Introduction
Democracy and gender equality are increasingly contested in European parliamentary contexts, with the rise of political parties and movements that oppose feminist and anti‐discrimination politics involving women, LGBTI*Footnote 1 and racialised people. The literature exploring far‐right and anti‐gender actors in institutional settings has focused on their discourse and impact on parliamentary politics and government (Alonso & Espinosa‐Fajardo, Reference Alonso and Espinosa‐Fajardo2021; Kantola & Miller, Reference Kantola and Miller2021; Norocel & Pettersson, Reference Norocel and Pettersson2023). Yet, limited attention has been paid to feminist responses articulated in parliamentary contexts where far‐right and anti‐gender parties actively oppose gender and LGBTI* equality (Cullen, Reference Cullen2021). This article addresses this gap by analysing feminist parliamentary responses to such opposition and the factors that enable and constrain these responses. The questions guiding our research are (1) What feminist institutional responses to far‐right, anti‐gender actors are articulated in parliaments? and (2) What factors contribute to and limit the capacity of parliaments to respond to anti‐gender opposition?
Building upon our previous research on the Catalan Parliament (Caravantes et al, Reference Caravantes, Elizondo and Lombardo2024) and on research conducted within the European CCINDLE project, we employ a multi‐level comparison of the Catalan Parliament (2021–2024) and the Spanish Parliament (2019–2023) involving content analysis of 21 parliamentary debates and 42 in‐depth interviews. We argue that the capacity of parliaments to respond to anti‐gender, far‐right opposition against gender, race and LGBTI* equality is structured by macro‐, meso‐ and micro‐level enabling and constraining factors that include democracy and its legacies, state structure the constellation of anti‐gender and pro‐equality forces, the institutionalisation of equality and critical actors. While they share strong institutionalisation of gender equality, the two parliaments are different in terms of the level of government and alliances opposing gender equality at each level. This leads to a diverse capacity for responses.
Both parliaments have experienced heightened polarisation around gender with the rise of the far right. Yet, a coalition among progressive forces made a cordon sanitaire possible in the Catalan Parliament. This was due to the limited presence of the far‐right Vox party, with 8.1 per cent of parliamentary seats, and the mainstream‐right People's Party – Partido Popular (PP) – with 2.2 per cent, alongside the willingness of other parties’ members of parliament (MPs) to form alliances to isolate the far right. In the Spanish national context, where Vox has secured 14.8 per cent of parliamentary seats and PP 25.4 per cent, antagonism around gender issues has been more pervasive and alliances among pro‐equality actors have been more difficult due to competition within the left‐wing coalition (Congreso, 2019). In this work, we build on literature that has identified feminist parliamentary response strategies (Kantola & Lombardo, Reference Kantola and Lombardo2024), including ‘knowledge’ (discourses and data), ‘coalition‐building’ (bringing actors together), ‘rule‐making’ (making and using rules) and ‘everyday pragmatic engagement’ (everyday practices to engage with anti‐gender actors), as well as examine the factors enabling and constraining them. In doing this, this article contributes to advancing theories of feminist institutional politics, anti‐gender politics, gender‐sensitive parliaments and democratisation.
Feminist institutional responses to anti‐gender politics in parliament
Feminist institutional responses have emerged in a context of the increasing presence of far‐right political parties and anti‐gender movements in parliaments across Europe, which poses a threat to the advancement of social rights, particularly feminist, anti‐racist and pro‐LGBTI* rights (Berthet, Reference Berthet2022; Dietze & Roth, Reference Dietze and Roth2020; Graff & Korolczuk, Reference Graff and Korolczuk2021; Kantola & Miller, Reference Kantola and Miller2021; Norocel & Pettersson, Reference Norocel and Pettersson2023; Spierings et al., Reference Spierings, Zaslove, Mügge and Lange2015). We understand anti‐gender actors as those who, from the 2000s onward, have actively opposed and sought to dismantle feminist, anti‐racist and LGBTI*‐oriented politics through a variety of mechanisms, both formal (gender and LGBTI* policy backsliding and defunding feminist, anti‐racist and LGBTI* NGOs) and informal (verbally attacking feminist, anti‐racist and LGBTI* politics, and delegitimising egalitarian claims), as well as by producing alternative knowledge to replace feminist, anti‐racist and LGBTI* knowledge (Paternotte & Verloo, Reference Paternotte and Verloo2021; Verloo, Reference Verloo2018). The political project that far‐right, anti‐gender parties propose in parliaments is that of a white supremacist, heteropatriarchal society that builds on essentialist gender binaries and traditional gender and family roles (Bogaards & Petö, Reference Bogaards and Pető2022; Krizsán & Roggeband, Reference Krizsán, Roggeband, Croissant and Tomini2024; Norocel & Paternotte, Reference Norocel and Paternotte2023; Paternotte, Reference Paternotte2023). Scholarship on the impact of the far‐right on democratic erosion has called ‘reactionary democracy’ the far‐right use of democratic concepts, such as ‘the people’, ‘to push reactionary ideas in the service of power’ (Mondon & Winter, Reference Mondon and Winter2020, p. 5). To enact this reactionary project in parliament, far‐right parties employ strategies that are ‘direct’ and outspoken attacks against equality policies and institutions, as well as ‘indirect’ opposition, when, as in the European Parliament, they argue that the European Union (EU) should not ‘invade’ national sovereignty through its gender equality policies (Kantola & Lombardo, Reference Kantola and Lombardo2021). They also use hate speech against groups targeted as enemies of the state – LGBTQIA* people, racialised people, women, feminists, Muslims and migrants (Igareda‐González, Reference Igareda González2022) – and the MPs that represent them.
Specialised literature has shown that gender is a central component of far‐right politics (Dietze & Roth, Reference Dietze and Roth2020; Spierings, Reference Spierings, Dietze and Roth2020), which acts rhetorically as ‘symbolic glue’ to unite different right‐wing groups in their opposition against equality (Kováts & Põim, Reference Kováts and Põim2015). Anti‐genderism is present in mainstream right parties facing rising far‐right competitors in Europe (Weeks & Allen, Reference Weeks and Allen2022), and in Spain (Arranz, Reference Arranz Sánchez2022; Cabezas et al., Reference Cabeza Pérez, Alonso Sáenz de Oger and Gómez Fortes2023). The political projects of far‐right and anti‐gender actors are context‐specific, with varieties of anti‐genderism (Reinhardt et al., Reference Reinhardt, Heft and Pavan2023) and a far‐right continuum (Norocel, Reference Norocel, Kondor and Littler2023) identified. Comparative literature highlights the specificities of anti‐gender politics in different national contexts: some align with femonationalist and homonationalist agendas, while others rely on religious arguments (Prearo, Reference Prearo2024; Sältenberg et al., Reference Sältenberg, Díaz Fernández and Caravantes2024). In Spain, far‐right and anti gender agendas are closely aligned (Cabezas et al., Reference Cabezas Fernández, Pichel‐Vázquez and Enguix Grau2023; Cornejo and Pichardo, Reference Cornejo, Pichardo, Kuhar and Paternotte2017). The connection between far‐right and anti‐gender actors (Meret & Scrinzi, Reference Meret, Scrinzi, Siim and Stoltz2024; Spierings, Reference Spierings, Dietze and Roth2020), however, becomes more complex when anti‐gender stances are adopted by left‐wing, self‐identified feminist actors who oppose transgender rights (Butler, Reference Butler2024; Thurlow, Reference Thurlow2024). In Spain, for instance, gender self‐determination has faced opposition not only from the far right but also from some feminist MPs within the Socialist Party (Platero, Reference Platero2023).
‘Gendered political violence’ is a key mechanism in the anti‐gender project (Bjarnegård & Zetterberg, Reference Bjarnegård and Zetterberg2023; Krizsán & Roggeband, Reference Krizsán and Roggeband2021; Krook, Reference Krook2020). Specialised literature understands violence against women politicians as a continuum of different forms of violence, including psychological violence that threatens and harasses them, and semiotic violence that vilifies, humiliates, and shames women politicians so as to convey a message of their ‘group‐based inferiority’ (Krook, Reference Krook2020, p. 189). The concept of ‘a continuum of violence’ is employed in Bjarnegård and Zetterberg (Reference Bjarnegård and Zetterberg2023), drawing on Kelly (Reference Kelly1988), to provide a more inclusive definition of violence that moves beyond the focus on the physical form and to show how the diverse forms of violence are related. Indeed, gendered political violence is not an isolated incident but rather part of a system of everyday practices – misogynist jokes, sexual harassment, hate speech – that normalise violence.
The use of gender‐based political violence against people and behaviours that deviate from the normative social order (Bjarnegärd & Zetterberg, Reference Bjarnegård and Zetterberg2023; Krizsán & Roggeband, Reference Krizsán, Roggeband, Croissant and Tomini2024) is anti‐democratic to the extent that it aims at excluding gendered, racial and sexual minorities from the ‘demos’ (Paternotte & Verloo, Reference Paternotte and Verloo2021; Roggeband & Krizsán, Reference Roggeband and Krizsán2018) and expelling their claims from the public arena (Krizsán & Roggeband, Reference Krizsán and Roggeband2021; Krook, Reference Krook2020). The far right's active promotion of political polarisation in democratic institutions is detrimental to the quality of democratic deliberations (Gora & de Wilde, Reference Gora and De Wilde2020) because it transforms a political opponent into an enemy to be destroyed (McCoy et al., Reference McCoy, Rahman and Somer2018). When such polarisation is orchestrated around gender, race and sexuality equality, and the enemies to be destroyed are gender, racial and sexual minorities, this creates a challenging context for feminist, LGBTI* and anti‐racist actors to uphold an equality agenda, and for women, racialised, LGBTI* and gender non‐conforming MPs to act in parliament and respond to anti‐gender opposition. Recent work on the Catalan Parliament shows that even a small parliamentary presence of the far right disrupts deliberation on gender issues, having detrimental consequences on democracy (Caravantes et al., Reference Caravantes, Elizondo and Lombardo2024). By provoking polarisation around gender, the far right pushed pro‐equality actors to hold meetings outside the parliamentary arena to have a safer space for gender debates. Both the deterioration of deliberation and its exclusionary effects contribute to democratic backsliding.
Institutional feminist politics is not ‘ordinary’ parliamentary politics because of the contestation of feminist policies and the persistence of structural inequalities in parliament. Gender equality policies are a contested field and experience resistance in all stages of policymaking (Engeli & Mazur, Reference Engeli and Mazur2018; Verloo, Reference Verloo2018). Parliaments that have experienced a rise in the far right across Europe show a heightened polarisation around gender (Berthet, Reference Berthet2022; Dietze & Roth, Reference Dietze and Roth2020; Kantola & Miller, Reference Kantola and Miller2021; Norocel & Pettersson, Reference Norocel and Pettersson2023; Spierings et al., Reference Spierings, Zaslove, Mügge and Lange2015). Yet, gendered morality issues such as abortion and LGBTI* rights have long been especially politicised in Spain's political parties (Chaqués & Palau, Reference Chaqués, Palau, Engeli, Green‐Pedersen and Thorup Larsen2012). Overall, feminist actors in institutions are still ‘marginalised insiders’ (Banaszak, Reference Banaszak2010) who struggle to advance policies in a sector such as equality that tends not to be prioritised or even resisted (Pettinicchio, Reference Pettinicchio2012). Besides, persisting structural inequalities in descriptive, substantive and symbolic political representation make gender equality policy not an ordinary parliamentary politics (Erikson & Verge, Reference Erikson and Verge2022) but one whose legitimacy is still questioned.
Typology of responses
Feminist institutional responses to anti‐gender opposition have emerged to address this challenging context. They are defined as ‘feminist action, practice, and discourse to counter opposition to gender equality and promote an equality agenda’, ‘that is articulated by politicians, staff, committees in a parliamentary context, or by a body that represents the whole institution’ (Kantola & Lombardo, Reference Kantola and Lombardo2024, p. 5). Responses do not necessarily come from self‐defined feminist actors and may come from various political ideologies. We refer to them as responses because they are not the same as regular equality policies, but rather discourses and actions that respond to anti‐gender politics. Feminist institutional responses are conceptualised by Kantola and Lombardo (Reference Kantola and Lombardo2024) through four analytical categories that allow us to identify different forms of responses enacted to oppose anti‐gender attacks: ‘knowledge’, ‘coalition‐building’, ‘rule‐making’ and ‘everyday pragmatic engagement’.
‘Knowledge’ refers to framing strategies and data employed to contrast anti‐gender discourses (Kantola & Lombardo, Reference Kantola and Lombardo2024). Knowledge is, for both anti‐gender and feminist actors, a critical tool for shaping their societal projects. While anti‐gender actors seek to produce knowledge and disinformation to delegitimise feminist politics, feminist actors produce critical feminist knowledge to advance gender and intersectional equality and counteract this opposition. In this context, knowledge encompasses discursive strategies like (counter)framing (Cullen, Reference Cullen2021), which foster cultural changes to counter ongoing attempts to undermine feminist progress, particularly efforts to defend the rights of marginalised communities (Zavella, Reference Zavella2020).
‘Coalition‐building’ comprises responses that bring pro‐equality actors together in a coordinated or loose way to expand awareness of gender issues and foster support for equality positions even among actors who have not defended them publicly before (Krizsán & Roggeband, Reference Krizsán and Roggeband2021). Coalition‐building involves negotiation, bargaining, conflict and alliance‐making. Coalitions can occur between individuals in the same parliamentary groups, facilitating cohesive voting practices, or between different groups to unite forces to contest anti‐gender advances. Coalitions can also be developed within parliamentary committees around an agreement on equality across parties, which involves the difficulty for pro‐equality actors to persuade members from less gender‐aware political factions to join, especially if agreements concern morality issues (Kantola, Reference Kantola and Ahrens2022).
‘Rule‐making’ responses encompass formal and informal institutional efforts by political parties, parliamentary committees or parliament to address anti‐gender attacks and opposition (Kantola & Lombardo, Reference Kantola and Lombardo2024). Rule‐making responses allow identifying formal regulations that institutions adopt or revise to counter anti‐gender opposition as well as informal practices to limit anti‐gender impact. Institutions affect social and policy change not only through the institutional paths, actors’ dynamics or discursive patterns they shape (Hall & Taylor, Reference Hall and Taylor1996) but also through the gendered rules – both formal and informal – that they make (Chappell & Waylen, Reference Chappell and Waylen2013). Rule‐making is the result of interactions between actors and institutions. In some cases, feminist institutional actors (Pettinicchio, Reference Pettinicchio2012) affect institutions by making new rules to respond to the attacks, seeking to shape them to their needs. In other cases, they interpret and navigate pre‐existing rules to counter anti‐gender opposition. These ‘rules in use’ (Gains & Lowndes, Reference Gains and Lowndes2022, p. 394), which denote the interactions between specific institutional rules and those who interpret and implement them, allow understanding of formal and informal mechanisms actors employ in their responses.
‘Everyday pragmatic engagement’ responses comprise individual and collective practices that feminist institutional actors enact to oppose and respond to anti‐gender groups in parliamentary settings (Kantola & Lombardo, Reference Kantola and Lombardo2024). This category refers to the everyday, routinised interaction with anti‐gender and far‐right actors and discourses, including deciding whether to engage with them. The practices can be agreed upon and orchestrated by specific actors or may emerge spontaneously as parliamentary debates unfold. They include parliamentary routines and practices, such as organising separate meetings or deciding whether and how to interact with anti‐gender discourses in plenary debates.
The categories of feminist institutional response that we have employed from the study of Kantola and Lombardo (Reference Kantola and Lombardo2024) present both commonalities and divergences with respect to parliamentary dynamics in policy areas other than gender. Coalition‐building shows similarities with other institutional coalitions concerning the politics of cohesion, bargain, conflict and compromise that is involved (Vercesi, Reference Vercesi2016; Warasin et al., Reference Warasin, Kantola, Rolandsen, Coughlan, Ahrens and Rolandsen2019). It diverges in the cross‐partisan coalitions that sometimes emerge triggered by solidarity with gendered targets and due to the often‐personal dimension of these attacks. Rule‐making is typical in parliamentary politics. Yet, feminist institutional response specifically involves the elaboration of formal rules to make the parliament more gender inclusive and informal rules to promote cohesive behaviour to isolate anti‐gender politics and protect existing egalitarian commitments. Knowledge is similarly used in parliamentary speeches to persuade or send messages to voters (Proksch & Slapin, Reference Proksch and Slapin2015), but different in the need to use it in feminist institutional responses to counter the frames of anti‐gender actors (Cullen, Reference Cullen2021) that question the very legitimacy of feminist knowledge. Everyday pragmatic engagement shares similarities with other practices that are regularly enacted in communities of practitioners (Pouliot, Reference Pouliot2016; Watson, Reference Watson, Hui, Schatzki and Shove2017), but with the specificity here that it concerns parliamentary practices feminist actors develop to engage everyday with actors that not only attack feminist politics but deny the legitimacy of gender equality as a policy field.
Levels of responses
Within parliaments, responses are articulated at different levels: at a macro‐level, depending on systemic characteristics and social contexts; at a meso‐level, defined by the specific parliamentary structures; and at a micro‐level, through the action of individual actors and groups. Building on the literature on feminist movements, state feminism and gender and party politics, we identify conditions relevant to the capacity of parliaments and actors to respond to anti‐gender and far‐right opposition across these levels. We refer to these conditions as enabling and constraining factors of feminist institutional responses and explore them empirically in the discussion section.
At the macro‐level, the state of democracy shapes the capacity of feminist institutional responses. Democracy and gender equality are interdependent (Lombardo et al, Reference Lombardo, Kantola and Rubio‐Marin2021; Verloo, Reference Verloo, Bellamy and Merkel2016), with a higher quality of democracy being positively related to support for feminist policies and institutions (Htun & Weldon, Reference Htun and Weldon2010; Tripp, Reference Tripp, Waylen, Celis, Kantola and Weldon2013). Relevant factors to the quality of democracy include the state's capacity to ensure anti‐discrimination and minority rights, and the equal participation and inclusion of civil society and political opposition in deliberative processes (Morlino, Reference Morlino, Croissant and Tomini2024; Young, Reference Young2000). State structures also matter, where decentralised states and territorially diverse party systems increase opportunities for feminist policy‐making (Kenny & Verge, Reference Kenny, Verge, Sawer, Banaszak, True and Kantola2023). The relationship between gender equality and democracy, however, is complex and dependent on contextual historical legacies such as fascism and colonialism that, when insufficiently challenged, make liberal democracies more unprepared to face the democratic erosion of anti‐gender and far‐right politics (Roggeband et al., Reference Roggeband, Rawłuszko, Meier, Díaz Fernández, Lombardo and Caravantesforthcoming).
At the meso‐level, the level of gender equality institutionalisation in parliamentary contexts is considered important for feminist institutional responses (Htun & Weldon, Reference Htun and Weldon2010). Parliaments are gendered institutions in that they enact formal and informal gendered rules that may hinder or promote gender equality, as the adoption of gender action plans and protocols against sexual harassment shows (Erikson & Verge, Reference Erikson and Verge2022). They can, therefore, be ‘gender‐sensitive’ to the extent that they create structures and rules that make parliament more gender‐equal (Childs & Palmieri, Reference Childs, Palmieri, Sawer, Banaszak, True and Kantola2023). Thus, feminist governance structures (Sawer, Reference Sawer2020) – such as gender, race and LGBTI* equality parliamentary committees – as well as alliances between gender equality institutions, feminist movements and other civil society organisations, strengthen feminist policies in democratic states (Krizsán & Roggeband, Reference Krizsán and Roggeband2021; McBride & Mazur, Reference McBride, Mazur, Waylen, Celis, Kantola and Weldon2013). Former research has shown that the institutionalisation of gender equality within the parliament plays a preventive role in facing anti‐gender politics by creating a favourable institutional culture for detecting discriminatory behaviour and promoting feminist knowledge (Caravantes et al, Reference Caravantes, Elizondo and Lombardo2024).
Another factor at the meso‐level is the existing constellations of progressive and anti‐gender forces. Left‐wing parties are commonly promoters of gender and LGBTI* equality compared to right‐wing parties (Beckwith, Reference Beckwith, Banaszak, Beckwith and Rucht2000; Keith & Verge, Reference Keith and Verge2018; Kittilson, Reference Kittilson2006). Crucial meso‐level factors affecting the possibilities for feminist institutional responses include the ‘colour’ of the governing party or coalition, the parliamentary representation of anti‐gender actors and the presence of feminist representation within the institution – whether through self‐declared feminist MPs, or the participation of feminist civil society in parliament. The culture of cross‐party coalitions and the dynamics of electoral competition within an ideological field can also enable or constrain feminist responses (Kantola, Reference Kantola and Ahrens2022).
Finally, individual ‘critical actors’ are an enabling factor of feminist institutional responses at the micro‐level. In the literature on gender and political representation, ‘critical actors’ refer to the role and impact of highly committed agents who actively promote gender equality despite their numbers (Childs & Krook, Reference Childs and Krook2009, p. 138). In parliamentary contexts where anti‐gender actors attack women, racialised, LGBTQIA*, feminist and progressive MPs and civil society, individual committed actors can make progressive change by articulating feminist responses to counter anti‐gender politics.
Methods and context: A comparative analysis of the Spanish and Catalan Parliaments
We explore the differences in feminist institutional responses in the Spanish and Catalan Parliaments during the 2019–2023 and 2021–2024 legislatures, respectively. We have selected these cases because, whilst sharing several features (strong institutionalisation of gender equality and feminist discourse and polarisation around gender), the different levels of government in Spain's decentralised system are key in explaining differences in the object of our analysis – the type and possibilities for feminist institutional responses. The regional or state/national level manifests in specific party dynamics, alliances of political forces that oppose gender equality and different memories of Spain's fascist past that enable or constrain the feminist institutional responses we examine.
Regarding commonalities, both institutions share similar legislation concerning gender equality, exemplified by the Spanish Law 3/2007 on the effective equality of women and men, and the Catalan Law 19/2020 on Equal Treatment and Non‐Discrimination (BOE, 2021), both of which mandate parity quotas in electoral lists. As a result, the parliamentary composition is near parity, with women comprising 44 per cent of MPs in the 14th legislature of the Spanish Parliament (2019–2023) and 47 per cent of MPs in the 13th–14th legislature of the Catalan Parliament (2021–2024).
Both parliaments reflect strong gender equality institutionalisation, that, following Elizondo and Silvestre's (Reference Elizondo and Silvestre2023) criteria, we consider at a medium level in the Spanish Parliament and at a high level in the Catalan Parliament. This slight distinction arises from the fact that, while the Spanish Parliament has adopted a Gender Equality Plan and a Sexual Harassment Protocol, these only include technical, not political personnel, unlike in the Catalan Parliament (CP, 2020). The high level of institutionalisation in the latter is also apparent in the appointment of a permanent administrative gender equality policy expert to lead the pioneering Equality Office (CP, 2020), the adoption of a protocol on sexual harassment regarding sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression (BOPC_207, 2022) and intersectional training for political and technical personnel (CP, 2021a). Both parliaments have feminist governance structures in place involving non‐political parliamentary personnel. The Spanish Parliament has a Head of Equality with permanent expert legal and administrative staff, political committees on Gender Equality and Employment, Social Economy, Inclusion, Social Security, and Migration, and sub‐committees on the Anti‐discrimination of Roma people and the State Pact against Gender‐based Violence. The Catalan Parliament has an Equality and Feminisms Committee, a Gender Equity Group charged with the implementation of the Gender Equality Plan, a Working Group on LGBTIphobia, a Study Committee on Institutional and Structural Racism, and an Intergroup on Sexual and Reproductive Rights, composed of MPs from different political groups and co‐led by MPs and civil society organisations.
Polarisation over gender issues and equality policies has occurred in both the Spanish and Catalan Parliaments with the entry of far‐right parties, 40 years after the end of Franco's dictatorship and decades later than in other European parliaments (Weeks et al., Reference Weeks, Caravantes, Espírito‐Santo, Lombardo, Stratigaki and Gul2024). Vox is the main force opposing equality matters in both parliaments, disrupting gender equality debates, delegitimising gender, racial and LGBTI* issues as policy problems, and reproducing Islamophobic, racist, antifeminist and LGBTIphobic hate speech in plenary and committee sessions. Vox entered the Spanish Parliament in 2019 as the third largest force, with 14.8 per cent of seats (Congreso, 2019), and the Catalan Parliament in 2021 as the fourth largest force, with a more modest 8.1 per cent of seats (CP, 2021c). Ever since, opposition towards egalitarian politics – primarily regarding migration, gender equality, LGBTI* rights and sex education – has increased in both bodies, as has the degree of political violence. In the Spanish Parliament, political violence has focused on MPs that are women, feminists, LGBTI* and racialised (i.e., experiencing structural race discrimination). In the Catalan Parliament, Vox's attacks have focused on civil society organisations working on sexual and reproductive rights and against LGBTIphobia and racism.
Another similarity is the strong feminist discourse and policy‐making in the Spanish and Catalonian governments, which has led to the centrality of gender equality issues in parliamentary activity. The Spanish executive in 2019–2023 comprised a left‐wing coalition government between the historic Spanish left, represented by the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party – Partido Socialista Obrero Español (PSOE), with 34.3 per cent of the parliament seats – and the new left, United We Can – Unidas Podemos (UP), with 10 per cent of seats (Congreso, 2019). The PSOE–UP coalition government was made possible with the support or abstention of the rest of the regional‐based parties present in the Spanish Parliament, including the Republican Left of Catalonia – Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (ERC; 3.7 per cent), Together for Catalonia – Junts per Catalunya (2.3 per cent) – Basque Nationalist Party – Partido Nacionalista Vasco (1.7 per cent), and Basque Country Gather – Euskal Herria Bildu (1.4 per cent) (Congreso, 2019). These parties have supported most of the government's and parliament's equality agendas and have opposed Vox in all matters. The Spanish Ministry for Equality, led by UP, was key in adopting progressive laws regarding sexual and reproductive rights, sexual freedom and LGBTI* rights. The Organic Law 10/2022 on the Comprehensive Guarantee of Sexual Freedom answered feminist movements’ demands to reform the classification of sexual crimes in the penal code (Faraldo‐Cabana, Reference Faraldo‐Cabana2021). The Organic Law 4/2023 for Real and Effective Equality of Trans People and to Guarantee the Rights of LGBTI people addressed transgender people's rights, allowing for gender self‐determination. This caused friction in the left‐wing coalition with some PSOE MPs opposing this modification. Beyond introducing progressive laws, the Spanish Ministry of Equality has launched the Co‐Responsibility Plan which increased men's involvement in family caregiving (Spanish Ministry of Equality, 2024), and introduced menstrual leave in 2023 (Spanish Ministry of Equality, 2022).
In the 2021–2024 Catalan legislature, a government coalition between the left‐wing nationalist Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC), with 24.5 per cent of the parliamentary seats, and the right‐wing nationalist Together for Catalonia, with 23.7 per cent, was followed by a minority government led by ERC in 2022 (CP, 2021c). Apart from the aforementioned Vox and PP, other forces in parliament included the Catalan Socialist Party – Partit dels Socialistes de Catalunya (PSC, which held 24.5 per cent of the seats), the center‐right Citizens – Ciutadans (4.4 per cent) and the left‐wing parties In Common We Can – En Comú Podem (ECP, 5.9 per cent) – and the Popular Unity Candidacy – Candidatura d'Unitat Popular (CUP, 6.7 per cent) (CP, 2021c). The leading role of ERC in both governments enabled the creation of a Councillor for Equality and Feminisms within the Catalan government. This entity has adopted new equality policies, such as a menstrual and menopausal equity plan (CG, 2023b) and an antiracist plan, reinvigorated the sexual education programme (Stoddard & Curtin, Reference Stoddard and Curtin2023) and increased funding for LGBTI* care‐services (CG, 2023a). It also purposefully articulated a strategy of response to anti‐rights groups, explicitly through an ‘anti‐fascist’ perspective (Verge, Reference Verge2025), including sanctioning anti‐gender campaigns, as the 20.000 Euro fine against Hazte Oír's transphobic bus shows (Solé‐Altimira, Reference Solé‐Altimira2023).
The most apparent difference between the two studied contexts is their level of government: regional for the Catalan Parliament and state/national for the Spanish Parliament. This territorial cleavage has been particularly relevant to Spanish and Catalan politics in the last decade, following reinvigorated sovereignty claims in Catalonia in the mid‐2010s. This relevance also explains Vox's rise at the state level, as the party's initial popularity built upon a nationalist Spanish agenda in response to the Catalan independence movement, rather than nativist politics, as is often the case in far‐right politics (Rama et al., Reference Rama, Zanotti, Turnbull‐Dugarte and Santana2021; Turnbull‐Dugarte, Reference Turnbull‐Dugarte2019). Given the semi‐federal Spanish system and the salience of the territorial dispute during the period studied, the interplay between Catalan‐ and Spanish‐based politics is constant. This affects party dynamics and positions on egalitarian politics, with left‐ and right‐wing Catalan‐based parties (and regional‐based parties from Basque Country, Valencia and Galicia) supporting gender equality positions in the Spanish Parliament despite the overall lower attention paid to these issues in their agendas (Cabeza Pérez et al., Reference Cabeza Pérez, Alonso Sáenz de Oger and Gómez Fortes2023). Political actors at the state and regional levels also experience the memory of Spain's fascist legacy differently (Manucci, Reference Manucci2020). Fascism evokes the oppression of regional cultural and linguistic diversity, especially in the Catalan context, where a culture of independence is present in movements and parties. The association of fascism with oppression and a lack of freedom may facilitate Catalan political discourses and practices to counter far‐right politics.
Finally, different levels of government also translate into different alliances of parliamentary forces opposing gender equality. The alliance of the mainstream right‐wing PP (which holds 25.4 per cent of seats in the Spanish Parliament (Congreso, 2019) with Vox on gender issues at the national level and in regional cabinets (Alonso & Espinosa‐Fajardo, Reference Alonso and Espinosa‐Fajardo2021; Field & Alonso, Reference Field and Alonso Sáenz De Oger2024) contributes to normalising far‐right anti‐gender politics. While opposition to equality in the Spanish Parliament comes predominantly from Vox, the PP has adopted an ambivalent position, and some PSOE MPs have opposed equality concerning transgender rights. This differentiates the Spanish from the Catalan Parliament, where PP's weak representation (2.2 per cent of seats; CP, 2021c) limits the impact of this alliance and the debate over transgender rights was not present in the studied legislature.
Research material
Our research investigates feminist institutional responses to anti‐gender politics in the legislatures following Vox's entrance into the Spanish and Catalan Parliaments in 2019 and 2021, respectively, based on a content analysis of 21 parliamentary debates and 42 semi‐structured interviews with MPs, technical personnel and civil society organisations with an institutional presence. The secondary sources analysed (12 debates in the Spanish and 9 in the Catalan context) include plenary and committee debates; parliamentary or committee resolutions on sexual and reproductive rights, gender‐based violence and LGBTI* rights; policy documents, such as the Catalan Parliament's Regulation (code of conduct) and Gender Equality Plan, and the Spanish Gender Equality Plan and Sexual Harassment Protocol; and reports by civil society organisations working on sexual, reproductive and LGBTI* rights, and anti‐racism in the Catalan case. The selection of plenary debates reflects the main issues addressed during the terms studied, including sexual reproductive rights, sexual freedom and trans rights in the Spanish Parliament, and gender‐based violence, sexual and reproductive rights and sexual education in the Catalan Parliament.
The interviews, conducted online and in person for an average of 45 minutes, include 20 interviews conducted in the autumn of 2022 with key actors in the Catalan Parliament – 14 political personnel, three parliamentary technical personnel and three representatives of civil society organisations working on equality that collaborate with parliamentary committees. Fifteen interviewees were women, and five were men. In the autumn of 2023, 22 semi‐structured interviews were conducted in the Spanish Parliament with 17 political personnel, three parliamentary technical personnel and two representatives of civil society organisations with institutional presence – 20 women and two men. The questionnaire was organised around two main areas: actors and forms of opposition against equality policies –where we explicitly included gender, anti‐racist, LGBTQIA* rights– and the institutional responses to this opposition.
Interviewees were selected based on their expertise on issues of gender equality, LGBTI* rights and racism, their participation in equality committees, and their voicing of feminist responses in parliamentary debates. The selection of interviewees followed a three‐step process. First, we identified key MPs articulating feminist responses and participating in equality discussions by analysing parliamentary debates and committees’ activities. Second, we contacted all identified MPs and interviewed those who consented. Third, we employed snowball sampling, using referrals from initial participants to recruit additional interviewees. To enable data analysis, the interviews were transcribed and coded into pre‐defined categories of feminist responses – ‘rule‐making’, ‘everyday pragmatic engagement’, ‘coalition‐building’ and ‘knowledge’– and other categories inductively identified in the Catalan case, like ‘protection and support’ and ‘funding’. In the Spanish case, we codified debates and interviews using Atlas.Ti software, and sub‐coded them inductively following a thematic analysis approach (Fereday & Muir‐Cochrane, Reference Fereday and Muir‐Cochrane2006). In both cases, to enable a rigorous comparison of how codes were employed in the analysis and reduce the risk of inconsistent interpretation, codes were discussed within the research team, and different researchers provided written comments on their interpretation. To preserve interviewees’ anonymity, the interviews are referred to by number (e.g., Int1, Int2), preceded by a code indicating their institutional context (e.g., SPA_Int1; CAT_Int1).
Feminist institutional responses to anti‐gender politics in the Spanish and Catalan Parliaments
Our interviewees report an increasingly aggressive and violent atmosphere in the Spanish and Catalan Parliaments – ‘[T]his is war’ (SPA_Int1). The main actors opposing gender equality in both bodies are the far‐right Vox and, to a lesser degree, the right‐wing PP. They oppose gender equality through various strategies. One includes attacks on women, racialised and ‘foreign’ MPs, as well as feminist, LGBTQIA* and anti‐racist MPs and civil society organisations. This involves the use of violence in different forms: hate speech of a sexist, sexual and racist nature, such as calling a feminist MP a ‘witch’, using racist slurs for MPs of South American origin (SPA_Int6, Int2) or ‘constantly associating migration with delinquency’ (CAT_Int1); increasing aggressiveness (CAT_Int1, Int3, Int10, Int11); violent gestures and ‘masculine’ grimaces (SPA_Int6, Int2); and emotional attacks – ‘goes directly to your stomach!’ (SPA_Int7). Feminist MPs report feeling mistreated as human beings on different grounds due to their non‐hegemonic positioning – ‘we suffered dehumanisation of gender‐race‐ethnicity‐class and diverse cosmovision’ (SPA_Int5).
Second, opposition occurs through the de‐legitimisation of gender equality knowledge, policies, actors and institutions by ridiculing and depicting gender equality as ideological, denying the existence of gender‐based violence, and accusing equality institutions, the Ministry of Equality and feminist and LGBTQIA* non‐governmental organisations (NGOs) of misusing public funds (Ruiz_Vox_DSCD_137; SPA_Int8; CAT_Int11, Int 14, Int 15). A third form of opposition involves the disruption of debates to advance gender, race and LGBTI* equality – such as calling an MP discussing abortion a ‘baby‐killer’ (CAT_Int2), and polarisation around gender to provoke confrontation between parties and erode feminist alliances by opposing ‘bad cultural feminism’ versus ‘good nationalistic feminism’ (Méndez_Vox_DSCD_216). Some MPs express the feeling that anti‐gender actors, particularly Vox, intentionally try to ‘wreck’ equality measures – ‘They've come to wreck it. I have no doubt about it. They've come to wreck the Equality Act, and it's shocking. It's shocking’ (SPA_Int2). They also alert about the ‘worrying’ impact of the openly racist, sexist and homophobic discourse on the democratic rights of women, migrants and the LGBTQIA* collective (CAT_Int1, Int5). A fourth form of opposition involves alliances with anti‐gender civil society (SPA_Int15) and far‐right media journalists and influencers accredited as press agents in parliament (SPA_Int1, Int9).
Following Kantola and Lombardo's (Reference Kantola and Lombardo2024) conceptualisation of feminist institutional responses, we identify four main response strategies: ‘knowledge’, ‘coalition‐building’, ‘everyday pragmatic engagement’ and ‘rule‐making’. Below, we present our main findings in these response strategies in Spanish and Catalan Parliaments.
Knowledge
Both parliaments show similarities concerning the strategy of ‘knowledge’, articulating a feminist response in four specific ways. First, the Spanish Parliament's Gender Equality Committee and the Catalan Parliament's Equality and Feminisms Committee, as well as the Working Group on LGBTIphobia and the Study Committee on Institutional and Structural Racism, routinely invite feminist experts, professionals and academics from civil society to share their knowledge of issues related to equality. The Spanish Parliament hosted several hearings of expert sessions regarding the 4/2023 so‐called ‘Trans Law’ concerning the rights of LGBTI persons, abortion rights, and sexual freedom (SPA_Int3, Int2). Still, interviewees from civil society collaborating with the Spanish Parliament expressed concern that the latter's capacity to involve experts has decreased, as has funding for commissioning reports to contrast and counter false claims by anti‐gender groups (SPA_Int20, Int7).
The Catalan Equality and Feminisms Committee, Working Group on LGBTIphobia, and Study Committee on Institutional and Structural Racism invite feminist experts, professionals and academics to provide knowledge on equality issues. Topics include abortion, prostitution, LGBTI* rights, gender and anti‐LGBTI violence, hate speech and migrant domestic workers’ labour conditions (CAT_Int4, Int7). Some of these discussions encourage intersectional knowledge, through anti‐racist trans‐feminist perspectives and discussions about migration, refugees and LGBTIphobia (Working Group on LGBTIphobia.). The Intergroup on Sexual and Reproductive Rights hosts fewer hearings but has organised thematic sessions on climate and sexual justice (CP, 2023b), and hate speech against sexual and reproductive rights (CP, 2023a).
Coalition‐building
Coalition‐building involves forging strategic alliances to defend equality legislation. In the Spanish Parliament, interviewees stress the importance and difficulty of building coalitions to respond to Vox. Despite an initial plan to establish a cordon sanitaire to isolate Vox's MPs, not all parliamentary groups agreed, which some regard as a failure (SPA_Int7, Int2). However, some respondents argue that, in the absence of a cordon sanitaire, the lack of negotiation or consideration of Vox's parliamentary initiatives (SPA_Int13) has been a strategy of containment of the far right. In the Catalan case, intra‐parliamentary alliances across the main parties promoted and facilitated a cordon sanitaire, as they agreed to vote against all proposals presented by Vox (CAT_Int4). Centre and progressive parliamentary groups’ effort to isolate Vox in relation to their discourse denying gender‐based violence exists in both contexts. This translates into Vox's MPs being excluded from inter‐party meetings (CAT_Int7), alongside inter‐party negotiations or actions to project a united image in parliament (SPA_Int4). Several interviewees highlight the joint action taken by all parliamentary groups – except Vox and the two national right‐wing parties, Ciudadanos and PP – to collectively read the names of women murdered by sexist violence during a plenary session to respond to Vox's proposal of replacing the concept of gender‐based violence with the gender‐neutral ‘intra‐family violence’ (SPA_Int5, Int7, Int9, Int10, Int11, Int13, Int18).
While cordon sanitaire is not exclusively implemented for gender‐related matters, it is at the core of feminist coalition‐building in the Catalan parliament and discussed by feminist actors in the Spanish Parliament. In relation to the latter, one interviewee shared the existence of an informal ‘feminist cordon sanitaire’ implemented by progressive and feminist women during extra‐parliamentary activities to counter the normalisation of anti‐feminist stances in the Spanish Parliament. As the MP put it: ‘There was a democratic cordon, as I saw it, from the vast majority of the democratic side of Congress, even in mundane settings like the dining hall and cafeteria. We didn't sit near each other’ (SPA_Int5). In the Spanish parliamentary arena, a strategic cordon sanitaire was enacted when it came to the issue of gender‐based violence to isolate Vox MPs concerning their denial of gender‐based violence (SPA_Int4).
In the Catalan Parliament, the cordon sanitaire has been purposefully used on equality matters, including preventing Vox's invitation to parliamentary hearings of civil society organisations that promote hate and discriminatory discourses (CAT_Int4) and isolating Vox's resolutions that articulate gender‐normative, LGBTQIA*phobic and nativist conceptualisations of a family (CAT_Int13). The main official document conveying the cordon sanitaire, ‘a commitment to a diverse and cohesive Catalonia of rights and freedoms’ (CP, 2021b), ratifies the institutional commitment to ‘make femicide and racist violence visible’. It also promotes resources for implementing the Law 19/2020 on Equal Treatment and Non‐Discrimination and the creation of a plan ‘against racism, xenophobia, anti‐Gypsyism, Islamophobia and any other form of ethno‐racial discrimination’. This resulted in the creation of a Study Committee on Institutional and Structural Racism in the Catalan Parliament (CAT_Int13).
Alliances with extra‐institutional feminist organisations and other civil society actors working to advance equality and human rights are considered crucial to parliamentary work (SPA_Int9, CAT_Int2, Int7). Alliances are facilitated by specific parliamentary structures, such as the Intergroup for Sexual and Reproductive Rights in the Catalan Parliament and the Intergroup on Population, Development and Reproductive Health in the Spanish Parliament. Extra‐parliamentary coalitions have also been developed in both contexts, with MPs building informal alliances with national institutional actors in the Senate and international networking groups in Latin America (SPA_Int8; CAT_Int1).
Everyday pragmatic engagement
There is no consensus among politicians in either parliament regarding the strategy of ‘everyday pragmatic engagement’ and whether, or how, to deal with the far right (SPA_Int10, CAT_Int2, Int19). Consequently, diverse engagement strategies emerge, ranging from informed counter‐arguments and non‐engagement, to forming support networks among responders. Some interviewees emphasise the importance of engagement during plenary and sub‐committee sessions, arguing, ‘you always have to answer, you always have to confront, and above all, you must not reduce the harshness or demands of feminist discourse’ (SPA_Int6), as well as not leaving certain attacks unchallenged – ‘When you have someone who calls you a baby‐killer, how can you not reply?’ (CAT_Int2). This direct engagement strategy is based on consistently responding to and confronting anti‐gender arguments. This is done either through a knowledge‐based approach, using relevant data, or through an emotional approach, incorporating affective appeals in speeches to demand an end to dismantling feminist policy‐making, as illustrated in the call: ‘Stop torpedoing women's rights!’ (Berja_PSOE_DSCD_137). The goal is to debunk falsehoods, maintain the rigour of feminist discourse and use data‐based feminist pedagogy to gain public support by explaining feminist positions to anti‐gender actors and the wider Spanish public (SPA_Int2).
Contrary to this strategy is the non‐interaction position, which aims to ‘act as if they do not exist’ (SPA_Int3; CAT_Int11), not to give the far right the ‘oxygen’ and ‘visibility’ ‘they need and seek’ (SPA_Int9; CAT_Int7). The policy of non‐interaction is predominant in the Catalan context (CAT_Int14, Int16), where interviewees stress the importance of ‘building your own narrative’ against hate speech rather than engaging in oppositional narratives (CAT_Int11). In the Spanish context, this strategy applies to political figures (i.e. Vox MPs) and far‐right journalists.
In parliamentary environments described as ‘brutal’ (SPA_Int3) and ‘much more aggressive’ (CAT_Int15) due to the prevalence of political violence, other informal strategies have been developed in both cases: practising ‘self‐containment, rationality and self‐control’ (SPA_Int7) to avoid being dragged into heated arguments with Vox; supporting MPs who have been attacked by, for instance, releasing statements of solidarity and condemning online sexist and Islamophobic attacks (CAT_Int1); and practising feminist cross‐party solidarity, whereby an informal agreement is based on ‘if they attack one of us, they attack us all’ (SPA_Int6). Whereas the need for specific protocols, for example, to protect women in politics subjected to violence, is part of the current conversation (CAT_Int6), institutional protection and support measures after such attacks have not been established in either case. One of the most striking impacts of the hostile environment around gender debates in both cases is the decision of Equality Committee members in the Catalan Parliament to move some of the discussions with civil society out of the parliamentary arena. Due to unsafe conditions for deliberation that have ‘expelled’ the pro‐egalitarian actors from institutional spaces (CAT_Int10), bilateral meetings are currently taking place outside the institution.
Rule‐making
Finally, we identify a ‘rule‐making’ strategy, including creating formal and informal mechanisms and repurposing existing rules. A cordon sanitaire is both a strategy of coalitions and a rule. In Catalonia, a cordon sanitaire – often referred to as a ‘democratic cordon’ (CAT_Int12, Int16, Int17) or ‘anti‐fascist pact’ (CAT_Int2, Int7, Int13, Int15) – exemplifies this category of response, wherein most parliamentary groups agreed to isolate the far‐right Vox at the beginning of the legislature by refusing to collaborate with or vote for the party's initiatives (CAT_Int1, Int7, Int16; CP, 2021b). In the Spanish Parliament, party interests block a collective formal response (SPA_Int7, Int6), as an MP conveys: ‘there was indeed a proposal from people within the [anonymised], as I mentioned, for a unified response, something like a cordon sanitaire. However, it didn't work because each party's strategies differ, the issues they address vary, and the individual responses of the representatives are also different’ (SPA_Int7).
The response is left to individual MPs and critical actors who seek to contain Vox's backsliding influence on gender equality policies by preventing the approval of its amendments (SPA_Int5) and conducting the Gender‐based Violence Committee's meetings behind closed doors to avoid Vox's media capitalisation (SPA_Int1). In the Catalan Parliament, the refusal by Vox MPs to sign the Zero Tolerance Commitment against Harassment and Discrimination has been used to exclude them from the Gender Equity Committee dedicated to promoting equality policies and gender mainstreaming which the far‐right party opposes (CAT_Int4, Int9; CP, 2021a). In both parliamentary contexts, MPs have also resorted to informal rule‐making responses to circumvent Vox's disruptive behaviour on gender equality issues, such as its refusal to support unanimous resolutions condemning gender‐based violence. This led to MPs from the other parties making separate declarations through press conferences (SPA_Int1) and the Board of Spokespersons in plenary sessions (CAT_Int4, Int15, Int17) to provide institutional legitimacy.
In both parliaments, there is open debate on institutional capacity to prevent hateful and discriminatory language. Spanish and Catalan MPs often request their respective Parliament Bureaus to sanction Vox's hate speech, including racist and Islamophobic comments (SPA_Int7, Int5; CAT_Int9, Int13). However, the Bureaus are hesitant for fear of limiting pluralism and freedom of ideological expression (SPA_Int2, Int12; CAT_Int4, Int8). The Bureaus’ response has not been satisfactory, according to interviewees, and some MPs regret parliament's failure to protect them from Vox's attacks and to prevent hate crimes (SPA_Int2, Int3, Int5, Int7, Int8; CAT_Int2, Int3, Int9). Although rarely used, other formal rule‐making mechanisms at the Bureaus’ disposal include invoking the code of conduct to call MPs to order three times and, potentially, expel them from plenary sessions for inappropriate behaviour, such as using discriminatory language (SPA_Int12; CAT_Int3). Another response to limit discriminatory language is using existing rules, such as applying to the parliamentary context the Law 19/2020 that prescribes equal treatment and non‐discrimination (BOE, 2021; CAT_Int9, Int13).
Enabling and constraining factors of feminist institutional responses
The study of the Spanish and Catalan Parliaments during the 2019–2023 and 2021–2024 legislatures allows reflection on factors that enable or constrain the capacity of parliaments to respond to the opposition against equality agendas by anti‐gender, far‐right actors. At the macro‐level, three key factors shape feminist politics: quality of democracy, legacies of exclusion and state decentralisation. The quality of democracy in a given context is crucial for ensuring inclusive and non‐discriminatory conditions of participation and deliberation (Gora & de Wilde, Reference Gora and De Wilde2020). Liberal democracy in multi‐level Spain (Nord et al., Reference Nord, Lundstedt, Altman, Angiolillo, Borella, Fernandes, Gastaldi, Good God, Natsika and Lindberg2024) upholds the principles of freedom, equality, pluralism and respect for minorities (Font, Reference Font, Muro and Lago2020), favouring women's representation in the Spanish and Catalonian Parliaments through gender quotas (Verge, Reference Verge, Lang, Meier and Sauer2023).
Democracy is an enabling factor for both the Spanish and Catalan parliamentary feminist institutional responses. The fact that Spain's democracy in 2023 is somewhat positively evaluated in Varieties of Democracy (V‐Dem), with 76 out of 100 (V‐Dem Institute, 2024), and The Economist index (8.1 out of 10) grants the very possibility for feminist responses to be expressed in parliament (The Economist, 2024). The state of democracy affects the type of feminist parliamentary response: the presence of more institutionalised types of feminist responses in our cases differs from more movement‐like kinds of response, such as ‘protest politics’, which characterise autocratising parliaments in Europe like the Hungarian one (Krizsán et al., Reference Krizsan, Sagi and Zenttai2024). Nevertheless, Spanish democracy is still exclusionary for marginalised communities (Rahman, Reference Rahman2018) and involves increasing political violence against women in institutional and digital spaces (Híbridas, 2020; Igareda‐González, Reference Igareda González2022), which constrain feminist institutional responses. In this context, meso‐level factors such as the capacity of parliamentary governing structures to intervene and ensure a safer institutional space – for example, sanctioning MPs’ hate speech and discriminatory language – would enable feminist institutional responses like formal ‘rule‐making’.
A second macro‐level factor is the role played by context‐based legacies of exclusion and inequality in liberal democracies. The memory of Spain's fascist legacy (Manucci, Reference Manucci2020), embedded in Catalan independentist political culture, allows a distance from Vox's Spanish nationalist agenda and enables explicit responses to anti‐gender, far‐right positions in the Catalan Parliament. This awareness facilitates institutional responses aimed at isolating the far‐right Vox through a cordon sanitaire. Some Catalan parliamentary groups call this an ‘anti‐fascist pact’, building on a joint memory of a repressive past during Franco's dictatorship. In the Spanish case, the uncomfortable presence of the fascist legacy in a country emerging from an elite consensual transition to democracy (Linz, Reference Linz, Braga de Macedo and Serfaty1981a, Reference Linz, Baier, Kepplinger and Reumann1981b) and in the mainstream national right‐wing party from which Vox originated –PP– (Gil Pecharromán, Reference Gil Pecharromán2019), complicates a clear‐cut identification of the far right as a democratic anomaly in parliament (Rama et al., Reference Rama, Zanotti, Turnbull‐Dugarte and Santana2021). This, combined with the fact that PP and Vox jointly represent more than one‐third of seats in the 2019–2023 legislature, makes a coordinated effort to isolate Vox through a cordon sanitaire difficult. The effectiveness of the ‘cordon sanitaire’ as a response to anti‐gender forces requires further exploration. Our analysis identifies its use as a feminist strategy to build alliances and isolate discourses and practices that threaten egalitarian commitments. When used, a cordon sanitaire might favour the legitimisation and promotion of equality measures and institutions; however, it can also legitimise anti‐gender discourses of victimisation and potentially reinforce polarisation on gender issues.
Other legacies in the Spanish and Catalan Parliaments, such as racism and colonialism, lead to the invisibility of racism in parliamentary debates despite some MPs’ efforts to bring issues of racial justice to the fore and the existence of a Study Committee on Institutional and Structural Racism in the Catalan Parliament. In the Spanish context, a State Pact Against Anti‐Romani Racism and for the Inclusion of Roma People was approved in 2023. However, no other parliamentary body is dedicated to the fight against structural racism. The almost absent discussion about these legacies limits the capacity to articulate feminist intersectional responses to multi‐faceted anti‐gender discourses that reproduce colonialist and racist tropes in parliamentary settings. These findings contribute to research on democratic erosion and how the rise and mainstreaming of the far right legitimises ‘existing systemic racism’ in liberal democracies (Mondon & Winter, Reference Mondon and Winter2020, p. 2). The predominantly single focus on gender equality embedded in institutional structures is not a new phenomenon, but a result of an established tradition of gender mainstreaming in the Spanish and Catalan contexts. This limits the articulation of anti‐racist feminist responses, for instance, to Islamophobic violence suffered by MPs (Cat_Int13).
A third macro‐level factor, indicated by the influence of regional parties in the Spanish Parliament and the depiction of far‐right national parties in the Catalan Parliament, is state decentralisation. This factor plays a crucial role in shaping responses to anti‐gender opposition. Decentralisation and a territorially diverse party system (Wilson, Reference Wilson2012) translate, in our comparative multi‐level analysis, into two dynamics that enable specific feminist institutional responses. First, the interaction of the territorial cleavage with ideological divisions leads to the alliance of regionalist parties – both left‐ and right‐wing – with left‐wing national parties to defend gender equality policies against national right and far‐right parties in the Spanish Parliament (see Kenny & Verge, Reference Kenny, Verge, Sawer, Banaszak, True and Kantola2023). Catalan and other regional forces in the Spanish Parliament approach gender equality and, to a lesser extent, feminism, as democratic values of a culturally and territorially diverse Spain in opposition to far‐right and anti‐gender actors’ nativist, conservative ideas of the nation. Second, a cross‐party agreement on gender equality in the Catalan Parliament isolates Vox in a context of minimal presence of the national mainstream right (PP). In the Catalan parliamentary context, ‘competitive federalism’ (Mahon & Collier, Reference Mahon, Collier, Haussman, Sawer and Vickers2010) means that the discursive construction of Catalan politics as distinctively more progressive than Spanish central‐state politics, and hence more gender‐friendly, favours strategies of ‘coalition‐building’ that uniquely overcome party alignments. In both the Spanish and Catalan cases, the dynamics of state decentralisation are directly connected to negotiating the fascist legacy.
We identify two factors at the meso‐level: the institutionalisation of gender equality and the constellation of political actors. The strong institutionalisation of gender equality within parliaments generates a pro‐equality, gender‐sensitive context that equips them to face challenges posed by anti‐gender actors (Elizondo & Silvestre, Reference Elizondo and Silvestre2023). It enables some of the strategies considered above, for instance, through a favourable institutional culture for elaborating ‘knowledge’ responses; mainstreaming structures that promote ‘coalition‐building’ among equality committees, such as the Equality Office and Gender Equity Working Group in the Catalan case; awareness of personal attacks suffered by MPs as exemplified by the envisioned ‘protection’ protocols for women politicians who suffer political violence; and a consolidated structure and institutional history to shield established equality agreements, including updating parliamentary equality plans. The context is more favourable in the Catalan Parliament than the Spanish Parliament, with high and medium levels of gender equality institutionalisation, respectively.
As part of the institutionalisation of gender equality within parliamentary settings, the institutional presence of a strong civil society network of organisations working on gender equality, LGBTI* rights and anti‐racism, that routinely collaborate with MPs and parliamentary groups, is key. In the Catalan case, there is an alliance of progressive parliamentary forces with progressive civil society. The latter co‐organises parliamentary working groups with MPs and provides specialised data on equality issues, including intersectional perspectives, enabling ‘coalition‐building’ and ‘knowledge’ responses while establishing the basis for critically assessing public funding allocations. However, this exposure also makes civil society organisations the object of direct attacks, thus constraining their agency within parliamentary settings, as exemplified by the ‘expulsion’ of meetings between MPs and civil society gender experts from the Catalan Parliament (CAT_Int10).
Factors such as the institutionalisation of gender equality play a double role in our analysis, both as enabling conditions for feminist institutional responses, and as responses themselves. As this institutionalisation preceded the irruption of anti‐gender, far‐right forces in the Spanish and Catalan Parliaments, it was not conceived as a response to political actors denying the need for egalitarian policy‐making or politics like the current anti‐gender agenda. Yet, the widening and resignification of feminist governance structures in both parliaments has accelerated in both legislatures. Some interviewees frame this as a necessary feminist response in a polarised context concerning gender equality (CAT_Int6, Int7, Int15).
The second meso‐level factor identified is the constellation of actors and the existing balance of political forces affecting, on the one hand, the factual and perceived representation of far‐right, anti‐gender positions and, on the other hand, the capacity of pro‐equality forces to articulate feminist institutional responses individually or in coalition. Despite their different representation in the Spanish and Catalan Parliaments (14.8 and 8.1 per cent, respectively), our interviewees report Vox's a consistently disruptive role in parliamentary debates around gender and LGBTI* equality, as well as an increasingly violent parliamentary atmosphere, and the rise of sexist, racist and LGBTQIA*phobic attacks. Yet, our analysis shows some differences. In the 2021–2024 Catalan Parliament, the oppositional front to gender equality is weaker than in the 2019–2023 Spanish Parliament. The low representation of the far right and the minimal representation of the mainstream right‐wing PP (2.2 per cent), compared to the Spanish Parliament (25.4 per cent), weaken alliances and competition over gender issues within the right‐wing ideological spectrum. This leaves Vox as the sole representative of anti‐gender positions.
In the 2019–2023 Spanish Parliament, Vox's position as the third largest force, alongside the complicity of the national mainstream right PP, as the second national force, challenges feminist actors to uphold a feminist agenda and respond to attacks within the increasing politicisation of gender issues in public debates. This challenge combines with internal competition and partisan divisions among self‐identified feminist actors over the legitimate construction of feminist goals, hindering ‘coalition‐building’ and weakening the capacity to respond to anti‐gender opposition in a unified manner. Partisan and competitive electoral dynamics among PSOE and UP in the Spanish left‐coalition government have prompted these parties to prioritise the capitalisation of political and media gains through polarised confrontation with Vox. The lack of a unified coalition against anti‐gender attacks individualises the burden of responses and emotional toll on the MPs who are most discriminated against and attacked – women, LGBTQIA*, racialised, feminist and anti‐racist MPs.
At the same time, however, politicisation around gender issues has triggered powerful, outspoken feminist responses (see Ayoub, Reference Ayoub2016; Krizsán & Roggeband, Reference Krizsán and Roggeband2021). This is evident in an enabling factor at the micro‐level, namely the role that critical institutional actors play in promoting a strong gender‐democratising agenda. Two executive figures with a pioneering feminist discourse and agenda, the Spanish Minister of Equality and the Catalan Councillor for Equality and Feminisms, have actively countered anti‐feminist, racist, and LGBTQIA*‐phobic agendas in parliament. The more intense polarisation of gender issues in the Spanish Parliament has prompted greater contestation of the Spanish Minister of Equality, who has faced harsher personal attacks than the Catalan Councillor. In the Spanish Parliament, other individual parliamentary and civil society actors, mainly from regionalist forces, have demonstrated a critical capacity to build alliances while strategically and systematically signalling anti‐gender opposition (SPA_Int9). Finally, far‐right media and journalists with an institutional presence, by contributing to an increasingly antagonistic parliamentary climate and legitimising anti‐gender discourse (SPA_Int1), act as a micro‐level constraining factor.
Conclusions
Rising opposition to gender, LGBTI* and racial equality in parliaments across Europe demands efforts to address not only the challenges that such opposition poses for equality and democracy but also the institutional responses articulated and the factors that enable and constrain them. Former research on the Catalan Parliament had shown that, whilst even a small representation of the far right jeopardises deliberation on gender through polarisation around the topic, feminist institutionalisation of equality in parliament and cordon sanitaire equipped the parliament to counter anti‐gender opposition (Caravantes et al, Reference Caravantes, Elizondo and Lombardo2024). This article builds on these findings and, conducting research within the European CCINDLE project, furthers our knowledge by providing first, new empirical comparative evidence on feminist institutional responses from the Spanish and Catalonian parliaments, and, second, a novel systematic analytical framework of the enabling and constraining factors of such responses. In particular, it offers two main contributions to the emerging literature on feminist institutional responses to opposition against equality.
The first contribution is operationalising the categories of feminist parliamentary responses to anti‐gender politics beyond the case of the European Parliament analysed by Kantola and Lombardo (Reference Kantola and Lombardo2024) with an empirical, multi‐level analysis of the Parliaments of Spain and Catalonia. These cases show that responding through ‘knowledge’ is paramount, involving turning to feminist expertise from civil society to counter disinformation and de‐legitimisation of feminist knowledge. ‘Coalition‐building’ is another crucial strategy, including intra‐parliamentary coalitions, mainly present in the Catalan case, and extra‐parliamentary coalitions, articulated primarily in the Spanish Parliament. ‘Knowledge’ and ‘coalition‐building’ can appear jointly through the intergroups comprising MPs and civil society organisations with expertise in sexual and reproductive rights, LGBTI* rights and anti‐racism. Collective ‘rule‐making’ appears more difficult and centred on individual strategies and informal rules in the Spanish Parliament. In the Catalan Parliament, it involves establishing new rules, such as a formal pact among most parliamentary groups to isolate the far‐right Vox party. Strategies of ‘engagement’ with anti‐gender actors range from non‐interaction to avoid giving them more visibility, to individual self‐containment, collective solidarity, self‐protection against the emotional harm provoked by far‐right hate against feminist, LGBTQIA* and anti‐racist actors, and the search for safe spaces outside of parliament for deliberation on equality issues.
The second contribution of this study is its novel identification of the main factors that enable and constrain feminist institutional responses to opposition against gender, race and LGBTI* equality in the Spanish and Catalonian Parliaments. At the macro‐level, key factors include the quality of democracy, the legacies of fascism and colonialism, and the decentralised structure of the state. While liberal democracy allows the expression of feminist political claims, its limited capacity to include marginalised subjects, and to address fascist and colonial legacies, constrains feminist institutional responses. Nevertheless, decentralisation opens possibilities for party alliances around gender, linked to the memory of the fascist past that facilitates unique coalitions beyond party alignments at the regional level, and around an ‘anti‐fascist pact’, to contain the far right more effectively than at the national level.
At the meso‐level, two factors are key for feminist institutional responses. The first is the constellation of actors in parliament, regarding the representation of the far right, mainstream right, and progressive and leftist forces. This is shaped by the dynamics of electoral competition in Spain's decentralised system, which creates a more favourable context for feminist institutional responses in the Catalan Parliament than in the Spanish Parliament. In the former, the minimal representation of the mainstream right PP makes Vox a leading actor in anti‐gender discourse, but also isolates it within parliament, as does the ability of other parties to form alliances around the aforementioned ‘anti‐fascist pact’. In the Spanish Parliament, where the representation of the far right and mainstream right is higher, Vox has gained relevance in the right‐wing spectrum by distinguishing itself from the PP with a stronger anti‐feminist agenda. Nevertheless, the two right‐wing parties also form alliances around gender issues, while dynamics of electoral competition around gender equality within the leftist coalition hinder strong, durable coalitions. Both circumstances constrain the containment of anti‐gender politics in the Spanish Parliament.
The second meso‐level factor is the strength of gender equality institutionalisation within parliament, which creates a context ‒ sensitive to gender and other inequalities and equips parliaments to face the challenges posed by anti‐gender politics. While gender equality institutionalisation exists in both parliaments, the Catalan case involves a more favourable context, given greater collaboration with civil society experts on gender, LGBTI* and racial equality. Finally, micro‐level enabling factors include critical feminist actors in the equality institutions of both governments, alongside individual MPs who have played an important role in responding to anti‐gender attacks through their knowledge and activism. This has been more constrained in the case of Spain's Minister of Equality due to a greater degree of polarisation around gender issues in the Spanish parliamentary context.
Overall, this study contributes, theoretically and empirically, to the emerging scholarly field of feminist institutional responses to anti‐gender politics in Europe. It shows the relevance of identifying both feminist institutional responses in different parliamentary contexts as well as the factors that enable and constrain them. It contributes to theories of state feminism and feminist institutionalism by suggesting the need to bring the polarised anti‐gender context in which feminist actors operate, and the factors that make feminist politics possible, to the core of theory. It seeks dialogue with scholarship exploring how democratic erosion and the quality of democratic deliberation is related to the impact of the far right, and dynamics of polarisation in parliamentary and party systems, as well as the dismantling of established rights and equality institutions. Gender equality and minority rights are becoming a central matter of contestation in liberal democracies, and feminist institutional responses are a window into exploring the defence of democratic principles. Future research is needed to address feminist institutional responses in other empirical contexts, varying in terms of the quality of democracy, or to identify the specificity of feminist parliamentary response by comparing it to parliamentary dynamics that address far‐right contestation of other policy areas than gender, such as environmental or migration policies. Finally, scholarly work needs to deepen the study of conditions that enable and constrain feminist institutional responses and further integrate factors that counteract democratic erosion into theories of feminist institutionalism.
Acknowledgements
This work has received funding from the European Union's Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under the CCINDLE project (grant agreement number 101061256). UK consortium partners are funded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) under the UK government's Horizon Europe funding guarantee (grant numbers 10051932 and 10048433). Views and opinions expressed are those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Research Executive Agency or the UKRI. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them. We wish to thank the European Commission for funding this research, Mieke Verloo as coordinator and all team members. We thank the Government of Catalonia for funding the DEMOC project (Ref. EXI077/21/000001 The Gender Division in the Agenda of the Catalan Parliament) and the PI Laura Chaqués Bonafont and team members of DEMOC Arantxa Elizondo and Cristina Zapatero. We also warmly thank the people we have interviewed in the framework of both projects for generously sharing their time and knowledge with us. Thanks also to colleagues who have given us feedback in the different conferences at which we have presented former versions of this work and to Ruya Leghari for her professional work of proofreading. Paloma Caravantes thanks the European Commission for funding under the Marie Skłodowska‐Curie Actions Postdoctoral Fellowship program (grant agreement number 101067130).
Data availability statement
Data are kept in the Radboud Data Repository under closed access due to ethical reasons and privacy requirements by participants.
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