Feminist digital diplomacy and foreign policy change in Sweden

Abstract

This article analyses how the launch of Sweden’s feminist foreign policy marked a change in Sweden’s digital diplomatic efforts. It draws on three strands of research: digital diplomacy, foreign policy analysis (FPA) and feminist scholarship. Informed by FPA, the article explores the relevance of political leadership, bureaucratic agency and political context as drivers of policy change, and, specifically, Sweden’s feminist digital diplomacy. The article provides an empirical case analysis of Sweden’s foreign policy change and conduct of digital diplomacy during the period 2006–2020. It draws on documents available on the official websites of the Government Offices of Sweden and the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, including sites such as SwedenAbroad and Swedish Foreign Policy Stories. The article concludes that Sweden acted on a window of opportunity in global politics, which advanced a novel feminist digital diplomacy. Sweden’s competitive edge was based on a strong transformative political leadership in foreign policy, state feminism and an early engagement of digital diplomatic management of its state image online.