{"title":"The Birth of the Finance Consumer: Feminists, Bankers and the Re-Gendering of Finance in Mid-Twentieth-Century Sweden","authors":"Orsi Husz","doi":"10.1017/s0960777323000383","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"This article examines a series of financial study courses for women in 1950s Sweden, jointly organised by commercial banks and an important non-partisan women's organisation, the Fredrika Bremer Association. The aim is to highlight and explain historical connections between feminism and financialisation. I argue that the feminist aspiration to emancipate women from the curtailments of ‘petty’ domestic finance aligned with the banks’ desire to domesticate financial markets. The performances of ‘female finance’ in these campaigns – striking a balance between PR and empowerment – contributed to the making of a new historical figure, not that of the female investor but rather the consumer of finance. The article not only demonstrates the role of gender in the financialisation of everyday life and in the domestication of finance, but also uncovers a longer pre-history behind these processes that are conventionally associated with neoliberalisation in later decades.","PeriodicalId":46066,"journal":{"name":"Contemporary European History","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8000,"publicationDate":"2023-07-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Contemporary European History","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1017/s0960777323000383","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"HISTORY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
This article examines a series of financial study courses for women in 1950s Sweden, jointly organised by commercial banks and an important non-partisan women's organisation, the Fredrika Bremer Association. The aim is to highlight and explain historical connections between feminism and financialisation. I argue that the feminist aspiration to emancipate women from the curtailments of ‘petty’ domestic finance aligned with the banks’ desire to domesticate financial markets. The performances of ‘female finance’ in these campaigns – striking a balance between PR and empowerment – contributed to the making of a new historical figure, not that of the female investor but rather the consumer of finance. The article not only demonstrates the role of gender in the financialisation of everyday life and in the domestication of finance, but also uncovers a longer pre-history behind these processes that are conventionally associated with neoliberalisation in later decades.
期刊介绍:
Contemporary European History covers the history of Eastern and Western Europe, including the United Kingdom, from 1918 to the present. By combining a wide geographical compass with a relatively short time span, the journal achieves both range and depth in its coverage. It is open to all forms of historical inquiry - including cultural, economic, international, political and social approaches - and welcomes comparative analysis. One issue per year explores a broad theme under the guidance of a guest editor. The journal regularly features contributions from scholars outside the Anglophone community and acts as a channel of communication between European historians throughout the continent and beyond it.