Related Papers
The mobilisation of women in Central and Eastern European countries: how contextual elements shaped women's NGOs from Romania and Poland
Andrada Iosif
In this article I approach the mobilization of women outside the realm of politics and inside NGOs in Romania and Poland, by analyzing some of the most important contextual elements that shaped their activities, interests or causes. In this manner, I present both similarities and differences between the communist legacies in the two countries, the effects of democratization and economic change, the civil society development and Western funding, elements of national culture, as well as transnational and EU actors. Issues such as interactions with the political sphere, network building and alliances, as well as differences between Western and Eastern countries are described throughout this endeavor. Conclusions are then drawn to stress out how different contextual elements have impacted women's movements in the Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries.
PRECARIOUS LOCATIONS: FEMINIST CO-OPTATION AND STRATEGIES OF RESISTANCE IN THE NEOLIBERAL AGE
PRECARIOUS LOCATIONS: FEMINIST CO-OPTATION AND STRATEGIES OF RESISTANCE IN THE NEOLIBERAL AGE
2018 •
Alexandra ANA
As women gained access to influence politics through official channels, the social justice concerns of feminist activists started to be pursued through institutionalized forms of political intervention. The institutionalization and professionalization of the feminist movement were widely associated with feminist and women NGOs collaborating with governmental gender equality bodies to advance movement goals and achieve policy success. While some scholars insisted on the benefits of infusing feminist ideas and practices within the state, others considered that NGOization made the feminist movement susceptible of cooptation contributing to its demobilization and depoliticization. The concept of co-optation reflects the dilemmas faced by contemporary feminist movements regarding the displacement of feminist goals and concerns that might be adapted to other priorities and agendassometimes adverse and conflicting with the original aims-once they become part of the official political channels of decision-making. The resource dependency of feminist NGOs and groups on state or private funds is also associated with the co-optation of movement organizations. With this in mind, how does one build on critical analyses around the concept of co-optation without disbanding the actions and efforts of feminist activists and NGOs as legitimating the policy agendas of state or private donors? This study aims, first, to explain, the tensions engendered by co-optation and the insider/outsider dilemma facing the contemporary feminist movement and, second, to explore the strategies developed by the feminist movement to resist or govern co-optation. In order to explore the process of co-optation, especially the tensions and strategies of resistance engendered by it, the paper uses the NGOization body of literature and provides empirical evidence from research on the Romanian feminist movement
Social Science Research Network
Introduction: Complex Interrelations of Gender Politics in Eastern Europe
2015 •
Gesine Fuchs
Following 25 years of democratic transformation in Eastern Europe, we are still confronted with ambiguous results regarding gender relations. Democratisation was neither synonymous with gender democracy, nor did the transition to a "free" market economy produce economic gender equality. This introduction to our special issues surveys new research on gender relations in the Eastern member states of the European Union. We then evaluate the structural impact of EU mandates in these domains, i. e., on the architecture of Women’s Policy Agencies and on the role of women’s Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs). We present a case study on gender developments in Ukraine as a non-member state to further illustrate the contradictory nature of evolving gender relations in the region as regards women’s roles, social policies and female activism. The introduction closes with reflections on the types of research and political activities that could further the pursuit of gender equality.
Gendering Democratic Backsliding in Central and Eastern Europe. A comparative agenda
"Good Change" and Better Activism: Feminist Responses to Backsliding Gender Policies in Poland
2019 •
Marianna Szczygielska
This chapter offers a critical analysis of the recent wave of delegitimization of gender equality policies in Poland between 2015 and 2018, as well as feminist responses to the so-called “war on gender ideology.” While the first part maps out the processes of backsliding gender policies at the levels of policy-making, funding distribution, and discursive attacks, the second one focuses on how these combined factors impacted earlier forms of feminist organizing in Poland and prompted new ways of mobilizing. From “Black protests,” All-Poland Women’s Strike to new forms of coalition building I trace feminist counter-strategies to backsliding gender policies. I argue that gender equality policies are the nexus of more general processes of democratic backsliding, revealing the formalistic nature of anti-discrimination measures undertaken by the previous government, but also bring to the open the unresolved tensions over the issue of “gender ideology” that characterized both the parliamentary and public debate around setting up and implementing equality infrastructure in Poland since 2007.
CEU Press CPS Book Series
Cps book gendering democratic backsliding
2019 •
Andrea Krizsan
Two decades after transition to democracy, countries in the Central Eastern European region are now experiencing democratic backsliding. De-democratization processes not only challenge democratic institutions but can also be seen as a form of cultural backlash against social and political changes that took place during the last decades. Gender and sexual orientation based equality is particularly hit: the cultural backlash translates to gendered processes of de-democratization. Attacks on gender equality and against actors standing for it are particularly widespread in countries of the Central and Eastern European region. This book aims to map gendered aspects of the decline in democracy in four countries in the Central and Eastern European region: Croatia, Hungary, Poland and Romania. We have a dual focus. First, we look at how processes of de-democratization affect previously established gender equality rights and what forms gender policy backsliding takes in the region. We are interested in learning how governments operate to block or reverse gender equality policies and what specific policy fields or issues are most under attack. Are policies actively removed or do we see more subtle dismantling strategies? Also, we ask if these dynamics and mechanisms are country specific or whether we can find similar patterns across countries? Second, we look at how these developments affect defenders and promotors of gender rights. How do women movements respond to these attacks? Do they change strategies? Do they falter in hostile conditions or we see resistance, maturing, diversifying coalition capacities? What do the anti-gender attacks and hostile states mean for movement capacities and strategies? Introduction provides a conceptual framework for the analysis. Separate chapters discuss gendered dynamics of de-democratization in the four countries.
The International Journal of Diversity in Organizations, Communities, and Nations: Annual Review
Open Societies? Connections between Women’s Activism, Globalization and Democracy in Central and Eastern Europe
2010 •
Katalin Fabian
International Journal of Diversity in Organizations, Communities, and Nations
Open Societies? Connections between Women’s Activism, Globalization and Democracy in Central and
2010 •
Katalin Fabian
Hope as Master Frame in Feminist Mobilization: Between Liberal NGO- ization and Radical-Intersectional Street Politics
Hope as Master Frame in Feminist Mobilization: Between Liberal NGOization and Radical-Intersectional Street Politics
2020 •
Alexandra ANA
The feminist critique of “family wage” central to the state-organized capitalism legitimates the contemporary supple capitalism relying on low-waged work of less-privileged women. The shift from redistribution to identity politics rendered invisible the structuring role of class. The feminist critique of welfare-state paternalism shifts the focus from the macro-level, from states responsibility for redistribution and fighting poverty, towards micro-level and individual responsibility. While this holds for Western welfare democracies, in CEE countries women entered the labour market much early. While the first decade following the collapse of the communist regimes was characterized by the emergence of an NGO-ized feminism, institutionalized and professionalized, engaged in competition for scarce funds and embracing a women’s empowerment discourse permeated by individualism and neoliberal free-market assumptions, the second decade was sequenced by the rise of a street feminism – contentious and disruptive in its form, intersectional instance, engaging in different struggles for social justice, addressing an anti-capitalist critique and the collective role of political economy.
Aspasia
Fashioning Women's Citizenship: Contemporary Paradoxes
2009 •
Katalin Fabian
Postcommunism from Within: Social Justice, Mobilization and Hegemony
Grounds for Hope? Voices of Feminism and Women's Activism in Romania
2013 •
C Laura Lovin
