Political Sexualities - Sexual Mobilizations in Conservative Movements

Abstract

“The personal is political” is the most famous feminist slogan. In the context of the feminist movement of the 1970s, it was a challenge to the nuclear family. Nowadays, conservative movements also claim that the personal is political, but they do so in order to defend the nuclear family and heterosexuality. This panel would like to shed light on these movements and especially on the way they politicise sexuality. The papers will analyse the movements' repertoires, identity and frame, but they will also address the individual level: how do conservative activists live and politicise their sexuality? Case studies on anti-gay movements in the US and Ireland, on masculinist movements in France and Quebec and on anti birth control pro-life movements in Italy will illustrate how sexuality is mobilised as a political issue by conservative political actors that are rarely the object of inquiry in social science.