Backlash advocacy and NGO polarization over women's rights in the United Nations
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3706567 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Jelena Cupać (0000-0002-7471-7624), Irem Tuncer-Ebetürk (0000-0001-5024-5725), Irem Ebetürk |
| Year | 2021 |
| Volume | 97 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 1183-1201 |
| Publication date | 2021-07-05 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | International Affairs (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0020-5850 • E-ISSN: 1468-2346 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/ia/iiab069 |
| OpenAlex | W3166414307 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 18 |
The article observes that women's rights politics in the United Nations are caught in full-scale polarization between feminist and conservative non-governmental organizations (NGOs), particularly visible in their fights over institutional spaces and language. It then sets out to elucidate the process by which this polarization came about. It first ties it to specific reasons for which conservative NGOs entered the UN; namely, their intent to halt and reverse the progress of women's rights. Next, the article observes that this intent has given birth to a specific style of conservative NGOs' advocacy: backlash advocacy. This advocacy differs from regular advocacy in that it does not target only UN decision-makers, but also a rival NGO group and its normative record. Polarization results from feminist NGOs' defensively reciprocating this attack. The article contributes to the literature on international organization (IO)-NGO relations by specifying why conservative NGOs, considered unlikely IO utilizers, end up actively using the UN and by showing that this diversification in NGOs' utilization of the UN can have detrimental rather than positive institutional effects. The article also invites feminist NGOs to be more aware of the political dynamic that now entraps them, and to tailor their future strategies accordingly
Backlash · Civil society · Human rights · Normative · Polarization (electrochemistry) · Political science · Politics · Population · Reproductive health · Reproductive rights · Sociology · Gender Politics and Representation · Historical and Contemporary Political Dynamics · International Development and Aid · Law
Special issue introduction
Chasing gender equality norms
The Coordination of Environmental Protection and Female Discrimination Based on the Concept of Affirmative Action
Competitive mimicry
The Nobel Peace Prize Increased the Global Support for Women’s Organizations
Norm spoiling, gender washing and the pushback against women’s rights in Brazilian foreign policy
Making for “strange bedfellows”
Engines of Patriarchy
Unbowed, unbent, unbroken? Examining the validity of the responsibility to protect
A practitioner’s perspective on resisting anti-gender politics in international organizations
Special Section introduction
Anti-gender backlash politics as anti-Western politics
From norm breaking to norm making
From “Global Scripts” to “Street Fights”
Gender Wars? Diplomacy as a Depolarizing Practice in International Politics of Gender and Sexuality
Individual Empowerment, Institutional Confidence, and Vaccination Rates in Cross-National Perspective, 1995 to 2018
Abortion Policies in a Polarizing World Society, 1970 to 2020
Canada and the African Union
| Unique citing works | 18 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 3,6 |
| Citation span | 2021 - 2026 (6) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 16 |