SEXDEM in collaboration with SKY doctoral program at the University of Helsinki organizes an online Christina talk (SKY Advanced Research Seminar) on Monday, November 30, 16-18 Eastern European Time (15-17 CET)

Associate Professor Elżbieta Korolczuk (Södertörn University & University of Warsaw): Conceptualizing the relation between right-wing populism and (anti)gender: an opportunistic synergy

The lecture will offer a conceptualization of the relationship between populism and gender, based on the analysis of anti-gender campaigns in Europe, with specific focus on the Polish case. Rather than looking for specific gendered aspects of populism as an ideology, I will examine an opportunistic synergy between the right-wing parties and ultraconservative groups opposing “gender ideology.” Opportunistic synergy is a dynamic, which includes political alliances, ideological affinities and organizational ties, and plays out on two distinct levels: ideological/discursive and strategic/organizational (Graff and Korolczuk 2021). Since populism is not a robust ideological project, it readily feeds on ideas, affects and narrative structures promoted by the anti-gender movement, albeit often in an opportunistic and selective fashion. Simultaneously, the actors behind anti-gender campaigns use the organizational resources that right-wing parties offer, especially in contexts such as Poland where the latter are in power. What facilitates this collusion is the fact that the ultraconservative critiques of “gender” have indeed been framed in populist terms. The movement presents itself as a necessary and courageous defense of “the people” (often in their private roles as parents) against powerful and foreign “liberal elites,” with “gender ideology” emphatically identified as a modern version of western colonialism.

Bio

Elżbieta Korolczuk is an Associate professor in sociology, who works at Södertörn University in Stockholm and American Studies Center, Warsaw University. Her research interests involve social movements, civil society and anti-gender mobilizations. She published numerous articles and book chapters, as well as books: Civil Society Revisited: Lessons from Poland (co-edited with Kerstin Jacobsson, Berghahn Books, 2017) and Rebellious Parents. Parental Movements in Central-Eastern Europe and Russia (co-edited with Katalin Fábián, Indiana University Press, 2017). Recently, she co-authored a book Bunt kobiet. Czarne Protesty i Strajki Kobiet [Women’s Rebellion. Black Protests and Women’s Strikes] with Beata Kowalska, Jennifer Ramme and Claudia Snochowska-Gonzalez, published by European Solidarity Centre in 2019, and a research monograph Anti-Gender Politics in the Populist Moment with Agnieszka Graff (forthcoming in Routledge). She is also a commentator and a long-time women’s and human rights activist.

Talk will be chaired by Katja Kahlina and Tuija Pulkkinen.