The University of Helsinki Faculty of Arts project “Anti-Gender Trouble” studies anti-gender mobilization in its relationship to democracy in Europe. The research combines the study of political theory with analysis of texts within the field of ‘anti-gender trouble' that consists of anti-gender actors, academic study of anti-gender, and EU politics that targets anti-gender mobilization. Instead of straightforwardly assuming anti-gender as anti-democratic populism, the project analyses the use of concepts of ‘majority', ‘minority and' ‘the people' in these texts. We expect the conceptual analysis reveal a complicated array of conflicting ideas of democracy in relation to anti-gender mobilization and to open insights into understanding why exactly gender emerges in the field of struggles over the meaning of democracy. The project will create a new theoretical approach for researching the phenomenon of anti-gender, and the results will be useful in depolarizing political discussion

2024

2028