Coming Out of Communism

How homophobic backlash unexpectedly strengthened mobilization for LGBT political rights in post-communist Europe While LGBT activism has increased worldwide, there has been strong backlash against LGBT people in Eastern Europe. Although Russia is the most prominent anti-gay regime in the region, LGBT individuals in other post-communist countries also suffer from discriminatory laws and prejudiced social institutions. Combining an historical overview with interviews and case studies in Poland, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic, Conor O’Dwyer analyzes the development and impact of LGBT movements in post-communist Eastern and Central Europe. O’Dwyer argues that backlash against LGBT individuals has had the paradoxical effect of encouraging stronger and more organized activism, significantly impacting the social movement landscape in the region. As these peripheral Eastern and Central European countries vie for inclusion or at least recognition in the increasingly LGBT-friendly European Union, activist groups and organizations have become even more emboldened to push for change. Using fieldwork in five countries and interviews with activists, organizers, and public officials, O’Dwyer explores the intricacies of these LGBT social movements and their structures, functions, and impact. The book provides a unique and engaging exploration of LGBT rights groups in Eastern and Central Europe and their ability to serve as models for future movements attempting to resist backlash. Thorough, theoretically grounded, and empirically sound, Coming Out of Communism is sure to be a significant work in the study of LGBT politics, European politics, and social movements.

Readers will learn a great deal about activist groups in those countries, and will understand the role “Europeanization” had on the LGBT movement after the fall of communism … This book will best serve graduate students, faculty, and practitioners in politics., This book is an ambitious, mixed-method examination of LGBT activism in postcommunist East-Central Europe that makes the counterintuitive argument that backlash to international pressures can be constructive to a social movement’s development... Coming Out of Communism is a tour de force in comparative analysis, interrogating civil society—which is notoriously difficult to study—and covering issues often ignored by the field., In this masterful and timely study, ODwyer shows us how backlash can paradoxically benefit the domestic organizing capacity of LGBT rights advocates. This is a novel and compelling argument, substantiated by meticulously documented contention around those rights in post-communist Central and Eastern Europe. In crafting this argument, ODwyer demonstrates the great potential that the often-ignored study of LGBT politics offers for understanding a host of theoretical debates pertinent to political scientists. As unfettered populism and nationalism shake the core of liberal democracies, this book is needed more than ever, because it provides a sliver of hope in times of great peril for the most vulnerable among us., Why has LGBT rights activism flourished in some post-communist states and floundered in others following accession to the European Union? How come joining the EU was, in some places, accompanied by increasingly intolerant public attitudes toward sexual minorities, rather than acceptance? In Coming Out of Communism, Conor ODwyer solves these puzzles, highlighting the role of homophobic backlash in provoking stronger organizing for LGBT rights in the region.Anyone interested in LGBT issues, social movements, or the impact of transnational institutions on domestic politics, will undoubtedly enjoy learning from ODwyers keen analysis and intriguing field research in Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania., Compelling and illuminating, especially where O’Dwyer’s local informants, observation, and research blends with synthesis from area-specific scholarship.

Conor O’Dwyer is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Florida. He is the authorof Runaway State-Building: Patronage Politics and Democratic Development.