Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Stockholm: Australia's first female foreign minister, Julie Bishop, has said feminism isn't in her "lexicon". It might exist for others but she would never blame her gender for not reaching a personal career goal.
Across on the other side of the world, her Swedish counterpart – albeit from the opposite side of politics – spun a new front for the term, making feminism the centrepiece of Sweden's foreign policy.
Margot Wallstrom, who announced Sweden's "feminist foreign policy" as her Left-wing government took power in October, has since explained that gender equality is a "prerequisite" for achieving Sweden's foreign and security policy objectives.
In other words, Sweden views violence towards women as a threat to peace and security.
Some have lauded Ms Wallstrom for her willingness to raise women's equality as part of trade talks, but even in egalitarian Sweden her policy was met with some scepticism. What does a feminist foreign policy look like? How would it serve Sweden's interests in the face of an increasingly assertive Russia? How far would Sweden push for equality when negotiating with trade partners?
"I think it is as simple as human rights are women's rights, but that is not a given today and you have to ensure that happens," Ms Wallstrom told Fairfax Media in Stockholm.
"Unless you ask women, they won't come forward and tell their stories. If they represent half the population, how can you get peace in a country if you don't ask women?"
Ms Wallstrom, a former UN special representative on sexual violence in conflict, said in that role she could see how women are targeted and yet remained marginalised when negotiating peace. So, for example, in February, she spoke with women's groups during a visit to the Ukraine and Sweden now requires its embassies to keep an "inventory" of women's issues in order to determine how to spend Sweden's generous foreign aid.
"In every war and conflict, women are the target. This has become the weapon of choice. Look at ISIL. They arrange modern slave markets with young girls and that also becomes a source of income for them. So we have to make that visible and fight that and decide on policy," she said.
But it's also served as a test of the government's ambition to champion human rights while balancing its export-led economy, most notably as one of the world's largest arms exporters.
Questions about what a feminist foreign policy meant in practice were answered in March during a diplomatic row with Saudi Arabia. That fiasco arose as Sweden, to the protest of business leaders and conservative politicians, opted not to renew a 2005 arms export agreement with the kingdom over human rights concerns.
Saudi Arabia promptly withdrew its ambassador in Sweden, halted all Swedish business visas to the kingdom and condemned Ms Wallstrom for insulting Islam. Ms Wallstrom had said in February that Saudi Arabia subjugated women by banning them from driving, and labelled its punishment of blogger Raid Badawi – 10 years' imprisonment and 1000 lashes – "medieval".
The kingdom also blocked Ms Wallstrom from delivering a talk on women's rights and democracy at a meeting of the Arab League in Cairo.
She has said she did not intend to insult Saudi Arabia or Islam, but she also hasn't apologised for her comments. The incident has raised further doubts over whether Sweden's focus on human rights has helped or harmed its bid for a seat on the UN security council in 2017-2018.
Israel briefly recalled its ambassador to Sweden last year after Ms Wallstrom announced the country would recognise the state of Palestine.
But Ms Wallstrom isn't the first politician to take up women's rights in foreign policy, and her take has its roots in the 15-year-old UN security resolution 1325, which recognised the uneven impact of war on women. Hillary Clinton, as former US Secretary of State, and William Hague, the former UK Secretary of State for foreign affairs, have both addressed the treatment of women in war.
Still, Ms Wallstrom is trying to start a much needed debate that sometimes isn't welcome but is at the least a conversation starter.
"In some countries it [feminist foreign policy] has a negative connotation and is seen as extremist but in most countries it's seen as curious and they just want to know 'what does that mean' and it gives us a possibility to explain.
"This is really defining gender equality as a peace and security issue."
