The School of International Studies Environment Research Cluster is excited to host an international workshop within the European project RETOOL – Strengthening democratic governance for climate transitions. The workshop contributes to research on climate movements, democracy and change within the RETOOL project, and will explore the interactions between climate movements, democratic transformations, the politics of knowledge, and processes of political and social change. The aim of the workshop is to build our understandings of how contestation, politicisation and collective emotions have influenced, and continue to influence, climate and environmental policies and politics in Europe, and how these experiences can inform a climate democracy that allows us to forge responses to climate change and environmental degradation with stronger democratic processes and public participation in decision-making.
A central question guides the workshop: what lessons can be drawn from social movements and activism, past and present, to reinforce democracy in climate governance? The workshop aims to promote dialogue between historical, sociological, socio-legal and political science approaches, with a broad interdisciplinary orientation.
Submission guidelines:
We welcome both empirically grounded research and theoretical or conceptual contributions that connect historical analysis, political science and sociological debates over climate/environmental movements and politics.
Abstracts must be written in English, with a maximum length of 400 words, and should be accompanied by a short biographical note (max 150 words).
Proposals should be sent by 9th January 2026 to alice.dalgobbo@unitn.it with the subject line ‘International workshop abstract’. Notification of acceptance will be sent by 31 January 2026.
The workshop will be held in English.
The workshop will take place at the University of Trento, School of International Studies (via Tommaso Gar 14, Trento), on 11–12 June 2026. There are no fees for workshop participation. The organisers will contribute to cover accommodation and meal costs. Participants are expected to cover their own travel costs.
A selection of papers may be considered for publication in a collective volume edited within the RETOOL project.
Coordinators:
elena pavan, University of Trento, Italy
Daniel Platek, Institute of Political Studies, Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland
This session of the 17th European Sociological Association Conference explores how social movements, political coalitions, and broader collective struggles can revitalize democratic values and practices, which are systematically dismantled in a global context marked by polycrisis, genocides, wars, and the resurgence of right-wing forces and ideologies within and beyond institutions. It seeks to promote a space for critical academic debate in the field of social movement and collective action starting from rigorous theoretical and empirical contributions that look at collective endeavours struggling for genuine social justice by tackling, amongst others, the following aspects:
• collective action dynamics in and across contentious fields – e.g., gender and sexuality, work and labour, environmental sustainability and justice, migration and racial justice, indigenous rights, education, etc.
• spatial and temporal dynamics of collective action and the revamping of global mobilization endeavours;
• symbolic, cognitive, discursive, and organizational processes in social movements;
• activists’ biographies and life-course trajectories;
• hybrid and digital forms of activism;
• the interplay between movements and their political/discursive/legal context;
• the development of cross-movement alliances and solidarities;
• the links between contentious and electoral politics;
• populist and radical right movements;
• political repression in authoritarian and non-authoritarian states;
• the outcomes of collective action.
Comparative works that connect theory and empirical analysis, as well as innovative conceptual and methodological approaches are particularly encouraged. Similarly, this session warmly welcomes submissions coming from different disciplinary fields and focusing on different areas of the world.
Researchers wishing to participate are invited to submit their abstracts by 30 January 2026. All abstracts must be submitted via the official conference platform: https://www.conftool.com/esa2026/
Coordinators:
Tanja Vuckovic Juros, University of Zagreb, Croatia,
elena pavan, University of Trento, Italy
Over the past two decades, a long-lasting wave of anti-gender mobilization –and more broadly, opposition to gender and sexual rights– has unfolded and progressively consolidated across the globe, driven by the construction and continuous redefinition of coalitions that bring together a wide variety of actors of different natures and ideological orientations. In turn, these encompassing coalitional efforts have taken root and continue to do so primarily through the persistent resignification of the concept of gender.
Indeed, the different meanings tactically imbued into gender served since the beginning as symbolic glue (Pető 2015) to cement “opportunistic synergies” (Graff and Korolczuk 2022) between religious-conservative and far-right actors in a obstinate defense of the traditional family, 'proper' gender roles and national identity. More recently, the “anti-gender crusade” (Garbagnoli and Prearo 2018) has reinvigorated through a relentless opposition to trans rights, unleashed in concert by traditional anti-gender actors and by TERFs or gender-critical feminists. Albeit quite prominent, this is just one among several other unexpected convergences that are currently fostered by he the “gender-phantasm” (Butler 2024). Others include, for example, alliances between specific groups of gay and lesbian activists joining arguments and efforts with the anti-gender and far-right activists particularly, but not exclusively, in anti-trans mobilizations.
This joint session by RN23 Sexuality and RN25 Social Movements focuses on this diverse spectrum of anti-gender alliances, and especially on the unexpected convergences among actors with a history of direct antagonism and conflicting interests, who would not seem to be easy bedfellows.
We invite submissions that address, amongst other relevant aspects:
• Actors, targets, organization and tactics of anti-gender alliances and collaborations;
• Successes and failures in strategies and tactics in joint and parallel mobilizations;
• Epistemics, argumentation and shared and/or dissonant assumptions and claims;
• Strengths and weaknesses, internal and/or across anti-gender alliances.
Researchers wishing to participate are invited to submit their abstracts by 30 January 2026. All abstracts must be submitted via the official conference platform: https://www.conftool.com/esa2026/
Coordinators:
Michele Grigolo, Nottingham Trent University, UK
Louisa Parks, University of Trento, Italy
Democracy is in crisis. A succession of global challenges — war, economic instability, environmental degradation, rising authoritarianism, and social fragmentation — has exposed the fragility of democratic institutions and practices. These pressures have intensified debates around redistribution and recognition, while fuelling populist movements and widespread disinformation.
Political sociology offers crucial tools to understand and respond to these dynamics. We invite proposals that explore how democracy and its institutions are being contested, reshaped, and potentially renewed across different contexts and scales. What forms of political participation and resistance are emerging? How do struggles for justice—social, environmental, and data-related—intersect with democratic renewal and decline? What role do science, knowledge, and information play in shaping public discourses of democracy, especially in the context of culture wars and misinformation?
We welcome contributions that address these questions and related themes by examining the multiple threats to democracy, reactions to these, and the interventions that seek to rejuvenate democratic life and solidarity. We also encourage contributions that address the political dimensions of environmental and social justice, gender justice, human rights, and the rise of populism as both a symptom and a challenge to democratic futures.
This stream seeks to place democracy—both as a system of governance and as a lived, contested, and evolving social project—at the centre of sociological inquiry. Join us in rethinking how political sociology can contribute to strengthening democracies through critical analysis, engaged scholarship, and collaborative action.
Researchers wishing to participate are invited to submit their abstracts by 30 January 2026. All abstracts must be submitted via the official conference platform: https://www.conftool.com/esa2026/
https://eventi.unitn.it/en/women-and-feminist-movements-palestine
https://eventi.unitn.it/it/investigating-gender-participation-gap-among-students-germany
https://eventi.unitn.it/it/la-prospettiva-civica-litalia-vista-da-chi-si-mette-insieme-cambiarla
https://eventi.unitn.it/en/novel-foods-technological-pathway-food-system-transformation
https://eventi.unitn.it/en/alternative-what-rethinking-afns-global-north-and-south
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/117489/protesting-jordan-stanford-up
https://socioecologico.com/2023/02/15/socio-ecological-transitions-seminar-sets-a-y-2022-2023-2/
https://socioecologico.com/2022/08/02/socio-ecological-transitions-seminar-sets-a-y-2022-2023/
Jointly organized by ESA Research Network 25 on Social Movements, ECPR Standing Group on Participation and Mobilization, Department of Sociology and Social Research, University of Trento, CoACT - Research Group on Collective Action, Change and Transition, University of Trento
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/en/evento/sociologia/107525/critical-margins-politicizing-the-crisis
https://socioecologico.wordpress.com/2022/02/04/socio-ecological-transition-seminars/
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/103297/union-movement-towards-movements
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/102065/easy-data-same-old-platforms
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/90225/food-practices-in-movement
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/90225/food-practices-in-movement
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/90225/food-practices-in-movement
This book is published under a Creative Common License [Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)] and can be freely downloaded at this link
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/75188/reflexive-consumption
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/74320/vibrationshintergrund
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/66269/street-citizens
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/63554/contentious-episode-analysis
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/58701/organizing-alternative-economy-movements
https://webmagazine.unitn.it/evento/sociologia/57821/potere-digitale