Gender-Blind and Anti-Feminist: Putin’s Russia as a ‘Norm Antipreneur’

AbstractAgainst the backdrop of the increasing global schisms around gender equality in recent years, the discussion of Russia’s domestic anti-gender politics is coming to the fore. To date, however, little work has bridged the domestic–international divide in this discussion by thoroughly examining the interplay between Russian foreign policy, national branding and the domestic conservative turn. This gap inspires the twofold question underscoring this essay: how do anti-gender discourses emerge in Russian politics, and with what effect do these discourses travel across different political contexts? Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Notes1 See also Wood (Citation2011), Riabov and Riabova (Citation2014), Novitskaya (Citation2017).2 Vladimir Putin’s address to the Federal Assembly on 8 July 2000, Rossiiskaya gazeta, 11 July 2000, available at: http://www.kremlin.ru/acts/bank/22401, accessed 6 September 2023.3 ‘Interv'yu Vladimira Putina radio “Evropa-1” i telekanalu TF1’, Kremlin.ru, 4 June 2014, available at: http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/45832, accessed 25 June 2022.4 ‘Bol'shaya press-konferentsiya Vladimira Putina’, Kremlin.ru, 19 December 2019, available at: http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/62366, accessed 25 June 2022.5 ‘Zasedanie Koordinatsionnogo soveta po realizatsii Natsional'noi strategii deistvii v interesakh detei’, Kremlin.ru, 28 May 2013, available at: http://kremlin.ru/events/administration/18205, accessed 25 June 2022.6 See for example, ‘Pryamaya liniya s Vladimirom Putinym’, Kremlin.ru, 17 April 2014, available at: http://www.kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/statements/20796, accessed 25 June 2022; ‘Vstrecha s uchastnikami obshcherossiiskoi aktsii “My vmeste”’, Kremlin.ru, 30 April 2020, available at: http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/63294, accessed 25 June 2022.7 ‘Obrashchenie Prezidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii’, Kremlin.ru, 18 March 2014, available at: http://kremlin.ru/events/president/news/20603, accessed 25 June 2022.8 All three resolutions were eventually adopted by UNHRC, despite the opposition of Western states and their close allies, such as Japan and Korea (Voss Citation2019), and the criticism of major human rights NGOs, such as Amnesty International.9 Natalia Zolotova, Russia, Address to the UN Human Rights Council on Draft Resolution, A/HRC/35/L.21, Geneva, Switzerland, 22 June 2017, available at: https://media.un.org/en/asset/k16/k160l17q3o, accessed 25 June 2022.10 Dina Gilmutdinova, Russia, UN Security Council on Women in Peacekeeping, S/PV.8508, New York, United States, 11 April 2019, p. 17, available at: https://www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9%7D/s_pv_8508.pdf, accessed 25 June 2022.11 Nikolay Kobrinets, Speech at the Final Session of the 27th Meeting of the OSCE Ministerial Council, Tirana, Albania, 4 December 2020, available at: https://www.mid.ru/ru/foreign_policy/news/-/asset_publisher/cKNonkJE02Bw/content/id/4470187, accessed 25 June 2022.12 ‘Russian Diplomat Anticipates Uneasy Work Under Sweden’s Presidency in OSCE in 2021’, TASS, 13 December 2020, available at: https://tass.com/politics/1234563, accessed 3 March 2023.13 ‘S/2020/1054, Russian Federation: Draft Resolution’, United Nations Digital Library, available at: https://www.securitycouncilreport.org/un-documents/document/s-2020-1054.php, accessed 2 August 2023.14 Gender mainstreaming involves the integration of gender equality principles into diverse domains encompassing peace, development and human rights. The concept emerged as a strategic framework to advance gender parity and rectify gender inequalities. At the Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995, gender mainstreaming garnered crucial support and recognition, being heralded as an essential method for realising commitments towards gender equality. The resulting Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action obliges a comprehensive array of stakeholders within development policies and initiatives, including UN entities, Member States and civil society participants, to actively engage in fostering this approach.15 ‘Letter Dated 30 October 2020 from the President of the Security Council Addressed to the Secretary-General and the Permanent Representatives of the Members of the Security Council’, United Nations Digital Library, pp. 28, 31, available at: https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/3893408, accessed 25 June 2022.16 ‘Explanation of Vote on a Draft Resolution on Women, Peace and Security', Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the UN, 30 October 2020, available at: https://russiaun.ru/en/news/wps_3010, accessed 25 June 2022.17 ‘Sergei Lavrov: OON rodilas’ na pepelishchakh Vtoroi mirovoi voiny’, TASS, 15 September 2015, available at: https://tass.ru/interviews/2254842, accessed 25 June 2022.18 Maria Zakharova’s personal blog, 4 July 2021, available at: https://t.me/MariaVladimirovnaZakharova/334, accessed 6 September 2023.19 ‘Statement by Mr Alexander Lukashevich, Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation, at the 1267th Meeting of the OSCE Permanent Council via Video Teleconference’, PC.DEL/462/20, 14 May 2020, available at: https://www.osce.org/files/f/documents/6/b/453099.pdf, accessed 25 June 2022.20 ‘Greetings to Russian Women on International Women’s Day’, Kremlin.ru, 8 March 2020, available at: http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/62961, accessed 25 June 2022.21 ‘Greetings to Russian Women on International Women’s Day’, Kremlin.ru, 8 March 2020, available at: http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/62961, accessed 25 June 2022.22 ‘Valdai Discussion Club Meeting’, Kremlin.ru, 21 October 2021, available at: http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/66975, accessed 25 June 2022.23 Konstitutsiya Rossiiskoi Federatsii, 25 December 1993, available at: http://www.constitution.ru/en/10003000-01.htm, accessed 1 August 2023.24 ‘The 2020 Global Gender Gap Report’, World Economic Forum, 16 December 2019, p. 32, available at: https://www.weforum.org/reports/gender-gap-2020-report-100-years-pay-equality/, accessed 10 August 2022.25 ‘“Ya tebya seychas, suka, ubivat' budu”: Bol’shinstvo zhenshchin, osuzhdennykh za ubiistvo, zashchishchalis' ot domashnego nasiliya’, Novaya gazeta, 25 November 2019, available at: https://novayagazeta.ru/articles/2019/11/25/82847-ya-tebya-seychas-suka-ubivat-budu, accessed 25 June 2022.26 Online interview with Irina Tartakovskaya, sociologist and gender scholar, 28 April 2021.27 Interview with Mari Davtyan, human rights lawyer, Moscow, 13 May 2021.28 Online interview with Oksana Pushkina, television host and former State Duma deputy from the ruling United Russia (Edinaya Rossiya) party (2016–2021), 17 May 2021.29 Interview with a feminist blogger and election campaign manager, Moscow, 11 July 2021.30 The interviewee ironically employed the informal term patsany—‘good/decent blokes’—commonly used as a respectful reference to men who follow a strict moral code and demonstrate readiness to stand up for themselves.31 Interview with the head of a regional NGO, 6 August 2021. Some interview details have been omitted to protect the respondents’ anonymity.32 Interview with Elena Zdravomislova, sociologist and women’s studies scholar, St Petersburg, 14 May 2021.33 Online interview with Irina Tartakovskaya, sociologist and gender scholar, 28 April 2021.34 Online interview with Oksana Pushkina, television host and former State Duma deputy from the ruling United Russia party (2016–2021), 17 May 2021.35 Interview with Maria Rakhmaninova, feminist and anarchist political theorist, St Petersburg, 5 May 2021.36 Interview with Asya Khodyreva, feminist scholar and activist, Moscow, 13 May 2021.37 Interview with Mari Davtyan, human rights lawyer, Moscow, 13 May 2021.38 Interview with Mari Davtyan, human rights lawyer, Moscow, 13 May 2021.39 Calculations are based on the Inoteka database maintained by OVD-Info, an independent human rights media project in October 2021; see ‘OVD-Info’, Inoteka, 1 October 2021, available at: https://ovdinfo.org/inoteka-en, accessed 25 June 2022.40 Tysiachniouk et al.’s (Citation2018) and Moser and Skripchenko’s (Citation2018) studies show that environmental NGOs resort to similar ‘survival strategies’.41 Interview with the head of a regional NGO, 6 August 2021. The NGO was investigated and recognised as a ‘foreign agent’ in 2022.42 ‘Joint Letter to Russia’s Prosecutor General on Unfounded Charges against Yulia Tsvetkova’, Human Rights Watch, 4 March 2021, available at: https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/03/04/joint-letter-russias-prosecutor-general-unfounded-charges-against-yulia-tsvetkova, accessed 25 June 2022.43 Interview with a feminist activist, 3 June 2021.44 Online interview with a feminist environmental activist, 11 May 2021.45 Online interview with a feminist artist, 9 July 2021.46 Online interview with Nika Vodwood, feminist blogger and activist, 16 July 2021.47 Interview with a feminist visual artist, St Petersburg, 22 June 2021.48 Interview with a gender studies scholar, Moscow, 3 June 2021.49 Interview with Marina Pisklakova-Parker, head of ANNA, Moscow, 5 May 2021.50 Interview with a gender studies scholar, St Petersburg, 14 May 2021.51 Interview with Asya Khodyreva, feminist scholar and activist, Moscow, 13 May 2021.52 Interview with Marina Pisklakova-Parker, head of ANNA, Moscow, 5 May 2021.53 Interview with Bella Rapoport, feminist scholar and blogger, St Petersburg, 16 May 2021.54 Online interview with Lilith Mazikina, journalist, 21 July 2021.55 Interview with Mari Davtyan, human rights lawyer, Moscow, 13 May 2021.56 FemTalks, official website, 2021, available at: https://femtalks.moscow/, accessed 25 June 2022.57 Eve’s Ribs, official website, 2021, available at: https://www.rebraevy.ru/main, accessed 25 June 2022.58 ‘Women. Disability. Feminism.’ (InvaGirls), official website, 2021, available at: https://invagirl.ru/, accessed 25 June 2022.59 Online interview with Alyona Levina, a feminist artist and the founder and coordinator of ‘Women. Disability. Feminism.’, 5 May 2021.60 Interview with Leda Garina, a theatre director and the founder of Eve’s Ribs, 23 June 2021.61 ‘Greetings to Russian Women on International Women’s Day’, Kremlin.ru, 8 March 2020, available at: http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/62961, accessed 25 June 2022.62 See also, ‘Ukrainian, Belarusian, and Russian Women in the Anti-War Movement’, Wilson Center, 23 March 2022, available at: https://www.wilsoncenter.org/event/ukrainian-belarusian-and-russian-women-anti-war-movement, accessed 22 October 2022.Additional informationFundingThe research for this essay was conducted by the author as an Independent Researcher between April and August 2021 and was not funded by any academic institution.Notes on contributorsAnna KutelevaAnna Kuteleva, Senior Lecturer in International Relations, University of Wolverhampton, Wolverhampton, UK. Email: a.kuteleva@gmail.com