Rich White Sweden Targets Poor Black Africa

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WASHINGTON, D.C. July 8 (C-Fam) Sweden, along with other Nordic countries, have been longtime leaders in the effort to create an international human right to abortion.  A recently launched strategy document from the Swedish government outlines its plan to push “sexual and reproductive health and rights” (SRHR)—including abortion—in the African region.

The strategy will be in effect from 2022 to 2026 and applies to the equivalent of about $60 million a year in U.S. dollars, an increase over the previous annual allocation of about $55 million.

The funding will be used to promote SRHR and the social norms that would support it, as well as “strengthened conditions for increased accountability for SRHR.”

Sweden sees itself as a global leader in advancing SRHR, a term that has been rejected in UN negotiations, as it is understood to contain abortion as well as a wide range of issues involving gender ideology and the concept of “sexual rights.”  In particular, the Swedish government pointed out in a press release announcing this forthcoming strategy that there are few other donors as active in promoting SRHR in sub-Saharan Africa.

According to the strategy, “where [sexual and reproductive health] services are offered, maternal care dominates, while initiatives to prevent and respond to sexual and gender-based violence, access to modern contraceptives, safe and legal abortion and efforts to promote the SRHR of young people are virtually non-existent.”

The report also claims that access to comprehensive sexuality education has “deteriorated.”  This is another concept that has been rejected by consensus and remains controversial as it is seen as sexualizing children.

Sweden was the first country to announce it would have a “feminist foreign policy” in 2014, and when it launched its handbook outlining the policy a few years later, it named SRHR as one of the top six priorities.  It explicitly referred to promoting “the right and access to safe and legal abortions.”

Sweden’s foreign aid department, Sida, worked to directly oppose the U.S. Mexico City Policy, which was reinstated and expanded under former President Donald Trump and blocked U.S. funding to foreign organizations providing or promoting abortion.  Sweden threatened to pull its funding from any organization that abandoned abortion-related projects in order to comply with the policy and remain eligible for U.S. funding, effectively forcing grantees to choose between the two donor countries.

Sweden has also been active in the “She Decides” campaign which was launched in opposition to the Mexico City Policy, and at the 2021 Generation Equality Forum hosted by UN Women, Sweden pledged support “to focus on the neglected areas of comprehensive SRHR such as comprehensive abortion care.”

As stated in a Sida brief, “Sweden’s official position is that access to safe and legal abortion […] falls within the framework of human rights,” and “although the right to abortion is not explicitly set out in any of the UN conventions on human rights,” the brief cites expert opinions and regional agreements as well as World Health Organization guidance to make the case for abortion as a right.

In the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), a mechanism by which countries review each other’s records on human rights, Sweden has been a leading proponent of both abortion and issues of sexual orientation and gender identity in its recommendations.  In the third and most recent cycle of the UPR, Sweden was among the top seven governments urging other countries to liberalize their abortion laws.

It should at least be pondered why a country like Sweden, only 1% black, is targeting largely black Africa for abortion and other social programs that harm families. Pope Francis has called such efforts “ideological colonialism.”

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