Warrior Princesses: Young Women Navigating Power and Femininity in Hungarian Far-Right Movements

This paper examines the political participation of young Hungarian women in two far-right youth movements: the youth wing of the Mi Hazánk Mozgalom (Our Homeland Movement) party and the Hatvannégy Vármegye Ifjúsági Mozgalom (HVIM). Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork conducted during the campaign period preceding the 2022 parliamentary elections, including participant observation at meetings, events, and rallies, as well as 18 in-depth interviews with both male and female members, the study explores how young women articulate their political identities, experiences, and aspirations within these nationalist organisations. Although the movements publicly promote traditionalist gender ideologies, many young female members describe their participation as empowering. They emphasise feelings of safety, purpose, and the possibility of combining motherhood with political ambition. Their narratives reveal a paradox: they express concerns that closely resemble feminist critiques, such as sexism, unequal opportunities, and the risk of being treated as tokens, yet they consistently reject the feminist label. Instead, they frame their agency through nationalist ideals of femininity, seeking recognition as committed political actors while also valuing romanticised notions of womanhood, marriage, and motherhood. The paper argues that this negotiation between agency and tradition reflects a distinctive form of gender politics within the Hungarian radical right. By analysing how these young women reconcile political ambition with nationalist femininity, the study contributes to interdisciplinary debates in political anthropology and gender studies. It highlights how far-right gender politics are lived, negotiated, and emotionally experienced, and how the movements attract women by promising both ideological belonging and a form of empowerment that liberal frameworks often fail to recognise.