Hate crime against the Sami minority

Hate crimes against the Sami occur in many settings and contexts

Both the interviews and the police reports show that hatred against the Sami is expressed in a range of environments and contexts. Incidents involving expressions of hate occur at school, in the workplace, at home, in public, and also on the internet. Verbal attacks occur in person, over the phone, and via social media, including messages directed at Sami youth via Snapchat or Jodel. The severity of this hatred ranges from insulting descriptions of Sami people to coarse racist invective, threats, and violent offences. While anyone of Sami heritage may be victimised, the risk of victimisation appears greater for those who display distinctive Sami attributes, such as clothing or names that are identifiably Sami. The interviews suggest that Sami members of reindeer-herding families can experience particularly high levels of exposure to hate crime.

The location and type of offence varies, but certain expressions are recurrent in the material collected for the study. Lappjävel [“Lapp bastard”] is by far the most common phrase used according to interview participants and police reports, sometimes accompanied by explicit threats or physical violence. Other racist phrases allude to prejudices regarding what allegedly constitute a Sami appearance or Sami characteristics. Misogynistic expressions are also used, especially when the victim is a woman or a girl, as are expressions that refer to other minorities in an offensive manner, including, e.g., fjälljude [“mountain Jew”].

In addition to incidents targeting individuals, the study shows that graffiti and offensive comments on the internet are targeted at the Sami people as a whole. Such incidents occur in various digital contexts, including community Facebook groups or interest groups focused on questions such as hunting issues, as well as in the comments sections of local or national media publications. Such comments are often linked to various rights primarily associated with reindeer-herding Sami, but the offensive expressions are directed at the Sami people as a whole, and are sometimes accompanied by more or less direct death threats, such as "once we get rid of the Lapps, everyone will be able to hunt and fish" or "kill all Sami with mustard gas". Threats against reindeer are also made, with the express intention of "exterminating the Sami". In some cases, traditional Sami cots have been vandalised.

Variation in the severity of reindeer husbandry offences

The study shows that reindeer husbandry is subject to crime to a varying extent. Much of this crime involves different types of offences against reindeer. These include hit-and-run incidents involving reindeer, dogs chasing or attacking reindeer, and reindeer being shot or deliberately run over by snowmobiles. These incidents often occur in forested or other remote areas, and as a rule no perpetrators or witnesses are identified, making it difficult to establish whether the offences were motivated by hate. While poaching and intentionally running over reindeer with vehicles is a problem that reportedly occurs throughout Sápmi, (the geographical area in which the Sami have traditionally lived, extending across northern Norway, Sweden and Finland and to parts of Russia), incidents of reindeer being tortured to death mainly occur in the county of Norrbotten, according to both interview participants and police reports.

In addition to reindeer-related offences, reindeer herders are also subject to threats and various forms of vandalism. Such acts include, for example, automatic reindeer feeders being vandalised or burnt down and vehicles or fences being destroyed at reindeer compounds. Verbal insults and threats of varying severity have also been expressed via social media, over the phone, and in person. While such incidents occur across Sápmi, some Sami communities are more affected, and describe periods during which they have received numerous threatening emails or phone calls every week.

Hate crime in response to the observance of Sami rights

It is clear from the study’s interviews that certain events are perceived as triggering hate crimes. Some of the hate crimes affecting the reindeer industry stem from conflicts with landowners, forest owners, and farmers who do not want reindeer on their land. Other conflicts involve hunters and snowmobilers who resent the restrictions imposed by reindeer herding rights. The geographical location may also affect the level of exposure to hate crime.

Competing industries that emphasise perceived conflicts of interest between the indigenous Sami minority and the majority population are also perceived as affecting conflict levels within Sápmi. These industries include hydropower, wind power, and mineral extraction and are associated with both local interests, in the form of jobs and infrastructure, and national interests linked to the so-called green transition. There are also indications that hate crimes may increase when Sami rights receive recognition. For example, damage to signs with Sami place names was described as having been most prevalent when they were first introduced in the late 1990s. Several of those interviewed also noted increases in hostilities in connection with various legal cases relating to Sami rights.

Crimes often committed in small communities where ‘everyone knows everyone’

Hate crimes against Sami people differ from hate crimes against other groups in the sense that they are often committed in small communities, where the perpetrator is known to the victim. For the most part, police reports relate to unknown perpetrators only in cases of agitation against an ethnic or national group and cases in which reindeer have been injured or killed (where there is little possibility of identifying a perpetrator). Offences that involve the victims being targeted by strangers in public environments, which are among the more common forms of hate crime against other minority groups, are not found among the police reports of hate crimes against the Sami, and few references to offences of this kind were made during the study’s interviews. The police reports examined generally related to more serious incidents, including sustained harassment, death threats, or violence against persons or reindeer. Verbal insults, which were described as relatively common in the interviews, are largely absent from the police reports. This indicates that the reporting propensity for such incidents is low.

Identified perpetrators often men or boys

When incidents occur at schools, workplaces, or in the home, the perpetrators are usually men or boys. The victims are also often men or boys, although Sami girls are also subjected to serious abuse by other pupils – although these incidents rarely involve violence. The few police reports relating to hate crimes in intimate relationships all involved female victims.

In the few cases where suspects have been identified in police reports relating to the killing or torture of reindeer, multiple individuals had often been present at the time of the offence, and all of these perpetrators were men of various ages. Although some interviewees indicated that there was an acceptance in the local community for hunting reindeer for meat, several said that the majority of locals do not engage in acts of this kind, and that it is probably the work of a small number of people. This view is further supported by the experience that problems involving reindeer being tortured and killed have declined dramatically following the arrest or death of specific individuals.

Hate crime has consequences for the everyday lives of Sami people

Because anti-Sami hate crimes and racism occur in a range of different locations and contexts, one recurring theme in the interviews was everyday worry over not knowing if, when, and how such incidents might occur. Interview participants described how their insecurity is also affected by the knowledge that other Sami have been victimised. This may be as a result of high-profile events that attract media coverage, or of someone close to them having been victimised. Several interviewees described being particularly concerned when wearing clothing that reveals their Sami heritage, with the Sami kolt being the most common example. Hateful comments on social media also contribute to insecurity. Offensive comments about Sami are often made in the presence of others, which can both reinforce the offence and contribute to a sense of isolation. Interview participants described feeling hurt by situations in which others had failed to act or speak out, with others’ silence being interpreted as an endorsement of the behaviour.

Some people hide their Sami identity to avoid the risk of being exposed to hate crime or other expressions of racism. They avoid wearing Sami clothing in public or mentioning their Sami heritage at school or work. The interviews show that Sami parents struggle with the question of how they should relate to anti-Sami hate crime and racism. On the one hand, they wish to protect their children from the knowledge that such incidents occur, but they also want to prepare their children for situations that may arise. Several interview participants said that family and Sami friends constitute a safety net in this context.

Ignorance of Sami victimisation has several causes

While this report contributes to describing anti-Sami hate crime, there is a significant lack of studies regarding the victimisation experienced by the
Sami in the form of hate crime and other expressions of racism. There are several reasons for this lack of knowledge. One is that the Sami comprise a small minority. Their relatively high level of victimisation is therefore not reflected in statistics that are based on the number of reports received annually by the police or other public agencies. Further, national surveys that use traditional sampling methods are unable to disaggregate racism and hate crime against Sami, since random samples of the population do not generate sufficiently large numbers of respondents of Sami heritage. Nor does Sweden currently maintain registers that include information on ethnicity. There are registers that identify parts of the Sami population, but many Sami are not included in these. The group’s willingness to participate in research studies may also be influenced by the historical experiences of the Sami people, among other things their experience of having been subjected to race-biological research.

These factors are further compounded by a low propensity to report incidents of hate crime. The clearance rate for these offences is low, which affects the propensity to report. Because Sami more frequently than other minorities experience hate crimes in communities where they know the perpetrators, their propensity to report these incidents may be even lower than for hate crime in general. In addition, to be included in Sweden’s hate crime statistics, incidents must be flagged by the police as possible hate crimes. These offences are not always flagged by the police in this way (partly because of the difficulty of establishing a hate-crime motive). The history of state policy towards the Sami, and the resulting relationship between the Sami and the Swedish state, may also affect reporting propensities, with the criminal justice system being viewed as an extension of the state. Ongoing conflicts in local communities, where individual police officers may be perceived as biased, also impact the willingness of Sami to file police reports when they experience hate crime victimisation.

Proposals to increase awareness of anti-Sami racism and hate crime

One problem created by the limited opportunities to describe anti-Sami hate crime and racism is that these offences risk going unseen and unnoticed. The government’s assignment to Brå therefore included proposing measures that may improve the visibility of the victimisation experienced by the Sami in the form of hate crime and racism - from the reporting of offences to the police to the production of statistics.

Some of the proposals presented in the report focus on increasing the propensity to report offences to the police, and improving the visibility of those offences that are reported. In this respect, the Police Authority needs to work with measures to raise awareness and build confidence among victims, and must ensure that it has the capacity to address crimes against the Sami in Police Region Nord. Other proposals include research studies that might help to improve the visibility of the hate crime and racism experienced by the Sami. These includes proposals for both broader and more targeted surveys of the Sami, as well as surveys regarding the prevalence of anti-Sami attitudes among the general public.