Normalization: A Key Dimension in Legitimizing Sexual Policies

When it comes to heteronormativity as an analytical tool, the conceptual distinction between norms and normalization very often remains unclear. This paper aims to show how a more specific and precise conceptualization of normalization contributes to a more nuanced understanding of the way certain sexual policies - from decriminalizing homosexuality to implementing same-sex partnerships - are legitimized. Drawing on biopolitical immunization as one of Isabell Loreys (2011) “figures of the immune” (Figuren des Immunen), normalization needs to be conceptualized as a mode of collective immunization against existential threats. Its modus operandi is closely intertwined with Foucault’s understanding of normalization and biopolitics, and can be conceptualized as follows: Perceived threats are neutralized via partially taking them in into an endangered social collective. Within the field of sexuality, the discursive construction of threatening sexualities is - implicitly or explicitly - related to the question of their alleged non-/reproductivity. Due to its process-like and never completed character, normalization is a much more diffuse and impalpable matter compared to the static-binary functioning of norms. Therefore, special analytical attention needs to be turned to shifting boundaries of what can be said and what has to remain unsaid within political discourses. Sensitivity towards evoked feelings of rightness, self-evidence and naturalness throughout empirical policy studies might additionally help to grasp ongoing processes of normalization within the field of sexuality over time. In this regard, normalization mainly performs a legitimating function: It determines whether - and when - certain sexual policies, e.g. the decriminalisation of homosexuality, can be successfully claimed and are accepted.