Freedom of Religion for Immigrants in Sweden: An Ambiguous Support

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

Religious freedom is guaranteed in the Swedish constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights. However, this article argues that the issue of religious freedom has become a subject for conflict in the public debate, in party politics and thereby for voters in Sweden. Both media and political parties have used populist rhetoric in debates discussing religious freedom in the case of immigrants. This article builds on SOM survey data and demonstrates how the public support for religious freedom concerning immigrants in Sweden is best characterised as ambiguous. The article argues that there is strong correlation between those respondents who agree that religious freedom is threatened in Sweden and those who do not support this freedom to include immigrants of ʻforeign’ religions. In conclusion the article discusses this ʻdual standard’ against the problem of democracy, populist politics and how populism ties with the cultural idea of Christianity as central to Swedish culture.