The New War on Gender Studies

On the morning of December 18, 2018, a bag was left outside the National Secre­ta­riat for Gender Rese­arch in Gothen­burg Sweden. While the dyna­mite shaped device inside turned out to be a dummy, the inten­tion was clear. Even the Swedish Vice-Chancellor Eva Wiberg herself noted, some scho­lars are espe­ci­ally exposed to violence, based on the nature of their rese­arch. “Without specu­la­ting in this certain case, we all know that this expo­sure has become very appa­rent for gender rese­arch today.”

Why is this inci­dent so shocking? Perhaps because it was not reported widely in the inter­na­tional press, despite the fact that it followed on after the contro­ver­sial closing of the Swedish Gender Equa­lity Agency (Jämställ­dhe­ts­myn­di­gheten), a victim to the right­ward shift in parlia­ment once the popu­list Swedish Demo­crats (Sveri­ge­de­mo­kra­terna) earned third-party status. Perhaps too because it shows the poten­tial for violence that can emerge in the wake of incre­asingly coor­di­nated attacks on gender studies as conser­va­tive and popu­list parties exploit this issue to their own ends. It does not foment debate and deli­be­ra­tion; as we are seeing, the world over, it fosters extre­mist stances, desta­bi­lizes liberal demo­cracy, and chal­lenges critical inquiry itself, along with its practitioners.

Attacks on NGOs and Academics

Bettina Rheims, Valentin P. III, 2011; Quelle: flickr.com

It is hard to imagine that the scien­tific study of gender inequa­lity in the labour force, govern­ment, and in personal and public life should garner such a response. And yet, while we have witnessed story after story in North America and Western Europe of govern­ment roll­backs on abor­tion provi­sion, LGBTQI rights, and NGOs aiding women’s support groups and the closure of entire programs devoted to women’s and gender studies, we somehow still think this is preserve of the popu­list, autho­ri­ta­rian play­book in embattled demo­cra­cies. To think of gender studies under attack is to think of the dire situa­tion facing acade­mics in Poland and Hungary, and on the horizon in Bolsonaro’s Brazil. For those scho­lars knee deep in the tren­ches, the world over, this is incre­asingly beco­ming busi­ness as usual.

As the socio­lo­gists Roman Kuhar and David Patern­otte have noted, the anti-gender move­ment –  the incre­asingly orga­nized assault on “gender ideo­logy” and “gender theory” used as a stand in by oppon­ents to marriage equa­lity, repro­duc­tive rights, sexual libe­ra­lism, and anti-discrimination policy –  has long moved beyond the borders of incre­asingly autho­ri­ta­rian count­ries. The chall­enge of sexual rights and gender iden­tity is part of a neo-traditionalist turn; hence it is a global concern in how we meet this chall­enge in the 21^st century.

We see it in the extreme in the realm of ever­yday life in the spike in hate crimes against sexual mino­ri­ties, in brutal acid attacks, and in the count­less testi­mo­nies of #metoo. It has seeped into the poli­cies of the tradi­tional conser­va­tive parties the world over, who cozy up to right-wing popu­lists in an effort to salvage popular support. Even the over-hyped egali­ta­ria­nism of social media is not immune from the moral panic that drove Face­book, Tumblr, and Insta­gram to dispro­por­tio­nally limit online spaces of sex posi­ti­vity and consen­sual erotic exch­ange in the name of Commu­nity Standards.

Femi­nism – on the right and left

Gender studies has, since its incep­tion in the 1970s as women’s studies, been a target of oppo­si­tion both from within and without. A product of the social move­ments of the New Left and the search for radical demo­cratic solu­tions to ongoing social cleavages, gender and sexual equa­lity nevert­heless remained hard won issues even among progres­sives. Disagree­ments among acti­vists forced femi­nists, gays, and lesbians to forge their own coali­tions, their contri­bu­tions to the spirit of 1968, as the histo­rian Chris­tina von Hoden­berg has recently shown, often mini­mized in contem­po­rary and histo­rical accounts. Still women’s studies gained a toehold in the march through the insti­tu­tions where in univer­si­ties like the Tech­nical Univer­sity of Berlin, rese­ar­chers like Karin Hausen oversaw much-needed studies of women’s history, sexual violence, harass­ment, labour inequa­lity, citi­zen­ship, corpo­rate war and mili­ta­riza­tion. Not without its own blind spots as the well-known Professor of women’s and gender Studies Chandra Mohanty famously pointed out, it has nevert­heless weathered various storms to hold univer­si­ties, govern­ment, and corpo­ra­tions accoun­table for failing to uphold mino­rity rights around access, repre­sen­ta­tion, and equality.

If 1968 helped spawn new forms of agita­tion and advo­cacy, coale­scing in the crea­tion of women’s and gender studies depart­ments in univer­si­ties in the Global North, it also became a touch­stone for the New Right, which like­wise saw debates around gender as foun­da­tional to the move­ment. Looking back at the spirit of 1968, Alain de Benoist, French academic, philo­so­pher, and founder of the Nouvelle Droit, proclaimed that those tumul­tuous months and their emphasis on libe­ra­lism, femi­nism, moder­nity, indi­vi­dua­lism, Marxism, and globa­lism masked “the sheer size of a crisis that demands a radical renewal of modes of thought, decision, and action.” Looking back in his Mani­festo of the French Right in the Year 2000, he argued that femi­nists, landing on the idea of gender as a social cons­truc­tion, fell into the trap of vying for equa­lity tout court, which in the end simply revi­vi­fies the male subject as universal. On the contrary, the New Right promotes a diffe­ren­tia­list femi­nism, one that seeks to safe­guard a place for sexual diffe­rence in the public realm, uphol­ding speci­fi­cally femi­nine rights like the right to virginity, mate­r­nity, and – in de Benoist’s thin­king at least – abor­tion. Instead of agita­ting for equality-come-patriarchy, diffe­ren­tia­list femi­nist acknow­ledges “the equal value of their distinct and unique natures.”

The Conser­va­tive Backlash

Bettina Rheims: Andy B., Paris, 2011; Quelle: art-corpus.blogspot.com

It is not diffi­cult to see the echo effect of aspects of this line of argu­men­ta­tion in the wildly popular writing of Canada’s Jordan Peterson, whose Twelve Rules for Life has become a main­stay of book­s­tore best seller lists the world over. Peterson and others like him see academic femi­nism as a full-frontal assault on balanced thin­king, a corro­sive “cultural Marxism” in need of contain­ment. Whereas de Benoist’s “femi­nism” appeals to the more radical consti­tu­ents of the avowed right, Peterson’s Univer­sity of Toronto creden­tials allow his not uncon­tro­ver­sial thin­king to gain a toehold with tradi­tional conser­va­tives, a coali­tion cemented most recently with his quasi-advisory role with the right-leaning Ontario provin­cial govern­ment that rolled back progres­sive sex education.

While the austerity measures of the mid 2000s economic down­turn put added pres­sure on gender studies depart­ments to prove their mettle, the latest war on “gender theory” emanates out of middle 1990s discus­sions in the inter­na­tional arena which forma­lized gender and sexual inequa­lity as part of the language of human rights. While the assault on gender studies in Hungary is the most glaring example, for years scho­lars in South East Asia, in Australia, Europe, and North and South America have been put in the posi­tion of defen­ding long-established rese­arch that sex, gender, and sexua­lity have varied over time and space, and in diffe­rent histo­rical moments.

These new anti-gender campaigns tran­s­cend borders. They unite Catho­lics with Evan­ge­li­cals, secu­la­rists and the devout. They chall­enge academic inte­grity while shoring up govern­ment policy, limi­ting repro­duc­tive rights, prop­ping up a parti­cular image of the family. Although they take on the appearance of a popular move­ment, they have been stage-managed and supported by popu­list poli­ti­cians. The Vatican’s role is long-standing, with Pope Francis going on record at World Youth Day in 2016 that gender is a form of “ideo­lo­gical colo­niza­tion.” Although chiefly the preserve of right-leaning parties, even Ecuador’s former leftist presi­dent Rafael Correa trumpeted the claim in 2013 that femi­nists, LGBTQI acti­vists, and other gender warriors were actively mobi­li­zing against tradi­tional values.

This move­ment has not been without violence. Gender studies scho­lars have received hate mail. They’ve been stalked and received threats. In November 2017, promi­nent queer theo­rist Judith Butler was atta­cked by a hete­ro­ge­neous mob in Brazil that mobi­lized via social media to protest her visit as “a threat to the natural order of gender, sexua­lity and the family”. Anti-Butler demons­tra­tors took to the streets of Sao Paulo. They burned her likeness in effigy, a prac­tice that conjured the inqui­si­to­rial history of targe­ting witches, Jews, heretic and sodo­mites. Far right groups followed her and her poli­tical scien­tist partner Wendy Brown to the airport where they were targeted with more slurs. Against Butler, oppon­ents rehe­arsed the well-worn charge that leftists, Jews, and sodo­mites, were behind the threat to tradi­tional values.

The New Culture Wars

This new war on gender studies is not solely targeted at univer­si­ties and rese­arch insti­tutes in fled­gling demo­cra­cies. Its reach is more compre­hen­sive and broader still. It is part of a new kind of culture war targe­ting all areas where critical rese­arch in gender and sexua­lity has brought about visi­bi­lity to vulnerable popu­la­tions, along­side important legal protec­tions and gains. It is flexible enough to appeal to the educated and the disen­fran­chised. It unites the popu­list with the conser­va­tive right. The natu­ra­lized vision of gender diffe­rence appeases tradi­tio­na­lists while simul­ta­neous appe­aling to those who feel select strands of academic inquiry and exper­tise has gone “gone too far.” It also explains how these move­ments can attract adher­ents from among women and queers, who buy into the language of diffe­ren­tiated forms of empower­ment that respect natural and inherent diffe­rences. In the era of iden­tity poli­tics, the language of biology as destiny has wide appeal.

It is a neo-traditionalist back­lash against sexual libe­ra­lism in all its forms. It might seem most palpable in mobi­liza­tions against sex educa­tion and universal bath­rooms and in threats against teachers and scho­lars in “other parts of the world.” But it is no less nefa­rious and active in how it targets the main­stream too. Most recently, we have seen it in the hypo­crisy of social media conglo­me­rates that claim algo­rithms are unable to diffe­ren­tiate between sex posi­ti­vity and porno­graphy. At precisely the moment of increased visi­bi­lity for femi­nist, sex posi­tive, and LGBTQI-desiring people in using the digital field as a space for acti­vism, art, conver­sa­tion, commerce and desire, even the staun­chly egali­ta­rian jargon of the social media­scape has fallen prey to fear monge­ring and moral panic.

We believe, to our own peril, that this is the stuff of autho­ri­ta­rian govern­ments in fled­gling demo­cra­cies. It is a vestige of a long-standing critique of gendered power in liberal demo­cracy and in late capi­ta­lism, which has gained new currency and new viru­lence in the current moment. That discord over how best to secure human rights and repre­sen­ta­tion so easily bubbles over into acts of real or intended violence should be a lesson to us all about the fragi­lity of our demo­cra­cies and the respon­si­bi­lity of every indi­vi­dual in uphol­ding their basic tenets in spee­ches, in parlia­ment, at the voting box and in print.

The pessi­mist in me sees these dark times ahead. The histo­rian in me knows that back­lash and oppo­si­tion breeds resi­li­ence. Here’s hoping the histo­rian wins out.