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Sweden gets its first transgender government minister

Sweden's new Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson named Lina Axelsson Kihlblom as her cabinet's Schools Minister.

Published: 30 November 2021 15:27 CET

Sweden gets its first transgender government minister

From left, new Housing Minister Johan Danielsson, Schools Minister Lina Axelsson Kihlblom, and Social Insurance Minister Ardalan Shekarabi. Photo: Sören Andersson/TT

Axelsson Kihlblom on Tuesday became the first transgender person to become a government minister in the Nordic country, a year after the appointment of Europe’s first transgender minister.

The 51-year-old former school principal and lawyer was added to the Social Democratic government by Andersson, who also became the first woman to hold the post as Prime Minister.

In her 2015 book “Will You Love Me Now?”, Axelsson Kihlblom described growing up as a girl in a boy’s body and her physical transition to a woman’s body, which was completed when she was 25.

“Trans people have always existed, they will always exist and we no longer feel ashamed. We are the new normal,” she wrote in an article published in 2018 by public broadcaster SVT.

KEY POINTS: Everything you need to know about Sweden’s new government

Divorced and the mother of two adopted children, her government portfolio covers primary and secondary schools, while Education Minister Anna Ekström will be in charge of higher education.

In October 2020, a member of the European Parliament, Petra De Sutter, was named Belgium’s deputy prime minister and became the first transgender minister in Europe.

Audrey Tang of Taiwan is considered to have become the world’s first openly transgender government minister in 2016.

Member comments

Anonymous - 12 December 2021 at 12:25 CET

As long as Lina Axelsson Kihlblom isn’t an athlete.

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'Very little debate' on consequences of Sweden's crime and migration clampdown

The Liberties Rule of Law report shows Sweden backsliding across more areas than any other of the 19 European Union member states monitored, fuelling concerns that the country risks breaching its international human rights obligations, the report says.

“We’ve seen this regression in other countries for a number of years, such as Poland and Hungary, but now we see it also in countries like Sweden,” says John Stauffer, legal director of the human rights organisation Civil Rights Defenders, which co-authored the Swedish section of the report.

The report, compiled by independent civil liberties groups, examines six common challenges facing European Union member states.

Sweden is shown to be regressing in five of these areas: the justice system, media environment, checks and balances, enabling framework for civil society and systemic human rights issues.

The only area where Sweden has not regressed since 2022 is in its anti-corruption framework, where there has been no movement in either a positive or negative direction.

Source: Liberties Rule of Law report

As politicians scramble to combat an escalation in gang crime, laws are being rushed through with too little consideration for basic rights, according to Civil Rights Defenders.

Stauffer cites Sweden’s new stop-and-search zones as a case in point. From April 25th, police in Sweden can temporarily declare any area a “security zone” if there is deemed to be a risk of shootings or explosive attacks stemming from gang conflicts.

Once an area has received this designation, police will be able to search people and cars in the area without any concrete suspicion.

“This is definitely a piece of legislation where we see that it’s problematic from a human rights perspective,” says Stauffer, adding that it “will result in ethnic profiling and discrimination”.

Civil Rights Defenders sought to prevent the new law and will try to challenge it in the courts once it comes into force, Stauffer tells The Local in an interview for the Sweden in Focus Extra podcast.

He also notes that victims of racial discrimination at the hands of the Swedish authorities had very little chance of getting a fair hearing as actions by the police or judiciary are “not even covered by the Discrimination Act”.

READ ALSO: ‘Civil rights groups in Sweden can fight this government’s repressive proposals’

Stauffer also expresses concerns that an ongoing migration clampdown risks splitting Sweden into a sort of A and B team, where “the government limits access to rights based on your legal basis for being in the country”.

The report says the government’s migration policies take a “divisive ‘us vs them’ approach, which threatens to increase rather than reduce existing social inequalities and exclude certain groups from becoming part of society”.

Proposals such as the introduction of a requirement for civil servants to report undocumented migrants to the authorities would increase societal mistrust and ultimately weaken the rule of law in Sweden, the report says.

The lack of opposition to the kind of surveillance measures that might previously have sparked an outcry is a major concern, says Stauffer.

Politicians’ consistent depiction of Sweden as a country in crisis “affects the public and creates support for these harsh measures”, says Stauffer. “And there is very little talk and debate about the negative consequences.”

Hear John Stauffer from Civil Rights Defender discuss the Liberties Rule of Law report in the The Local’s Sweden in Focus Extra podcast for Membership+ subscribers.

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