The female resistance

Antagonism is mounting between today’s right-wing populists and a somewhat unexpected but formidable opponent: Women. In the US, much like in Poland, women’s rights have been among the first targets of attack by populist leaders. Women are not taking it lying down.

Traditional conservatism in the West has largely come to terms with the need to grant women broad reproductive freedom. Today’s right-wing populist administrations, by contrast, are downright pre-modern in this regard, attempting to reverse reforms championed by the left and long accepted by the conventional right.

It is no secret that the mainstream consensus is a source of contempt — and success — for the modern populist, and not just on women’s rights. Donald Trump’s first acts as US president show an eagerness to reject longstanding norms in many other areas as well, including foreign affairs and economic policy. But it is the attack on women’s rights that is receiving the most powerful pushback.

Poland’s de facto leader Jarosław Kaczynski has retreated politically only once since his party’s return to power in 2015. Last October, when thousands of women of all ages took to the streets in the “black protest,” his government was forced to withdraw its plan to introduce a total ban on abortion (under the current law, abortion is allowed in the event of rape, severe fetal defects or a threat to the mother’s health).

Similarly, of all the sources of opposition to Trump, only women have been able to organize quickly and efficiently. Last month’s Women’s March on Washington boasted a turnout some three times larger than Trump’s own inauguration the previous day.

As women have stood in the path of the populists, mainstream political leaders and parties have practically cowered; unsurprisingly, they continue to lose ground. But women have not been entirely alone. NGOs and other kinds of social movements have also stepped up. Even the media have helped the cause; though they are not accustomed to such a blatantly political role, circumstances — such as Trump’s “war” on them — have forced their hand.

The composition of the resistance actually makes considerable sense. Right-wing populism is at its core an attack on liberalism, not necessarily on democracy. Separation of powers, a free press, an independent judiciary and free trade are liberal ideals; they are not democratic.

Women have stood above the rest in the opposition, because they are in many ways the antithesis of right-wing populism, support for which comes primarily from poorly educated white men, the demographic cohort with the least comprehension of feminism. The question now is whether women can win the battle against the populists. While the answer is not yet clear, they do have a few powerful weapons in their arsenal.

For starters, women are more numerous than any other single social group, including blacks, Latinos, the left, the right, liberals, conservatives, Catholics and Protestants. There are more women than there are white men in the US, or in Poland for that matter.

Most important, women far outnumber populists (women must fight for their rights as if they were a minority, though they are a majority, and as if they lacked human capital, though in the West they tend to be better educated than men).

Moreover, women are everywhere, and discrimination, to varying degrees, is part of all women’s experiences. This makes them something of a revolutionary class in the Marxist sense. It also makes it relatively easy for women to build solidarity.

During Poland’s black protest, thousands more people protested in solidarity, from Berlin (where several thousand took to the streets) to Kenya (where about 100 people demonstrated). During the Women’s March on Washington, up to 2 million people marched in solidarity worldwide. Clearly women are a global force, so who better to resist the likes of Trump, Kaczynski and other right-wing populists as they launch an assault on globalism?

Perhaps the most important weapon in women’s arsenal is that they are unashamed. While the 20th century was characterized by discipline through fear, the 21st century has been characterized by repression through shame. Unlike fear, shame can be hidden — that is the point.

Whereas one can feel fear without losing one’s dignity, shame arises from feelings of inferiority. That is what women are rejecting in their anti-populist protests.

Mainstream political parties still experience shame, as do other traditional organizations such as trade unions. They have scruples, and are concerned about how they are perceived. That makes them poorly equipped to stand up to the most shameless group of all: The populists.

The populists have benefited massively from their lack of shame, saying and doing whatever wins them the support of their political base. But women are not having it. They are throwing off the shackles of the shame that has long been used to repress them, and fighting fire with fire. Can the populists take the heat?

• Sławomir Sierakowski, founder of the Krytyka Polityczna movement, is director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Warsaw.

 ©Project Syndicate