Ayoub, Phillip M;
Rainer, Elise;
(2025)
Promoting LGBTI rights in foreign policy: strategies for action while avoiding backlash.
Politics, Groups and Identities
10.1080/21565503.2025.2543302.
(In press).
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Abstract
Contestation surrounding LGBTI rights in foreign policy remains widespread. Despite these challenges, an increasing number of governments, including major donor states, have integrated LGBTI rights into their foreign policy and development aid agendas. What are the outcomes of these diplomatic efforts, and how can LGBTI rights be advanced effectively? This article addresses this critical question for human rights scholars by drawing on primary source data and interviews with key foreign policy personnel from donor governments engaged in LGBTI diplomacy. We explore how governments can engage sensitively and effectively on LGBTI rights while minimizing the risk of backlash, theorizing when greater visibility is advantageous and when closed-door diplomacy is more appropriate. Engaging with scholarship on human rights promotion, critical queer theory, and insights from practitioners on the ground, we offer a nuanced framework for understanding the conditions under which foreign governments can successfully advocate for LGBTI rights. By bridging the optimism of human rights norm promotion with the caution of critical theorists, we carve out a middle ground where foreign policy action can be both impactful and contextually appropriate.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Promoting LGBTI rights in foreign policy: strategies for action while avoiding backlash |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1080/21565503.2025.2543302 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1080/21565503.2025.2543302 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | © 2025 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way. The terms on which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent. |
| Keywords: | LGBTI rights; diplomacy; norm diffusion; social movement actors; human rights; foreign policy analysis |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS > Dept of Political Science |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10212921 |
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