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A European Agenda? The supra-national dimension of anti-feminism (in Europe)

European Politics
Gender
Religion
Social Movements
Campaign
Feminism
Stefanie Mayer
Institute of Conflict Research - IKF
Stefanie Mayer
Institute of Conflict Research - IKF

Abstract

Attacks on feminism, LGBTIQ+-activism, gender research and equality policies by Christian actors are on the rise globally (Kuhar & Paternotte, 2017; Strube et al., 2021). In Europe, Christian groups have started using a twin-track strategy, consisting on the one hand of grassroots mobilizations like petitions or citizens’ initiatives and on the other hand of a political strategy to expand their influence in the field of policy-making (Datta, 2018; 2021). This is evidenced not only by legal changes, for example stricter anti-abortion laws in Poland, but also by anti-gay and anti-queer mobilisations like Manif Pour Tous in France or Demo für alle in Germany in the past few years. Christian actors have created their own professional NGOs and networks in order to increase their influence on political developments across regional and national borders on a trans- and supranational (European) level. In order to add to the rather scarce research on the European dimension of anti-feminist movements (but see Mos 2018), this paper will analyse the programmatic and strategies of the antifeminist network Agenda Europe as detailed in the strategy paper Restoring the natural Order (RTNO). Taking frame analysis as our starting point, we analyse the construction of problems, constructions of blame and victimhood and the solutions proposed in order to understand the normative convicitions and world-view underpinning Christian conservative anti-feminism. Specifically we want to question and hopefully add nuance to the observation of a secularisation of these discourses (Kuhar 2015; Datta 2018). Stefanie Mayer is a political scientist at the Institut für Konfliktforschung (IKF, Austria). Her main research interests are critical studies of right-wing extremism and -populism, racism and anti-feminism as well as research into feminist politics, activism and theory building. She published her PhD-thesis on feminist activism in Vienna (2018, in German) as well as a number of articles on anti-feminism together with Edma Ajanovic and Birgit Sauer. Judith Goetz (University of Vienna) is a literary and political scientist and member of the research group Ideologies and Policies of Inequality (www.fipu.at) as well as the research network Women and Right-Wing Extremism (www.frauen-und-rechtsextremismus.de). Her interests focus on rightwing extremism and gender as well as anti-feminism. Most recently, she was co-editor of the anthologies Untergangster des Abendlandes. Ideologie und Rezeption der rechtsextremen ‘Identitären’ (Marta Press, 2017), Rechtsextremismus Band 3: Geschlechterreflektierte Perspektiven (Mandelbaum, 2019) and Rechtsextremismus Band 4: Herausforderung für den Journalismus (Mandelbaum, 2021).