@article{2025:ahlhaus:from_ba,
title = {From “backlash” to “productive” responses.},
year = {2025},
note = {The book Anti-Gender Mobilisations in Europe and the Feminist
Response: Productive Resistance (Smrdelj & Kuhar, 2025a) asks how
feminists adapt their strategies over time in response to a new,
hostile environment of anti-feminism. This review essay critically
acclaims the volume against the state-of-the-art research. It
emphasises that the book advances research by focusing on the analysis
of reactions; critically rethinking the concept of “backlash” for
analysis; and offering a clear definition and typology of
forward-looking, productive reactions to anti-gender actors on a
continuum from low to high engagement with anti-gender actors. The
essay proposes that future research could further develop four aspects
of the book’s contributions to the field: First, methodological
approaches to studying how responses to anti-gender mobilisations
change over time could be further elaborated to go beyond a linear
“backlash” understanding of temporality. Second, to sharpen the
distinction between responses to anti-gender mobilisations and
feminist mobilisations, it is argued that “productive resistance”
could be further spelled out beyond the level of engagement with
anti-feminists. Third, the critique of reactive logics could be
extended by challenging the corresponding strict two-camp frame
(feminists vs. anti-gender), instead building on a co-constitutive
lens, and fourth, determining who responds beyond normative
assumptions.},
journal = {Culture, Practice & Europeanization},
pages = {110--126},
author = {Ahlhaus, Pauline},
volume = {10},
number = {1}
}