And unfortunately, this brand of patriarchal authoritarianism is visible across the globe today. In China, Xi Jinping and The Chinese Communist Party position feminism and the ‘feminisation of men’ as threats to the country’s stability while women are excluded from the highest levels of political power and instead encouraged to ‘stay home and have babies.’ In Russia, a similar ‘re-masculinisation’ campaign has been accompanied by the rollback of women’s reproductive rights, decriminalisation of forms of domestic abuse, and the glorification of ‘traditional’ values that limit women’s participation in public life. Turkey has likewise seen a decline in women’s rights, which culminated in the country’s withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention in 2021. Meanwhile, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan often argues, in language echoing his autocratic counterparts, that ‘women aren’t equal to men’ and belong at home.
