This book explores the contradictory development of gender roles in Central and Eastern Europe including Russia. In light of the social changes that followed the collapse of communism and the rise of new conservatism in Eastern Europe, it studies new forms of gender relationships and reassesses the status quo of female empowerment. Moreover, leading scholars in gender studies discuss how right-wing populism and conservative movements have affected sociopolitical discourses and concepts related to gender roles, rights, and attitudes, and how Western feminism in the 1990s may have contributed to this conservative turn. Mainly focusing on power constellations and gender, the book is divided into four parts: the first explores the history of and recent trends in feminist movements in Eastern Europe, while the second highlights the dynamics and conflicts that gained momentum after neoconservative parties gained political power in post-socialist countries. In turn, the third part discusses new empowerment strategies and changes in gender relationships. The final part illustrates the identities, roles, and concepts of masculinity created in the sociocultural and political context of Eastern Europe.

Autorentext

Katharina Bluhm is a Professor of Sociology with a focus on Eastern Europe and Russia at the Free University of Berlin, Germany. She has published widely on the transition from communism to market economy from a comparative perspective. She regularly teaches courses on gender, nation and state; the welfare state and gender; and economic sociology and institutional theory. Her recent books include New Conservatives in Russia and East Central Europe (coedited with Mihai Varga, Routledge, 2019).

Gertrud Pickhahn is a Professor of East-Central European History at the Free University of Berlin, Germany. Her research focuses on the historic cultural landscape of east-central Europe, which was largely shaped by its multi-ethnic and intercultural circumstances. She has studied plurality and diversity, as well as the contacts and conflicts they entail, in various projects. She has published widely on the General Jewish Labour Bund, for example her book Gegen den Strom. *Der Allgemeine Jüdische Arbeiterbund (Bund) in Polen 19181939* (München/Stuttgart, 2001); and on processes of transformation in Eastern European history. Her research chiefly focuses on masculinity and nation-building.

Justyna Stypiska is a postdoctoral researcher at the Free University of Berlin, Institute of East European Studies, Department of Sociology, Germany. She received her PhD from the Jagiellonian University in Krakow for a dissertation on age discrimination in the labour market. Currently she is leading an international project MOMENT- Making of Mature Entrepreneurship in Germany and Poland. Her research interest focus on age and gender inequalities in the labour market, age discrimination, life course theory, as well as the relation between ageing, social innovation and social sustainability.

Agnieszka Wierzcholska is a postdoctoral researcher and teacher in history at the Institute for East European Studies at the Freie Universität in Berlin. She has received her PhD from the Freie Universität in 2019 for the dissertation "Relations Between Jews and non-Jews in Poland, 19181956: A Micro-Historical Study on Tarnów". Her research interests are primarily Jewish history in Eastern Europe, Holocaust, as well as nation-building in the region. Additionally, Wierzcholska is interested in gender history and feminist movements in Poland.