Authoritarian populist movements leverage gender through six interconnected political and cultural strategies:

1. Construct a threat

Authoritarian populists depict so-called gender ideology, feminists, and LGBTQ people as threats to national identity, security, women and children, and traditional values. This fuels fear, entrenches us-versus-them thinking, and justifies authoritarian actions—from surveillance to political violence—under the pretense of protection.

2. Normalize authoritarian ideas

Authoritarian populists use gender to reshape the public’s understanding of what democracy entails. For instance, social hierarchy and dominance are first explored as they relate to gender relations, gender identity, women, and LGBTQ rights—arenas in which hierarchies may appear less contested or have already been normalized. This lays the groundwork for more broadly challenging core ideals of liberal democracy, including equality, pluralism, and human rights, and framing them as unnatural, undesirable, or unrealistic.

3. Change culture

To shape the intellectual and cultural terrain in which politics occurs and make authoritarian ideas more palatable, authoritarian populists rely on cultural strategies that leverage gender and gendered anxieties. This occurs through two main pathways: (1) By establishing intellectual and educational institutions that help legitimize these ideas and (2) By introducing these ideas in environments that are not primarily political or partisan or do not self-present as such, including lifestyle content or fitness subcultures. 

4. Build a big tent movement

Political and cultural leaders instigate gender-related anxieties that serve as the symbolic glue for a coalition bringing together groups that hold different beliefs related to gender (e.g., pronatalism, anti-trans rights, misogyny, opposition to so-called gender ideology). These groups have different entry points into the coalition, and may even have contradictory political values, but are united against a common, constructed enemy, and mobilized against abstract and loose ideas. This coalition broadens the pillars of support for authoritarian populists by providing access to new constituencies, as well as to organizations and institutions that can supply funding and other resources.

5. Divide and polarize

Authoritarian populists frame gender as inherently divisive in order to intensify us-versus-them thinking. This strategy operates at two levels: it polarizes society and fractures pro-democracy coalitions. By shaping the debate along divisive terms, these leaders obscure areas of general public agreement and common ground, deepening social and political polarization and intensifying emotional and political tensions. Simultaneously, they weaponize gender to fracture pro-democracy coalitions and weaken opposition to authoritarian practices. 

6. Distract

Authoritarian populists leverage gender-related narratives, controversies, and policies—like sex education, women’s and trans rights, and purported threats to children’s safety—to stir outrage and divert attention from anti-democratic power grabs, corruption, and/or unpopular agendas.