Inequality in Greenland

As a Danish colony, the modernization of Greenland by the Danish state in the 1950s and 1960s was influenced by the Nordic welfare state model. The introduction of Home Rule in 1979 and Self-governance in 2009 meant that Greenland became more independent, and the Greenland Parliament (Inatsisartut) and Government (Naalakkersuisut) took over a still larger number of fields of responsibility. Increased Greenland decision power over fields of responsibilities such as ‘social affairs’, ‘housing’, ‘education’ and ‘health care’ did not change the basic ‘welfare state’ approach which meant that Greenland legislators still aimed at equal opportunities and conditions. Public statistics, reports and thorough research, however, indicates that despite the overall goals, inequality is prevailing and larger than in, for instance, the Nordic countries when it comes to income inequality.

The Greenland Inuit are the majority population in Greenland and the people of Greenland has achieved self-governance. This has influenced the orientation of both government, public institutions and many organisations and associations in the Greenland civil society to most often have a primarily national, regional, municipal, local or community focus.

An important part of the study of inequalities in Greenland will thus be to analyse to which degree inequalities are also influenced by culturally different approaches. Mapping inequalities and social problems, uncovering patterns (applying among other theories and methods an intersectional approach), finding particularly vulnerable social groups to be further analysed to get insights into explanations for vulnerability that might facilitate developing – and applying already known – practices to overcome roots of inequalities is the overall goal with this research project proposal ‘Inequalities in Greenland’. The research project ‘Inequalities in Greenland’ consists of four parts described below.

The first part of our project is to analyze how the distribution and control of economic, political, and ideological power are formed and sustained by particular discourses in reports on inequality – published by government agents. Furthermore, we will investigate how the political parties discuss and propose how to diminish/eliminate inequalities through more equally distributed access to resources and opportunities that affect income, education, and access to employment as well as to civil and social human rights, including health, education, protection, and social services as well as gender equality and the rights of the child.

The second part of our project will draw upon statistics that contributes to describing and explaining the diversity and development of social inequalities, the processes that generate them and their consequences, especially for the most disadvantaged groups.

The third part of our project will continue and expand the first part through qualitative interviews to understand how inequality-promoting structural dimensions are reflected by people, especially people in the most disadvantaged and vulnerable groups.

The fourth part of our project intends to describe and analyze institutions/associations (including indigenous) and citizens' practices engaging in the struggle to overcome inequalities and thus thriving to co-create knowledge. We will provide analyses of models of citizen and community action, as well as business and development models, that bear on the fight against poverty, for example, and is founded on family support or capacity building. We will choose a number of community projects to show their values, visions, traditional knowledge, cultural ways, and practical methods. The data will come from case studies carried out within the action-research framework.

We apply an intersectional approach, as it enables us to further document and analyse both the system and the conditions of inequality including opportunities and access to rights. Furthermore, it makes it possible to identify for instance different kinds of discrimination and how they intersected to the socioeconomic, sociocultural, political, and legal environment contributing to discrimination and inequality.

The project will benefit from a broad variety of data sources focusing on different aspects of inequality and the conditions, and contexts of inequality. The data sources include existing documentation such as official statistics; reports and research projects on key subjects related to inequality; documents highlighting the political discourses. Our mixed methods approach means that quantitative methods will be applied as well as qualitative methods including community-based research and action research and qualitative interviews.

Greenland

Objectives

A. Describe
B. Explain
C. Imagine

Axes

1. Current state of wealth distribution
2. Social transitions and trends in the distribution of wealth
3. Towards a more equitable distribution

Work Packages

1.1. The structures of distribution among agents
1.2. Economic inequalities of gender, ethnicity, and age
1.4. The state as regulator and agent
2.1. Development trajectories
2.2. The dynamics of economic inequalities
2.3 Demographic trends and inequalities
3.1. Institutional changes
3.2. Indigenous perspectives on development
3.3. Indigenous and citizens’ practices in the struggle to overcome inequalities
3.4. Social innovation, reconciliation and adaptation