Midis de STRIGES, "Exploring EU legitimization narratives using LGBTIQ+ rights : a rainbow road or a roadblock?", par Emilia Salminen (CEVIPOL & IEE)

Exploring EU legitimization narratives using LGBTIQ+ rights: a rainbow road or a roadblock?

Emilia Salminen

CEVIPOL, ULB

Résumé: 

This thesis examines how LGBTIQ+ issues are constructed, circulated, and contested within competing EU legitimization narratives under the Union of Equality (UoE) initiative across the first and second von der Leyen Commissions (2019-2024 and 2024-2029). It treats LGBTIQ+ issues as a contested narrative object, not only a policy area, and asks what the struggles around them reveal about the EU’s evolving claims to legitimacy. Since the mid-2010s, LGBTIQ+ rights have been tied to the EU’s core values under Article 2 TEU, earning the Union the label "Rainbow Europe". Such Self-depiction was reinforced by the April 2026 CJEU judgment Case (Commission v. Hungary) against Hungary. Yet, LGBTIQ+ issues are equally increasingly a site of conflict and contestation. The thesis applies a narrative framework that distinguishes two models of EU legitimization: a pragmatic sui generis model, and an ideational model. This thesis will traces how the narratives travel and change across three dimensions of the EU (as policy, community, and external boundaries). The aim of the thesis is to analyse how LGBTIQ+ issues function as a strategic resource through which the EU defines itself, is challenged internally, and distinguishes itself externally, and to identify the limits and possibilities of embedding them as part in the EU's narrative legitimization.

Date : Jeudi 26 novembre 2026 (12h15–14h)
Lieu : Salle H3.241 (bâtiment H) et en ligne sur Teams
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