Change search
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf
The cohesive and dividing power of anti-fascism: Language and class among Finland-Swedes in the 1920s-1940s
Stockholm University, Faculty of Humanities, Department of History.ORCID iD: 0000-0003-4728-2765
Number of Authors: 42023 (English)In: Anti-Fascism and Ethnic Minorities: History and Memory in Central and Eastern Europe / [ed] Anders Ahlbäck; Kasper Braskén, Routledge, 2023, p. 75-91Chapter in book (Refereed)
Abstract [en]

This chapter analyses how the Finland-Swedish minority's identity construction related to anti-fascism during the interwar period. Many Swedish speakers were initially involved in the far-right Lapua movement, 1929–1932, which claimed to unite the language groups in its fight against communism. Other Swedish speakers, however, were concerned about the fate of the Swedish-speaking minority after the defeat of communism. Would it be next in line, just like national minorities in fascist Italy or German Nazism? Anti-communism remained a strong part of the political identity of many Swedish speakers, but as a response to ultra-nationalist mobilization among the Finnish far right, anti-fascism became a powerful albeit contested ingredient in the ethnic mobilization of the Swedish-speaking minority identity during the 1930s. The chapter presents three different layers of anti-fascist responses, including the liberal-conservative Swedish People's Party, the Swedish-speaking Social Democrats, and the anti-fascist minority literature produced by Swedish-speaking authors in interwar Finland. We interrogate in which ways class interests overrode or challenged demands for ethnic unity, and what external and internal pressures affected the formation of an anti-fascist minority position. The findings demonstrate how anti-fascism functioned as a force of both cohesion and division – and eventually compelled the leaders of the Finland-Swedish minority community to reassess their political alignments.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Routledge, 2023. p. 75-91
National Category
Political Science
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:su:diva-235017DOI: 10.4324/9781003393450-7Scopus ID: 2-s2.0-85178991599ISBN: 9781003393450 (electronic)OAI: oai:DiVA.org:su-235017DiVA, id: diva2:1909285
Available from: 2024-10-30 Created: 2024-10-30 Last updated: 2024-10-30Bibliographically approved

Open Access in DiVA

No full text in DiVA

Other links

Publisher's full textScopus

Authority records

Ahlbäck, Anders

Search in DiVA

By author/editor
Ahlbäck, Anders
By organisation
Department of History
Political Science

Search outside of DiVA

GoogleGoogle Scholar

doi
isbn
urn-nbn

Altmetric score

doi
isbn
urn-nbn
Total: 73 hits
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf