Church of Sweden Apologizes to Sami for Involvement in Colonial Oppression & Past Abuses

Image by Thom Reijnders on unsplash.com

By Ebba Lekvall, Essex Law School

“Today, we acknowledge [these past abuses], and, on behalf of the Church of Sweden, I apologise.”

Those were the words of the Archbishop of the Church of Sweden, Antje Jackelén, as she led the reconciliation service in Luelå Cathedral this past Sunday (23 October), and officially apologised to Sweden’s indigenous population for the Church’s involvement in past colonial oppression and abuses. This is part of the Church’s reconciliation process and efforts in dealing with a dark past that has included forced Christianisation, destruction and desecration of Sami religious places and objects, active participation in grave looting in search of Sami remains, deprivation and suppression of Sami identity and culture.

The Sami are the only indigenous people of Europe and their traditional land – Sápmi – stretches across half of modern-day Norway and Sweden, as well as part of Finland and Russia. It is estimated that there are around 100,000 Sami in Sápmi, with 20,000-40,000 in Sweden.

Source: https://samer.se/karta

The Sami are believed to have lived on this land for thousands of years. In Sweden, colonisation of Sápmi began in the early 14th century but really took off in the 17th century when silver was discovered. This led to Sami populations being driven further to the north and west, which led to centuries of conflict between the Sami and colonisers as the Sami saw their rights, including to land and water, being curtailed. These rights are still being violated today in breach of international human rights law and Sweden has been criticised by the UN Special Rapporteur on the rights of Indigenous Peoples for its treatment of the Sami, including for the lack of protection for their right to their lands and resources.

The Church of Sweden was instrumental in the oppression of the Sami, who were forced to convert to Christianity (through methods like fines, imprisonment and even the death penalty) and to attend church, where their language and traditional joik singing was banned. As part of the Christianisation of the Sami, the Church also defaced Sami religious sites and destroyed drums used in traditional ceremonies. This contributed to the loss of traditional Sami religion and culture.

In addition, the Church was the main force in organising so-called “nomad schools” for Sami children, which were run between 1913 and 1962. Like the residential schools for indigenous children in Canada, these were boarding schools and based on racist ideology. However, unlike the Canadian schools, the purpose was not necessarily to assimilate Sami children into Swedish citizens. Rather, the schools in Sweden were created based on the understanding that reindeer-herding Sami should live according to what the Church considered to be as close to their nature as possible, whereas non-nomadic Sami should be assimilated into white Swedish society. Therefore, the children of reindeer herders were sent to the nomad schools, where they were provided sub-standard education, where Swedish was the language of instruction and where their own language was banned. Consequently, generations of Sami lost their language.

The Church was also involved in other racist policies. In 1922, the State founded the Institute for Eugenics. Its director, Herman Lundborg, believed in racial purity and argued that ideas about the equal worth of peoples was an illusion (he became an inspiration for German eugenics researchers whose work laid the foundation for many Nazi policies). Lundborg conducted his “research” on the Sami people which led to trauma, lasting generations. He travelled to Sápmi and measured skulls and faces of the Sami, and also collected information about eye and hair colour. He photographed each person, sometimes naked, and a catalogue of pictures with public access is still kept at the library at Uppsala University. Church representatives had a close relationship with Lundborg and they acted as points of contact between Lundborg and the schools and villages he visited.

While the State has remained largely silent and has yet to apologise, the Church has taken the lead in redressing past abuses against the Sami and has begun a reconciliation process which has included mapping its involvement in abuses and holding Ságastamallat (conversation or dialogue in Sami) – where testimonies have been collected about the experiences of the Sami and consequences of the Church’s abuses. The first one took place in October 2011 and the second took place 21-22 October. Two more Ságastamallat are planned – one in 2026 and one in 2031. The Church will then have spent 20 years working on the process of reconciliation.

The current (and retiring) Archbishop has, for many years, made repeated public comments about the Church’s past abuses against the Sami, and called for Sweden to deal with its colonial past. Under her leadership, the Church published a White Paper – “The Sami and the Church of Sweden” – where the Church “examines its guilt and responsibility towards the Sami in [Sweden’s] colonial past.” The White Paper documents past abuses and violations committed. The Church has also published a book about the nomad schools – “When I was eight, I left my home and I have still not returned” – which contains ten testimonies from persons who attended these schools. In the preface, the Archbishop wrote: “The Church took part in the colonisation of Sápmi and actively contributed to exercising power and control over the Sami. We delivered theological thought models that could justify the colonial system. Church representatives also had a driving role in the creation of the nomadic schools at the beginning of the 20th century.”

Last November, the Church made an official apology in Uppsala Cathedral, the seat of the Archbishop. This apology was repeated this Sunday in Luleå – which was symboliccally important as Luleå is located in Sápmi. Both apologies were made in Church services that were live streamed and still available online. The services were conducted in both Swedish and Sami. Importantly, the traditional joik was also included, as were several testimonies, including about experiences in the nomad schools and a poem about the racial policies of the Church. Others spoke about the loss of identity across generations, and how the loss of language and land (including land still owned by the Church) has contributed to the loss of culture.

The Archbishop’s apology acknowledged that the Church “has contributed to and legitimised oppression” and that the apology was only one step “forward on the long road of reconciliation.” As part of this road to reconciliation, and linked to the apology, the Church also made eight commitments, including to increase knowledge and awareness of the Church’s historical abuse against the Sami and the consequences of this and to expand knowledge of and respect for the principles of indigenous rights within the Church of Sweden and in society, as well as to preach the Gospel in the Sami languages and in the Sami cultural context, with respect for the Sami spiritual and ecclesiastical tradition.

After centuries of oppression at the hands of the Church, this public apology is an important step in the work done by the Church as part of the ongoing process of reconciliation. However, the Archbishop also acknowledged that “we cannot determine how you will receive this apology. It is not our place to demand to know when a response will be given and what that response will be.” Representatives of the Sami Parliament in Sweden have said that in order for the Sami people to accept the apology, practical action from the Church is needed. It remains to be seen whether the Church is able to deliver on its eight commitments and how the apology will be received by Sami communities.

In further developments, and perhaps spurred on by the Church’s work, the government agreed with the Sami Parliament last year to create a truth commission to “identify and review from a historical perspective the policies the Sami were subjected to and the subsequent consequences for the Sami people.” Commissioners were appointed in June 2022 and are expected to deliver their report in 2025. Little information is currently available about the commission, including details about its mandate, but it does not seem to include a mandate to recommend reparations.

Given the State’s history of dragging its feet when it comes to acknowledging responsibility for its abuses against the Sami, both past and present, and the fact that it refuses to ratify the ILO 169 Convention on indigenous rights, this is perhaps unsurprising. But it would be a missed opportunity nonetheless. At the very least, any reparations provided to the Sami should include acknowledgement of responsibility and an apology. With the Church leading the way, one can only hope the State follows suit.

Rethinking International Law from Amazonian Onto-epistemologies: the Kukama People and the Amazonian Waterway Project

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Cristina Blanco, PhD candidate at the School of Law, University of Essex, was awarded the PhD Fieldwork Grant 2021-22 by the Socio-Legal Studies Association (SLSA). Cristina’s research focuses on the interactions between Amazonian onto-epistemologies, international law (IL) and human rights in the context of an investment project.

In the Amazonian rivers, water flow varies significantly with the seasons. During the dry season, low water levels hinder the navigation of large vessels. Although the peoples inhabiting the Amazon rainforest have travelled and traded using these rivers over centuries, the fluctuating navigability prevents uninterrupted large-scale transport. This is the main reason why the Peruvian state is promoting the “Amazonian Waterway”, an infrastructure project that consists of removing sediments from the bottom of the main Amazonian rivers.

The Amazonian Waterway is far from being an isolated project. It rather reflects the neoliberal developmental paradigm favoured by IL (Escobar 2011, Pahuja 2011, Eslava 2019). In addition to generating serious socio-environmental impacts, the project hides a profound conflict of ways of understanding the world.

The Amazonian indigenous peoples conceive the territory as a space inhabited by human and non-human entities, a conception that challenges the very definition of what we call “nature”. The sharp distinction between humans and non-humans that governs the Western world and underlies modern (international) law is not necessarily present in Amazonian cosmologies (Viveiros de Castro 2004, De la Cadena 2010, Descola 2013).

For the Kukama-Kukamiria people, for instance, the territory is inhabited by different “categories of people” living in a “plurality of worlds” (Tello 2014). The river is an (aquatic) world in itself, inhabited by beings endowed with their own subjectivity and intentionality (Rivas 2011). Therefore, thinking from the Amazon means not only standing in a geographically different place but also thinking onto-epistemically different.

In this scenario, the main problem the research seeks to explore is that IL does not take this onto-epistemic diversity seriously. Instead, it frames the issue as a cultural question of relevance to indigenous collective rights. While such rights play an indispensable role in protecting indigenous worldviews, they are insufficient to prevent their elimination.

This, in turn, has important implications in areas as critical as the Amazon. Trying to make sense of IL from the Amazon, this case study provides the opportunity to explore how to move from the impact of IL in the Amazon (historically aimed at its internationalisation) to enable the influence of Amazonian epistemologies on IL. This exercise of “Amazonising IL” enables us to reveal the epistemological richness of the Amazonian cosmovision and explore its potential for rethinking IL.

The research has three main methodological components. Substantively, it is a socio-legal research that takes as the unit of analysis the interactions between IL, human rights and the Amazonian worldview relevant to the case study. In analytical terms, it has an interdisciplinary approach theoretically informed by Amazonian studies and critical approaches to IL. As for the empirical component, it uses a case study method based on qualitative analysis of documentary and visual information, as well as in-depth semi-structured interviews.

The fieldwork was possible thanks to the valuable support of the SLSA.

Bibliographic references

De la Cadena, M. (2010). “Indigenous cosmopolitics in the Andes: Conceptual reflections beyond “politics”.” Cultural anthropology 25(2): 334-370. https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1548-1360.2010.01061.x

Descola, P. (2013). Beyond nature and culture, University of Chicago Press. https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/B/bo9826233.html

Escobar, A. (2011). Encountering development: The making and unmaking of the Third World, Princeton University Press. https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691150451/encountering-development

Eslava, L. (2019). The Developmental State: Independence, Dependency, and the History of the South. In: The Battle for International Law: South-North Perspectives on the Decolonization Era. J. von Bernstorff and P. Dann, Oxford University Press: 71-100. https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-battle-for-international-law-9780198849636?cc=gb&lang=en&

Pahuja, S. (2011). Decolonising international law: development, economic growth and the politics of universality, Cambridge University Press. https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/decolonising-international-law/7E8B4FB0AAECFD08355914EE41DDB5C7

Rivas Ruiz, R. (2011). Le serpent, mère de l’eau: chamanisme aquatique chez les Cocama-Cocamilla d’Amazonie péruvienne, Paris, EHESS. http://www.sudoc.abes.fr/cbs/xslt/DB=2.1//SRCH?IKT=12&TRM=160329019&COOKIE=U10178,Klecteurweb,D2.1,E192cfbd9-1f1,I250,B341720009+,SY,QDEF,A%5C9008+1,,J,H2-26,,29,,34,,39,,44,,49-50,,53-78,,80-87,NLECTEUR+PSI,R95.151.73.225,FN

Tello, L. (2014). “Ser gente en la Amazonía, fronteras de lo humano: aportes del pueblo kukama.” Amazzonia indigena e pratiche di autorappresentazione. Milano, Franco Angeli: 39-48. https://www.francoangeli.it/Ricerca/scheda_libro.aspx?Id=21593

Viveiros de Castro, E. (2004). Perspectivismo e multinaturalismo en la América indígena. Tierra adentro: territorio indígena y percepción del entorno. A. Surrallés and P. Hierro. Copenhague, IWGIA: 37-82. https://www.iwgia.org/images/publications/0331_tierra_adentro.pdf

AHRC Grant for Consolidating Peace and Indigenous Rights through Higher Education – a Biocultural Indigenous University in the Andean Amazon of Colombia

Photo credit: Estudio Bosque

Dr. Matthew Gillett and Dr. Marina Lostal, both Senior Lecturers in Law at the University of Essex, have jointly been awarded the competitive AHRC Grant to “Develop international networks to research peace and trust”.

Their project, titled “Consolidating Peace and Indigenous Rights through Higher Education – a Biocultural Indigenous University in the Andean Amazon of Colombia”, addresses the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 16 concerning Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions.

Dr. Gillett and Dr. Lostal have been awarded approximately £60,000 over 24 months to create an international, multi-disciplinary and inclusive research network, linking Indigenous representatives with researchers, human rights experts, and educational professionals. They will conduct the project together with International Co-Investigator Santiago del Hierro (ETH Zurich).

In addition, they have been awarded a £2,000 grant through the Essex IAA Active Engagement Fund to kickstart the project before the official start date of the AHRC Grant.

The research is connected to efforts to establish a “Biocultural Indigenous University” (BIU) in the Andean Amazon of Colombia. By centring Indigenous pedagogy in an autonomous institution, the BIU model seeks to strengthen the preservation and inter-generational transfer of Indigenous knowledge and contribute to pluri-epistemic collaboration.

“It is from the messages that biodiversity transmits to us, that the idea of establishing a territorial university was born: the Pan-Amazonian Indigenous Biocultural University-AWAI, led by the Inga people of Colombia, a space for dialogue between Indigenous knowledge and Western techniques, technologies and science, from a decolonial and liberating perspective, deeply collective and non-ethnocentric, with a perspective of biocultural peace to promote life until the sun goes out”.

HERNANDO CHINDOY CHINDOY (Atun Wasi Iuiai (“AWAI”), the Indigenous Territorial Entity of the Inga People of Colombia

Equally, the research project seeks to contribute to SDG Targets 16.1 (reducing violence) and 16.4, (combating organised crime and illicit financial flows), by providing opportunities for Indigenous youth to obtain qualifications and employment and escape cycles of violence, criminality, and alienation.

Given the traditional Indigenous connection with surrounding ecosystems, the BIU model also offers a pathway to ecologically-centred sustainable development.

Centring on the BIU, the research network will explore the feasibility of Indigenous-led and autonomous tertiary education in Colombia. It seeks to address the following matters:

  • how an Indigenous-led university can be established and recognised as an autonomous institution;
  • the implications of this university for the rights of Indigenous people to education, cultural and a healthy environment; and
  • the parameters of a rights-based framework for establishing an Indigenous-led autonomous institution at the tertiary level.

Alongside the creation of the research network, the project will be realised through knowledge exchange, including a workshop in Colombia, meetings with Colombian officials, and an engagement with relevant United Nations Special Mandate holders. The project will complement the Devenir Universidad network, which is researching and documenting the pedagogic and spatial planning aspects of BIU.

Prof. Theodore Konstadinides, the Law School’s Director of Research commented: I wish to congratulate Marina and Matthew for their recent success. This is a very important interdisciplinary project that will enable us to further develop our international research networks in South America and cement the reputation of the Law School as a pioneer in addressing global human rights challenges. I am looking forward to seeing Marina and Matthew stimulating new debate and exchanging ideas with the relevant stakeholders in Colombia and promoting the United Nations’ sustainable development goals“.

Preliminary work by the grant recipients has already been undertaken, including a submission to the United Nations Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples prepared together with Hernando Chindoy Chindoy (AWAI) and others. The implementation phase of the project will commence in early 2022, with outcomes of the research project to be disseminated via publications, including a report and an academic publication.  

Dr. Gillett and Dr. Lostal would like to express their gratitude to the research team of Essex Law School (Prof. Theodore Konstadinides, Prof. Stavroula Karapapa, and Prof. Ting Xu), the internal reviewers (Prof. Sabine Michalowski and Dr. Carlos Gigoux Gramegna), and Kai Yin Low for their invaluable input while preparing this proposal.

For further information about the project, please get in touch with the Investigators: Dr. Matthew Gillett and Dr. Marina Lostal at mg21486@essex.ac.uk and ml20391@essex.ac.uk respectively.