Gudrun Schyman

Gudrun Schyman
Leader of Feminist Initiative
Incumbent
Assumed office 6 March 2013 Serving with Sissela Nordling Blanco (since 2011)
Leader of the Swedish Left Party
In office 1993–2003
Preceded by	Lars Werner
Succeeded by	Ulla Hoffmann (Interim)
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	schyman.se

Gudrun Schyman (born 9 June 1948, Täby, Uppland) is a Swedish politician. She is currently the spokesperson of Feminist Initiative, a political party she co-formed in 2005.

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 following a tax evasion scandal. She remained an independent member of parliament until 2006. Schyman has become known for controversial ideas, such as special male-taxation.

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 and later found guilty of 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] In the 2014 European Parliament election proved to be the party's most successful election so far, as the party attracted 5.3% of the national vote in Sweden, with Soraya Post taking one seat as an MEP.^[11] In the 2014 general election, Fi received a best-ever 3.1% of the vote; despite not meeting the 4.0% threshold for getting seats, Fi became the most popular party outside of parliament.

Notes

References

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