State Feminism in Poland: the Case of Institutional Unstickiness

The concept of state feminism draws attention to state-based institutions – women’s policy agencies – established by political leaders to address substantive representative claims of women’s movements and to further sex-based equality (McBride et al. 2010). In Poland, the name and competencies of the only national-level women’s policy agency - the equality/equal treatment plenipotentiary – have undergone many transformations since its first establishment in 1986. Over the years, the agency’s trajectory has been extremely vulnerable to political cycles, and its legitimacy towards women’s movements problematic (Klejdysz 2016; Gaweda 2021; Krizsan 2012). When the right-wing populist Law and Justice party came to power in 2015, the office of Plenipotentiary was once more radically reformed and became an instrument of the ruling party’s anti-gender political agenda. Another change occurred following the victory of the pro-democracy and pro-European opposition coalition in the 2023 parliamentary elections. The electoral victory was driven by electoral mobilisation among women and young people, and the change in power raised high hopes that feminist demands would be more readily accommodated within the government's agenda. In December 2023, the plenipotentiary office was replaced by the newly created position of the Minister of Equality, taken up by the left-wing MP Katarzyna Kotula. However, the political agency of the Minister was low, and draft bills introduced by the Minister to legally recognise partnerships for same-sex couples and to facilitate gender affirmation procedures were rejected. In July 2025, the position of Equality Minister was dissolved, and Kotula was demoted to the position of the state secretary with an unclear scope of responsibilities. Using the concept of “institutional stickiness” – the ability or inability of new institutional arrangements to take hold where they are transplanted (Boettke et al. 2008), and analysing public discourse on the office of Equality Plenipotentiary/Minister during the two Law and Justice governments (2015-2023) and current coalition government led by the Civic Coalition (since December 2023), the article explores the question of why state feminism would not “stick” in Poland not only in the situation of anti-gender backlash and democratic backsliding, but also in times of seemingly favourable, pro-equality political environment.