Agnieszka Graff - Anti-Gender Politics in the Populist Moment

This book charts out a new phase in the global struggles around gender equality and sexual democracy: the ultraconservative mobilization against gender ideology and feminist efforts to counteract it. It argues that anti-gender campaigns, which emerged around 2010 in Europe, are not a simple continuation of the anti-feminist backlash dating back to the 1970s, but part of a new political configuration. Opposition to gender has become a key element of the rise of right-wing populism, which successfully harnesses the anxiety, shame and anger caused by neoliberalism, and threatens to destroy liberal democracy.

Anti-Gender Politics in the Populist Moment offers a novel conceptualization of the relationship between the ultraconservative anti-gender movement and right-wing populist parties, examining the opportunistic synergy between these actors. The authors map the anti-gender campaigns as a global movement, putting the Polish case in a comparative perspective. They show that the anti-gender rhetoric is best understood as a reactionary critique of neoliberalism as a socio-cultural formation. The book also studies the recent wave of feminist mass mobilizations, viewing the transnational revolt of women as a left populist movement.

This is an important study for those doing research in politics, cultural studies, gender and sexuality studies and sociology. It will also be useful for activists and policy makers.

Agnieszka Graff is Associate Professor at the American Studies Center, University of Warsaw. She is a feminist activist and public intellectual. Her articles on gender in Polish and U.S. culture have appeared in Public Culture, Signs, European Journal of Womens Studies, Feminist Studies and East European Politics and Societies. She has authored five books of feminist essays in Polish, among them wiat bez kobiet (World without Women, 2001, anniversary edition 2021) and Matka feministka (Mother and Feminist, 2014, Spanish edition 2021). She coedited the Spring 2019 theme issue of Signs Gender and the rise of the global right.

Elbieta Korolczuk is Associate Professor at Sdertrn University in Stockholm and at the American Studies Center, University of Warsaw. She is a sociologist, commentator and womens and human rights activist. Her research interests involve gender, social movements, civil society and politics of reproduction. Her recent publications include two edited volumes: Civil Society Revisited: Lessons from Poland (coedited with Kerstin Jacobsson, 2017) and Rebellious Parents: Parental Movements in Central-Eastern Europe and Russia (coedited with Katalin Fbin, 2017), as well as the coauthored volume Bunt kobiet. Czarne Protesty i Strajki Kobiet (Womens Rebellion. Black Protests and Womens Strikes, 2019, with Beata Kowalska, Jennifer Ramme and Claudia Snochowska-Gonzalez).

LGBTI Politics and Value Change in Ukraine and Turkey

Exporting Europe?

Maryna Shevtsova

Anti-Gender Politics in the Populist Moment

Agnieszka Graff and Elbieta Korolczuk

https://www.routledge.com/Routledge-Studies-in-Gender-Sexuality-and-Politics/book-series/SGSP

Agnieszka Graff and Elbieta Korolczuk

First published 2022

by Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

and by Routledge

605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

2022 Agnieszka Graff and Elbieta Korolczuk

The right of Agnieszka Graff and Elbieta Korolczuk to be identified as authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

The Open Access version of this book, available at www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Graff, Agnieszka, 1970 author. | Korolczuk, Elzbieta, author.

Title: Anti-gender politics in the populist moment / Agnieszka Graff

and Elzbieta Korolczuk.

Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2021. |

Series: Routledge studies in gender, sexuality and politics |

Includes bibliographical references and index. |

Identifiers: LCCN 2021014784 (print) | LCCN 2021014785 (ebook) |

ISBN 9780367679491 (hardback) | ISBN 9780367679507 (paperback) |

ISBN 9781003133520 (ebook) | ISBN 9781000413298 (adobe pdf) |

ISBN 9781000413342 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Sex discrimination against womenPolitical aspectsPoland. |

Anti-feminismPolitical aspectPoland. | PopulismSocial aspectsPoland. |

ConservatismSocial aspectsPoland. | WomenPoliticalPoland. |

Sex discrimination against womenPolitical aspects. | PopulismSocial aspects. |

Anti-feminismPolitical aspects. | ConservatismSocial aspects. |

WomenPolitical activity.

Classification: LCC HQ1237.5.P7 G74 2021 (print) |

LCC HQ1237.5.P7 (ebook) | DDC 320.082/09438dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021014784

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021014785

ISBN: 978-0-367-67949-1 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-0-367-67950-7 (pbk)

ISBN: 978-1-003-13352-0 (ebk)

DOI: 10.4324/9781003133520

Typeset in Sabon

by Newgen Publishing UK

We wish to thank several people and institutions for helping us to transition this book from an idea to a reality. In Poland we wish to thank the University of Warsaw, whose IDUB program helped to finance the publication. We also thank our colleagues at the American Studies Center, and especially ASC director Grzegorz Ko for support and encouragement. In Sweden this book has been supported by both Sdertrn University, where Elbieta Korolczuk is affiliated, and Lund University, which hosts the program Civil Society Elites? Comparing elite composition, reproduction, integration and contestation in European civil societies, a key source of funding for our research. The program is sponsored by the Riksbanken Jubileumsfond (grant number M17 0188:1), and we extend our sincere thanks to them. We are especially grateful to Hkan Johansson, who in his capacity of project leader steadfastly supported our efforts both intellectually and organizationally.

Thanks are also due to institutions which hosted key events on the anti-gender movement: Heinrich Boell Foundation, Friedrich Ebert Foundation, Polish Gender Society and At Gender. Our work has been nourished by the growing academic and activist community working on the anti-gender campaigns, and we are sincerely thankful to be a part of it. We extend our thanks to scholars who organized and participated in the many discussions on anti-gender campaigns during the last seven years, many of whom commented on our various texts on the subject: Katharina Bluhm, Sara Bracke, Maria Bucur, Katheryn M. Detwiler, Gabriele Dietze, Sara Garbagnioli, Weronika Grzebalska, Jenny Gunnarsson Payne, Isabel Heinemann, Sara Kalm, Eszter Kovts, Roman Kuhar, Teresa Kulawik, Anne Meuwisse, David Patternote, Andrea Pet, Julia Roth, Ann Snitow (who is sadly no longer with us), Alexandra Minna Stern, Susana Danuta Walters and Mieke Verloo. Any mistakes are, of course, ours. Special thanks are due to Eszter Kovts, Roman Kuhar, David Paternotte and Andrea Pet, who laid the foundations for intellectual debate on anti-gender campaigns in Europe and tirelessly worked to bring together scholars, activists and institutions interested in this topic.