Flyktingar: krigets offer eller säkerhetshot? : En jämförande studie av tre svenska riksdagspartiers konstruktion av flyktingar

Sammanfattning: In 2022 the Russian invasion of Ukraine took place, which caused millions of Ukrainians to flee their homes. The refugee crisis occurred seven years earlier in 2015, and millions of refugees fled their home countries as the Ukrainian refugees did in 2022. However, during the refugee crisis of 2015 people commonly fled from countries like Syria, Afghanistan, and Iraq. During these refugee waves, people have searched for asylum in Sweden. However, the political measures have differed between these two refugee waves. Therefore, research regarding Sweden’s three biggest political parties’ construction of refugees during these two events is significant.  This essay examines how the construction of refugees differs between the refugee crisis of 2015 and the Ukrainian refugee wave of 2022 within the Swedish parliament. To do so, a critical discourse analysis has been applied while analyzing protocols from the Swedish parliament. The findings show that the three political parties constructed refugees differently depending on their geographical origin. Ukrainian refugees were constructed in more positive terms and often as victims in need of help compared to non-European refugees, who were constructed in more negative terms and often as a burden or a threat. Additionally, this might be the explanation regarding why refugees were securitized in 2015 and why they were not in 2022, which this essay showed.