Gudrun Schyman

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Gudrun Schyman
Leader of the Swedish Left Party
In office
1993–2003
Preceded by Lars Werner
Succeeded by Ulla Hoffmann
Member of the Swedish Parliament
for Stockholm County
In office
1988 – 2006[note 1]
Personal details
Born Gerd Gudrun Maria Schyman
(1948-06-09) 9 June 1948
Täby, Stockholms län
Political party MLK (1970s), Left Party (1988-2004)
Feminist Initiative (2005-)
Alma mater Socialhögskolan i Stockholm
Profession Politician, Socionom
Website www.schyman.se
Gudrun Schyman (born 9 June 1948, Täby, Uppland) is a Swedish politician. She served as leader of the Swedish Left Party from 1993 until January 2003. She remained a member of the Left Party until 2004, when she left to focus entirely on her feminist political work. She remained a member of parliament until 2006.

Leader of the Left Party

In 1993 Schyman was elected party leader for the Left Party.

Schyman's greatest asset was her appeal to the voters, and her party more than doubled its number of MPs during her leadership. She gained popularity for her candor; for example, she is open about her struggle with alcoholism and has supported the initiative to make the Riksdag an alcohol-free workplace.[1] During her period as party president, the party adopted feminism as an ideological basis. In 2003 she was charged with misleading the tax authorities by attempting to take illicit tax deductions.[2] She was temporarily succeeded by Ulla Hoffmann.

In 2002 she made a controversial speech concerning men's oppression of women, in which she said "The discrimination and the violations appears in different shapes depending on where we find ourselves. But it's the same norm, the same structure, the same pattern, that is repeated both in the Taliban's Afghanistan and here in Sweden".[3][4]

In October 2004, Schyman together with other MEPs of the Left Party proposed before the Riksdag, a national assessment of the cost of men's violence towards women; furthermore they demanded that the state fund women's shelters.[5] The proposal attracted wide attention, with the media calling it a "man tax."[6]

Founder of the Feminist Initiative

Schyman left the Left Party in 2004 and in 2005 co-founded Feminist Initiative, an organization which at its first congress decided to contest the coming parliamentary elections. In 2006 Jane Fonda supported her in the party's campaign prior to the 2006 election. Feminist Initiative received only approximately 0.7% of the votes, compared to the 4% threshold required for parliamentary representation. In the 2009 European parliament elections, the party received 2.22% of the vote.[7] In the summer of 2010—leading up to the 2010 election—Schyman burned 100,000 Swedish krona in a protest against unequal pay in Sweden. The stunt, staged by advertising collective Studio Total, gave Feminist Initiative widespread attention,[8][9] but in the election, the party received only 0.4% of the votes.[10]

Notes

  1. ↑ She represented the Left Party until 2004 when she left the party and sat until 2006 as an independent.

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Gudrun Schyman.
  1. ↑ Therésia Erneborg, "Gudrun Schyman: Det är alkohol-industrins vinstintressen som styr," Dagen March 1, 2003, retrieved July 26, 2011 (Swedish)
  2. ↑ Åsa Kroon and Mats Ekström, Vulnerable woman, raging bull or mannish maniac?: Gender differences in the visualization of political scandals, Working Paper 4, 2006, Örebro University : "Gudrun Schyman — Leader of the Left Wing Party 1993 – 2003," pp. 7–8, "The Schyman scandal," pp. 9–14 (pdf)
  3. ↑ Sjölund, Jill (October 9, 2006). "Jämo: Ni är ju som talibaner" (in Swedish). Aftonbladet. Retrieved May 18, 2007. 
  4. ↑ Text of so-called "Taliban Speech" to 2002 Congress of the Left Party (Swedish)
  5. ↑ Gudrun Schyman et al., Motion 2004/05:So616 Ansvaret för mäns våld mot kvinnor, Sveriges Riksdag, October 5, 2004 (Swedish)
  6. ↑ "Schyman in equality policy shock: tax men," The Local October 5, 2004, retrieved July 26, 2011.
  7. ↑ "Val till Europaparlamentet - Röster" (in Swedish). Election Authority (Sweden). June 11, 2009. Retrieved June 29, 2009. 
  8. ↑ "Swedish feminists burn cash in wage equality protest". BBC News. July 6, 2010. 
  9. ↑ Fredrik Wass, "TV: Här bränner Gudrun Schyman 100 000," Makthavare.se, July 6, 2010, retrieved July 26, 2011 (Swedish)
  10. ↑ "Val till riksdagen - Röster" (in Swedish). Election Authority (Sweden). September 23, 2010. Retrieved July 26, 2011. 
Preceded by
Lars Werner		 Leader of the Swedish Left Party
1993—2003 		Succeeded by
Ulla Hoffmann
Authority control
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