Abstract

Globally, gender has been identified in research as a salient dimension embedded in the social relations of forests. While research related to the Global South is abundant on this topic, the scholarly output from the Global North is sparser. Based on the theoretical understanding of gendering as ongoing contested spatial and constitutive differencing practices, this study, through a qualitative approach, aims to examine and analyse the constitution of private forest ownership in the boreal and production-oriented setting of Sweden. A thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews with 25 female and 26 male forest owners was conducted. Many of the interviewees did not express a gendered experience of their forest ownership, and a diversity in practices of gendering was demonstrated. Also, the analysis highlighted how the gendering of activities, experiences, expectations, and forest values was constructed by emphasising differences through a complementary or dichotomy-related understanding of gender, and by associating specific bodies (women/men) with specific spaces (forest/household), tasks (manual forest labour/domestic labour), characteristics (strong/caring), and perspectives (economic/ecological). This construction contributes to a reproduction of the power of specific production-oriented masculinities and values, e.g. by marking distance or difference to femininities. In the gendering of forest ownership, doing ‘difference’ was highlighted both as a means of ‘othering’ and as a positive and innovative way of resisting and negotiating, as well as a way of reasserting and constituting the current gendered forest ownership and the production-oriented context of forestry in Sweden.

Keywords

Gender; Forest owners; Forestry; Masculinity; Femininity; Space

Published in

Forest Policy and Economics
2020, Volume: 115, article number: 102162

SLU Authors

• Andersson, Elias

  • Department of Forest Resource Management, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

Sustainable Development Goals

Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls


UKÄ Subject classification

Gender Studies
Human Geography


Publication identifier

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.forpol.2020.102162

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/105339