What women cannot not want? : - a critical discourse analysis of Swedish gender equality policy in development cooperation

Gender equality is an important attribute in Sweden, much connected to the country’s selfimage. This thesis analyzes Swedish state policy strategies for Sweden’s works with gender equality abroad, in development cooperation. From a feminist postcolonial perspective, the thesis conducts a critical discourse analysis of the policy framework regulating Swedish development cooperation in relation to gender equality. The result show that women and men are constructed as discursively different in the policy framework. Further, the issue of gender inequality, as portrayed within the policy framework, constructs women as particular vulnerable and subordinated to men. A discursive construction which paradoxically reinforces the traditional, stereotypical gender norms which the policy framework aims to abolish. In line with this paradox the result also show that men are not recognized as responsible for gender inequalities nor are they lifted as agents of change in gender equality work. A result that suggests that women are both the ones in need of and the ones responsible for creating a gender equal future in developing nations according to the discourse of Swedish development cooperation policy.