Care, Reproductive and Family Policies In an Age of Right-Wing Politics and Feminist Resistance

Over the last decade, conservative, anti-gender, and right-wing actors have gained unprecedented governing power. From Europe and Latin America to North America and parts of Asia, these actors proactively use care, family, and reproductive policies to advance nationalist, racist, nativist, religious, and patriarchal agendas. However, their impacts remain uneven and insufficiently understood. At the same time, feminist actors have mobilized to counter the rise of reactionary and anti-gender politics. From feminist strikes to mobilizations in international, national, and local institutions and arenas, care and reproductive rights have emerged as powerful sites of feminist resistance and coalition-building with other progressive movements and actors.

This session seeks to examine how right-wing and anti-gender actors, as well as feminist forms of resistance, are reshaping care, family, and reproductive policies across diverse welfare, political, and cultural contexts. By bringing together scholarship on right-wing politics, anti-gender movements, and feminist activism, this session aims to address some of the central questions of our time:

• How do different strands of the right expand, transform, or retrench family, reproductive, and care policies?
• What implications do these developments have for gender equality and for racialized, migrant, and LGBTQ+ families?
• What forms of feminist resistance and policy innovation emerge in an age of right-wing politics? How are these struggles informed by an intersectional praxis?
• How can care and social reproduction become sources of democratic renewal in the face of growing conservative and authoritarian challenges?

We are particularly interested in contributions from the Global South and in research adopting comparative perspectives.