Introduction

This chapter introduces the main themes and objectives of the book. It outlines the relevance of studying racialised minority activism in times of a neoliberal turn in racial capitalism and the increasingly hostile environment towards migrants and racialised minorities in European societies. It discusses the insurgence of racialised minority activism in the Nordic region, contextualising it in the changing demographics of the studied countries and the growth of the younger generation born and raised in the countries but not considered to belong to them. The chapter defines the concept ‘postethnic activism’ and describes how the book uses it to analyse activism that is based on the racialised position as non-white or ‘other’ in the Nordic societies. The chapter examines previous research on the changing conditions of political action in neoliberal times. It presents the main argument of the book: in the context of widespread de-politicisation processes, postethnic activists are re-politicising questions of race, class and gender in ways that have broad effects beyond activist circles.