Logotyp: till Försvarshögskolans hemsida

Historically and traditionally, military work has been closely associated with men. However, the post-Cold War normalization process has brought about a transformation in both the Swedish Armed Forces themselves and the perception of the organization. Normative concerns, including gender equality, have gained significant prominence, compelling the armed forces to embark onvarious initiatives aimed at achieving a more gender-balanced structure. Despite the extensive profiling and efforts made by the Swedish Armed Forces (SAF) over the past decades, women currently make up only 11.9% of the military personnel.

This dissertation examines how (in)equality manifests itself in the military profession today, in view of the substantial changes that have occurred. The dissertation encompasses both the experiences of personnel and the actions of the organisation. By doing so, it sheds light on the gradual advancement of gender equality within the SAF, attributing this delay to resistance against change that becomes evident at the structural, organizational, and professional levels. This resistance is further explained through the concept of "functional disinclination," which emerges from the empirical studies presented in this dissertation.

Utilizing a range of data and methodologies, the dissertation collectively highlights an organizational incapacity to align with the normative demands set forth. The barriers to achieving gender equality are not merely reflective of resistance; they also form a recurring pattern that impedes the implementation of normative changes

The purpose of the study is to investigate how the everyday experience of being a man in a male-dominated organization and what navigating the organization is like. The study builds on 15 interviews with men of various ages and ranks in the Swedish Armed Forces. The findings revealed three major themes that illustrate how men, and their actions, contribute to producing and re-producing gendered norms. First, the ideal military person is seen to have characteristics that are predominantly male and even though respondents only identify with these characteristics to some extent, the typical male ideal is still prevalent within the Armed Forces. Second, this image is reproduced by an uncritical stance towards the internal workings of the organization, relating to career paths and their reliance of traditional gendered roles. Third, the Armed Forces encounter resistance to gender equality work from within the military organization, in both action and inactions. We suggest this is due to a resistance to change and that work with gender equality is minimized to a shadow task that lacks committed men. We conclude that men's reality seems both obvious and unreflected, and these structures are upheld within the Armed Forces.

How organizations engage with gender equality is crucial to them being perceived as fair and attractive employers. As recruitment and training of personnel is a core function of the military organization, it is relevant to investigate this from a gender critical perspective. The aim was to critically examine how a military organization operates in respect of equality of pay between women and men by means of a collective agreement, as an example of how the organization tries to address gender inequality. A qualitative analysis using Bacchi's 'What is the problem represented to be' (2009) analysis of policy documents was conducted. The analysis focuses on how the actual issue is problematized and what is left unproblematised, and the key findings are that efforts to achieve gender equality within the Swedish Armed Forces are counterproductive and result in perpetuating deficiencies in the organization's work with wider gender-equality issues. Despite external pressures, there is a structural reluctance and inability within the Swedish Armed Forces to seriously engage with addressing the organization's gender-equality issues. As resistance to gender-equality work is usually implicit, this study's strongest contribution to the field is that such resistance can be identified as being explicit and therefore more easily challenged.

Klimatförändringar, pandemier och skolskjutningar är alla exempel på samhällskriser som aktualiserar frågan om hur skolans personal arbetar i krissituationer. Vilken beredskap har skolan att hantera samhällskriser? Vilka kompetenser behöver skolans personal? Vad innebär det att vara en krisaktör? I boken beskrivs olika typer av samhällskriser, deras faser, orsaker och karaktäristika. Författarna argumenterar för att krishantering bör ses som en aspekt av den professionella lärarkunskapen och läsaren får ta de del av konkreta strategier och förhållningssätt som är en del av skolans krishantering. Barnperspektivet lyfts fram, liksom situationen i svensk skola och vilka förutsättningar som här finns för ett fungerande krishanteringsarbete, inte minst när det gäller förebyggande insatser. Skolans värld möter samhällskriser riktar sig till skolpersonal som behöver kunskap om krishantering i skolan. Boken innehåller forskningsnära diskussioner om hur en kris på olika sätt påverkar skolan, dess personal och eleverna. Den presenterar praktiska övningar för reflektion som kan användas som underlag i utbildning av blivande och verksamma lärare, men också av rektorer och annan skolpersonal.

The Armed Forces are one of Sweden’sSweden largest governmental organizations and at the same time one of Sweden’s most genderGender-segregated and male-dominated workplaces. Recruiting more women into the organization is one of the organization’s main goals for personnel planning, along with providing them with more opportunities for career developmentCareer development. This study sought a deeper understanding of the power resourcesPower resources that can be identified and which are used by female military personnel within the armed forces. A total of 16 women were interviewed and their ranks ranged from soldier/sailor to general/admiral. The qualitative analysis of the interviews shows that female military personnel use power resources to adapt to the male-dominated organization’s demands and to even out perceived asymmetric power relationships in their daily professional work. The power resources can be explained using four themes: structural power resources, cultural and social power resourcesSocial power resources, emotional power resources, and minority perspective as a power resource. More female military personnel would have increased the task effectiveness of the military organization. To make that possible, the Swedish Armed ForcesSwedish Armed Forces would have to discuss the prevailing masculinity norm, the meaning of being a man, and the gains of a more gender-equal organization.

The Swedish Armed Forces have traditionally been exclusively male, and service in the cause of defending the country has until recently been the privilege of men. While the very first women entered the military 37 years ago, the military has so far failed to fully integrate women into the organization and promote gender equality. The object of this study is to probe servicewomen's meanings, identities, strategies and experiences in a male-dominated institution. For that purpose, a qualitative approach was chosen, and nine female members of the Swedish Armed Forces, from private to general, were interviewed. The rich empirical data on what it means and feels like today to serve as a female minority as part of unique culture emphasizing corporateness - on their attitudes, options, dilemmas, contradictions as well as the double binds imposed on them by the prevailing male orthodoxy - are analyzed and discussed in light of Pierre Bourdieu's theoretical concepts : cultural capital, habitus, masculine domination and symbolic violence.