Navigating gendered repression: feminist resistance to anti-gender politics in Turkey

This article examines how anti-gender politics shape feminist organizing in Turkey, highlighting both constraints and strategies of resistance. Drawing on 21 interviews with feminist activists in Istanbul and Ankara, and informed by social movement theory, it shows how state-driven policies curtail visibility, institutional access, and political influence, while simultaneously prompting new practices of resistance. Localized activism and intersectional alliances, and adaptive repertoires of contention sustain mobilization under authoritarian pressures. The findings argue that reactive and proactive forms of resistance operate as intertwined dimensions of feminist agency, offering new insights into how movements contest anti-gender backlash in constrained political environments.