The articles on the developments in different countries, when read together, tell us something broader about the current transnational polarization around “gender” and the role that it plays for different political projects that claim to speak in the name of “the people”.

Launch of Baltic Worlds 2020, vol. XIII:1 Special Issue: Women and “the People”

Guest editor Jenny Gunnarsson Payne, Södertörn University, presents the issue and invites contributors from different countries to report and discuss.

Speakers

Paula Biglieri, Director of the Cátedra Libre Ernesto Laclau, Faculty of Philosophy and Letters, University of Buenos Aires.
Yulia Gradskova, Associate Professor at the Institute of Contemporary History and Lecturer in Gender Studies, Södertörn University.
Jenny Ingridsdotter, PhD in Ethnology, Umeå University.
Anna Sedysheva, PhD-candidate at the Polish Academy of Sciences’ Graduate School for Social Research in Warsaw, Poland.
Anna-Maria Sörberg, Freelance writer based in Stockholm, Sweden.
Alev Özkazanç, Professor of Political Science and Gender Studies. Since June 2019 visiting scholar at Wolfson College, University of Oxford.

This issue takes a closer look at the constellation of conservative, often illiberal and sometimes even authoritarian anti-gender mobilization, the still powerful yet increasingly contested neoliberal hegemony, and the recent rise of feminist mass-movements. How does the drama between them play out in different national, regional and transnational contexts?
It is suggested that contemporary feminist mobilization plays a crucial role of providing a democratic and progressive alternative to both neoliberalism and illiberal-authoritarian articulation of “the people”.