The special issue offers an interdisciplinary approach to exploring the questions of agency of less mainstream groups in protest movements in patriarchal and authoritarian societies. The themes covered include the place of feminist and gender equality movements in democratically restricted environments, intersections between feminism and nationalism and citizenship, possibilities of right-wing feminism and ‘pop-feminism’, the role of gender in high politics and the relationship between nationality and sexuality in the context of protest movements. The journal features contributions by scholars, human rights and gender equality activists, and journalists, and facilitates a constructive and wide-ranging discussion of the recent and ongoing protest movements in Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine.