From the Margins to a Mission: How the European Union became a Defender of LGBT Rights

This Paper aims at investigating the reasons and dynamics behind the EU’s recent interest in LGBT rights. The interest manifests itself not only in legal and policy changes, but also in the way the EU portrays itself as the defender of LGBT rights, declaring this mission as an essential part of its identity and values. This development raises questions: Why did this happen at this moment in time? What is it that makes LGBT issues so attractive for mainstream politics? Why did LGBT rights and not other minority or anti-discrimination issues become the symbol for a modern and inclusive Europe? This Paper focuses on actors inside different EU institutions and asks why they took up the issue and started listening to activists’ demands. This will fill a gap in the research, as most studies in the field focus on social movements and their lobbying strategies, while EU actors tend to be treated as "black boxes”. In my Paper I will argue that it is important to take up their perspectives and investigate "why they opened the doors activists were baning in". By asking how these actors explain the increased institutionalization and priorization of LGBT equality, one could learn more about their motivations and interests. I will analyze some examples of actions of the EU to advance LGBT equality by asking: What kind of European identity do these actors construct through their narratives? Is the protection of LGBT rights seen as an inherent part of a European identity or as goal that still has to be achieved? Is the change narrated as a process of negotiations and struggles to find consent or as evident and a matter of "things change"?