Explicit Tolerance and Implicit Exclusion: A Study on National Identity in Sweden

While people in many Western countries report increasingly tolerant and inclusive attitudes, minorities continue to face considerable, and in some cases growing, discrimination and exclusion. In this paper, I propose that the gap may stem from a discrepancy between explicit attitudes and more automatic, implicit attitudes. Most people may want to be inclusive and tolerant, but implicitly harbor more exclusionary views of belonging and national identity. To survey potential differences between explicit and implicit attitudes, I fielded a survey consisting of 217 Swedish participants who completed both explicit and implicit measures of perceived “Swedishness”. Participants were asked to evaluate four distinct minority groups: individuals with Norwegian, Finnish, Syrian, or Bosnian backgrounds. The results reveal significant differences between explicit and implicit perceptions, as well as between the different groups. All groups were explicitly perceived as Swedish, but only individuals with a Norwegian background were implicitly perceived as Swedish. The paper concludes by discussing the implications for research on Swedishness, national boundaries, and nationalism.