Interrogating Science Policy in a Pro Gender Equality Setting: The Case of Sweden

This paper interrogates science policy-making through a gender lens in a country setting that strongly promotes gender equality as a societal value and as an explicit policy goal. The paper asks: can something be learnt from this kind of a setting to benefit the implementation of the targets of the UN Sustainable Development Goals? Swedish society has among the smallest societal gender gaps in global comparison. With its long term history of gender equality policy and actions, and the current social democratic-green coalition government declaring itself as a “feminist government”, it provides an interesting societal setting for this kind of exercise. Gender mainstreaming the activities of public authorities is a strong policy line, including, among others, public research funding and innovation agencies, and recently universities. The paper addresses the question in what ways are gender dimensions integrated in Swedish contemporary science policy. How are problems in this arena articulated, defined, and contested? How are gender dimensions taken into account in the governance and steering of science, in science policy strategies, and in the activities of different key stakeholders and inter-organisational activities? How does international collaboration, specifically within EU and the Nordic region, reflect on how gender dimensions are taken into account in the Swedish science policy landscape? What kind of dilemmas and contradictions can be identified? The empirical material consists mainly of science policy documents, and is supported by material generated through participant observation in some science policy arenas, such as research funding agencies and governmental advisory committees, as well as media coverage. An emerging issue in gendering of science policy-making that is of high relevance to the SDGs is highlighting the gender dimension of research content in funding of research, in addition to the gender distribution of scientific labour force and among gatekeepers and decision-makers in science.