50 Years of LGBTQ Scholarship at APSA Mini-Conference: Political Homophobia and Resistance

Session Submission Type: Full Paper Panel

Part of Mini-Conference

• 50 Years of LGBTQ Scholarship at APSA Mini-Conference

Session Description

Political homophobia is a global phenomenon. From the Russian government’s deployment of “traditional values” to squash political opposition in civil society to Argentine President Javier Milei’s campaign promise to shut down the National Institute Against Discrimination, politicians routinely stoke homophobia and moral panic to justify repression and exclusionary policies, and appeal to voters. In other words, political homophobia is entangled with forms of both authoritarian and democratic governance, occupying the intersection of formal exclusion and popular prejudice. Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer (LGBTQ) scholarship outside of the United States and North America underscores the importance of the entanglement of nationalism and homophobia, often expressed as anti-colonial or anti-Western resistance at the heart of the intersection. This panel seeks to uncover the mechanisms of political homophobia as well as forms of innovative resistance from contexts outside Euro-America. How does political homophobia intersect with colonial and decolonial discourse? How does the relationship between electoral politics, homophobia and LGBTQ resistance play out in what Cricket Keating calls “authoritarian-leaning democracies”? How do these insights challenge existing literature on the sanguine connection between democratization and LGBTQ politics?

The papers bring rich empirical data to bear on these essential questions, employing a variety of methods from survey experimentation to ethnographic observation. O’Dweyer, Rosenberg and Stenberg explore the electoral impact of “LGBT-free zones” in Poland, contributing to the establishment of the specific consequences of political homophobia. This paper fills the gap in the literature regarding how and under what conditions political homophobia is electorally useful for politicians. Ayoub and Harris tackle the tricky issue of outcomes in social movement research by testing the efficacy of different framing choices, directly comparing competing options for countering homophobia in Zimbabwe. What is the best way to address the confluence of nationalism and homophobia? The paper moves beyond identification of different LGBTQ rights frames to assess their relative efficacy, providing actionable insights for scholars and activists alike. Moreau problematizes the connection between democratic governance and improvements in wellbeing for LGBTQ people by applying a biopolitical lens to LGBTQ inclusion. Bringing together the social movement literature on strategic identity work and queer theory, she explores two specific examples of the use of identity to resist the embodied effects of homophobia, both of which incorporate transnational discourses of human rights and what Ayoub and Harris call “locally rooted” messaging. Finally, Keating examines the tensions of coalition building between LGBTQ and other social movements in moments of political turbulence. Such cross-movement coalition building can prove extremely efficacious, precipitating the resignation of corrupt politicians, but also extremely risky, leading to intense repression. Keating’s study contributes to existing social movement literature on coalition building and repression, and feminist scholarship on the limitations of solidarity and the tensions between the politics of representation and redistribution negotiated within multi-issue coalitions.

Sub Unit

• Division 47: Sexuality & Politics

Individual Presentations

• Races at the Bottom: Local Impacts of Official Discrimination on Elections - Conor O'Dwyer, University of Florida; Andrew S Rosenberg, University of Florida; Matthew Stenberg, University of California, Berkeley

• Testing the Effectiveness of Frames Combatting Homophobia in Zimbabwe - Phillip M Ayoub, University College London; Adam Harris, University College London

• The Biopolitics of Identity Work: LGBTQ Activism in Argentina and South Africa - Julie Moreau, University of Toronto

• Coalition and Contention: LGBTQ Struggles in Sri Lanka’s Aragalaya Protests - Christine (Cricket) Keating, University of Washington

Chair

• Erica Marat National Defense University

Discussant

• Momin Rahman Trent University