Gender, Identity, and Knowledge Production: Far-Right Discursive Strategies in Contemporary Europe

Abstract

How does the far right strategically deploy gender, identity, and knowledge claims to advance its political project? This panel examines the discursive and organizational strategies through which far-right actors reframe rights, construct collective identities, and establish epistemic legitimacy across Europe. Moving beyond traditional party-political analysis, the papers reveal how far-right mobilization operates through civil society organizations, gendered rhetoric, transnational knowledge networks, and digital community-building. The panel investigates multiple dimensions of far-right discursive strategy. It examines how civil society organizations tied to far-right parties frame family and reproductive rights to challenge liberal democratic values, assessing their impact on democratic debate. Gender emerges as a strategic tool through femonationalism. Beyond individual parties, the panel analyzes how transnational far-right epistemic communities establish legitimacy by hybridizing traditional professionalism with far-right symbols, legitimizing partisan actors as knowledge producers, and serving as knowledge reserves connecting disparate local contexts. Digital spaces receive particular attention as sites where far-right actors construct "Alt-European" identity.