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Published in Reviews and Critical Commentary: http://councilforeuropeanstudies.org/critcom/post-marriage-lgbt-politics-in-spain/ ; Council of European Studies

Although the rest of the American politics subfield has taken up many of the research challenges that LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) politics poses, there has been very little attention to LGBT politics within APD (American political development). Yet LGBT politics has deeply developmental and "state-centered" dynamics. Until the middle of the twentieth century, sexual orientation was simply not widely and deeply politicized in the United States. But abruptly, in a period of a decade and a half (roughly 1940–1955), national political and bureaucratic actors created a national sexuality regime that has taken 60 years of LGBT struggle to partly reverse. In seeking to substitute a different, overtly inclusive sexuality regime, LGBT citizens and their straight allies have initiated far-reaching changes in public policy, regulation of the workplace, and the institution of marriage. American politics has thus been developed by LGBT politics—and in the process, a fruitful research agenda has emerged.

Although the rest of the American politics subfield has taken up many of the research challenges that LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) politics poses, there has been very little attention to LGBT politics within APD (American political development). Yet LGBT politics has deeply developmental and "state-centered" dynamics. Until the middle of the twentieth century, sexual orientation was simply not widely and deeply politicized in the United States. But abruptly, in a period of a decade and a half (roughly 1940-1955), national political and bureaucratic actors created a national sexuality regime that has taken 60 years of LGBT struggle to partly reverse. In seeking to substitute a different, overtly inclusive sexuality regime, LGBT citizens and their straight allies have initiated far-reaching changes in public policy, regulation of the workplace, and the institution of marriage. American politics has thus been developed by LGBT politics-and in the process, a fruitful research agenda has emerged. Adapted from the source document.

Queer and radical criticisms of the LGBT movement have existed since the movement's origins. Indeed, within any movement there are tensions between radicalism and liberalism, assimilation and separatism, and the role of professional or hierarchical organizations. Examining three recent publications on the LGBT movement, I argue that within the LGBT movement there is a tension between queer radicalism and professionalism (which is often conflated with homonormativity and assimilation.) As the national LGBT movement grew, it inevitably developed professional, formal organizations. Although a necessity in maintaining movement coherence and focus, professional organizations are also deeply problematic because of how they suppress dissent and radicalism. Professional organizations also incorporate corporate diversity culture, which is often staffed and led by white professionals and targets only visible and fundable identities such as race and gender.

Although the study of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) politics appears to be widely accepted within political science, a recent survey of political scientists reported some skepticism about its legitimacy and scholarly worth (Novkov and Barclay 2010). This article examines potential concerns about LGBT studies and draws attention to the field's scholarly importance. The first part briefly addresses three objections to the study of LGBT politics that echo criticisms of the study and practice of identity politics. I argue that these objections do not withstand scrutiny, and that the case for studying the intersection of politics and sexuality within the discipline of political science is compelling. Sexuality and gender are fundamental aspects of human societies that reflect power relations and increasingly have become the object of public policy. The second part of the article examines the burgeoning literature on the politics of sexual orientation and identity. Beyond its intrinsic importance, LGBT politics contributes to a broader understanding of politics, power, social movements, public opinion, policymaking institutions, urban politics, and the relationship between science and public policy. Though not exhaustive, this review addresses many of the principal empirical and theoretical works in this area.

This dissertation examines the impact of litigation on a social movement's dominant substantive goals and message. While scholars have devoted substantial attention to the study of social movement litigation, research in this area typically focuses on how social movements affect substantive law, or more broadly, how a movement's legal tactics bring about social change. By contrast, my focus in this dissertation is on how litigation affects the social movement itself. In particular, how does litigation as a tactic shape a social movement's collective agenda? How does it affect which perspective among possible competing visions comes to define the movement?I investigate these dynamics through a case study of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) movement from 1985 to 2008. The study involves three phases of original empirical research, each of which investigates a potential mechanism that may privilege litigation over other tactics in its ability to set the LGBT movement's primary substantive agenda. First, I use a content analysis of newspaper coverage of LGBT politics to determine which movement tactics have received the most media visibility. Second, I perform a statistical analysis of LGBT organizations to determine which movement tactics have been most associated with organizational survival and stability. Third, I perform a qualitative analysis of a subset of those LGBT organizations to examine variation in the strategy-formation processes used by primarily litigation-, lobbying-, or protest-based movement groups.The media content analysis revealed that litigation received more news coverage than any other LGBT movement tactic, suggesting that litigation had greater visibility than other tactics. In addition, the statistical analysis revealed that the movement organizations that used litigation had greater survival rates than other types of LGBT movement organizations, suggesting that litigation has been a particularly stable feature of LGBT politics. The qualitative analysis of LGBT organizations revealed further insights into how litigation may influence the agendas of non-legal movement actors. Whereas litigating LGBT movement groups proactively pursued preplanned organizational priorities, protest groups formed their agendas reactively, focusing on the issues covered by the mainstream media. This phenomenon appears to have diverted protest groups away from their original priorities and toward the issues that the media found newsworthy. Given my findings that litigation coverage dominated news headlines, the processes identified here may enable litigation to dominate protest activism as well. Taken together, these findings suggest that the media visibility and stability of social movement litigation may contribute to the prominence of litigation and cause legal goals to dominate the movement's overall substantive agenda. I describe this process as the "legalization" of a social movement's agenda.This dissertation makes a novel contribution to existing scholarship by exposing systemic processes that may privilege movement litigation relative to protest, elevating the issues being litigated to top movement priorities. Significant implications follow for theories of law and social change. Focusing on litigation narrows a movement's agenda because courts offer a forum for only those grievances that can be translated into legal claims. This may be particularly problematic for movements that base their legal claims in antidiscrimination law, which has become settled around quite limited understandings of equality as formal access to equal opportunity and discrimination as an intentional, individual harm. This interpretation not only denies remedies for the structural factors most responsible for perpetuating inequality, it also places the focus on preventing individual wrongdoing rather than producing substantive outcomes. Thus, when antidiscrimination litigation comes to define an equality movement's priorities, the movement may find itself privileging issues with little hope of creating substantive social transformation.

The LGBT or sexual diversity movement in Nicaragua, which was repressed by the FSLN in the 1980s, is currently supported by that party. I argue that this change in the FSLN's policy responds to shifting international frames regarding sexuality and human rights as well as to efforts to separate the LGBT movement from its allies in the feminist movement, and efforts to incorporate the LGBT movement into the FSLN's clientelistic networks. Despite real gains for LGBT activists as a result of these new policies, ultimately the FSLN has offered sexual diversity activists far more in the area of culture than rights.