Gender Fatigue in the Nordics: Uncovering Covert Backlash

This article investigates the phenomenon of gender fatigue as a covert form of potential backlash against gender equality in Denmark and Norway—two countries often perceived as frontrunners in gender equality. While overt backlash, involving explicit efforts to roll back equality gains, is rare and lacks mainstream appeal in these countries, more subtle forms of resistance to gender equality can be detected. Based on representative surveys conducted among the general population in both countries, the study uses the theoretical framework of gender fatigue and introduces three dimensions of this concept: denial, deprioritization, and depletion. These dimensions reflect different ways of approaching the issue of gender equality, ranging from rejecting the relevance of gender inequality to regarding it as unimportant or overly emphasized. The study examines the prevalence and distribution of these dimensions across the two countries and among different social groups. Gender fatigue is more widespread in Denmark than in Norway but tend to be driven by the same socio-demographics in both countries not least men and right-wing supporters.