Gender justice movements are increasingly having to contend with repressive and authoritarian terrains. This repression extended and deepened following the Covid-19 pandemic, which was used as an excuse by many states to roll back democratic freedoms. This literature review maps changes in civic space across different contexts around the globe over the last ten years. The review was conducted as part of the six-year Countering Backlash research programme.
Drawing on relevant literature, the paper examines shifts in civic space and engages with anti-gender backlash and its intersections with democratic backsliding. Literature shows that civic space is not shrinking uniformly across contexts, but is being actively reconfigured in gendered ways, with impacts that are also deeply gendered. The review concludes by identifying gaps for further research, advocacy, and collaboration. These include a deeper focus on efforts to counter the gender backlash; better resourcing of organisations devoted to this effort; and research to refine understandings of country and regional trends in civic space, the links between gender backlash and democratic backsliding, and the impact of non-state backlash actors.