Victims or perpetrators? : A critical discourse analysis of how women and men are portrayed in regards to terrorism in the Swedish riksdag

This thesis examines how women and men are portrayed in regards to terrorism by Swedish parliament officials through Norman Faircloughs threedimensional model in critical discourse analysis. The empirical material consists of political debates from the Swedish riksdag annd was analysed through specific themes based on the previous work of feminist academics within the field of terrorism studies. The theoretical framework in this essay concluded that while men are usually described as the perpetrators of terrorism women were drawn upon either as victims or forgotten in the events of terrorism. The theoretical framework also concluded that women who perform violent acts of terrorism are usually described based upon the societal expectations of them or characterized as biologically deviant. The themes obtained by the theoretical framework were used together with Fairclough’s model to scrutinize the debates in order to discover if the themes were present and what the implications of different portrayals might be. The primary findings suggests that actors within terrorism are usually discussed in a gender neutral matter. Secondly, terrorism was portrayed as a consequence of the patriarchal system and the violence of men. Women were likewise portrayed as victims in the sense of terrorism. The final point of research concluded that traditional gender norms were present in the Swedish parliament but that the theories of Sjoberg and Gentry were not