Gendered Advocacy Coalitions in Estonia and Lithuania: A Comparative Study about the (non-)Ratification of the Istanbul Convention

Sammanfattning: The Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence, known as the Istanbul Convention, was ratified by the European Union in 2023. However, five member states have not yet ratified. This essay investigates why some European Union member states have not ratified the Istanbul Convention, focusing specifically on Estonia and Lithuania using the most similar systems design: the former has ratified the Convention, but the latter has not. This essay analyses the (non-)ratification of the Istanbul Convention by applying Gwiazda and Minkova’s (2022) refined advocacy coalition framework, a perspective on (non-)ratification that accentuates the role of feminist and anti- gender advocacy coalitions. This study hypothesises that the formation of a strong feminist advocacy coalition is needed in a country for it to ratify the Convention and that non-ratification results from the presence of a strong anti-gender advocacy coalition. The essay concludes that the hypothesis could be a possible explanation for the (non-)ratification of the Istanbul Convention because the feminist advocacy coalition was likely stronger than the anti-gendered advocacy coalition in Estonia and an anti-gender advocacy coalition has been present and determined in the sphere concerning the (non-)ratification of the Istanbul Convention in Lithuania.