Book Review: Rape in the Nordic countries: Continuity and change by M. B. Heinskou, M. L. Skilbrei and K. Stefansen

• Author: Johan van Wilsem,Anneke Koning
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/10575677211050430
• Published date: 01 December 2022
• Date: 01 December 2022
• Subject Matter: Book Reviews

Heinskou, M. B., Skilbrei, M. L., & Stefansen, K. (2020).

Rape in the Nordic countries: Continuity and change. Taylor & Francis. 246 pp. $48.95, ISBN: 9781138606517.

Reviewed by: Johan van Wilsem ,Netherlands Court of Audit, The Netherlands, & Anneke Koning, Leiden

University, The Netherlands

DOI: 10.1177/10575677211050430

The Nordic region (i.e., Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Iceland) is generally characterized

by its efforts to promote gender equality and to institute humanitarian penal policies. Despite their

progressivist orientations towards punishment and gender equality, as in other industrialized

nations, crimes like sexual violence and rape persist. To disentangle how Nordic governments and

their societies in general view and respond to such acts of violence, Heinskou, Skilbrei, and

Stefansen’s (2020) Rape in the Nordic Countries covers several conceptual, theoretical and method-

ological debates throughout its 14 chapters.

One of the central and recurring issues addressed is the def‌inition and boundaries of the phenom-

enon: when an act is considered to be sexual violence, and when it is not. This also includes legal

discussions on when behavior could qualify as a criminal sexual act, and ref‌lections about how to

assess whether a sexual act is consensual. While discussions about def‌initions and delineations

risk being abstract, this volume manages to address these topics in concrete ways that invite the inter-

est and commitment of the reader; for instance in the description of how the criminalization of rape

within marriage came about in Finland (chapter 6 by Kotanen). The volume also gives much consid-

eration to the question of whether rape is legally def‌ined as sexual behavior that is committed with

force versus performed non-consensually. These opposing paradigms are clarif‌ied by Jokila and

Niemi (chapter 8, p. 127): “In the lack-of-consent construction, the focus is on the expression of

opinion by a victim, thus emphasising a complainant’s response to actions (…) of a perpetrator.

In the use-of-force construction, the focus is on the denial of the will of the victim.”The authors prob-

lematize the common assumption that a shift to consent-based rape law will solve problems that

many countries have faced with prosecuting rape cases –a development and standpoint surely fol-

lowed with interest in many other national contexts outside of the Nordic region.

Not only does the book offer much attention to def‌initional and legal boundaries and ref‌lections on

consent, it also includes studies on perceptions of sexual violence. The contributions in the book on

perceptions vary widely, including ‘victim’and offender narratives, as well as quantitative work. One

example focuses on the issue of question wording and its impact on prevalence estimates of sexual

violence, which appears to matter pointedly (chapter 5 by Stefansen, Løvgren and Frøyland).

Research by Schierff and Heinskou innovatively devotes attention to offenders’perceptions of

their own sexual transgressions, while Stefansen researches how recipients of unwanted sexual

touching perceive such behaviors. Further, Gottzén and Franzén (chapter 10) utilized a

perception-oriented and evaluation approach to examine the effectiveness of a school-based preven-

tion program on sexuality and bystander responsibility, which was modeled after Mentors in

Violence Prevention (developed in the U.S.). The program consisted of a documentary showing

on the handling of a rape case in a rural Swedish community (the so-called Bjästa case), followed

by discussions between students and teachers. Instead of the intended discussion on gender,

sexual violence and the role of bystanders, the conversations displayed distancing remarks by stu-

dents and teachers to the way the rural community reacted, thus reinforcing existing stereotypes

about sex offenders and rurality as uncivilized culture.

Lastly, the contemporary issue of unwanted sex in the digital world is also covered in several

chapters, ranging from an offender’s‘in-his-own words’narrative about the rationalization of

their actions, to more generalizing quantitative contributions on the role of self-control in online

sexual offending and social media discussions of ‘victims’seeking for comfort and recognition.

474 International Criminal Justice Review 32(4)