Scandinavians born in a backward miserable setting (5)
I believe the answer is:
danes
'scandinavians' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'born in a backward miserable setting' is the wordplay.
'born' becomes 'ne' ('born' in French - used to indicate a birth name).
'in' is an insertion indicator.
'a backward miserable setting' becomes 'das' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'ne' inserted inside 'das' is 'DANES'.
(Other definitions for danes that I've seen before include "people in Copenhagen" , "Europeans who inhabit Andes" , "Scandinavians" , "Vikings" , "Natives of, eg, Copenhagen" .)