Contemporary Land Questions in Sweden, Far‐Right Populist Strategies and Challenges for Inclusionary Rural Development

This article analyses the rural politics and discursive strategies of the Sweden Democrats political party and contrasts them with the politics of movements proposing inclusionary rural development in Sweden. The article examines political and media documents on rural issues produced by the Sweden Democrats, uses documents of and interviews with representatives of rural development initiatives in Sweden and analyses relevant forest owners’ magazines. The results show that the defence of property rights and exclusionary politics are a prominent part of the populist strategy of the Sweden Democrats in rural areas and that technological development and mechanisation of forestry and agriculture become crucial challenges in articulating political efforts for inclusionary rural development in Sweden. The article concludes by highlighting differences between the Sweden Democrats’ populist strategies and the political efforts to build inclusionary rural politics in the context of contemporary land questions in Sweden.