The Far Right Is Betting That Feminism Is Unpopular. Here's Why They're Wrong.

Feminist power can counter authoritarian threats and protect democracy. But its mass mobilizing potential is being held back by a lack of funding, digital organizing infrastructure, and cross-border coordination. Vesna Jusup and Shaunna Thomas, ECDA Director of Outreach and Senior Adviser, respectively, explain why overcoming these barriers can change the face of European politics, but tough battles lie ahead and the next two years are critical.

Across Europe, far-right movements aren't just using misogyny casually. They're weaponizing it as an explicit political strategy.

Here's what that looks like in practice: they spread disinformation about feminist organizations, frame gender equality initiatives as existential threats to national identity, and harass women candidates and feminist leaders with coordinated online attacks. All this while explicitly seeking to weaken trust in democratic processes and institutions by targeting those defending or depending on them. And this isn't happening in isolation. This is a transnational, coordinated campaign.

The far right is playing a double game. On the one hand, they genuinely need to roll back women's autonomy to consolidate authoritarian power. Controlling reproduction, undermining economic independence, and normalizing gender hierarchy are essential to their project. But they're also betting that feminist positions are unpopular enough that they can use them to paint all progressives as extreme and out of touch. They want to make "feminist" toxic, so they can tie it around the neck of every progressive candidate and party.

But this strategy reveals an opportunity, not a weakness.

First, women aren't a fringe group – they're 50-52% of the electorate. The far right is attacking the majority and betting they can make the majority feel like outsiders. Second, the issues women care most about – safety, healthcare, affordability, bodily autonomy – aren't fringe positions. They're majority positions. The far right has to spend enormous resources on disinformation precisely because these positions are popular when communicated effectively. Third, we have proof of concept. Look at Poland, where massive women-led mobilizations have repeatedly blocked authoritarian advances. When feminist organizations have resources and infrastructure, they win.

So yes, authoritarians are attacking feminists. But they're also revealing that feminist organizing (when properly resourced!) represents a genuine threat to their project. Our job is to turn what they hope is a political liability into an actual source of democratic strength.

Women are not disengaged. They are unconvinced.

Across Europe, women – particularly younger women and those navigating economic or social precarity –  are often accused of being disengaged from politics. But they are not. They are unconvinced. They are watching politics unfold like a movie in a foreign language, rarely speaking to their daily realities, even as those realities are increasingly shaped by decisions made in parliaments drifting rightward.

This is the real problem. And it's a solvable one, but only if we're honest about its complexity. Women are not a monolith. Some have previously supported progressive leadership but now feel uncertain. Some lean conservative on certain issues while remaining open on others. Some outside major urban centers rarely see themselves reflected in political messaging at all. These are not fringe audiences. They are the weight that can balance the scales.

But they are best mobilized through relational networks: conversations between peers, content shared within trusted communities, narratives that feel authentic rather than imposed. Feminist organizing has a distinct advantage here – it understands that people are more likely to change their minds when they feel seen, not targeted.

The organizational context makes this mobilization an uphill struggle. Feminist organizations across Europe are systematically underfunded. This limits their reach and their ability to sustain activities over time. They lack adequate digital and data infrastructure, which means they can't organize or fundraise at the scale needed. They're structurally fragmented with almost no cross-border coordination even though they're facing a far-right movement that coordinates transnationally.

The result? These organizations can't effectively mobilize women voters or counter well-resourced far-right networks.

This is exactly why the far right's strategy of making feminism seem fringe has had some success. Not because feminist positions are actually unpopular. Feminist organizations just haven't had the infrastructure to communicate effectively at scale.

We have a uniquely powerful pro-democracy base that remains under-organized, under-mobilized, and insufficiently connected across borders.

Building feminist power is urgent

To build lasting feminist power across Europe, we need to move on three fronts simultaneously. The first is investing in the digital infrastructure feminist organizations are currently denied: the CRM systems, data tools, and fundraising pipelines that well-resourced movements take for granted. The second is developing coordinated narratives grounded in what actually moves women voters, because the cost of living, healthcare, safety, and democratic erosion aren't separate from feminist politics; they are feminist politics. The third is building the influencer ecosystems and relational networks that make those narratives travel through trusted messengers, in formats native to people's lives, not imported from campaign headquarters.

When a young woman connects rising food prices to her ability to plan a future, or housing costs to her ability to leave a violent relationship, and voices it publicly, that's not an anecdote. That's a political intervention. Content is infrastructure. And right now, we need to build it.

The opportunity and the warning

The far right has made a strategic bet: they believe they can use feminism as a wedge to divide progressive coalitions and alienate moderate voters from its ideas.

But that bet only works if feminist organizations remain under-resourced, unable to communicate at scale, and disconnected from each other.

There is a tendency in moments like this to reach for easy optimism: to assume the correct arguments will prevail, that demographics will deliver. But demographics aren't destiny. The forces reshaping European politics are organized, strategic, and persistent. They understand power: how to build it, how to wield it, and how to normalize it.

Look at what's already happened. In the United States, the sudden rollback of reproductive rights transformed abstract debates into immediate, personal crises. In Hungary, democratic erosion reshaped institutions in ways that directly affect women's access to services, safety, and autonomy. In both cases, women are fighting back and they are starting to win. These are not distant cautionary tales, they are previews.

Women represent over half of the electorate. The issues they care about – safety, healthcare, economic security, freedom – are majority positions. And when feminist organizations have infrastructure and resources, they win.

Investing in feminist infrastructure, narrative power, and leadership development turns what authoritarians hope is a political liability into a source of democratic strength. Not because women are a special interest, but because they are the largest, most reliable pro-democracy constituency we have.

The good news is that the tactics and tools already exist. Feminist movements have spent decades developing them: coalition-building across differences, narrative strategies that cut through noise, and organizing models that turn individuals into communities and communities into power. The challenge is not to re-invent feminist organizing, but to supercharge them ahead of elections.

The work is difficult. The timeline is short. The opposition is real.

The elections taking place over the next two years are critical for democracy in Europe. The far right is coordinating across borders. Feminists must too.