Hydropower histories and narrative injustice: state-owned energy companies’ narratives of hydropower expansion in Sápmi

Abstract

For over one hundred years, hydropower expansion has taken place in Sápmi, the land of the Indigenous Sámi people in Northern Fenno-Scandia and the Kola Peninsula. In modern energy company narratives, certain parts of history remain unmentioned. Among these are the narratives belonging to Sámi people who were negatively impacted by hydropower expansion. Thus, the aim of this article is to analyse three state-owned energy companies’ narratives about their hydropower expansion in Sápmi and compare them with challenging voices or counter-narratives. The sources used are the companies’ websites and the official documents and material found there, as well as other documentary sources, literature, and research spanning a time period of 1910 to 2021. The overall questions are: To what extent and in what ways are Sámi experiences regarding hydropower expansion part of the companies’ narratives. This study uses counter-narrative and narrative justice as conceptual framework and shows that the full impact that hydropower expansion has had on Sámi people’s situations is insufficiently communicated in the companies’ narratives. Instead, the companies mainly construct their narratives as hydropower expansion in Sápmi being a phenomenon located in history without connection to ongoing consequences on Sámi lands and lives.