealist writerPaul Eluard who was one of France’sgreatest love poets.

Politics and desire– So my PhD called ’Of politics anddesire’ was about his relationship to thesurrealist movement in the communistparty and also his relationship towomen - and the experienced failure ofboth. He wrote about this very moving-ly. It was a man exposing the terms ofpatriarchal culture he was invested in atthe same time as he tried to problema-tise it; how the institution of heterosex-uality was constantly sabotaging thedesires for the relationships he hoped tohave with women. His writings hadgreat political influence on me.

From the conservative, male-domi-nated Cambridge University Jill Lewissuddenly found herself teaching femi-nist literature at the school of experi-mental arts at Hampshire College,Amherst, MA in the USA. Here she hasbeen for more than 25 years, one semes-ter each year, and from 1996 as fullProfessor in Literature and Genderstudies.

- There were no feminist theory

courses as there are now. I started posingthe question how does one analyse andexplore the gender scripting in the cul-ture; by looking at the text what can youlearn about the gender system that hasbeen normalised in that culture? So thisbecame a key element of my teachingthat was connected to issues like racism,colonialism and militarism, she says.

Multicultural dialogueThe book “Common differences -Conflicts in Black and White FeministPerspectives” came out in 1981, writtenas a dialogue between Jill Lewis andGloria Joseph, an Afro- Americanwoman.

– It was a polemic dialogue. Glorywould say: “Most of the women I knowthink feminism is a white woman’sthing and it sucks!” and I wouldrespond: ”Wait a minute, the issues thatare being identified by white women –aren’t they important to black women?”

– I think I was naïve at some level,because I did not realise that it was sucha big thing for a black and a whitewoman to write a book together. Whenit was published, it got a lot of atten-tion, we were flown to Washington, andwe were on television. This was yearsbefore bell hooks had publishing any-thing on these issues. So problemetisingfeminism from different cultural per-spectives became strongly part of mywork as became dialogues on sexualitywith connection to radical feminist les-bianism and social feminism, Jill says.

– Were the dialogues on sexuality andfeminism your way into HIV preventionwork?

– Well, I have been interested in thepolitics of sexuality since the 1970’swhen I spoke publicly on monogamyand men’s sense of property overwomen’s bodies and the cultural script-ing of sexuality and gender. So theAIDS epidemic with its urgent tragicsituation, hit on where my interests lay.

– The turning point came when mystudent Carol died of AIDS. She wasbabysitting my son, so I knew her well.I realised that with the epidemic Iwould see a lot of young people diebefore me. It was also absolutely intoler-


able for me that a lot of my generationwould disappear and that my childrenand other children would have to growup with that risk. I felt I had a back-ground of analysis and knowledge -both teaching ability and political inter-vention experience through the studentmovement, and I wanted to put it intofighting the epidemic.

Years of voluntary workWhen she was not teaching in the USJill worked as a volunteer at SussexAIDS Centre run by gay men, the firstindependent AIDS centre in Britain.From 1986 to 1993 she was goingaround talking at schools, talking withpeople in crisis on the help telephoneline and doing fund raising. For UKNational Aids Trust Jill organised work-shops with teenagers all over Britain,examining how HIV/AIDS was treatedin British schools and discussing how it

could be done better. The project endedwith a hearing where the educationalauthorities had to listen to the youngpeople’s opinions for one and a half-hour without interfering.

– This experience and the perspec-tives of the young shaped me a lot andwere important for the development ofLiving for Tomorrow.

So was another England-wide proj-ect she organised for the HealthEducation Authority on HIV/AIDSand sex education in secondary schools.Here the teachers were questionedabout what they needed support in andwhat the dilemmas were when it cameto sex education in secondary school.

– Not one teacher in the whole ofEngland mentioned gender. For me thatwas the beginning of Living forTomorrow. Coming from gender stud-ies and the women’s movement it wasstrange for me to realise how all the

interrogation of gender was off the mapfor most people working in health. It issuch an absurdity! Sex is a genderedactivity; it is not between two lampposts! Jill exclaims and then asks:

Sabotaged by lack of gender– How can you develop politics on sex,if you have eliminated gender from thewhole map? It is not only short-sighted– I saw how HIV prevention would bemassively sabotaged by lack of genderperspectives - it would be like water onthe duck’s back, Jill says while pointingout that all through the 1990’sHIV/AIDS prevention internationallywas solely based on health and medicalapproaches with the assumption thatthis would influence the behaviour.

– Instead the main question shouldbe gender and relationships when build-ing HIV prevention. How girls imaginethey should behave to be attractive to

Jill Lewis with some of the participants in the Living for Tomorrrow project in Estonia.

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boys and how boys within the culture ofexpectation of masculinity and feminini-ty imagine they should behave. Howmight you develop a project where youngpeople could interrogate these attitudescritically and connect that to informationabout HIV/AIDS so it would be adynamic knowledge? This was the ques-tion explored in Living for Tomorrow.

Heterosexuality – a water-tight norm– It is part of the problem that prob-lematising heterosexuality is one of thehardest for the feminist movementbecause heterosexuality is seen as thewatertight norm. Both men and womenin our societies have a nervousness andopposition to questioning gender normsand relate to feminism, Jill states further.

– Why is that do you think?– Men and women grow up in cul-

tures where they learn to embody a gen-dered identity with the references andnorms in that culture. Boys grow up inmany ways damaged by the gender sys-tem, locking themselves in expectationsof masculinity and femininity. Awoman’s main trust of society is to find aman, get married and have children andnot “rock the boat too much”, becausethere aren’t too many men out there whoare willing to rock the boat with you!Girls gain knowledge to be safe, to pleasethe men and be complacent with themand this overrides their ability to beacertive. Men need to feel that their con-trol is not challenged; they feel pressureto perform according to the norms ofmasculinity.

– So is the solution then to get rid of theinstitution of heterosexuality?

– No, heterosexuality can be organ-ised in many ways, anthropology showsthat. But AIDS is something irreversibleand devastating for the individual, forthe family and the whole society, and ifthe norms of heterosexuality are leadingto this damage, they have got to be prob-lemetised and changed. Besides I think itis important to link critical interrogationof the terms of heterosexual 'normality'to wider gender inequality concerns.

Important to listen to theyoung–What did you yourself get back fromworking with Estonian youth?

– The whole project was developedaccording to the young people’sresponses. So I learned a lot, the experi-ence gave me so much back. It pushedme further to realise how important it isto listen to what the gender systemlooks like for the young people, whatthe stakes are. Besides I had to be veryrespectful to what I disagreed with. Thegirls invested very much in femininityand were for example very dismissive toNordic women who in their eyes hadlost their femininity; thin women withhigh heels were their ideal.

– And it was never a peacefulmoment for me working with 15 yearsolds in Estonia. From the beginningthey did not know the word gender,they had no reference to the women’smovement and they had only justrealised what AIDS was. Sometimes Ifelt I was too theoretical and other timesI thought Gosh! If some of my academ-ic feminist colleagues saw me now –what we did was also so basic.

Nordic feminism conservativeon sex– You have had Norway as a base for sev-eral years; how is your impression ofNordic gender studies and our ”genderequal societies” in relation to the politics ofsexuality?

– In general I found sexual politicsof feminism very conservative in theNordic countries. The irony is that inthe US – with the lack of general genderequality politics – the debates on sexual-ity is much more alive and demanding.Also in Britain I found the debatesmuch more explosive, much more con-testing. But there seems to be certaincomplaisance here, I did not find radicalinterrogation of sexuality. I sometimesfelt crazy when I talked about it in myway! There is an acceptance of thenorms of heterosexuality and a socialclosure of the family in Norway that Ifind strange.

The morning-after pill andunsafe sex– Besides it is a paradox that genderissues have not been a part of sex educa-tion in Norway. When I worked forLandsforeningen mot Aids (NationalAssociation against AIDS) organising aconference on women and AIDS I alsodiscovered that there is no teacher’straining in sex education, at least not aslate as in 1996. And what also surprisedme is the low rate of condom use. Thereis a problematic distinction betweenhealth and sexual safety. For example;Norway was the first country in theworld where you could buy the morn-ing-after pill freely. But the issue wasseen only as preventing unwanted preg-nancies and not connected with unsafesex. The morning-after pill does notimply condom use, while the only routeto preventing the spread of HIV is high-ly skilled condom use, Jill points outworryingly.

Part of something larger– So the need for projects like Living forTomorrow is just as big in Norway as inEstonia?

– Absolutely. The main purpose ofthe project was to document the think-ing by giving voice to a process of edu-cational methodology; to help build amodel that could be implemented any-where. A sign of success was that theyoung participants in the project wenton to be volunteers in an NGO (NonGovernmental Organisation) workingon HIV prevention and running work-shops. This and other traces of the proj-ect like the manual and questionnaireare now being circulated all over theworld. In this way the young Estonianshave got the feeling that they are partsomething larger and something whichis badly needed, Jill Lewis emphasises.

NOTES1 See Living for Tomorrow homepage at www.nikk.uio.no


A t the European ResearchConference “Gender andPower in the New Europe”

in Lund, Sweden in August this year,some of this research was presented anddiscussed. A subject of discussion wasthe past’s significance for understandingthe present.

Hungarian women in politicsDr. Andrea Petö, Associate Professor atthe University of Miskolc in Hungary,lectured in both plenary and workshopsessions on her work giving Hungarianwomen a place in post-war history. In1998 she published a book aboutHungarian women in politics between1945 and 1951 which came out inEnglish this year (Petö 2003). The booktells a hidden and forgotten story aboutwhat happened to Hungarian women’sorganisations the years following theend of the Second World War. In thisperiod of time Hungary developed to bea communist one-party state, and avariety of women’s organisations were,as Petö describes it, liquidated. Itapplied not only to the ones who werepart of the other political parties, butalso to the religious ones, the ones con-nected to the rightist rule from before1945 and to the feminist organisations.

When a Piece of the Past is MissingBy BERET BRÅTEN Cand.polit. and Adviser at KILDEN - Norwegian Information and Documentation Centre for Women’s Studies and Gender [email protected]

Is history important in our lives? What if history was not written down? What ifa piece of the past was missing? That is what it is like for many of the women inwhat we used to call Eastern Europe. Women think that it robs them of impor-tant insight and understanding, also about today’s society. That is why research,writing and filming is taking place now – for instance in Hungary and Croatia.The goal is to make women’s recent history visible again.

Dr. Andrea Petö lectured on her work giving Hungarian women a place in post-war history.

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They were either forbidden, engulfed bythe communist controlled women’sorganisation Democratic Alliance ofHungarian Women (MNDSZ), or theydisintegrated because their activities didnot comply with the authorities’requirements. Petö’s book containsanalyses of the largest political parties inpost-war Hungary, history of the lives ofwomen who were important for thepolitical life, and history of the Jewishwomen’s organisation. Here is also astudy of women who entered the policeforce and the stories of communistwomen who gained key positions.

“The abolition and standardisationof the woman’s movement between1945 and 1951 put an end to the insti-tutional political pressure for women’sinterests, and impeded the developmentof female politicians who could haverepresented women’s interests in otherareas”, writes Petö.

When the communist regime col-lapsed a few decades later, there did notexist a range of female networks andwomen’s organisations in Hungary. Fewwomen were prepared for entering thepolitical arena when the democratisationprocess started at the beginning of the1990’s. In this way what happened withwomen’s organisations and female politi-cians right after the war is important toenable us to understand women’s lack ofparticipation in the period after 1990.

Non-narratives in HungaryNow Andrea Petö is working on a proj-ect about gender and political conser-vatism. In Hungary the number ofwomen in the rightist and conservativeparties is about the same as the numberin parties to the left. This surprisedPetö, since the other European coun-tries have a greater number of womenon the left side than on the right. Shestarted interviewing conservativewomen of different ages to learn moreabout their political preferences, andonce again an untold tale aboutwomen’s history turned up. Thewomen’s political attitudes today appearto be closely connected to their familyhistory.

These women are from families whohistorically belonged to the upper middleclass. After the Second World War theyexperienced the nationalisation of theircompanies and properties by theCommunist Party, she explained at theworkshop “Narratives and Memories” atthe conference in Lund. Many of thesefamilies experienced terror and traumas.200.000 refugees fled after the uprising in1956 and the ensuing Russian invasion.

The memories connected to theseevents are cultivated in the conservativefamilies. Petö calls these memories“non-narratives” because they are lack-ing in words.

- A narrative does not need to be astory, it can also comprise of feelings offear which were filtered to these womenthrough their family. You could beimprisoned for voicing your resistanceor your sympathies; That is why thewomen remember 1956 through feel-ings, she said.

For some of the women it is not evena matter of their own feelings, but aninheritance of their grandmothers’ orfathers’ feelings.

Castrated conservatismA defence strategy is transferred fromthe fathers to the children. The politicalinheritance is connected to the father.Mothers were mostly valued for theirlove. The father-daughter relationship isa framework for understanding the con-servative women’s identity. The opposi-tional ideas and the resistance againstcommunism were preserved in the fam-ily, underlined Petö.

Politics meant communism – noth-ing else. Therefore the fathers represent-ed a kind of castrated conservatism.They were intended to protect the fam-ily’s political interests, but had no wayto do this in practice.

- Now it is the daughters’ duty tocomplete what the fathers should havedone, but could not do, Petö pointedout. She thinks that this is an importantreason why many women are active inrightist and conservative parties.

Understanding does notassume agreementIn her book on Hungarian women inpolitics Petö points out that the post-war period in women’s history is hiddennot only due to political reasons, butalso because power structures haveremained much the same, regardless ofthe fall of communism. In Lund shereflected over her own challenges inconnection with interviewing conserva-tive and rightist women.

- I was anxious about how theywould receive me, since I am a leftistfeminist, she said.

It seems to have gone well, for bothparties. For, as another participant atthis workshop, Sara Geets from theUniversity of Antwerp, commented: awish to understand does not assumeagreement.

- When you write about a woman,you really want to like her. But you haveto let her go. Instead you have to con-centrate on learning something fromher and find out why she thinks as shedoes, Geets said.

Women’s Narratives from ZagrebThen we change the scene and theworkshop; physically to a little seminar-room in one of the buildings compris-ing the Lund University, mentally toCroatia. A country we often think of asbeing new in Europe, but which hasroots several centuries back. For youngCroatian women though, there is a holein their history. The hole is about lifeunder socialism, about being a womanin Tito’s Yugoslavia after the war.Perhaps it is like that now because now,right afterwards, it is difficult to lookback and because the recent past issomething you’d rather forget. The wishto start all over is strong. But at theCentre for Women’s Studies in Zagrebthey take the chance to look back. Theirgoal is to fill this hole in history throughparticipation in the internationalresearch project “Women’s Memories ofLife during Socialism” which involveswomen’s studies centres and women’sresearch initiatives in Prague, Berlin,


Krakow, Belgrade/Novi Sad andBratislava.

A follow up on the project is thedocumentary film “Pine and Fir Trees”which was shown in the seminarroom inLund. In the film we meet five elderlywomen who talk about their lives inTito’s Yugoslavia. There is the actresstelling us about her life on the scene.There is the university graduate, thepartisan, and the one who sat in jailafter the war. And there is the one whodreamt of sewing her own dresses, butwho, in lack of money or a sewing-machine, ended up in a factory. Theyhave different ethnic origins, religiousbeliefs and social background. Do theygive us an ugly picture of the life theyhave led? Yes and no. Their narrativesare about the limitations in what waspermissable to say or do, but they arealso about possibilities.

As one of them expressed it:– Life was good, and if you ask me,

I would do it again.In the audience there were a number

of researchers and students from coun-tries in eastern Europe. The youngestmentioned that they learned little aboutthis period in school. The socialist peri-od has become a non-period.

Women were the first to lose aftercommunism, some of the older womencommented.

Abortion is a difficult issue in coun-tries where religious interests werestronger than ever. And general welfareis weakened by more market-thinking.

– You can say what you want aboutsocialism, but health care was betterthen, said one of the others.

– We have to dare to look back, takea critical stance and discuss what wewon, what we lost and what we shouldhave kept, another answered.

The East’s presence The conference Gender and Power inthe New Europe was the fifth in a rowof European feminist researcher confer-ences. At the same time it was the firstone where women’s studies and genderresearchers from what we earlier calledEastern Europe really asserted them-selves. This applied especially to lecturesand debates on history and historicalmethods. The real hole in European his-tory, also when regarded with feministeyes, is about the absence of the Eastand what has happened here, and whatconsequences that has had for Europe asa whole. Several participants pointedout how important it is to think of all ofEurope when the topic is post-colonialhistory and what has made our conti-nent what it is today. If we do that, thenthe Hapsburg dynasty, the czar rule andthe Soviet Union become as important

as the USA and the earlier British colo-nial power.

Maria Grzinic from Solvenia, now atthe University of Vienna, lectured inplenary under the title “FortressEurope” about how Balkan and whathas happened there is excluded fromwestern consciousness. When one talkabout war and injustice in Europe, theHolocaust is still the starting point, shesaid. She questioned why Balkan is leftout. Maybe because Europeans can sayabout the Holocaust that they did notknow, not until later. But we knewabout Balkan, and we still let what hap-pened happen. The Holocaust is easierto deal with, after all, she pointed outand added that if we continue tellinghistory in that manner, Europe will con-tinue to be divided.

The fact that women’s studies andgender researchers from the east nowspeak out so clearly, gives us hope foranother kind of development. The miss-ing pieces of the past can be builttogether to make history complete.

REFERENCESPetö, Andrea: Women in Hungarian Politics 1945-1951, ColumbiaUniversity Press/East European Monographs,2003Peto, Andrea “A Missing Piece? How Women in the CommunistNomeclature are not Remembering” East European Politics andSociety Vol. 16. No. 3. Fall pp. 948-958.Peto, Andrea: Napasszonyok es Holdkisasszonyok. A mai magyarkonzervativ noi politizálás alaktana. (Women of Sun, Girls ofMoon. Morphology of Conservative Women’s Politics of TodaysHungary) Budapest: Balassi, 2003“Pine and Fir Trees” , a documentary film edited by IrenaScuric and Tino Turk. Production: Centre for Women Studies,Zagreb, Women’s Art Centre – Elektra, Zagreb, Top Mag Filmand Video Production, Zagreb.

”Gender and Power inthe New Europe”was held at Lund University inSweden August 20-24, 2003,and was the fifth in a series ofEuropean feminist research conferences. For five days 750researchers and feminists wereassembled for plenary sessions,debates and 18 different workshop streams.www.5thfeminist.lu.se

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Harriet Silius, Professor of Women’s Studies at Åbo Akademi University in Finland wished for a non-violent society where there wouldbe no violence against women. To the left: Djurdja Knezvic from Croatia who rather wanted to deal with problems that surround ustoday than gaze into the future.

By BOSSE PARBRING

Information Officer, Swedish Secretariat for Gender [email protected]

– Now that all politicians claim they are feminists, it is time for us to formulateour vision of what it would take to make a truly feminist society, said researcherLena Gemzöe, who was moderator for a debate on feminist utopias at theEuropean feminist research conference Gender and Power in the New Europe in Lund, Sweden in August.

Feminist Utopias Challenge at Conference in Lund

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The conference, which attractedover 700 researchers from mostEuropean countries and other

parts of the world, included plenary lec-tures with key note speeches, 18 differ-ent thematic workshop streams, booklaunches and special seminars. The ple-nary lectures as well as the workshopsfocused on how the new Europe hasshaped up with respect to power, citi-zenship, gender and ethnicity. Keynotespeakers included Catherine Hall andGail Lewis from Britain, Saskia Sassenfrom the USA, Irina Aristarkhova fromthe University of Singapore, Teresa deLauretis from the USA and Nina Lykkefrom Linköping University and JennySundén from Södertörn UniversityCollege in Sweden.

Everybody claims to be a feministIn her book Feminism, which was pub-lished last year, Lena Gemzöe envisionsa feminist utopia. She does not feel thatwe live in a feminist society despite thefact that leading politicians claim to befeminists and say their parties representfeminist politics. Therefore she thinks itimportant that feminists formulate theirutopian ideas of what a feminist societycould look like. At the conference, LenaGemzöe was given the role of beingmoderator for a debate among Euro-pean gender researchers on the possibil-ity of envisioning feminist utopias – andwhether it is desirable to do so.

The most striking feature was thatseveral of the researchers were hesitantto formulate utopias. They emphasizeddifficulties such as differences betweenwomen, making it difficult to conceiveof a utopia that would satisfy all require-ments. Perhaps the ingrained role ofresearchers to rather ask critical ques-tions than deliver practical solutionsalso posed a hindrance?

Nevertheless, a few feminist utopiaswere formulated by the researchers.Harriet Silius, Professor of Women’sStudies at Åbo Akademi in Finland wishedfor a non-violent society where therewould be no violence against women.

– I also hope that women would bericher than they are today, that we

would also speak other languages thanEnglish in the feminist Europe and thatthere would be no nationalism.

But Harriet Silius does not think itis her responsibility to describe how thisutopia is to be achieved.

– I am influenced by the 1960’s and1970’s when everybody was supposed toshare the same dream, which did notwork. Instead, I hope that we will hearmore from young students about theirfuture.

– I find it important to discuss whathome signifies, said social anthropolo-gist Ulrika Dahl, who works in theUSA.

– Home is traditionally a privateplace that can be dangerous for women.But it could be a more open place witha sense of community, where peoplecould come and go and get a bite to eat.A place for caring.

Ulrika Dahl also wanted to formu-late utopias on work – who carries outthe work and for whom?

– Work should be a place where wedon’t work ourselves to death and weshould also work for other things thanjust money.

The death of patriarchySociologist Diana Mulinari from theCentre for Gender Studies in Lund saidthat pondering what the good lifeshould look like is, on the whole, a priv-ilege for middle-class academics in theWest.

In my youth in the 1970’s, I partici-pated in discussions on the impossibili-ty of tearing down class barriers, whichwe then struggled for. But I have neverbeen involved in discussions on theimpossibility of tearing down patri-archy. This has never been the subject ofdebates because it is not seen as an inter-esting question.

– We are patted on the head andregarded as good girls in an institution-alised feminism. But I want to see thedisappearance of patriarchy before I die,she underlined.

Djurdja Knezvic from Croatiarather wanted to deal with problemsthat surround us today than gaze intothe future.

– It is OK to dream, but it is betterto do something where we are at pres-ent, she stated.

The debate on feminist utopiasbecame heated when Diana Mulinariclaimed that it is important to payattention to the fact that the women’smovement is defeated in Sweden. In heropinion, older feminists must pass on toyounger ones that we have not comevery far yet.

– We live in a hell. Every day we facemore racism and more ChristianDemocrats. Having gender studies atLund University and a good husbandwho picks up the kids from the day-carecentre is not worth dying for. We havestill much to fight against, she said.

Globalisation movementbrings renewalHowever, several young feminists in theaudience reacted against this dystopia. Awoman from New Zealand, born in themid-1960’s, was shocked by DianaMulinari’s statement.

– I have gained much from whatfeminists fought for in the 70’s.Otherwise my life would have lookedtotally different. It would even be differ-ent if I were five years younger, sincechanges happen all the time.

Diana Mulinari objected by sayingthat we have equality for heterosexualnuclear families.

– This is not what we fought for inthe 70’s. It is important to observe bothsuccesses and setbacks.

– I see no need to regard a certainperiod as defeated, said another youngfeminist in the audience. I see feminismas a long process. In my opinion, thealternative globalisation movement,which is influenced by feminism andqueer activism, brings hope for thefuture.

REFERENCESGemzöe, Lena: Feminism, Bilda, Stockholm, 20025th European Feminist Research Conference – Gender andPower in the New Europe: www.5thfeminist.lu.se The programmeof the conference and many of the papers presented can becopied from the site.

The article has previously been published in Swedish in Genusmagasinet 3-4/03.


“HOME ALONE” By BERIT BRANDTH and ELIN KVANDEProfessors, Department of Social and Political Science, NTNU,[email protected]@svt.ntnu.no

The radical changes in the Norwegian parental leavesystem that have taken place during the last 10years, have also included giving fathers exclusiverights to parental leave. The father’s quota of theparental leave has been considered a success since 80 percent of fathers who have earned the right toparental benefits, utilize this right. But the intentionof the fathers’ quota, which was to strengthen thecontact between child and father, seems mainly to be achieved when the father is “home alone”with the child.

T he possibility of spendingtime with infants may proveto be one of the most radical

breaks with traditional father roles, andmay have long-term implications for thevalues and practices of fathers. Thebook Fleksible Fedre [“Flexible Fathers”](Brandth, Kvande 2003)1 studies thesignificance of the Norwegian parentalleave reform of the 1990’s for the carepractices of men. The reform extendedthe leave to a total of 52 weeks with 80percent pay, and gave special rights tofathers. The fathers’ quota is four weeksof leave solely reserved for fathers and itcannot be transferred to the mother. It isbased on the idea that fathers areobliged to take leave from work to carefor the child. In addition to exclusiverights, both mothers and fathers havejoint rights which they may decide toshare. The intention of granting fathersextensive rights to parental leave is to

encourage their contact with and carefor children, and to label working menas fathers. This way the state is acting onthe behalf of small children.

The mother’s model powerUp until now, research has focused onthe consequences of parental leave forthe adults (mothers, fathers, parents),especially on the extent to which theparental leave schemes have changed theparticipation patterns of fathers andresulted in more equal sharing of familyand work time between mothers andfathers. Generally speaking, research onfathers and care has studied how thecare practices of the father have beenshaped by the mother. Due to her activ-ities in the labour market, she hasopened the door to the father’s entitle-ment to paid parental leave, and hernegotiative strength has been considereddecisive for the father’s degree of partic-

ipation in the family (Brandth andKvande 1998). Moreover, it has beenpointed out that the mother’s modelpower, i.e. her standards for care andhousework, is also required of thefather’s efforts (Holter and Aarseth1993), and that this has been a severehindrance for fathers’ participation.

The great silenceIn the research on fathers and father-hood there has been little focus onfathers’ own stories about fathering,

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especially stories about what fathersactually do and how they talk abouttheir fatherhood. We are therefore con-fronted with a silent field (Morgan1997). In the book we focus on thefather’s own voices about practices asfathers. One of the main perspectives inthe book is that fathers can not be stud-ied only as fathers. In order to under-stand how fatherhood is constructedtoday, one has to have as a term of ref-erence what can seem rather obvious:namely that fathers are men and must

be understood from a gender perspec-tive. By having an explicit gender focuson fathers, the perspective widens andchanges. We are witnessing a great vari-ation and flexibility in the meanings ofgender to day. The categories of genderare dissolved and the meanings of mas-culinity are negotiated and practiseddifferently.

Fathers also become flexible becauseof the different contexts of work theyencounter in the post-modern workinglife. Even though men no longer need to

have the sole responsibility as breadwin-ner, there are signs of workplacedemands on men today no less hardthan they have been earlier. The work-ing conditions men experience cantherefore lead to absent fathers.

Relational care and thechild’s influenceA paradox within much of the researchon families and the previous research onfathers is that it is often forgotten whatinfluence the child has on the parent’s


FATHERS


care. In research where the perspectiveof gender equality is highlighted, thereis a comparison between the motherand the father. The child often becomesa passive victim of the adults’ molding.In the book we look at the child’s inter-action with the father and the conse-quences this has on the formation offatherhood.

In Flexible fathers an interestingpoint is on the relationship betweenfathers and children, and how childreninfluence their fathers’ care practice.Theoretically, this implies seeing chil-dren as active agents who contribute tothe production of the adult world andtheir own place in it. Seeing children associal agents is in contrast to traditionalsocialisation theory where the idea isthat children are formed by forces exter-nal to themselves in order to adapt tosociety (Corsaro 1997). Even thoughthe study deals with very young chil-dren, they still exercise some influenceon their interaction with their fathers.

Regarding care as a relational prac-tice means that care can be learned anddeveloped if and when the situationinvites or demands it. This in turnmeans that care ability is not somethingfixed, but rather a potential that may beformed and developed differentlydepending on the relations and situa-tions in which it is practised. Hence,care is situation-dependent. In this waycare also becomes more ambiguous andmore open to variations. Seeing care asrelational enables us to study how chil-dren influence the father’s practice.

It is not only important for childrenthat their fathers are home on leave, butthe ways in which they are at home alsoinfluence their care practices. Fathersmay follow the intention of the quotaand stay completely away from work forfour weeks or more. Then they havebeen “home alone”, i.e. the mother hasnot been at home at the same time.What we wanted to study is what carepractices are developed and how thechild influences these practices.

Home aloneA common characteristic of the historiesof these fathers is the experience that

care work signifies using time on theirchildren. Time permeates fathers’ narra-tives about care. The point is not onlythat they have understood that it is vitalto spend time with their children, mostfathers would agree with them on this,but that these fathers actually have giventime to their children by taking leaveand thus gained the experience thatspending time on their children isimportant. When we consider whatthey do with their children while onleave, it is obvious that they are on thetrack of what we may call “slow time”(Hylland Eriksen, 2001). This meansthat the children’s needs are the centreof their attention. It is the child thatmakes the time slow. The time is notspent running from one thing to anoth-er, trying to squeeze as much as possibleinto the shortest possible time. Care isabout time.

The fathers describe days that arenot filled with numerous events andthings to do. Basically there are very fewtasks on the agenda. The time is spentdoing such things as getting dressed,brushing teeth and going to the shop.There is no impression here of a busydaily life. Rather the slow rhythm ofcare decides. It is the child’s needs tosleep and eat that regulate it. The chil-dren get the father up in the morningand determine his time. Their activitiesgive him the “perception of slow time”.

Need-oriented care practice There is also a development of compe-tence as the fathers get to know theirchild by having the main responsibilityand spending a great deal of time withhim or her. It becomes easier for themto develop an understanding of thechild’s needs. One of the fathers inter-viewed tells us about having responsibil-ities and using time:

“Sure, I believe that when you haveso much time with your kids, you virtu-ally learn how to read them, how theytell you stuff which you maybe wouldhave lost if you didn’t have so muchtime. ... if you spend a whole day withthem, then you sort of see the totality oftheir days, and understand why they arecross and cranky.”

Having the total responsibility iswhat makes him see how demandingcare work is and makes him feel close tohis children. He also claims that he hasa learning experience when he pointsout that he is learning to “read” his chil-dren. By spending a great deal of timewith them, the day-to-day affairs of hischildren become a whole, making it eas-ier for him to understand why, forexample, they are grumpy and cross. Hethen avoids being the type of father whocomes home from work and disciplineshis children. Again we see how the chil-dren influence the father’s care practicein this situation.

Quantity time,not quality time These fathers learn to practise what wemay call a rationality of care. Rationalityof care implies spending a great deal oftime with the children. Fathers describethat the children have initiated a processin them where focus is on quantitativetime, that they spend extensive amountsof time with their children. They haveexperienced that care cannot be carriedout in a few intensive hours, and someof them have become strongly critical ofall mention of intensive ‘quality time’.Rather, they have realised that it isimportant to be there for the child. Thisconsciousness becomes clear throughtheir answers to various questions, bothregarding what they believe a goodfather must be, and when we ask whatthey feel they are especially good at withtheir children.

With mother at home The importance of being home alonebecomes significant in contrast to menwho did not use their fathers’ quota tohave the sole responsibility for the childwhile the mother went back to work.They either took their quota while themother was still at home, or continuedto work part time. In such a context, theprocesses described above are not initi-ated. The mother’s main responsibilityfor the child is not interrupted, and thefather becomes a supporting player forthe mother. The mother continues herclose relationship with the child, read-


ing and translating the child’s needs forthe father. Consequently the child hasno independent influence on thefather’s care practices. It is the motherand not the child who mostly interactswith the father in these cases. The fatherwill therefore not get to know his childin the same way, and care practicesbased on knowing the child well are notdeveloped. As a result, he feels morecomfortable with the older children.

Thus we see that the different con-texts result in quite different conditionsfor the development of fathers’ carepractices. If we return to one of theintentions of the fathers’ quota, whichwas to strengthen the contact betweenchild and father, we see that this prima-rily occurs in the context we have called“home alone”. To the question ofwhether the fathers’ quota has any sig-nificance for fatherhood, and conse-quently for the desired transformationof men, the answer will be ‘not neces-sarily’. It depends on the way it is used.If it is used in a way, which leads to thedevelopment of a rationality of care, itmay have important consequences forthe meaning of men and masculinity.

Work constructs absentfathersResearch has shown that masculinity isconstructed in relation to other menthrough comparisons and achievements,primarily at the work place. Particularlythis is so in western societies where hege-monic masculinity is tied to income-gen-erating work. This may appear a paradoxsince men and women to a large extentshare bread-winning, and dual-earnerfamilies have become the most common-ly occurring. It is therefore an underlyingquestion how masculinity expressedthrough father practices relates to hege-monic masculinity as expressed throughprofessional work.

Our study confirms other researchfindings, that men’s relationship to workproduces what we may call ’absent’father practices. ‘Absent’ father practiceswrestle with the ’home alone’ fatherpractices which, as we have seen, can becreated by means of the father’s quota.For, despite the fact that fathers use the

leave, they continue to work a lot. Only5 percent of the fathers work part-time,while more than 40 percent of themothers do so. Most commonly, moth-ers reduce their working hours whenthey have children, but fathers do not.More than a third of the fathers in thestudy work more than 40 hours a week.And, when fathers work such longhours, mothers work less. Fathers work-ing overtime have, in other words, part-ners who work normal hours or part-time.

However, if we look at the motherswho work a lot, we see that the sameapplies to their partners. When mothershave high work- and educational-statusand work a lot, fathers do not reducetheir working time in order to increasefamily time with children. From theperspective of the child, this is not apositive result. These parents have verylittle time left to care for and to be withtheir children.

The main characteristics of contem-porary changes in working life withincreasing demands on the employees’time, can be seen as a counter forceagainst a change towards a close andmore caring father. A greedy workinglife where fathers’ and men’s genderidentity is connected to what they do atwork maintains the status quo. It iswithin these two contexts, work andwelfare state policies, that today’s fatherpractices take place and are formed. Ourresearch shows that while work life isthe strongest hindrance for fathers, thewelfare state policies are the mostimportant door openers.

1 “Fleksible fedre” is based on data froma large study on fathers’ use of theparental leave schemes. The study includ-ed a questionnaire that was sent to allmen who became fathers in the periodMay 1994 to April 1995 in two munici-palities in central Norway. A total of2194 questionnaires were mailed and theresponse rate was 62 per cent. From thissame sample we have interviewed thirtycouples that used the parental leave sys-tem in various ways. The interviews tookplace when the child was from 1-2 yearsold.

REFERENCESBrandth, B. and E. Kvande (2003): Fleksible fedre. Oslo:UniversitetsforlagetBrandth, B. and E. Kvande (1998): “Masculinity and child care:The reconstruction of fathering”. Sociological Review, 46,2:293-313.Brandth, B. and E. Kvande (2001): “Flexible work and flexiblefathers”. Work; Employment and Society, 15,2:251-267.Brandth, B. and E. Kvande (2002a): “Reflexive fathers negotiat-ing parental leave and working life”. Gender, Work andOrganization, 9, 2: 186-203.Brandth, B. and E. Kvande (2002b): “Fatherpresence in Child-Care”. In : A.M. Jensen and L. McKee (red.): Children and theChanging familiy. London:Falkner RoutledgeCorsaro,W. (1997): The Sociology of Childhood. London: PineForge Press.Gillis, J. (2000): Innlegg på konferansen”Work and Familiy:Expanding the Horizons”, San Francisco, 3.- 4. mars 2000.Hochschild, A. (2001): “At the End of the Global Care Chains:Children and the Global transfer of Love”. Forelesning vedNTNU, 01.10.2001.Holter, Ø.G. og H.Aarseth (1993): Menns livssammenheng. Oslo.Ad Notam Gyldendal.Hylland Eriksen, T. (2001): Øyeblikkets tyranny:rask og langsomtid i Informasjonssamfunnet. Oslo: Aschehoug.Morgan, D.H.J.( 1997): Conference report “Families and theState: Conflicts and contradictions”, 23.-24-May, Edinburgh,Scottland)


New Girls and Old GenderBy HARRIET BJERRUM NIELSEN

Professor, Centre for Women’s Studies and Gender Research, University of [email protected]

For both girls and boys the “old” gender roles have become less distinct. The new,active girls are able to both speak out and assert themselves, in contrast to thequiet, modest and dutiful girls described by the schoolroom research of the seven-ties and eighties. The idea of the old gender roles lives on, unperturbed by the real-ity that children of today mostly have left them behind. How are the new, activegirls met by teachers and peers, and how do they find out who they are in thecrossing discourses of strong girls and attractive babes?


Girls have gained visibility inschool. The quiet, modestand dutiful girls described by

schoolroom research in the 1970’s and -80’s still exist, but today they are onlyone group among the girls, a groupreferred to as “the quiet (read: boring)girls“ by pupils and teachers alike, andin contrast to the new, active girls whocan both speak out and assert them-selves, often in a more relevant andsocially competent manner than theloud-speaking and assertive boys. Itapplies to both girls and boys that the“old“ gender roles, either with quiet,modest girls or noisy, aggressive boys,have become less distinct (Studies fromthe 1970’s and -80’s: See e.g. BjerrumNielsen and Larsen, 1985, BjerrumNielsen and Rudberg, 1989, BjerrumNielsen 1998).

The idea of these old gender roles,however, is still alive and well, com-pletely untouched by the fact thattoday’s children in reality have left themto a large extent. This paradox could beobserved for example in Norway in thespring of 2003 where two public reportson marks in the lower and higher sec-ondary schools showed that girls nowdid better than boys in all subjects butphysical education. Educational scienceresearchers who commented on thisnational catastrophe to the newspapersstated that the problem was connectedto the fact that schools emphasize thewrong characteristics, putting a premi-um on the girl’s conformity and dutiful-ness, while the boy’s style of creativity,initiative and independence was beingdiscredited (Dagbladet 1.4.2003). Inaddition the annual PISA-survey fromOECD (see http://www.pisa.oecd.org)showed that Norwegian boys haveunusually poor reading skills. The reac-

tions were forthcoming. The Ministerof Education awarded an immediategrant of 20 million Norwegian crownsto do something about the matter. Shecommented that the problem couldappear to have a connection with theschool’s learning strategy having moreappeal to girls than to boys. It is obvi-ously assumed that girls still are clever,dutiful and “girlish“ and that this hadbecome the new ideal in schools sincethere are a majority of female teachers.None of these assumptions is correct.

New Genders in SchoolThat the girls are more able than theboys and appear as a more active groupof pupils doesn’t mean that gender haslost its significance or that girls now liveproblem-free school lives. I will illus-trate this by describing some situationswhere three such active and self-con-scious girls are confronted by genderduring school time. I followed thesegirls’ class from their starting in firstgrade at a school in Oslo in 1992 untilthey graduated from tenth grade in20011.

I had consciously chosen a classwhere the pupils came from modernfamilies with well-educated workingmothers. Nearly three quarters of thepupils were girls, and the class had anexperienced form teacher interested ingender equality. In short my intentionwas to study the active girls. Neither didthis fail. From the first to the last day ofobservation there was a general pictureof active, out-spoken and confidentgirls. Not even the quieter girls, whichthere still were a pair of, acted shy orgigglish when they spoke or did presen-tations in class. All of the girls askedquestions, addressed the classunprompted and offered a running

commentary on the teacher’s plan. Thiscould be formulated as active advice orevaluatory comments: “It would bemuch better to do it this way instead”,“I don’t understand why it’s necessary towrite this”, “These instructions arenuts!”, “Did we actually get an answerto our question?’, “This was quite fun”(acknowledgingly to the teacher)2.

The five boys in the class were morepassive during class and often they hadto be prompted by the teacher beforethey contributed. These were mostlycalm and quiet boys who sought to-gether as soon as they had the opportu-nity to do so. They appeared to thrive inthe class and had friendly relationshipsto both teachers and the girls when theyhad to work with them. One boy whowe will call Ola had more of a tradition-al self-assertive boy-style with a certainamount of commotion and noisearound him. Through all nine years thegirls held the leading position in theclass conversation. When I interviewedthe pupils the second last year of juniorhigh school (higher elementary) andasked them to describe differencesbetween girls and boys, almost all ofthem said that “girls are better at school;they work more seriously and are muchbetter at discussing’.

Elementary school:Individualistic girlsWhile most of the girls combined anactive and self-assured pupil-role withafore mentioned girl-features such aspreoccupation with relationships and anaccommodating attitude toward theteacher’s person and rules, there werethree girls whose more individualisticbehaviour made them stand out fromthe rest. They spoke without beingprompted, were spontaneous, told


jokes, called out loud when the teacherdidn’t hear them the first time, general-ly did what they wanted to and refusedto accept messages given to the class as awhole. At the same time they wereclever and gregarious girls with goodpersonal resources who contributedknowledgably to the different topics inclass. If they had been boys they wouldprobably have been considered charm-ing and colorful characters – as Olaactually was.

Kari, Mari and Mette, as we callthem, were not thought of quite in thisway. Already a few weeks after schoolstarted they were spoken of as being aproblem:

At lunch break one of the subjectteachers (who on another occasion hadtold me about how important she feelsgender equality in school is) came over tothe form teacher and I while we were eat-ing out lunches. She asks the form teacherwhat her opinion of Kari is? The subjectteacher states that she personally has begunto get rather irritated over “that lady”,and she has heard that others have too.Kari is chicking up and being bossy andcan’t subordinate herself. (Field notes,Grade 1, October 1, 1992)

The form teacher has also noted afew problems: Kari has to learn to seeherself as part of a group, Mari is dis-tracted, corrects the other pupils andtalks too loud, Mette is small an imma-ture. But the teacher thinks that thiswill adjust itself as time passes, and ingeneral she tries to compensate for thegirl-dominance by calling alternately ona boy and a girl, each their turn. Thismeans that the five boys in reality aregetting way more attention than the 13girls. Other teachers, i.e. the subjectteacher above, feel more provoked bythe girls’ individualistic behaviour.When I tell them about my project theysay for example: “Oh, you’re in the classwith those poor oppressed boys!”, orthey identify the class as “The one withKari, Mari and Mette?”. Interestinglyenough the opposite does not happenwhen we are talking about the parallelclass which in many ways is the mirrorpicture of my observation class: here theboys dominate both in number and

level of activity, and the male formteacher basically relates to them only,while the girls sit and whisper on theside lines.

According to my observations Kari,Mari and Mette are cracked down on assoon as there is the least sign of distur-bance in the class, and the chastisementhas a much more irritated and moralis-tic tone than when Ola is called toorder. One subject teacher tells me thatthese girls are critical to everything onesuggests, and that that’s an attitude shedoesn’t like. Already during my observa-tions in Grade 2 Kari, Mari and Metteseem more sceptical and critical towardsthe school and especially the subjectteachers than they did when they start-ed in first grade. Kari quits protestingopenly but keeps a critical distance toeverything going on in class, i.e. in theshape of sharp observations of theteacher’s contradictions and inconse-quences. Mari finds a role as trouble-maker: regularly blowing her frustrationout over teachers and other pupils, con-stantly protesting and battling. Byfourth grade she has become worldchampion at driving her teachers crazy.Mette has the most trouble finding acoping strategy. She turns graduallymore surly and sarcastic towards most ofwhat is happening in class. In fifth gradea replacement teacher refuses to havethe class any more because of Mari andMette.

While the three girls’ individualisticbehaviour collides with the teachers’gender expectations in primary school,it does not seem to cause problems forthem with their peers. All three girls arewell integrated in the group of pupils,and assume leadership in slightly differ-ent ways. Kari is very skilled at organiz-ing games and common activities. Mariand Mette lead the “Stone Age flirt” ingrade 3 and 4, teasing and wrestlingwith the boys.

Lower secondary: Genderequality pedagogiesIn the lower secondary school the pic-ture changes. The class has been com-bined with the parallel class and redev-ided forming two classes with both

active and quiet girls, and both activeand quiet boys. The secondary schoolteachers have a different attitude towardthe individualistic girls than the teachersin primary school. In the teacher’s roomthey boast to me of these two classeswith “strong girls and great boys”. Theframe of reference now is modern gen-der equality pedagogics and it has sucha great influence on the teachers’ per-ception that they hardly mention thequiet group of girls which also is part ofthe class. The teachers are not that wor-ried about the quiet boys either any-more, perhaps because the presence ofactive boys subdues their worries aboutgirl dominance. Kari is now described asa superior pupil, and Mari and Metteare considered strong personalities withtheir own opinions. While the teachersare sitting in the teacher’s room over-flowing enthusiasm about the moderngenders, the girls are meeting the oldgender for real – this time communicat-ed by their peer group. Even though thegirls are more than keeping up as far asmarks and active class contribution areconcerned, body and looks have gaineda significance they in each their way arehaving a hard time integrating in theirself image. They are active participantsin the process: The meaning of gender isnegotiated between the active girls andthe active boys, while the quiet pupils ofboth sexes watch, hardly consideredgendered beings at all in the arena of theclassroom.

Mari is hit by gender hard and first.Her noisy and teasing style is identifiedas “masculine“ by the boys and she isteased about “being a man“ – at thesame time as the boys start using dero-gatibe sexual characteristics to her andabout her. After a short period of angerand desperation she rises as a Phoenix.Discarding her sport clothes, sheemerges the leading fashion queen andtransforms her long-lasting battle withthe boys to real power-flirting. Beingable to handle both the code of the boysand the sexuality code leads to herstrengthening her position in manyways, at the same time as a great deal ofenergy is being canalized into being firstout with the latest fashion. Kari appears


more paralyzed by the new situation.Being the smartest pupil in the class isdifficult for her to combine with beingsexually attractive even though she putsconsiderable effort into both. Shebecomes more shy and passive in theclassroom work, even though she still isgetting top grades. She becomesextremely thin and appears towards theend of lower secondary as being a bitinsecure and very teenage mainstreamin both looks and clothes style. Frombeing someone who pursued her ownprojects with quiet self-assurance shenow mostly sits and smiles nervously tothe coolest of the boys, in her tightpants and bare midriff. Mette keeps theboys at a distance and eventually findsan identity being anti-mainstream inrelation to both cliques and clothesstyle. At the graduation ceremony aftertenth grade where most of the girlsappear in skin-tight, low-necked andeven strapless dresses and tiny high-heeled sandals, she stands out in Levis,designer top, joggers and hair dyed intwo nuances of bright red. The othersacknowledge her for having “her ownstyle’, but her frequent conflicts withothers and her moodiness can indicatethat it is not only simple choosing yourown way at this age.

But also Kari and Mari express inthe interviews that it is difficult findingout who you are in these crossing dis-courses about strong girls and attractivebabes, which they both feel repulsed byand are attracted to. The active boysplay a leading role in the babe-dis-course, but it is doubtful that this aloneis causing problems for such strong girlsas Kari, Mari and Mette. And at leastMari and Mette get back at the boys intheir weak areas, for example throughjokes about penis sizes. The quiet boysare ignored just as thoroughly as thequiet girls. The active girls are them-selves busy presenting themselves aspopular and heterosexually successfulwith perfect bodies. They envy eachother’s looks and high marks, even asthey are struggling to live up to a dis-course of feminine solidarity which theyalso carry, raised as they are in modernand equal families. These conflicting

discourses meet in Kari, Mari and Mettein a way which is barely thematized intoday’s gender equality pedagogics: onthe one side the discourse of the strongand clever girls which clearly has madeits mark on their subjectivity, but whichhas met a somewhat mixed reception inschool. On the other side the discourseof the perfect body, a new arena ofachievement for ambitious girls whichboth threatens independence andwidens the field for agency and desire.Both Mari and Mette dream of becom-ing clothes designers. Maybe an attemptto build a bridge between the gender-discourses in which they are trying tofind themselves?

Gender as frame of interpretationThe point is not that these girls are to bepitied. Kari, Mari and Mette got a lot ofattention from teachers and fellowpupils, they got good marks, and aresure to be found among tomorrow’sadvancing young female professionals.The point is rather that discourses ofgender do not always change in pacewith individuals or school results.

Gender in school occurs in complexinteraction between different kinds ofgendered behaviour and the differentgendered interpretation of this behav-iour. This applies to all pupils, and itmay well be that an analysis of boy’sgendered school life would explain whysome of them have unchosen readingand are losing in the battle of schoolmarks. But when “the girls“ are com-pared to “the boys“ it is assumed thatthe groups are quite homogeneous. Inwhich case school would offer best fit toeither the one or the other gender.Through the last decades concern hasturned from the poor, overlooked girls,locked into a universe of masculinity, tothe poor immature boys, locked into auniverse of femininity. The one group isjust fine, the other to be pitied. Such adefinition of the problem overlooks thefact that girls and boys can meet differ-ent problems at school, and that notnecessarily all girls and all boys meet thesame problems.

This article was first published in Norwegian in NIKK magasin 2-2003

REFERENCESBjerrum Nielsen, Harriet og Larsen, Kirsten. 1985: Piger ogdrenge i klasseoffentlighen. University of Oslo, Pedagogiskforskningsinstitutt, rapport 2, 1985Bjerrum Nielsen, Harriet og Rudberg, Monica. 1989. Historienom jenter og gutter. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget Bjerrum Nielsen, Hariet. 1998.’Sophie og Emile i klasseværelset“in Jens Bjerg (ed.): Pædagogik – en grundbog til et fag.København: Hans Reitzel.

NOTES1 During that period Norway was subject to a school reformlowering school entrance age from 7 to 6, and thus renumber-ing the grades. Primary school (grades 1 through 7) and lowersecondary school (grades 8 to 10) are compulsory. It is alsocommon to complete upper secondary for pupils aged 16through 19. For more information about the Norwegian schoolsystem see English language home pageshhttp://odin.dep.no/ufd/engelsk/education.

2 Here a cultural comment may be useful. The Nordic countrieshave traditions for non-authoritarian child upbringing whereindividuals are encouraged to express opinions, also criticalones. The learning environment at all levels of school is there-fore more interactive than may be the case in other countries.


T his author feels that queer-thinking1 is an undemocratictheory and asks whether

expanding masculinity projects mightbe hidden behind trendy queer per-formance.

Trans and queerIn the debate mentioned above aboutthe trans-movement at last year’s PrideFestival in Stockholm the participantsplead that they genuinely “are“ whatthey feel like, and insist on living assuch. For the trans it is important tocreate an exterior which matches theinterior, to signal an inner identitythrough outer signs or indications suchthat others understand who they “are”.The thought assumes the modernitydiscourse’s conception of a subjectwhich is divided in an inside and anoutside, where the inner and the outer issupposed to correspond according tocultural rules for consistency. As presup-posed, it is the inside, the inner feeling,which is superior and is given status of

being the “truth” (Lundgren 2001).This is the background when they referto being born in the wrong body, thatthey have always experienced and feltthemselves as if they for instance “are”women born in a man’s body.

The same day in the same buildingthere is a queer-feminist seminar focus-sing on sexuality. The signs “man” and“woman” are more interesting than the“real” gender, it is pointed out from thepodium, since sexuality in our culture isdefined by gender. The audience is toldthat drag-king is this year’s offer toqueer women; but also den butchy les-bian, she who uses male gender attrib-utes, is positively biased since butchimplies brains. Both the drag-king andthe butch are intended to be disso-nances, a game with sexual attributes,but the performances only discord ifone interprets them with a given cultur-al framework for accordance. The per-formance depends upon a dichotomousgender model; without the cultural sig-nals for man and woman and their strict

interpretation, and with heterosexualityas distance marker, the staging is with-out significance. The basic recipe, twogenders with opposite signs, can bemixed in new ways given that the outerexpression such as clothes and make-upare consistent and in accordance witheach other. These post-structuralist par-ticipants stage identity outwardly,through the use of outer signals whichmust accord with each other (Rosenberg2002). For example, it is not possiblefor the one who dresses as a femme,with female gender attributes, to act likea butch. The rules for what accords andwhat disaccords are culturally estab-lished, and “the others” – individualothers, media, the public – must con-firm the dissonance.

”The others cultural eyeCommon for post- and modernitythinking about identity is that peopleunderstand themselves through the cul-tural signs for gender and sexuality.Established categories for gender and

Queering Me Softly – orExpanding Masculinity?By EVA LUNDGRENProfessor of Sociology, Centre for Feminist Studies in Social Sciences, University of [email protected]

She on the far left feels like Martin. He beside her is Madeleine. He says thatemotions are the most important confirmation of who one is, and he feels insult-ed if someone doesn“t treat him as a woman. They are participating in a panelalong with Don Kulick, who feels like a queer-expert and a known lesbian who isafraid of using wrong terms, when everything stands and falls with the rightname: man, woman, HBT: homo, bi, trans. Another person in the panel is uncom-fortably confused: “When we in the homo-movement don’t know who is what,how can we then know who the enemy is?’ For everyone in the panel self-defini-tion is vitally important, so important that they demand that “others“ only per-ceive what they have decided they should perceive.


sexuality are connected, dependingupon which individual identity is beingsignalled, and “the others’’ confirmationof this identity is completely necessary.“Others” are assumed to see with thesame eyes and to understand what thesignals indicate, including the culturalcodes for what accords with what, andwhat discords. There is no room forunsorted performance and protestingagainst category constraint other thanthe compulsory breaches which followstrict and established rules.

I ask myself: what scenarios do wearrange if we emanate from self-defini-tion being a human right and at thesame time insist that acknowledgementin the eye of others is vital – so impor-tant that we demand that “others” seewho we are, as we see ourselves? Theabove mentioned trans and queer proj-

ects are intended to queer and discord,some more softly than others, but Iwonder: Can expanding projects ofexpanding masculinity hide behind thequeering me softly-staging?

Esben and Esther on stageIn the prize-awarded film “Alt om minfar” (“All About My Father”) we meetEven’s, that is the son’s, staging of hisfather, the Norwegian medical doctorEsben Benestad. When the main char-acter alternately stages himself as a man,Esben, and a woman, Esther Pirelli, ithappens in a stereotyped way. Esbenrepairs his car and smells sweaty; Esthermakes herself up and is unusually poor-ly furnished in the head; interchangingbetween super- and subordination sig-nals. The main character decides notonly that he is man or woman, but also

when he wants to be man or woman,what kind of man or woman he wantsto be, and insists, in the meeting with“the others” interpretation, on an inter-pretation privilege, with the help ofarguments like “inherent disposition”and “that’s the way I am’. In my inter-pretation of the movie in the Norwegiannewspaper Dagbladet (November 2,2002), this is an illustration of the casethat masculinity can mean sovereignfreedom of choice (Svalastog 1998), andthat Esben’s trans-performance can looklike a well known maleness project. Thishighly modernity-inspired -project ofidentity can be understood as a mascu-linely loaded project with a powerfulpossibility of interchangeability for theone with full freedom of choice. Inother words, the identity project hashuge profits.

In his answer to me (DagbladetNovember 17, 2002) the main charactersays: “I always feel like a woman, alwaysfeel like a man” (my cursives). The outerexpression or the outside, “the femaleexpression”, as Esben Esther calls it, ison the other hand a means of makingothers perceive him /her as a woman,and in that manner create “femalebelonging” for the main character.Then he feels like the one he alwaysfeels like.

The film’s main character differenti-ates sharply between the real EsbenEsther and the outer expression, whichonly is a means to get others to see whathe wants them to see. The outer staging– the exposure – in the others’ gaze isstill essential in the shaping of identity:it is what is going to confirm that he is who he feels like he is. As well as the pride-seminar speaker, Esben alsoassumes that it is necessary to put him-self on stage, and they expect that all themembers of the audience have the samegaze as they have. They don’t pay athought to the possibility that otherscan have other glasses, crooked corneasor even be cross-eyed.

The narrativeIn this perspective Benestad’s self-expo-sure on stage can be interesting throughtime; that is as it is expressed in the nar-

Even Benestad with his father Esben Esther Pirelli Benestad at the Amanda Awardsceremony at the Norwegian International Film Festival in Haugesund, where”Alt ommin far” (All about my father) was awarded the prize for the best Norwegian featurefilm for cinema in 2002.

Phot

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rative about Esben Esther PirelliBenestad. Through the many exposuresin media and in the film “All about myfather”, a story is created about a manwho early, as a child, sometimes dressedin women’s clothes. A man who in timefeels like a man, and sometimes as awoman – but who now always feels likeboth a man and a woman.

In the narrative the expanding gen-der project is infiltrated in a sexualityproject. At the time Esben every nowand then dressed in women’s clothes, hewas the father of two and married toLiv. He got divorced and married thepsychologist and sexologist Elsa Almås.The stable heterosexual direction ofdesire is in this period combined withEsben sometimes feeling like and“becoming” a woman, but it is notEsther, but Esben who is attracted toElsa. Esther has no sexual desire whatso-ever; she rather depicts herself as anasexual being giving birth to poetrywhile she bakes bread. Elsa is left tointeract sometimes with Esben, some-times Esther, while it is the man, Esbenwho she is attracted to. As time passesEsther is the one being staged more andmore of the time as Esben disappears,and we understand that there is a limitto Elsa’s interest.

Who attracts who?In his answer to me Esben Esther says:“I am a person who is attracted towomen, not all women, but some ofthem – and especially to Elsa Almås”(my cursives). It is probably no coinci-dence that the gender terms have disap-peared here replaced by “person”. Is theman and woman – as the main charac-ter always feels like – attracted to Elsa?“Lesbian flirt with Elsa is not the thingin my life that gives me the greatesterotic experience, but it’s not complete-ly without reward’, says the main char-acter. Lesbian is a term for female samegender sexual desire, it assumes in otherwords that it is Esther who desires Elsa.Here at least I get confused, and notonly by the apparent contradiction. Themain character’s performance is depend-ent on acknowledgement from “theother” to be who she is, but Elsa does

not desire Esther – and then Esther cannot, according to her own logic, get theacknowledgement which is necessary toperceive herself as the one she feels sheis. And if the main character always feelslike two genders, man and woman, andElsa and the rest of the audience knowthat and see behind the stereotype one-gendered outer exposure, who and whatis it possible for “the other” to acknowl-edge? The expanding gender? That thereare no limits for the male gender?

The expanding genderIn the TV-3 documentary “Född i felkropp” (“Born in the Wrong Body”)(November 21, 2002), we meet twentyyear old Jojo – Johan – Pettersen. He hasa short fur jacket, lips like Julie Roberts’,false eyelashes, long bleached hair, glit-tering long nails. “Maybe I look like aBarbie doll – but a smart Barbie doll”,says Jojo. He follows the well knownscript of being born as a boy, but has asfar as he can remember felt like a girl.Jojo has lived for years as a homosexualman, but has now decided to live as aheterosexual woman. To become whatshe feels like, Jojo is going to eat hor-mones and attain womanly forms. Whatdistinguishes Jojo’s story from many oth-ers is that Jojo wants to keep his peniswhile his friend Hanna wants “to changegender completely”. Jojo says: “I feel likea girl, but at the same time I like mybody and my dick”. “Do I have to muti-late myself to fit into a form?” Tobecome a woman the usual way, to getthe genitals that correspond to the gen-der, is to be mutilated for Jojo. Themutilation indicates the cutting away ofsomething that belongs to oneself, inother words: the normgiving model is amale body.

Jojo does not want to be a mutilatedwoman; she wants to be a woman with apenis. But female identity is not “locat-ed in the genitals”; as for Esben it islocated in the inner feeling. None ofthem is willing to lose the penis, butthey both want “the others’’ acknowl-edgement of their femininity. Accordingto the researchers Suzanne Kessler andWendy McKenna (1978) showing theslightest penis-attribute is enough to be

considered to be a man in our culture. Itis often more difficult for MTF (MaleTo Female) transsexuals than FTM-transes to convince their surroundings oftheir “inner gender-identity”; at the firstsign of “a five o’clock shadow”, they arerevealed. According to this line of argu-ment it is the main criterion for beingmale Jojo and Esben will keep. Is it pos-sible that we find the added value of themasculinity projects in the phallus,where the penis symbolizes the powerpotential? Is that why masculinity besuch an all-encompassing project –expanding to sovereign freedom ofchoice, interpretation privilege, two gen-ders in one, woman with penis?

In Suzanne Osten’s play “Det allraviktigaste” (“The Most Important”) atthe Unga Klara theatre in Stockholmactress Ann Petrén changes gender asothers change costumes. Five malegestalts are staged. The erotically attrac-tive dream man for women is androgeni-cally perfect, carries himself well, is beau-tiful, flows in his sexuality, and desiresboth men and women. But mostlywomen. Another attractive man is theheterosexual lonesome cowboy.Regardless of version, to fill space androom as a man does was the most diffi-cult part of the performance, says AnnPetrén (Dagens Nyheter January 12,2003). Acknowledgement from “the oth-ers” is also necessary to become a man;but a man does not have to seekacknowledgement, for example by adapt-ing and nodding, or laughing and actinghappy. To stage oneself as a man meansto take for granted that the others are lis-tening to who you signal you are, andgive you adequate space as this personwithout you tidying yourself up. If this isthe costume of power in the sense givento the male sign by Petrén, then a mancan count on the outer exposure and per-formance bringing not only the others’acknowledgement, but also that they willconfirm what he wants them to confirm.

Sex in the public eyeIt seems that Pirelli to a higher degreeperceives himself to be who he “is”when he is exposed to the public eyethan from the acknowledgement of


Elsa’s eyes. The stage seems to suit hisproject, and illustrates that identity asan outer performance needs an increas-ing amount of exposure to the publiceye. The supposedly private – sexualmeetings – can then easily be trans-formed into something public. In a sit-uation where queer-inspired sexual dis-play has become public – exposed forthe public eye with demands ofacknowledgement – one can becomewhoever one wants to be: correctlytransgressing boundaries. As a logicalconsequence, in Stockholm men’shomo-political demands to be usingpublic parks for fucking and blow-jobsin others’ acknowledging sight are beingpromoted.

…and still more expansionIf identity is an outward indication,something we choose to be, why thenlimit the choice to gender and sexuality– woman, man, trans, hetero, homo, bi,queer? I personally have for a long timebeen wanting to be a young Nigerianhorse of aristocratic blood. Can I choose ethnicity? Class? Age? “Foreveryoung…” The 74 year old Norwegianartist Lars Kristian Gulbrandsen whocomes from my home district does justthat. Every time he looks in the mirrorhe sees Tatjana, 23 years old. Tatjanawears a mini-skirt and plateau shoes,and paints herself with wall-paint. Thesame company who stood behind thefilm “All about my father” has also madea documentary about her.

If we can chose who we want to be,we also have to take the consequences ofour choices, and expose them for criti-cism. With the possibility for maleexpansion that is offered by this think-ing, dirty old men should accept thehard criticism they receive when theyare so silly as to choose such an unpleas-ant identity! If we can choose who weare and how others are to see us – astemporary gender-benders, as two gen-ders at the same time, as women withpenises, then it is a matter of an expan-sion-project. What will the next expan-sion-sign be, if acknowledgement in theothers’ eyes works as a kick which needsstill greater expansion?

Unsorted sight – how queeris queer?Queer’s intention to question bound-aries for gender and sexuality indicatesan enormous interest for borders andboundaries. Boundlessness and disso-nance can only be understood in thelight of such obsession with categories(terms). This implies that what is trans-gressed, that which is on the wrong sideof the border, become important as thenormal back-drop against which wepose. In a society lacking these codeswhich queer lifestyle wishes to challengeand oppose, staging oneself as a westernqueer would not be especially challeng-ing or oppositional. Its explosive force isdependent upon certain cultural codesfor it to be able to cause dissonance. Iimagine that the explosive political forcein the feminist project can not lie inwanting to maintain patriarchalarrangements just to have a back-dropfor us to appear feministically clear, butrather in driving the patriarchal arrange-ments toward the cliff and over theedge, smashing them in the fall, untilthere not even be dust left of them. Inthis perspective queer-theory’s symbiosiswith existing heteronormality and strictgender-rules is quite problematic. Andidentity-shaping exclusively within theframe of the cultural monkey does notgive any opening for unsorted identityconstruction, neither individually norgroup-wise.

Well known masculinityEsben Esther Pirelli Benestad representsa well known masculinity based on free-dom of choice. He alternates betweenstereotype categories, but is completelydependent upon the outer performanceto become who he is. There is always arisk involved when one mirrors oneselfin other’s eyes, both individual othersand the media as other. Because it is notsure that the others see that whichPirelli or the pride participants or Jojowants to express. Pirelli assumes that heis on top of the interpretation hierarchy,he – as Petrén’s men – having learnedfrom the Old Testament’s god Jahve’spresentation: “I am who I am”. Pirellijust assumes that “the others”, they who

one mirrors oneself against, slavishlyfollow the cultural norm concerninggender-signs and sexuality-signs, corre-spondence and dissonance. But fortu-nately it happens that others haveunsorted sight, breaking with the cul-tural codes for what fits together andwhich boundary breaking is correct.

Queer calls for a feministagendaThe renowned lesbian who I mentionedin the introduction was afraid to use thewrong terms. If self-definition and itsacknowledgement in other’s eyes is ahuman right, the fear is well grounded.If the others only get to see what I wantthem to see, then I assume a position ofgreat power demanding that other peo-ple’s brains be colonized. In this per-spective queer is an undemocratic proj-ect, and is based on – and will preserve– inequality and super-/subordination.On meeting the expanding masculinityfocus under the queer-flag of sexuality,where masculinity appears as withoutpower, feminist theory should not con-tent itself with reminders that there ismore than one gender. Analysing genderwithout dismissing power’s performanceis more feministically demanded thanever.

This article was first published in Norwegian in NIKK magasin 1-2003.

REFERENCESFödd i fel kropp – TV-3 dokumentar 21/11 2002 (se også[email protected]: ”De är kvinnor – födda sommän”).Kessler, Suzanne og McKenna, Wendy 1978: Gender. An Ethno-metodological Approach. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.Lundgren, Eva 2001: Ekte kvinne? Identitet på kryss og tvers.Pax Forlag A/S, Oslo.Lundgren, Eva 2002: En gammeldags machomann. Dagbladet2/11.Pirelli Benestad, Esben Esther 2002: Eva Lundgrens uetterrette-ligheter. Dagbladet 17/11.Skawonius, Betty 2003: Befriande att få vara sexistisk. DagensNyheter 12/1.Svalastog, Anna Lydia 1998: Det var ikke meningen. Om kon-struksjon av kjønn ved abortinngrep, et feministteoretisk bidrag.Teologiska institutionen, Uppsala universitet.

NOTES1 Queer-theory analyses heteronormativity as a heavy culturalcategorization. One way to exercise a critical approach to het-eronormativity is to stage oneself as queer. Often one thentries to create ‘disharmony’ through untraditional combinationsof gender attributes and sexuality.


T he use of sexuality in mass cul-ture as an attention-catchingdevice and as a means of

addressing specific target groups is byno means as new as would appear fromthe debate. In Denmark pictures of sex-uality have been represented legally inthe public arena since a change in thelegislation liberated pictorial pornogra-phy in 1969 (Thing, 1999). However,there is good reason to assert that inrecent years references to sexual mattershave proliferated. But what is new - andthis presents us with a massive challenge- is the vastly increased imprint ofpornography in mass culture. This is the

case not merely in advertising, but as ageneral trend in fashion coverage, inyouth magazines, in TV programmesand music videos, and not least in cam-paigns launched by young people them-selves. And it all hangs together: therevival of stereotypes in the representa-tion of gender is very much connectedwith the breakthrough of pornographyin mass culture /Sørensen & Cawood2002, Sørensen 2002).

The mainstreaming ofpornography: “porn chic”“Mainstreaming” is the term which bestdesignates the presentday position of

pornography in our culture. In severalof his books the British media researcherBrian McNair has dealt with the phe-nomenon known in media research as“porn chic” (McNair 2002 and 2003).This designates the cultural process bywhich pornography slips into our every-day lives as a commonly accepted andoften idealised cultural element. Thisprocess is accelerated by three interact-ing tendencies. The first is volume: thisapplies both to the fact that pornogra-phy has become available in greaterquantities and to the fact that it is moreeasily available. Limitations of time,place and supply no longer apply for

Pornography and gender in mass cultureBy ANETTE DINA SØRENSENResearcher on sexuality [email protected]

If we are to credit the public debate, the last few years have witnessed a newphenomenon in Scandinavia. This is referred to as “the sexualisation of the publicarena”, with the implication that there is an increased reference to sexuality inmass culture. But what is actually new about this situation is the far greaterimprint of pornography in mass culture and the gender stereotypes which arethe offshoot. In the 1990s advertising images reflected the postmodern dissolu-tion of the traditional meaning of gender, but now there is a backlash bringing areturn to extremely traditional representations of gender.

would-be users of pornography. Parallelto these changes in supply and availabil-ity, there is a clean-up tendency,through which regular pornographybecomes respectable. This trend is pro-moted by the mass media’s growinginterest in the field and appears in suchdiverse genres as TV documentaries, ref-erences in ordinary magazines to porno-graphic internet links, reviews of porno-graphic magazines, and articles dealingwith pornography and pornographyuse, and in live reports from strip clubsor S/M cellars (Sørensen 2003). In

Denmark, one latest manifestation ofthis clean-up tendency is an ex-porn-model’s autobiographical account of her“amazing” life in the international pornindustry (Kean & List 2002).

Normalising porn useIn their dealings with pornography themass media operate quite consciously inthe schismatic field between taboo andliberated explicitness. The motivationfor their coverage of the topic is formu-lated as a public service wish to docu-ment and provide information aboutthe shady side of existence. All the same,the real agenda seems to be to challengenorms and shift boundaries. It is arguedboth explicitly and implicitly that itought to be acceptable to say and showthings which some people regard asgoing beyond the limits of decency, andit is implied that the reader’s or viewer’sacceptance of pornography and its pres-ence in mass culture is merely a ques-tion of broadmindedness. In otherwords, if one has reservations on thematter one is simply not broadmindedor liberated enough. The Danish youthmagazine Tjeck, which targets both

sexes, is financed by the trade unionmovement and is distributed free to allyoung union members - has ridden theporn wave since the mid-90s. InFebruary 2002 the magazine carried anarticle entitled “Snoop Doggy Dogg – Ihave fucked one million ho’s”; this is agood example of what is stated above.At first glance the article appears to be adiscussion of the ethical dilemmasposed by pornography as exemplified bythe story of a young man who suffersmoral qualms in connection with thepurchase and use of Snoop Doggy

Dogg’s hardcore porn video. However, itsoon appears that the theme of the arti-cle is not so much ethical dilemmas asthe fascination exerted by pornography,and that its purpose is to legitimise andnormalise pornography use. The mainarguments of the critics of pornographyare explicitly made to look ridiculous,and the message is underlined bydetailed consumer information onwhere the film can be obtained and bythe use of pictures and citations fromSnoop’s porn video (Tjeck Magazine2002/123: 42-45).

Pornographic fragmentsSimultaneously with the two tendenciesmentioned above, a third tendencyemerges via the process known as “pornchic” or mainstreaming of pornography.Fragments of pornography slip out intothe mass culture. On billboards, inmusic videos, in fashion reportage andin youth magazines there is an increas-ing use of figures, stylistic features andverbal expressions which are not inthemselves pornographic though theyare studiously cited from a pornograph-ic universe: such things as the postures

and dress of photo models, their move-ments, the scenes in which they are pic-tured, the lines they are given to speak.Thus the fashion reportage in Sisley’sautumn 2002 catalogue used stronglysexualised images with clear reference toboth sex with animals and classic porno-graphic scenarios. One item in the cata-logue carries a reference to the cum-shot, that is, the climax of a porn film’splot where a male model ejaculates intothe mouth or onto the face of a femalemodel. Here a paraphrase of the cum-shot is given in a picture of a young

woman squirting milk into her mouthfrom a cow’s udder. The milk tricklesout of her mouth and down her chinwhilst she looks ecstatically and teasing-ly out of the page, her glance correspon-ding exactly to that directed at theimaginary viewer by a model in a tradi-tional porn film.

Stereotyped gender representationsThe mainstreaming of pornography inmass culture gives rise to a set of prob-lems connected with the way in whichthe sexes are represented. Much regularpornography, and especially ordinaryhard-core porn, makes use of a gender-role stereotype which seeps into themass culture as it draws on pornograph-ic references. This is especially true ofadvertising, but as stated is also the casein more ordinary fashion reportage. Toput it bluntly, the division of roles inmainstream hard-core pornography isthe classic one: the women exhibitthemselves, allure with voluptuousmovements and then provide sexualservicing. The men fall for it, and areunfailingly virile. Naturally, this gender



representation does not occur in allpornography; but the point is that it isincreasingly present when advertisingimages and fashion coverage ape porno-graphic styles. This is not simply a mat-ter of retro, where historical nooks andcrannies are rummaged through andtraditional gender representations recy-cled; rather, a more limited, one-dimen-sional representation of gender is per-vading mass culture and securing afoothold as the sole valid account of themeaning of masculinity and femininity.

This situation is particularly surpris-ing with respect to the advertisingindustry, which generally has the reputeof being “streetwise”, able to size upsocietal tendencies and get on board ofcultural trends as soon as they appear.Relations between the sexes are noexception. For the last 50 years advertis-ing has functioned as a seismographrecording movements in gender rela-tions. Every expansion of the role reper-toire or shift of power relations hasimmediately been registered, staged anddistributed to the consumers.

The diversity of the 1990sSeen with hindsight, and in the light ofthe pornographic breakthrough in massculture, the 1990s was a decade in whichthe traditional meanings of gender weredecisively dissolved in advertising. Thiswas quite in line with the way thingswere going in society as a whole, as wellas with postmodern ideas about the cul-tural construction and potential alter-ability of gender. In advertisementswomen conquered the public sphere,took possession of the car and brokedown the doors of male sanctuaries.They were represented as powerful, intel-lectual, independent beings. The varietyof meanings were also characteristic forthe descriptions of masculinity served upby the mass culture. It became possiblein the 1990s to pull the meaning of mas-culinity free of power and the breadwin-ner role, and to represent men as sexobjects, sensitive dependent individualsand caring fathers. As Marc O’Polo pro-claimed in 1997: “The male swan willwatch over the offspring while his matesearches for food” (Sørensen 1997).

Today – or so it seems - the diversi-ty of gender representation has againbeen forced out to the mass-culturalmargins and we are heading towards theultimate sexualisation of femininity: areduction of the meaning of femininityto “sexy”. It was recently emphasisedthat “sex” is the paramount mark offemininity, during all the hullabaloosurrounding the launch of Yves St.Laurent’s new men’s perfume “M7”.The advertisement shows a full-frontalnaked man with the penis clearly visible,and a number of men’s magazines,including GQ, found this so offensivethat they refused to publish the adunless the picture was expurgated. Thus,despite 30 years of so-called sexual liber-ation it is still only possible to show full-frontal nakedness if the model is female.And the reluctance to use pictureswhich sexualise reified masculinity maymean that the increased sexualisation ofmass culture in the wake of the porn-chic tendency will only apply to repre-sentations of women and femininity,and that femininity will thus have sig-nificance exclusively in connection withsexuality.

Wanted: alternative narra-tives of genderThe mass-cultural mainstreaming ofpornography (the porn-chic tendency)saddles us with the kind of problemwhich may well have circulated in ourculture in earlier times but which nowstrikes with renewed force. When therange of gender images available in massculture presents an increasingly one-dimensional view of what masculinityand femininity can mean, the possibili-ties for identification at the disposal ofboys and girls, young men and women,are drastically limited. Media researchhas taught us that there is a correspon-dence between reality and the picturesdrawn of it by mass culture (Drotner1996). It is not solely the case that peo-ple’s various life practices influencemass-cultural pictures and narratives;the influence also goes the other way:people’s life practices take shape fromthe images produced by mass culture.Those images, therefore, do not simply

screen off reality: they also contribute toforming that reality. So if we are seriousabout the Scandinavian ideal of equalityand wish to create equal opportunitiesfor men and women it is imperative thatalternative mass-cultural narrativesabout gender are created for the genera-tion which is now growing up. If thereare no stories about female companydirectors, professors and presidents, orabout male sex-objects and caringfathers, how can the new generationever realise that these possibilities exist?And how are they to learn that genderneed not limit options?

This article was first published in Danish in NIKK magasin 1-2003

REFERENCESDrotner, Kirsten, (1996): Øjenåbner. Unge, medier og modernitet.Skriftserie fra Center for Ungdomsmedier, Nr. 1,Dansklærerforeningen [Eye-opener. Youth, media and modernity.Publications from the Centre for Youth Media, no. 1, Associationof Danish Teachers]Kean og Henrik List (2002): Katja - Stjerne i syndens by[Starin the city of sin], Tiderne SkifterMcNair, Brian (1996): Mediated sex – pornography & postmod-ern culture, ArnoldMcNair, Brian (2002): Striptease culture – sex, media and thedemocratisation of desire, RoutledgeSørensen, Anette Dina (1997): ”Kønsrepræsentationer og erotiser-ing – strejftog gennem 40 års reklamebilleder”, i Kvinder, Kønog Forskning 4/97: 63-71. [”Gender representations and erotici-sation – an excursion through 40 years of advertising images”,in Women, Gender and Research]Sørensen, Anette Dina og Cawood, Sarah Højgaard (2002): Videnom pornografiens effekter på børn og unge [Pornography’seffect on children and young people], a memo addressed tothe Ministry for gender equality, June 2002.Sørensen, Anette Dina: “Pornchic – køn og pornografi imassekulturen [Porn-chic: gender and pornography in mass cul-ture ”] in the anthology Perspektiver på ungdom og køn[Perspectives on youth and gender] (ed. Bibi Hølge-Hazelton),to be published April 2003Thing, Morten (1999): Pornografiens historie i Danmark [TheHistory of Pornography in Denmark], AschehougTjeck magazine, 2002/123, February 2002


A Nordic Research School in InterdisciplinaryGender StudiesBY SUSANNE V. KNUDSENSenior Researcher, NIKK [email protected]

and

NINA LYKKEProfessor, Department of Gender Studies, Linköping [email protected]

In November 2003 the Nordic Gender Studies centres received the happy messagethat their joint application for a Nordic Research School in InterdisciplinaryGender Studies has been approved by the Nordic Research Agency, NorFA. The planis to offer 20 PhD courses over a period of five years. The Research School is aresult of the successful development of Nordic gender research and researchtraining since the first co-operation started in the 1970s.

The School is expected to receivea grant of 5 million NOK (app.700.000 Euro) - 1 million

NOK per year over a five year period.The school is a joint venture between

• NIKK, from where Senior Re-searcher, Dr. Susanne V. Knudsen, willchair the board of the School

• The Department of GenderStudies, Linköping University, Sweden,where the Director of the School,Professor Dr. Nina Lykke, and theSecretariat is to be located

• A consortium of 34 partner uni-versities with units for Gender Studies.The majority of partner universities aresituated in the five Nordic countries,Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norwayand Sweden. As Northwest Russia andthe three Baltic States, Estonia, Latviaand Lithuania, are also eligible for fund-ing from the Nordic Research Agency,Gender Studies units from these fourcountries will also participate.

Organisation and planned activitiesThe new Research School will be organ-ized as a network or centre withoutwalls. Through letters of intent andthrough appointment of contact per-sons/key supervisors, the 34 partnerinstitutions have committed themselvesto collaboration within the frameworkof a joint programme of activities. In theconstitution of the partnership, specialattention has been given to integrate allmajor PhD training programmes andPhD-networks in InterdisciplinaryGender Studies in the Nordic countries,including the national Research Schoolswhich exist within the area in Swedenand Finland as well as all institutions,which regularly offers ad hoc PhDcourses within the field. Moreover, thecomposition of the partnership reflectsan effort to support the building of PhDtraining in Iceland, the Faroes and theBaltic States. A group of other Nordic

collaborators, including among other aSami college, has been affiliated for thesame reasons.

In addition, partnerships withselected international partners outsidethe region have also been established.Among these are the NetherlandsResearch School for Women’s Studies,the Centre for Women’s Studies at theUniversity of Lodz, Poland, and theEuropean network on Men andMasculinities, which some years ago wasset up with the help of EU-Commissionfunds. This network of internationalpartnerships is planned to be expanded.

The core of the Research School’sjoint programme of activities is plannedas a package of 20 PhD training coursesto be offered as 4 three-day courses eachyear. The programme of PhD courses isdesigned to benefit as much as possiblefrom the in-depth Nordic/Baltic/North-west-Russian knowledge-bases and thebroad, cross-disciplinary expertise


which the partners represent together.The courses will be developed andtaught by transnational teams, and allthe partners will be involved in coursedevelopment and teaching.

Thematic clusters In terms of contents, the course pro-gramme is organised as four main the-matic clusters, each with different sub-clusters. Two of the main clusters willgive a systematic overview of significantapproaches and conceptual frameworksin interdisciplinary Gender Studies. Asub-cluster will, for example, focus onfeminist theory and epistemology anddeal with theoretical and epistemologi-cal tensions between realist, poststruc-turalist, social-constructivist and post-social-constructivist approaches, and ondifferent levels of multi-, inter- andtrans-discipinarity which are significantfor Gender Studies. They will alsoinclude reflections on the historicaldevelopment of Gender Studies, givingspecial attention to the Nordic contextfrom the 1970s till today and to theimpact which changing conditions ofknowledge production in the knowl-edge-based society have had on thedevelopment of the field. Another sub-cluster will focus on methodologies incomparative and transnational GenderStudies research, giving special attentionto Cultural Studies- and Social Science-oriented approaches to comparativegender and diversity research in aNordic/Baltic/Northwest-Russian aswell as broader European perspective. Athird sub-cluster will deal with qualita-tive and quantitative empirical analysisin Interdisciplinary Gender Studies.The aim is to give systematic introduc-tions to theoretical backgrounds andanalytical implementations of bothqualitative and quantitative methodolo-gies in Interdisciplinary Gender Studiesas well as to tensions and possible syner-gies between the two approaches.Courses in research ethics and feministpedagogy will also be offered.

Two other main clusters will focuson a selection of interdisciplinarythemes such as Intersectionalities,Queer lifestyles, Feminism and Post-

colonial Theory, Masculinities andTechnobodies, and on a variety of socialscience & humanities topics for exam-ple Gender, Diversity and Welfare Stateand Feminist Cultural Studies.

Forum for self-reflection In addition to the joint programme ofPhD courses, the activities of theResearch School will include an annualworkshop for PhD supervisors andteachers. The aim is to develop a forumfor self-reflection and sharing of experi-ences among the School’s key supervi-sors and teachers, and for developingnew models and innovative practices byevaluating and jointly elaborating onexisting “best practices” as regards peda-gogy in PhD supervision, tutoring/mentoring and interdisciplinary co-teaching. A maximum of ICTs will beused to facilitate the development of theSchool as a virtual forum for creative,trans-institutional and trans-nationalnetworking, and for stimulating intel-lectual exchange which is not limited toexpensive face-to-face-meetings, butwhich can take place on a more day-to-day basis.

A history of research collaborationAn important background for the estab-lishment of the Research School is thelong-term development of NordicGender Research which has expandedinto a well-established and recognisedarea of research since the 1970s. Today,gender research is institutionalised ininterdisciplinary centres and depart-ments at a majority of the Nordic uni-versities. Moreover, Gender research hasbecome an integrated dimension ofmost human and social sciences, and ithas to some extent been developed as acomponent of technoscience studiesand medicine as well. Gender Studiesprofessors, doctors, PhD students etc.are at a majority of Nordic universities,employed both at an array of interdisci-plinary centres for Gender Studiesand/or affiliated with a broad spectrumof different disciplines.

The foundation of NIKK in 1995was a milestone in the development of

Nordic co-operation. Another is theNordic English-language journal,NORA, which has existed since 1993.However, Nordic co-operation startedas early as in the 1970s. A first impor-tant achievement was the early 1970sinitiative to create a broad Nordic studycircle with a title typical of the period:“The specific character of women’soppression under capitalism”. The circlebecame a major success. Sub-groupswere started in all Nordic countries andmet for several years as part of annualseminars of a leftist academic organisa-tion called the Nordic SummerUniversity.

Existing research training Another important background for theResearch School is the development ofPhD training within the field of GenderStudies which so far has primarily takenplace at national and local levels. Themajority of Nordic universities havethus enrolled PhD students to do gen-der research. The models for enrollingdo differ, however. PhD students can beenrolled:

a) Within the framework of a discipline, b) Within the framework of a disciplineand Interdisciplinary Gender Studiesprogramme, or c) Exclusively within the framework ofan Interdisciplinary Gender Studiesprogramme.

Most widespread is the combinedmodel b). A majority of Humanitiesand Social Science Faculties in theNordic countries has a number of PhDstudents who do gender research withinthe framework of a discipline, but whoseek theoretical and methodologicalinspiration for their research at PhDcourses in interdisciplinary GenderStudies.

Moreover a number of universitiesin Sweden, Norway and Finland areoffering programmes in interdiscipli-nary Gender Studies at which PhD stu-dents can be inscribed for the full dura-tion of their PhD research. Some ofthese programmes have institutionalisedthe combined model b: double affilia-


tion with a discipline and with theInterdisciplinary Research School.The PhD degree is in these casesawarded by the discipline. This modelis used by the national SwedishResearch School for Gender Studies atwhich 30 PhD students are enrolled.This School was founded in 2001based on a grant from the Swedishstate, and located at the University ofUmeå in collaboration with 3 smallcolleges (“högskolor”). The nation-wide Finnish research school, theGender System Graduate School, hasalso institutionalised the combinedmodel. This School was founded in1995 and re-organised in 2003. Thereis collaboration between the GenderStudies Centres at all Finnish universi-ties. The School has grants for 20PhD students at this time.

A small, but growing number ofNordic universities, located primarilyin Sweden, but also in Norway, havechosen to use model c: an affiliation ofPhD students to a discipline-inde-pendent degree-awarding GenderStudies programme. In 1999 theDepartment of Gender Studies,Linköping University, was started dueto a grant from the Swedish state, andbecame the first Nordic institution toestablish an interdisciplinary PhDdegree-awarding Gender Studies pro-gramme.

Most of the Gender Studies units,located at the universities in theNordic countries, offer PhD coursesin interdisciplinary Gender Studies onan ad hoc basis. This has been donesince the PhD model became institu-tionalised as model for Nordicresearch training in the 1990s.

In Norway and Denmark, nation-al PhD training networks has for sev-eral years ensured a minimum of reg-ular PhD courses in InterdisciplinaryGender Studies. In Iceland, theFaeroes and Greenland, there is nospecific offer of PhD courses inInterdisciplinary Gender Studies.However, at the University ofReykjavik, 3-4 MA courses in the fieldare offered annually, which are opento PhD students.

On the Nordic level, the courseprogramme of NIKK has since 1996ensured a regular offer of Nordic PhDcourses. This course programme hasbeen funded by The Nordic ResearchAgency. Until now the courses havebeen offered ad hoc on personal ini-tiative from the researchers at NIKK.

Training activities in the BalticStates and Northwest Russia are alsogoing to be part of the ResearchSchool. As part of the process of liber-alisation and democratisation whichfollowed in the wake of the fall of theSoviet Union, Gender Studies startedmushrooming both in Russia and inthe Baltic States. But the developmentof institutions, based on resource allo-cation, has been slower. In NorthwestRussia however, the EuropeanUniversity of St. Petersburg hasoffered Gender Studies at MA-levelsince 1997 and has now 8 PhD stu-dents with a Gender Studies compo-nent in their research. In the BalticStates there are Gender Studies centresat the universities of Tallinn, Riga andVilnius, but there are no possibilitiesto take a PhD degree in GenderStudies.

MouldingMasculinities,Volume 1 and 2

The two “Moulding Masculinities” vol-umes represent the first major publica-tion in English of Northern Europeanstudies on masculinities. They focus onmen’s relationships towards each otherand their bodies, primarily from psy-cho-dynamic and social constructionistperspectives. The contributors aredrawn from disciplines as diverse associology, social anthropology, mediastudies and sports sciences, and includescholars from Denmark, Sweden,Norway, Finland, The Netherlands,Germany, Australia, the UK and theUSA.

Volume 1 studies changes withinmasculine identity and subjectivity anddiscusses the construction of masculin-ities that arise from the relationshipsand understandings men developtowards their own and other men´sbodies, sexualities and masculinedis/abilities.

Investigating the relational aspectsof masculinity, volume 2 describes howdifferent masculinities are mouldedwithin diverse structures and settings.It explores how men interact with eachother and how they collectively react toand embody changing concepts of mas-culinity.

By centering on the struggle andnegotiation between different groupsand discourses of masculinity andinvestigating the origin of dominantimages and ideals of masculinity, thesetwo volumes will widen internationalunderstanding of how historic forms ofmasculinity are interpreted, revivedand combined in the process of mould-ing masculinities.

Moulding masculinities, volum 1 Among Men (ISBN 1840148047), volum 2 Bending Bodies (ISBN 1 84014 803 9).Edited by Søren Ervø, University of Copenhagen, Denmarkand Thomas Johansson, University of Gothenburg, Sweden,Ashgate 2003.

This is NIKK• Serves as a platform for co-operation

for Women's Studies and Gender Research in the Nordic Countries

• Promotes, initiates and co-ordinates Women's Studies and Gender Research in the five Nordic countries and internationally

• Strengthens the flow of information about women's studies and gender research within the Nordic countries and internationally

• Conducts research projects

NIKK is located at the University of Oslo togetherwith the Centre for Women's Studies and GenderResearch

UNIVERSITY OF OSLO

BAvtalenummer911000/211

Economique

To:

• NIKK is financed by the Nordic Council of Ministers.

• The Nordic Council of Ministers is a forum

for cooperation between the Nordic governments.

• The Nordic Council of Ministers implements

Nordic cooperation.

• The Prime Ministers have the overall responsibility.

• The activities are coordinated by the Nordic

ministers for cooperation, the Nordic Comittee

for Cooperation and portfolio ministers.

Founded 1971.

P.O.Box 1156 BlindernNO-0317 Oslo, NorwayTelephone +47 22 85 89 21Telefax +47 22 85 89 [email protected]

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DENMARKThe Co-ordination of Women's and Gender Studies in DenmarkHilda Rømer ChristensenSociologisk institutKøbenhavns UniversitetLinnésgade 22DK-1361 København Ktel: +45 35 32 35 01fax: +45 35 32 39 [email protected]://www.sociology.ku.dk/sochrc/index.htm

ICELANDCentre for Women's StudiesA∂albyggingHáskóli ÍslandsIS-101 Reykjavíktel: +354 525 4595fax: +354 552 [email protected]

NORWAYKILDEN Norwegian Information andDocumentation Centre for Women's Studies and Gender ResearchGrensen 5NO-0159 Oslotel: +47 22 24 09 35fax: +47 22 24 95 [email protected]://kilden.forskningsradet.no

SWEDENSwedish Secretariat for Gender ResearchGöteborg UniversityP.O.Box 200SE-405 30 Göteborgtel: +46 31 773 5600fax: +46 31 773 [email protected]://www.genus.gu.se

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