Hostile terrain: researching gender and abuse in the military amid backlash and backsliding

Please join the CMS working group and Megan MacKenzie (Simon Fraser University, Canada) for a virtual roundtable to reflect on the challenges of researching gender, abuse, and culture in the military in the present moment. As anti-gender and anti-‘woke’ movements gain traction across the world, ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’ (DEI) measures have increasingly become the target of sustained backlash. Throughout 2025, we have watched as numerous organisations and government departments – including the Department of Defense – across the USA began rolling back their DEI policies and programmes, some with the explicit desire of bringing “masculine energy” back into the workplace. While it may not be as visible, this phenomenon is not unique to the US-context: anti-liberal politics are increasingly being mobilised in confusing and varied ways across different countries to reconfigure laws and policies. In this roundtable, we bring together scholars to discuss what this backlash and backsliding might mean for those of us who are researching already conservative, heteronormative, and patriarchal organisations such as state-militaries. The roundtable will provide space for reflection and discussion on how the work of feminist and critical military scholars in this space is being challenged, and to think about how we can find strategies to move forward.

Speakers

• Megan MacKenzie, Simon Fraser University
• Hannah Richards, University of Bristol
• Beth Greener, Massey University

Registration will close two hours before the event begins.