Education, Recognition and the Sami People of Norway (original) (raw)

In this paper I discuss selected aspects of the case of the Sami people in Norway, their struggle for influence over their own education institutions, and for equal as well as special rights in the Norwegian education system. Compared to many other Indigenous peoples, the case of the Sami in Norway appears to be a story of success. For example, the Norwegian Sami have their own education institutions, and they are among the most educated Indigenous peoples in the world. I also use the Sami case to reflect upon the relation between education and the self-identity of cultural minorities, here drawing upon (and discussing) the work of German social philosopher Axel Honneth. I conclude that recognition is an important aspect of learning and education and that Honneth’s critical theory of recognition has explanatory force when analyzing the postcolonial situation of the Sami people of Norway. The Sami struggle for inclusion and influence over their own situation has to a large extent been fought as a struggle for rights and for cultural recognition. However, I also pointed to some problems in Honneth’s focus on the nation state as a given analytic entity; the legitimacy of the Norwegian nation state and its territorial claims, for example, have always been called into question by (some of) the Sami.