Anti-Gender Mobilizations: Backlash or a Project? The Case of Serbia

It has become quite common to refer to anti-gender mobilizations as a form of backlash. Certain scepticism about the usefulness and general applicability of the concept has its adherents (Patternote 2018; Corrêa, Patternote & House 2023; Kuhar and Zaharijević 2025). Yet, backlash remains fortified within the commonly used terms, such as rollback, pushback, or democratic backsliding. My proposal is to see the anti-gender mobilizations of today as a political project, a form of political strategizing. Project 2025 comes directly to mind, but the Serbian example is also a case in point. In the post-socialist and post-conflict context of Serbia, anti-gender mobilizations emerged as a reframed extension of the ‘good, old’ ethno-nationalism. The language that shapes them is new and relatable to other countries around the globe, but the underlying frames to which it sticks are not. The ‘good, old’ antifeminism, homophobia, xenophobia and anti-Europeanism of the war and post-war era, readily reshaped itself into the narrative about the traditional values and natural family. Building on the previous research on ‘gender equality for show’ (Zaharijević & Antonijević 2024), or the politics of ‘tactical Europeanisation’ (Slootmaeckers 2017), I want to show how (ab)use of gender equality in the constitution of façade democracy can easily switch and be substituted by anti-gender politics. The synergy between the Serbian authoritarian regime and the Serbian Orthodox Church, reveals the profoundly strategic side of this project: the Church can stand aside while the regime promotes ‘European values’ through the body of the out-lesbian PM, or can step in and become the staunchest promoter of the anti-gender narrative, while she is still in office. Navigating the political currents, the regime uses both gender equality and anti-gender narratives when that is opportune, dropping them equally swiftly when some better political strategy is in need. Transacting values – and lives – does not appear in the form of backlash, as there is nothing to lash back to. Instead, it is a form of political adjustment of the regime to remain in power, regardless of the tools at hand.