Bargaining with gendered egalitarianism. A transnational compensatory patriarchy in Polish Catholic Missions in England, Belgium, Sweden

Abstract

The article examines the transformations of masculine formal (ordained) power in the Polish migrant religious organisations of the Roman Catholic Church. Based on qualitative in-depth interviews with 97 transmigrant women and men (consecrated and lay activists) involved in 14 Polish Catholic Mission organisations in England, Belgium and Sweden, the article gives an insight into various criticisms of patterns of priests’ patriarchal power in the Polish structures of the Roman Catholic Church. The analysis highlights how such power transforms in a transnational context when these organisations have to adapt to and function in more egalitarian, pluralistic and secularised Church organisational cultures than in the more patriarchal culture of Poland. We argue that the transnational context reinforces patriarchal models, albeit in a changed, hybrid form that we call ‘transnational compensatory patriarchy’. Our contribution to the discussion on the gendered transformation of power in transnational religious organisations focuses on two issues. First, we analyse the under-researched transformation of the patterns of masculine formal power in religious migrant organisations. Second, we show through a concept that we call ‘bargaining with egalitarianism’ how patriarchal power isomorphically (and hybridically) adapts itself to the more egalitarian context without losing its patriarchalism, which operates in the sending country. Therefore, we indicate the complexity and ambivalence of the transformation of masculine power by pointing to its intersectional sources and various ways of changing gender regimes.

Keywords:

• Transnationalism
• masculine formal power
• religious organisations
• patriarchy
• bargaining with egalitarianism
• gendered migration

Introduction

An important experience of Polish Catholic activists who migrate to Western Europe and Scandinavia is an encounter with the different patterns of power in the local religious organisations of the Roman Catholic Church (hereafter RCC). In England, Belgium and Sweden, Polish migrants recognise greater gender egalitarianism and diversity. The presence of women in the formal power structures of the RCC organisations as well as the inclusion of lay men differs significantly from the Polish context, where the power is monopolised mostly by priests (Leszczyńska 2016). Therefore, the functioning of the migrants within the transnational space of religious organisations (Faist 2000, Levitt and Jaworsky 2007, Pries 2008) stretched between Poland and the migration countries generates numerous tensions and dilemmas related to the perception of models of male power in the RCC. As a result, there is a critical distance and a pressure to redefine them, and these new practices can be studied.

An interesting theoretical space for observing the ways of articulating tensions and redefining expectations around male models of religious power is provided by Polish Catholic Missions (hereafter PCMs). PCMs are the official Polish structures of the RCC abroad, and currently there are 70 PCM organisations around the world. Their task is to activate the religious and social life of Polish migrants so that they do not lose contact with Polish Catholicism, the nation and its values. PCMs are usually located in big cities, which are the main destinations of migrating Poles. They take the form of either (1) personal parishes with their infrastructure or (2) shared ones, where they coexist with other ethnic churches (Krotofil 2013). There is usually one central PCM, which coordinates the activities of all missions in a given country. Regardless of their type, however, the transnational specificity of the PCMs makes their structures (and their members) subject to dual powers. Therefore, they are subordinated to various, often contradictory, gender regimes that form a complex pattern of power relations within an organisation (Connell 2006, 839). On the one hand, PCMs fall under the more democratic models of power regimes in the local structures of the RCC in England, Belgium and Sweden, known for the far-reaching feminisation of its organisations. In all these countries women frequently manage parishes and administer sacraments. Their inclusion stems from a systematic drop in men’s vocations, resulting from the advanced processes of pluralisation and secularisation of multicultural societies. Furthermore, England, Sweden and Belgium are among the top countries in the world in terms of indicators of gender equality (Pew Forum 2010), which translates to a high position of women in the organisations of other denominations (Salminen-Karlsson 2005). In England and Sweden, where Catholicism has a minority status, the better position of women in its power structures is strengthened by the influence of the Protestant culture, where the ordination of women takes place.

On the other hand, PCMs are also subject to the power regimes of the RCC in Poland, which are known for patriarchal exclusion of women from the formal religious or administrative power structures, regardless of whether they are consecrated (i.e. nuns) or lay women (Leszczyńska 2019). Although the doctrine does not prohibit it, in practice even nuns do not become extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion, and lay women do not become altar servants. The RCC in Poland also does not admit women to important administrative Church functions. Moreover, such masculinisation of the Church does not mean that lay men have access to the positions of formal power within it. Lay men are a community that—like lay women—feels strongly excluded from the structures of Church institutions and has little access to various resources and a low sense of agency (Leszczyńska 2016). The patriarchal, centralised and hierarchical power of priests in the practice of the RCC in Poland results from the Polish national and historical specificity. It is the naturalisation of the belief in the hierarchical relationship between the laity and the clergy, not only in the institution but also in the community (Meslin 2011). In addition to the differentiating specificity of the RCC in Poland in the area of power, there is also homogeneity and conservatism resulting from the lack of ethnic diversity (Leszczyńska 2019). By contrast, the RCC in the countries in question was either, created and developed by migrants (England and Sweden) or heavily transformed by them (Belgium). Hence, a certain blurring of the universal premises of Catholicism takes place (e.g. inclusion of non-normative practices such as the blessing of non-heterosexual unions), as its particular form accepted by migrants differs in terms of ethnicity, nationality, but also generation and gender (Ryan 2017).

The transnationality of the PCMs thus creates a unique opportunity to investigate whether and how the RCC perceived as a ‘primary example of patriarchy’ with its ‘ostensibly inviolable patriarchal nature’ (Ebaugh 1993, 401) can transform the masculine power of priests in migration. By examining how Catholic activists negotiate expectations of masculine religious formal power in more egalitarian migration contexts, we can ‘frame discussions of patriarchy around the empirical realities’ (Inhorn 2007, 21–22).

Our contribution to the discussion on the gendered transformation of power in transnational religious organisations focuses on two issues. First, we analyse the under-researched transformation of masculine formal power patterns in religious migrant organisations. Second, we show how patriarchal power isomorphically (and hybridically) adapts itself to the more egalitarian context without losing its patriarchalism, which operates in the sending country. Therefore, we indicate the complexity and ambivalence of the transformation of masculine power by pointing to its intersectional sources and various ways of changing gender regimes (see Goździak and Dianna, 2002, Szczepanikova 2012: 479, Woodhead 2013).

Heading to ‘transnational compensatory patriarchy’ through ‘bargaining with egalitarianism’

The findings presented here can make a significant contribution to the current feminist discussion of ‘doing gender’ at the intersection of religion and migration. An important issue in this area is the study of the gendered transformation of power in transnational religious organisations. Systematic interest in these problems began only in recent decades (see Cadge and Ecklund 2007; Bonifacio and Angeles 2010; Longman, Midden, and van den Brandt 2012; Ryan and Vacchelli 2013). This was primarily a part of interdisciplinary research on gendered geographies of power in migration, focused on the results of changing contexts for ‘doing gender’ (Mahler and Pessar 2001, Yeoh and Brenda 2003, Anthias and Maja 2010, Nawyn 2010, Levitt 2012, Donato and Gabaccia 2016). The existing studies primarily focus on and document activities of small, ethnic-religious organisations and assemblies of immigrants. Comparative analyses synthesising the accumulated knowledge are still scarce (Urbańska 2018). We attempt to fill this gap by analysing in-depth interviews with 97 lay and consecrated Catholic activists in 14 PCM organisations, in several cities in three countries: England, Belgium and Sweden.

The novelty of our contribution is that previous research has focused primarily on showing the empowering potential for women in the processes of the gendering of immigrant religiosity (Levitt and Jaworsky 2007, Ryan and Vacchelli 2013) in various religious organisations (e.g. Hüwelmeier 2013, Rey 2013) or beyond (‘lived religion approach’, e.g. Williams 2008; Marshall and Sabhlok 2009; Szczepanikova 2012, Jackson 2013). The greater accession of women to power structures was explained by the influence of top-down pressures, e.g. the new, different, better socio-economical position of migrant women than men on the labour markets (Ebaugh, Rose, and Chafetz 1999); or as an effect of loosening the ties of migrant religious organisations with their more patriarchal headquarters in origin countries (Hüwelmeier 2012). Bottom-up phenomena were also pointed to, i.e. greater openness of women to the culture of the host country and their better adaptability (Levitt and Jaworsky 2007) as well as their growing secularisation in the context of migration (Borowik 2012; Darvishpour 2002). Broadening this discussion, we analyse the under-researched masculine formal power in the religious organisations, an issue only recently problematised, with the growing interest in men and masculinity studies at the intersection of religion and migration (Charsley and Wray 2015, Hearn 2015; Wojnicka and Pustułka 2017).

The focus on patterns and differentiated expectations about masculine formal power in religious organisations, situated in transnational spaces, allows us to observe the dynamics of the ongoing change. This is a transformation neither in the direction of egalitarianisation of power regimes nor their retraditionalisation. The transformation that we observe shows the third way—it rather reinforces patriarchal models, albeit in a changed, hybrid form that we call ‘transnational compensatory patriarchy’. To understand how this process takes place, we also introduce an additional concept: ‘bargaining with egalitarianism’.

We define ‘transnational compensatory patriarchy’ as the transformation of expectations about and practices of the power patterns in the organisations of the RCC. This transformation makes it possible to adapt the power patterns to more egalitarian models of gender relations in the transnational contexts of religious organisations, while at the same time maintaining their cohesion with the organisation in the country of origin. The efforts taken by lay men in the migratory context to gain more agency and increase their access to the power in the sacred and profane spaces of the religious organisations illustrate the essence of this change. We interpret this change as compensation for the exclusion and low status assigned to them in countries of migration (Fiałkowska 2019, Leszczyńska, Urbańska, and Zielińska 2020). And this compensation is possible through a more egalitarian transnational context that opens up opportunities for transformation. We are inspired by several conceptions. We draw on the category of ‘transnational patriarchy’ (Jongwilaiwan and Thompson 2013), referring to macro determinants of the patriarchy in the context of migration. Jongwilaiwan and Thompson use the example of the matrimonial choices of Thai women in Singapore to point to the structural conditions of reconstructing the transnational patriarchy, i.e. economic inequalities and sovereignty policies of nation-states. This reconstruction is possible in conditions of economic deprivation of migrant women, for whom the most important resource of access to citizenship is marriage with a citizen of the host country (2013, 365). In the context of our study, the macrostructural conditions that reconstruct the patriarchy are generated by two forces. On the one hand, they stem from the pressure of egalitarian power patterns of the receiving countries that influence the PCMs’ gendered regimes. On the other hand, they result from the socio-economic structural position of Polish migrant men in new countries, perceived through categories of marginalisation and uncertainty. The strategy to cope with these pressures can be better understood by reference to migratory strategies of compensation as a form of the ‘hegemonic bargain’ described by Anthony Chen (1999) in his research on the process of Chinese American men ‘achieving manhood’. Also useful for us is the concept of ‘compensatory patriarchy’ (Mensah, Williams, and Aryee 2013). Coined in studies on the African diaspora in Canada, the concept refers to an impulse to somehow balance the sense of migrants’ deprivation of power in the secular world by exercising such power in the religious sphere (Mensah, Williams, and Aryee 2013, 158). Other studies have also shown that activism of lay males in areas of power in religious organisations is linked to migratory exclusion and also that it is policy-oriented in the countries of origin (George 2000, Jolly and Reeves 2005). Inspired by this research and our international comparative study, we decided to propose the concept of ‘transnational compensatory patriarchy’, which shows that this model goes beyond the individual context and is reproduced in England, Belgium and Sweden.

To understand how it is possible to entrench patriarchal models in the egalitarian context we must also introduce the concept of ‘bargaining with egalitarianism’. We understand this as a process of taking democratic models of criticism and resistance from the ‘blueprint’ of egalitarianism and using it to reconstruct the power system of the ‘transnational patriarchy’ as the new form of ‘compensatory patriarchy’. This concept will therefore allow us to show how a better position in the patriarchal power structures (Kandiyoti 1988; Kibria 1990, Wojnicka and Pustułka 2017) provides men with greater chances of reinforcing this type of power, even though they are in a new migrant situation of co-dependence on a relatively more dominant egalitarian system.

There is also an additional meaning in our deliberate reversal of Kandiyoti’s original concept of ‘patriarchal bargain’ (1988). This idea suggests that both men and women have access to resources, despite the asymmetry in favour of men, ‘with which they negotiate to maximise power and options within a patriarchal structure’ of male dominance (Kibria 1990, 9). Kandiyoti ‘has suggested that a woman’s strategies reveal the blueprint of what she calls the “patriarchal bargain”, that is, the ways in which women and men negotiate and adapt to a set of rules that guide and constrain gender relations’ (Kibria 1990, 9). For us, the most significant dimension of Kandiyoti’s concept is the situation of ‘a negotiated exchange between individuals, in which specific benefits are acquired as a result of following rules’ (Jongwilaiwan and Thompson 2013, 364). In the case of our analyses, the process of exchange and bargaining takes place in the migrant setting, i.e. in a more egalitarian context, interpreted by our informants as a kind of egalitarian mainstream and a new system of domination. It is also recognised as a threat to the patriarchal orders with its gendered regimes of power in the PCM organisation, which needs to find itself again in this new space. The presence of this ‘negotiated exchange’ practised by our interlocutors, which they conduct with the egalitarian system, is embodied in patterns of expectations. These patterns include a kind of submission to elements of egalitarianism, which is a price of the multifaceted benefits available to men. It is therefore necessary to introduce the concept of ‘bargaining with egalitarianism’ to address the inherently contradictory process of grasping and utilising selected egalitarian models by religious conservatives. Equally important, however, is the necessity of exchange with the egalitarian system as a condition for the patriarchy to survive in the new contexts of dependence.

Data and methods

The analysis is based on qualitative, comparative fieldwork conducted between 2016 and 2018. We talked to activists of 14 PCMs. In Belgium, where one central PCM manages over a dozen municipal parishes of various types, we reached activists from the three largest and longest-operating PCMs in Brussels and Antwerp. In Sweden, we reached all three existing PCM parishes, located in Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö. In England, where there is one central PCM for England and Wales, we spoke only to activists from eight PCM parishes selected as the most important of the 14 located in London, the main destination for Poles.

Two main questions organised our research. What are the gendered expectations of both lay and consecrated PCM activists regarding masculine formal power patterns in the Polish RCC migrant organisations? How are those patterns transformed in a situation when these organisations, following their migrant parishioners, must function within the more egalitarian, pluralistic and secularised organisational culture of the RCC? To find the answers to these questions, we conducted 86 interviews with 97 participants involved in the activity of PCMs (50 women and 47 men). The interviews were supplemented with elements of overt observation in the field, conducted mainly during formal (gatherings and masses) or informal meetings (in cafes or in PCM social rooms) of members of the PCM’s communities. We held 35 interviews (including IDI and group) in England, 23 in Belgium, and 31 in Sweden. The participants of the study were involved in various areas of the work of the PCMs, as full-time workers in formal positions as well as carrying out informal activities, usually referred to as traditional and cultural customs. For our informants, the PCMs were therefore sometimes their workplace (for the clergy and some lay women working as secretaries or organists), and for others a space for unpaid social activity done in their free time. The majority of our informants were either involved in more than one mission at a time or knew them from their involvement in the past.

We started the procedure of searching for interviewees by analysing the local and central PCMs’ websites to find activists responsible for administering and managing these organisations. As Catholic Church organisations, Polish missions are hierarchical and centralised. For ethical reasons, therefore, before starting the fieldwork we contacted the heads of the missions (i.e. Polish priests) and asked for consent to do the research in their respective PCM. As a rule, the priests in charge of the 14 local missions (and later also our informants) were quite sympathetic to our research. During the research, we were positioned as Polish, which by definition inspired greater trust and co-ethnic solidarity (see Garapich 2016). To our surprise, we were not asked questions about our religious and political affiliation; as a rule, it was probably assumed that we were Polish Catholics. Our family status certainly contributed to this, as all three of us were mothers who took their children abroad with them.

To differentiate the sample selection strategy, we asked the priests in charge of the missions to identify activists in the mission, whom we then attempted to interview. At the same time, we also used the snowball method—the interviewees identified further individuals who they said were active and important for the existence of the Polish missions. As there were usually a few activists in single parishes, we extended the sampling strategy to more organisations in London or other cities (in Belgium and Sweden). Investigating more missions also allowed for better anonymity. This data collection strategy allowed us to reach more varied and critical perspectives on power.

We conducted the interviews in various places: quiet cafés and private homes as well as church spaces at the local PCMs (e.g. presbytery). The interviews were conducted in Polish, our participants’ native language, and lasted between one and three hours. In most cases, we used recording devices, and otherwise, when we did not receive permission to record, made notes. The interviews were transcribed and subjected to content analysis using the MAXQDA 12 software.

The goal of our sampling strategy was to include the greatest possible diversity of PCM activists in terms of their gender, class and age. Ultimately, the sample corresponds to the socio-demographic specificity of migration flows to individual countries. There is also a clear pattern of class and economic mobility, but only in relation to the position occupied previously position in Poland. The new position in the host countries is rather defined as uncertain and marginal in relation to the natives. Thus, our interviewees varied widely in terms of education, age and origin. Those in the PCMs in England were mostly people who had come for work after the accession of Poland to the European Union. The majority in Sweden were migrants who had left Poland in the 1980s and early 1990s for economic reasons. Our interlocutors in Belgium were from all periods of migration: post-war and post-Solidarity refugees, pre-accession economic migrants, and post-accession contemporary migrants. The interviewees’ social status also encompassed diverse groups—the majority of those from England represented various parts of the middle class in Poland. The men involved in the English PCMs were mainly specialists and professionals working in highly qualified positions (pharmacists, architects, executives) or business owners. Women who had been employed in Poland were often housewives in England, while some also worked in the services or care sector. The people active in the Swedish PCMs were from the middle class—office workers, teachers, but also owners of service companies—as well as the working class. Most of the interviewees in Belgium were working-class, especially from Eastern Poland, but most activist leaders in these missions were middle-class. The PCM activists were also diverse in terms of age—in England, they were relatively young (between 20 and 40), while in the other two missions they were older.

The strategy of qualitative analysis was based on selecting fragments from ethnographic notes and interviews that showed transformations of expectations regarding—experienced by both lay and consecrated PCM activists—patterns of doing formal power by priests in the Polish organisations of the RCC in transnational contexts. These discursive fragments were in the form of criticism, or negotiating migrants’ expectations, as well as the form of explanations (accounts), which the situation of interviews helped to formulate. According to our interviewees, the patterns of exercising formal power by the Polish priests aptly capture the clash of patriarchal and egalitarian models that take place in the context of migration as well as their transformations. Not only do we find these patterns in the content analysis of loosely structured interviews, but they also appeared spontaneously during overt observations in Polish diasporas. They circulate in migrant communities, among different generations of migrants. Our interviewees recognised four patterns of exercising power by priests: ‘authoritarian patriarch’, ‘good patriarch’, ‘good brother’, ‘liberal other’, which we describe in the empirical section. They are similar in all three countries, as our analysis strategy based on maximising similarities and contrasts in the international context shows. These patterns reveal how masculine formal power and its gendered dimensions are recognised, categorised, criticised, and ultimately reproduced by lay parishioners and the priests themselves. The critical potential leads us to treat them in terms of normative resistance.

Towards greater autonomy within patriarchal specialisation

The patterns, which we encountered in all the mission’s communities, symbolise the forms and means of exercising power disavowed or accepted by Polish migrants. They refer both to the Polish clergy serving in PCMs and those in the parishes which our informants go to as a gesture of resistance. They also refer to foreign priests from the local structures of the RCC, whose representations (‘liberal other’) appear as a negative reference point. These are the types recognised not only by secular activists but also by priests and nuns.

Analysis of the criticism towards priests in the PCMs at first glance shows that the negative opinions refer not so much to unequal treatment of men and women in the missions as to the priests’ general practices of power. Above all, the majority of our interlocutors (both women and men) criticise the authoritarian, centralised, controlling and exclusionary style of exercising power in the PCMs, associating it with the RCC in Poland. We call this type of power ‘authoritarian hierarch’. Direct criticism therefore specifically addresses styles of management. Only more extensive analysis shows that the criticism refers, albeit not explicitly, to the question of gender divisions within the PCMs. The main object of criticism here is the priests’ selectively hegemonic closing of the structures of religious and social functions even to lay men (except for the inclusion of upper-class men).

Two alternative patterns are recognised in response to this ‘authoritative hierarch’ model. The first is a ‘softened’ version, in which a technocrat assumes the role of the ‘good patriarch’. The imperative of obedience and humility, an essential condition of pastoral power, becomes softer and entangled in a familial, social relationship with a ‘caring father’, who above all strengthens the working-class masculinity in migration. The second, most preferred alternative is the ‘brother-guide’ pattern, focused strongly on both the heavily gendered religious needs of the faithful and heightened socio-patriotic needs emerging in the context of migration. Partial decentralisation of power is also important, but inclusivity in the religious aspect concerns only lay men.

These two preferred models are, in fact, different versions of still patriarchal order of the PCMs. This is viewed positively in opposition to local Catholic Churches, criticised for liberalisation of gender and sexual norms, as well as in response to the identities of the clergy heading them. We present a picture of the latter below, under the category of ‘liberal other’. The criticism is therefore not aimed at the gendered foundations of sacred and pastoral power practised in an androcentric, essentialistic and segregated manner, although it transforms this power strongly by using quasi-democratic arguments. We discuss each of these patterns separately below.

‘Liberal other’ vs. ‘authoritarian hierarch’—two extremes of criticism

These two types of priests are situated at opposing ends of the typological and transnational spectrum: the ethnicised ‘authoritarian hierarch’ connoted negatively with Poland, and the ‘liberal other’, associated with the secularised model, liberalised in terms of gender and sexual issues.

‘Liberal other’

The ‘liberal other’ is defined as a specific, non-Polish, priest, identified by his country of origin, serving in the local structures of the RCC. The ‘liberal other’ also functions as a category of stereotyping, identified with the imagined religious culture of the host country or this part of Europe. This means that a Polish priest can also become the ‘liberal other’, of course, if he transgresses the essentialistic norms of reproducing a gendered and sexual order.

The attitude to this pattern of power carries an intrinsic contradiction. On the one hand, in certain areas, the ‘liberal other’ is evaluated positively and perceived as an example to follow for the RCC in Poland. This applies to practising a democratic style of collaboration and proximity instead of hierarchical distance and also opening the social space in the Church to the faithful. These characteristics constitute a blueprint of egalitarianism with which our interlocutors bargain. On the other hand, in the overall balance of the criticism made by both males and females who had remained with Polish priests, the ‘liberal other’ is viewed negatively. It is perceived as having given up power and the Church to women. This type of criticism is made spontaneously mainly by Polish men from the younger and middle generations. They are indignant that women in local Churches have exceeded their roles and left the place assigned to them: they organise all areas of parish life (e.g. they have keys to the church), sit on parish councils, act as Eucharistic ministers, lectors, read the Gospel, and officiate at funerals. According to some of our male interviewees, women ‘rule’ in the local Churches. This is made clear, for example, by Ryszard from England:

If [women] enter the altar, men will leave. That is what is happening in many parishes, that when there are altar girls in Polish parishes, there are very few boys. (Ryszard_Lay_England_10).

Interestingly, the scale and foundation of the indignation of our interviewees alone show how strong are the perspectives of the hegemonic, separative gender order. For our male interlocutors, the very fact that women in local parishes of the RCC are going outside the private (care) sphere suffices to interpret this as a fundamental disturbance of the power relations. This is even though the transgressions they criticise are a long way from full egalitarianism since women in the RCC do not have equal opportunities and cannot be ordained as priests.

In the narratives, the ‘liberal other’s’ pattern of power becomes a symbol of the individualism and secularisation of the RCC in the West. It represents a type of insubordinate masculinity (Connell 2002) that makes numerous, unacceptable subversions to the religious gendering rules of the RCC and power hierarchy. The next important dimension of the criticism, especially in the Belgian context, focuses on practices of inclusion of non-heteronormative believers, i.e. same-sex unions and families. The inclusion finds expression in declarations, but also in practices, i.e. administration of Holy Communion to non-heteronormative people or blessings for homosexual marriages. Another dimension of criticism relates to the clergy’s declared acceptance of euthanasia, IVF as infertility treatment, and divorce.

‘Liberal others’ are perceived by our interlocutors as weak and unmanly because they accept the non-heteronormative practices of parishioners. Even acts of the radical transformation of the gender order—e.g. situation when ‘liberal others’ openly oppose the interpretation of the pope’s authority—are not interpreted by our male interviewees as acts of courageous resistance. Instead, they are viewed as acts of weakness, softness, concession, and lack of strength of character. They also regret the fact that the local models of secular culture are prevailing over sacred religious dogmas; that the RCC in the West has become too tolerant and open with them—something for which they blame the Second Vatican Council and the 1960s moral revolution. This is represented well by these comments from Darek, an activist in Belgium who claimed that the RCC in Belgium has ‘lost its identity’ as it does not condemn IVF or generally progressive values and practices.

These bottom-up practices of transforming power models are therefore seen as a matter of conforming to the faithful’s wishes, as well as ‘shortcuts’, ‘doing deals’, weakness of character and loss of identity. They are not perceived in terms of reform, as a reflexive religious agency or an attempt to democratise power. Instead, these changes are defined as heresy or the blessing of sins. Some of the Polish believers perceive these practices as a norm and an everyday occurrence in the non-Polish parishes they are familiar with, but also as a mass phenomenon and part of the culture of the host country. According to our interlocutors, all the transgressions of the ‘liberal other’ are the antithesis of the ideal of the androcentric Church and hierarchical power.

Importantly, however, it is mostly men who lead this criticism, with women expressing it less often. If this ‘liberal other’ pattern is recognised and appreciated by Polish migrants who criticise the Polish structures of the RCC, it often leads them to leave PCM organisations in general. However, our research focusing on active members of the PCM structures does not allow us to evaluate the scope of this process.

‘Authoritarian hierarch’

At the other end of the scale, this time associated with Poland, is the ‘authoritarian hierarch’ pattern. If we look at this criticised model through the prism of gender norms, we can see an interesting process of nationalisation of one of the variants of Polish authoritarianism. The pattern is systemically associated with the Catholic hierarchy in Poland or with some of its emissaries—priests from some PCMs. Among Polish migrants, the model of the ‘authoritarian hierarch’ becomes a fundamental figure of their anticlericalism, which gains a national component abroad. The ethnicised category ‘Polish’ often appears in the assessments.

This model is associated with centralised, hierarchical, patriarchal practices of doing power focused only on benefits. This type of priest demands loyalty, as well as controlling and blocking the space of social and national-patriotic actions of lay people. ‘Authoritarian hierarch’ is often presented in opposition to the English, Belgian and Swedish religious cultures of exercising power, which our interlocutors praised and saw as relatively more egalitarian. He is also contrasted with Polish ‘brother-guide’ type priests emancipated from the ‘authoritarian’ model. According to many of our interviewees, this model is present especially in those missions which for several decades have been led by older generations of Polish clergy. The ‘authoritarian hierarch’ is focused on retaining positions and on maintaining control and power. He builds distance between himself and parishioners, as well as among other members of the clergy (priests from non-Polish local Churches) and nuns. He is particularly interested in protecting his interests, for example using his position in competing for positions with lay activists. Parishioners perceive ‘authoritarian hierarchs’ as supercilious, dominant, haughty and judgemental, and with a tendency to impose their will. A typical dimension of this imposition is the subject of economic exploitation by hierarchs in Poland. Our interviewees cited such patterns, while also emphasising the situation of coercion and economic blackmail generated by priests who do not pay heed to Poles’ ‘poverty’. They make parishioners pay for services, with those failing to do so becoming subject to administrative exclusion. The ‘authoritarian hierarch’ is therefore described as a type of power dividing along class lines (mainly the male perspective), without giving sufficient respect to the faithful. One specific indicator of relations built in this way is the question of failure to appoint parish councils for Poles at the PCM. The lack of the democratic models that would undoubtedly be provided by taking parishioners’ views into account is regarded as a Polish cultural model. Let us look at the narrative of a long-term activist in England:

As far as I remember, the involvement of lay people in the Church in Poland was always kept to a minimum. The parish priest was the parish priest, and he was in charge. (Janusz, Lay_England_14)

Marcin and Karina, activists at PCMs in Sweden, spoke of similar processes:

M: It’s different in Poland in the RCC. There’s the priest and his subjects, and here [in Sweden] the priest, if he doesn’t work together with his subjects he has nothing to… he can’t do very much. There’s just no way.

K: But in Poland too, there’s a lot, money talks. […] I sometimes even get annoyed when I’m in Poland and hear the priests talking about money, because that happens often. (Karina_Lay_Sweden_18; Marek_Lay_Sweden_19)

For many migrants, this model has only been recognised and reflected upon within their migration experience. In terms of reflexive distance and agency, they have gained in that process. Furthermore, the criticism towards the ‘authoritarian hierarch’ pattern triggers the strongest practices of resistance. The latter has a greater potential to fulfil abroad, where migrants gain relatively better socio-economic conditions to make choices. They might more often be turned into something more than the practice of gossip (as the most significant ‘weapon of the weak’ (Scott 1985) in rural parishes in Poland; see Pasieka 2016), for example in defecting to other Christian Churches or other types of informal strategies of distancing from authoritarian power.

‘Bargaining with egalitarianism’ in the ‘brother guardian’ (transnational) pattern

The ‘brother guardian’ pattern is the most interesting transformation of attitudes to priest power in the transnational space. This type was born out of criticism and ultimate rejection of the Polish ‘authoritarian hierarch’ and the Western ‘liberal other’. According to our interviewees, the transnational pattern of the ‘brother guardian’ is the third way, a kind of solution that offers reform of priests’ power. It is formed in the process of intercepting elements of egalitarianism, as the result of ‘bargaining’ with it.

This model reflects two fundamental contradictions in the faithful’s attitudes—on the one hand, the desire to preserve the patriarchy, and on the other, the need for democratic rules. As a result, the migrants assess the practices of the ‘brother guardian’ as the most democratic. As such, they are closer to the egalitarian model of power of the ‘liberal other’, albeit to a limited extent. By finding the gendered foundation of this ambivalence, we can better explain the sources of these contradictory expectations. Although the ‘brother guardian’ opens spaces for migrants’ subjective actions, he also supports the reproduction of the androcentric, separate status quo within the gender regime. According to our interviewees, he is responsible for introducing more inclusive, partnership-based models to relations, but with male migrants. He not only incorporates them in the social sphere of activity in the organisation, but also brings them more fully into the structures of religious power, thereby compensating for men’s feeling of exclusion in the post-migration space. Such inclusion also opens the space for hybrid variants of masculinity closer to egalitarianism. This means acceptance and practice of models of masculinity imbued with emotions as well as reflexive religiosity and community.

The ‘brother guardian’ model therefore brings together various contradictions. It reproduces the inclusive relationship from the egalitarian level, as shown by numerous terms used by the informants to describe priests—’brothers’, ‘partners’—while also sustaining the hierarchy, as indicated by such expressions as ‘guide’ and ‘guardian’. This is somebody described as full of energy and openness to believers, initiating and including, and yet remaining separate and androcentrically conservative regarding gender. As a result, both male and female migrants perceive the ‘brother guardian’ as a kind of watchman, defending the order of gender and sexuality, which he has already ‘reformed’ yet still remains consistently patriarchal, from the influence of the relatively more liberalised RCC in Western European countries. They also identify this type with priests constructing a new, ‘refreshed’, collective identity of Polish church structures, which do not yield to the influences of the excessively progressive ‘liberal other’. Let us examine some comments from Krystyna, a female activist in England:

[…] it is just my duty to inform him [the priest] about my every move, because he has to know what is happening, that’s how lay people’s work should look, right? We can’t just do as we please, because if that’s the case then sects creep in. (Krystyna_Lay_England_13)

It is no coincidence that the ‘brother guardian’ is mostly associated with Churches outside of the PCMs, to which Polish believers defect as an expression of protest (in Belgium), or with small PCMs in multinational English parishes in which men’s movements are active (e.g. the Men of Saint Joseph movement). This type is therefore situated in opposition to the Polish ‘authoritarian hierarch’ and ‘good patriarch’ (whose characteristics we will discuss at the end). Migration here is perceived as a turning point in young priests’ careers—a chance to break free from the authoritarian, centralised, closed Polish Catholic hierarchy. The ‘brother guardian’ model is associated with the dynamic generation of migrant Polish priests, who open the social and patriotic-national space to initiatives of the faithful and the religious space to men of various classes.

A possible interpretation is that the ‘brother guardian’ implements after migration a sacred version of the national masculine identity model of Poles. This model equates the act and process of migration—crossing state borders—with the nation-building rite of passage that constructs the core of Polish collective identity. In this process, the land worker or industrial labourer should transform himself into a soldier, and the intellectual into a lobbyist fighting for patriotic interest (Garapich 2016). Here, the consecrated man is given the role of guardian of Polish Catholicism in its renewed, partially ‘democratised’ guise. Men’s battle and violence change into new meanings—spiritual engagement and work, which they pursue individually and in a homophilic, partnership-based, but still patriarchal community.

‘Good patriarch’

The final type of power pattern recognised by activists is the ‘good patriarch’. Although viewed more favourably, this is another variant of the patriarchal reproduction of power, still situated in the ‘authoritarian-hierarchical’ spectrum. It is encountered especially in Belgium, as a result of the working-class nature of migration there.

The ‘good patriarch’ pattern of power is viewed more positively than the ‘authoritarian-hierarchical’ one, especially by working-class women and men. In the androcentric Church, it reproduces that power, compensating by incorporating men from the working class, albeit in a way that has nothing to do with ‘bargaining with egalitarianism’. This is a pattern of the priest as patron, a shepherd tending his flock of parishioners, resolving their life and work problems. Unlike the ‘authoritarian hierarch’, this type of priest includes, and even surrounds himself with working-class men. He supports migrant workers in socio-economic matters and helps them find their feet by sorting out jobs, organising investments, giving them jobs, as well as collecting funds for treatment after accidents and for social welfare. This type therefore strengthens their position after migration as heads of the family, fathers, husbands and workers.

Although the ‘good patriarch’ maintains rigid models of rules and gender relations, this is a working-class brand of conservatism. There is ‘conservative consent’ inherent in these practices, meaning that what counts more than strict religious rules in specific situations is belonging and acknowledgement of power, resulting in greater tolerance for one’s own. Such priests have usually surrounded themselves for years with the same circle of trusted confidants, mainly men or conservative men. As a rule, and as a patriarchal father, they do not share power, but centralise it. They tend to support and construct a circle of ‘their own’, as in the examples from England and Belgium:

[…] you can’t get in his way. He’s not nice then. When he’s in charge of people, he builds them up, helps them, everything… It’s one big farce and joke. But he’s there, because they need someone like him. That’s Poland, villages, the Church, people need someone like him. […] He’ll die, he prefers to sink everything, all his possessions, so that nobody can use it. He is jealous, under the influence, obstinate, from the sticks, so he won’t give away half a metre of land. (Władysław, Lay_Belgium_11)

This type of power relationship, associated with the culture of Polish rural parishes, is also described in terms of hierarchical relations overlapping with relations of closeness and familiarity (Gdula, Lewicki, and Sadura 2014). This type of power corresponds to the folk habitus in Poland, as it has connotations of resourcefulness, thrift, and pragmatism.

The pastoral/familial practices of the ‘good patriarch’—openness and support for a socially oriented space for public activities in the PCM, as well as a strategy of including men from lower social classes—reduce the potential for resistance and rebellion, and specifically defecting to other egalitarising Catholic parishes. The ‘good patriarch’ is forgiven for excessive exploitation of his power, with men from lower social classes displaying the greatest acceptance for this style. Interestingly, they support an androcentric model according to which the ‘good patriarch’ priest should reproduce a gendered division of labour and set suitable boundaries for women who transgress it.

We recognise the ‘authoritarian hierarch’ type as well as the folk version in the form of the ‘good patriarch’ as two variants of the same pattern of reproduction of hierarchical, centralised, patriarchal power, which form a spectrum of models of masculinity maintaining the hegemonic blueprint (Connell and Messerschmidt 2005). It is important to emphasise that these are not patterns that bargain with egalitarianism. This is therefore not a ‘transnational compensatory patriarchy’, as with the ‘brother guardian’.

Discussion and conclusions

Two main questions organised our research: what are the gendered expectations of both lay and consecrated PCM activists regarding masculine formal power patterns in the Polish RCC migrant organisations? How are these patterns transformed within a more egalitarian, pluralistic and secularised RCC organisational culture?

Our contribution to the discussion on gender, migration and religion is to show that the reorganisation and strengthening of patriarchy in the transnational contexts of migration are also achieved through the active use of egalitarian structural conditions. Previous studies showed that such changes primarily occur under the influence of macro determinants of the patriarchy (Jongwilaiwan and Thompson 2013) or a combination of these patriarchal structural conditions with the phenomenon of exclusion of male migrants in host countries (Chen 1999; George 2000; Jolly and Reeves 2005; Mensah, Williams, and Aryee 2013). However, our research proves that such reorganisation may also happen through the active use of egalitarian structural conditions. Therefore, we argue that the mechanisms of ‘hegemonic bargain (Chen 1999) or the ‘compensatory patriarchy’ (Mensah, Williams, and Aryee 2013) build not only on the patriarchal patterns. Such mechanisms can also be fulfilled by taking over elements of egalitarianism, constituting what we called ‘bargaining with egalitarianism’. Moreover, the transformation that we recognised entrenches patriarchal models, but it does so in an altered, hybrid form that we call ‘transnational compensatory patriarchy’. The significance of our conclusions is reinforced by the fact that our analyses are based on (still rare) comparative studies of three countries. We therefore went beyond the dominant model of studies of individual communities.

Furthermore, discovering the transformation of the Polish model of patriarchal power towards the inclusion of larger numbers of lay men brings a new perspective that men, not women, empower themselves in migrations. This is also an important contribution of our research, as the other studies discussed focus primarily on women’s empowerment after migration in relation to migrant men (e.g. Ryan and Vacchelli 2013). Our study proves that it is men who pragmatically and selectively adopt egalitarian models. Such models provide men with opportunities and tools to resist the previous forms of their exclusion from the RCC in Poland. However, this resistance does not affect the gendered structures of power, which still privilege and empower men in relation to women, who are separated from the sacred sphere. Finally, women concentrate on introducing greater egalitarianism, but only within their gendered specialisations and without contesting key divisions. These conclusions would not have been possible without the inclusion of masculinity perspectives at the intersection of religion and migration.

Our perspective also has limitations. Further exploration of the processes of doing gender in migration in the area of expectations towards formal religious power should be broadened with analysis of the experiences and expectations of activists abandoning migrant religious organisations. Further research should also include social remittances sent to countries of origin. By observing the process of patriarchy transformation that takes place in egalitarian contexts and the strategies of empowering conservative men, however, we contribute a theoretical explanation of the complexity and ambivalence of the processes of ‘doing gender’ in migration (see Szczepanikova 2012: 479, Woodhead 2013), pointing to the ambivalent ways of changing gender regimes.

Authors note

Sylwia Urbańska, Katarzyna Leszczyńska and Katarzyna Zielińska contributed equally to this article.

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to our colleagues from the Faculty of Sociology of the University of Warsaw, the Institute of Sociology of the Jagiellonian University, and the Faculty of Humanities of AGH University, for their comments on the research results, and to Ben Koschalka for copy editing and translating. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to: Sylwia Urbańska, ul. Karowa 18, Warsaw 00-324, Poland, the Faculty of Sociology, University of Warsaw,

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding

Grant from the Polish National Science Centre, “Gender as a Factor Distinguishing Religious Organisations. Social Practices of Gender and their Interpretations in Polish Catholic Mission Organisations in England, Sweden and Belgium”, no.2014/14/E/HS6/00327.

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Sylwia Urbańska

Sylwia Urbańska—is Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Sociology at the University of Warsaw. Her speciality is sociology of the family and gender studies; she studies social changes in the context of migrations and rural communities. She recently published: Poza granicami. Płeć społeczno-kulturowa w katolickich organizacjach migracyjnych. [Beyond Borders. Gender in Catholic Migration Organisations], co-authored with Leszczyńska, K. and Zielińska, K., NOMOS Publishing House, 2020; Matka Polka na odległość. Z doświadczeń migracyjnych robotnic 1989–2010 [The Polish Mother from a Distance: Experiences of Migratory Workers 1989–2010] “Monografie FNP” series, 2015. Her articles have appeared in, among other journals, Central and Eastern Migration Review, Qualitative Sociology Review, Ethnologia Polona, and LUD, and in the collections Pożegnanie z Matką Polką [Farewell to the Polish Mother] (2012) and Niebezpieczne związki. Macierzyństwo, ojcostwo i polityka [Dangerous Liaisons: Motherhood, Fatherhood, and Politics] (2015), edited by R. Hryciuk and E. Korolczuk. She is a member of the board of the Polish Gender Association.

Katarzyna Leszczyńska

Katarzyna Leszczyńska—is Associate Professor at the AGH University of Science and Technology in Krakow, working in the Faculty of Humanities. Her research focuses on the relationship of gender, religion, organisations and social institutions. She was a PI supported by the National Science Centre in Poland. Author and co-author of books including Płeć w instytucje uwikłana (2016), Poza granicami. Poza granicami. Płeć społeczno-kulturowa w katolickich organizacjach migracyjnych (with Sylwia Urbańska and Katarzyna Zielińska, 2020). Author and co-author of articles, incl. Journal of Contemporary Religion, Polish Sociological Review, and Central and East European Migration Review. She works on the board of the Gender Sociology Section of the Polish Sociological Society.

Katarzyna Zielińska

Katarzyna Zielińska—is Associate Professor at the Institute of Sociology of the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. Her academic interests focus on the intersections between religion, gender and politics in Europe. She has published numerous articles in Polish and international academic journals (e.g. East European Politics and Societies, Religion, State and Society) and authored two monographs on theories of secularisation (Nomos Publishing House, 2009) and on the role of religion in the Polish parliamentary discourse (Jagiellonian University Press, 2018). She has also co-edited several books (e.g. Collective Identity and Democracy in the Enlarging Europe, Peter Lang, 2012 and Democracy, State and Society: European Integration in Central and Eastern Europe, Jagiellonian University Press, 2011).