ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines the intellectual sources of anti-genderism and maps out the transnational anti-gender movement. The Vatican played a key role in developing the claims used in anti-gender campaigns; in the nineties, “gender” became the new enemy of the ultraconservative wing of the Church, a generalized evil that to some extent replaced Jews in their role of scapegoat associated with modernity and moral degeneracy. In recent decades the religious movement developed into a political one. Today, cooperation between ultraconservatives and political actors is facilitated by transnational networks and organizations, such as the World Congress of Families, International Organization for the Family, Agenda Europe, CitizenGo and Political Network for Values, as well as local actors such as Ordo Iuris and Radio Maryja. This chapter examines these networks and groups and their strategies, stressing the importance of the East-West divide and for the political and moral geography of the movement. It explains how ultraconservative actors moralize the socio-economic crisis in their campaigns in order to mobilize large groups of citizens, including parents of young children, while right-wing populists promote welfare chauvinism to the same end. The chapter also examines the anti-gender movement’s aspirations in the field of education and knowledge production, its claims to scholarly legitimacy. Gender studies scholars are portrayed as ideology-driven activists blinded by “cultural Marxism,” while academic credentials are claimed for anti-genderism’s own supposedly “scientific” claims presented in works of the movement’s key thinkers associated with the movement include Gabriele Kuby and Marguerite Peeters are examined.
