The co-optation of feminisms: a research agenda

ABSTRACT

This article introduces the thematic section “The co-optation of feminisms: a research agenda,” which brings together contributions that discuss the appropriation, dilution and reinterpretation of feminist discourses, and practices by nonfeminist actors for their purposes. Recognizing the myriad ways in which feminist scholars and activists have shared their concerns with co-optation within their respective subfields, we propose that it is productive to develop a more substantive research agenda around co-optation. In the first section, we seek to contribute to this by synthesizing the scattered literature on co-optation in various feminist subfields. Subsequently, we present a selection of studies on co-optation published outside feminist studies in order to identify concepts and empirical insights that are instructive for developing a feminist research agenda on co-optation. This forms the basis for a set of guiding questions that we propose could be helpful in analyzing co-optation. The article finally presents the contributions to this thematic section and discusses what each article adds to our understanding and conceptualization of co-optation.

KEYWORDS:

• Co-optation
• mainstreaming
• institutionalization
• appropriation
• complicity

Acknowledgments

This thematic section has grown out of a panel on the “Cooptation of Gender Equality Discourses” that we organized at the fourth ATGENDER spring conference (Barcelona, 25–27 June 2014), and we want to express our thanks to those contributing to that panel as well as to the contributors to this special issue who came onboard later. We are grateful for Laura Sjoberg’s support of this thematic section on the co-optation of feminisms and for the insightful feedback we received from the two anonymous reviewers. Sara de Jong wants to thank her students for the inspiring discussions during the MA course “Radical Approaches and the Politics of Co-optation” at the University of Vienna. She was supported with funding from the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration under grant agreement no. 624577.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Sara de Jong is a Research Fellow at The Open University, UK in the Strategic Research Area Citizenship and Governance.

Susanne Kimm is a doctoral student in Political Science at the University of Vienna.

Notes

1. Note that the vocabulary used by different authors to describe the co-opted versions of feminisms displays some remarkable similarity: “faux-feminism,” “guise” (McRobbie 2009, 1), “shadowy version” (Fraser 2009, 114), “appears to be one’s own” (Stratigaki 2004, 36).

2. In the environmental movement, the concept of “greenwash(ing)” is used to critique marketing strategies that mask the negative environmental impact of corporate practices (e.g., Karliner 2001).

3. One exception might be Fraser’s argument, which has garnered a lot of attention and critical discussion (e.g., Bhandar and Ferreira da Silva 2013; Eschle and Maiguashca 2013; Schild 2015).

4. According to Keck and Sikkink (1998), the five criteria to evaluate the effectiveness of transnational action networks are: (1) issue creation and agenda setting; (2) influence on discursive positions of states and international organizations; (3) influence on institutional procedures; (4) influence on policy change in “target actors;” and (5) influence on state behavior (25).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme for research, technological development and demonstration (FP7 People: Marie-Curie Actions): [Grant Number 624577].