Research projects

Anti-Gender Backlash and Democratic Pushback

Funded by the European Union - HORIZON Research and Innovation Actions (January 2023 - December 2025)

The goal of PUSH*BACK*LASH is twofold: (1) Firstly, to systematically inquire into the present-day contestation of gender equality issues and policies at both elite and citizen levels. Approaching democracy from a global feminist perspective, we employ a rigorous, comparative, multi-method design (e.g., experiments, surveys, interviews, participatory theatre). Our project enables: (a) identifying anti-gender strategies and best practices in counter-acting them across space and time; and (b) assessing the effects of antigender discourses by focusing on parties, social media, and public opinion. Secondly, to (2) develop and test strategies that can effectively counteract anti-gender and anti-feminist discursive strategies. Aiming at supporting the quality of democratic governance in more inclusive European societies, we acknowledge intersections between gender and other social categories at all stages of the project (composition of consortium and advisory board; theory formulation, empirical investigation, and policy recommendations) and thus engage with stakeholders. To develop sustainable solutions, we bring together gender activists, EU experts, and researchers from several fields of political science (political theory, public policy, political parties, public opinion, political behavior), anthropology, communication and media, philosophy, sociology, and social psychology. PUSH*BACK*LASH is a transdisciplinary, gender-diverse consortium aiming at equipping pro-equality actors with practical toolkits for responding to anti-gender equality and anti-feminist discursive strategies and backlash tactics.

Keywords:

– Gender in political sciences
– Political science
– Social issues
– Women and gender studies

Acronym: Push*Back*Lash

Prof. Dr. Nikita Dhawan (lead) and Dr. Ana Maria Miranda Mora (postdoc researcher) oversee the Work package WP1 – Conceptual Framework: Gender Justice in a New Age of Democracy.

Rescuing the Enlightenment: A Critical Theory of Postcolonialism

Funded by the VW Foundation (October 2019 to September 2024)

Since postcolonial studies is seen as anti-enlightenment, it may seem paradoxical to propose a critical theory of postcolonialism. So far, many postcolonial scholars have argued that the lofty ideals of the Enlightenment went hand in hand with colonial violence and fascist terror. At the same time, it is argued, the Enlightenment benefited the interests of a certain privileged class, establishing norms that were implicitly racist and sexist (Chakrabarty 2000). Despite these objections, Gayatri Spivak argues that given the imperial and counter-imperial nature of the Enlightenment, "one cannot not want it". Spivak (1994) uses the metaphor of the "child of rape" to admonish the postcolonial world that, despite the colonial and fascist violence that accompanied the emergence of these norms, it must learn to love the child of rape born of an act of enabling violence - namely the contaminated legacies of the European Enlightenment, such as "human rights" and "democracy". The aim of this project is therefore to understand the contradictory consequences of the Enlightenment without adopting an anti-enlightenment stance. The indispensability of the Enlightenment in the realization of critical projects must be considered together with the Euro- and androcentrisms that plague its legacy and, like a pharmakon, are both poison and medicine. To envision post-imperial futures, critical theories of decolonization are posited.