Feminist+ solidarity as transformative politics

How do feminist and queer activist imaginaries respond to, initiate, mitigate, enable and complicate the ongoing process of radical transformation in the world? This special issue brings together insightful analyses of how the famous feminist dictum, ‘the personal is political’ is finding new expression in this era of climatic, pandemic, economic and political crises, particularly in the European context. Starting with a conversation with Shaharzad Akbar, who reflects on women’s courageous resistance (in the absence of an effective global response) to what she identifies as ‘gender apartheid’ in Afghanistan, and ending with an Open Forum that hosts Arlene Avakian, María López Belloso, Oksana Dutchak, Cynthia Enloe, madeleine kennedy-macfoy and Merk Koçak, this Special Issue highlights feminist + solidarity as transformative politics and explores, through six inspiring articles, the different ways in which transformative activist imaginaries find expression in union-organizing, mobilizing, collective space-making, home-making, queer aesthetics, writing, and art. 1 When we decided to co-edit a European Journal of Women’s Studies (EJWS) Special Issue on Transformative Activism in 2017 our Editorial Board in London, there was no global pandemic in sight, Russia’s 2014 attack on Ukraine was not on the radar of the international community, feminist and human rights activists in Afghanistan were making important and a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan seemed quite unimaginable. Although the many were still to challenges, workings of gender and sexuality; and the ecological and climate justice movements that remind us of our interconnectedness not just with each other but with all species, with all life, to name a few. The + is a reminder of how feminisms have been transformed by these other struggles towards an open-ended vision that serves all life. It’s possible to view the + also as a reminder of our beautiful diversity as the subjects of feminism, of the intersectionality and interconnectedness that was always there, but not always acknowledged. As Dina Georgis reminds us ‘there is always a better story than our better story’ (Georgis, 2013: 26). The + is an invitation for opening ourselves up, personally and collectively, to a better story of feminism, one that is shaped by curiosity, openness, creativity and modesty. In other words, feminist + solidarity is an invitation to co-imagine an even better story of feminist solidarity.