1 Scholars focusing on the interplay of nationalism and homonegativity [3] in post-Communist and Balkan countries have produced a considerable amount of research in this field in the past decade (Graff, 2006; O’Dwyer et Schwartz, 2010; O’Dwyer, 2010; Andreescu, 2011; O’Dwyer, 2012; Johnson, 2012; Davydova, 2012; Kahlina, 2014; Petz, 2014; Berg et al., 2014; Slootmaeckers et Sircar, 2014; Gould and Moe, 2015). Studies of public and collective acts of nationalist ethno-centrism and homonegativity have been particularly successful in demonstrating how the two discourses feed into each other. Nevertheless, many of the aforementioned studies also included the factor of Europeanisation, either focusing on this factor directly, or introducing it as a variable. The accession period seems to play a strong role in the development and emancipation of minority rights in many Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) countries (Dimitrova and Rhinard, 2005; Kantola, 2010; Kuhar, 2012; Kriszan and Popa, 2012). Nevertheless, numerous studies show that the adaptation pressure in the area of equality policies tends to diminish after accession and later fails to produce any change, thereby rendering any further Europeanisation as only shallow (Saurugger, 2005; Holzhacker, 2007; O’Dwyer, 2012; O’Dwyer and Slootmaeckers, 2014; Van Der Val and Verloo, 2015).

2 Nevertheless, the aim of this study is not to focus on the process of Europeanisation of the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) policy in Slovakia. While we devote some space in this paper to explain the history of political activism of LGBT persons in Slovakia after the year 1990, this chapter only serves the purpose of providing the reader with some basic knowledge of political development. The focus of this paper revolves around the Slovak Referendum on Family of 2015 (as it was presented by the organisers). The study aspires to analyse the interplay of discourses of homonegativity and ethno-nationalism in the public statements of two organisations promoting and fostering the referendum – the Alliance for Family and the Slovak Conference of Bishops. We are particularly interested in exploring the discursive cleavages and the discursive production of the dichotomy of “depraved Europe” and “traditional/pure Slovakia”. This discursive practice has so far been applied by some scholars focusing on CEE countries, therefore we assume that scholars in this particular field will find a study conducted in the Slovak environment useful for further research. The case of Slovakia will be analysed by the methodology of critical frame analysis, which was meticulously developed for the MAGEEQ and QUING projects. The international research projects focused upon the multiplicity of gender equality policies within EU Member States and worked with the methodology of critical frame analysis (Verloo, 2007), which will be further elaborated upon within this study. Within these projects, critical frame analysis was developed in order to analyse the discursive power dynamics in policymaking. For this study, the choice of methodology is particularly salient since it scrutinises “the different representations that socio-political actors offer about policy problems and solutions” (Van Der Haar and Verloo, 2016, 1). The study focuses on the so-called issue frames, which have an inherently normative aspect, as they provide coherent reasoning and diagnostic elements for a particular issue (Dombos et al., 2012).

3 While we do not focus explicitly on the Europeanisation of LGBT rights in Slovakia, we approach Europeanisation through the prism of discursive-sociological institutionalism and its particular interest in the discursive framing of policy issues (e.g. Lombardo and Forest, 2012; Schmidt, 2010). For this study, we understand the notion of Europeanisation as political usage, which is presented by Sophie Jacquot and Cornelia Woll (2003, 2010). The authors conceptualise the political usage of the European Union as the “mediation done by an actor to transform a material or immaterial resource provided by the European institutions into a political action” (Jacquot and Woll, 2003, 6).

4 As Nira Yuval-Davis (2002, 12) states: “A variety of cultural, legal and political discourses are used in constructing boundaries of the nations”. Departing from the conventional understanding of Europeanisation as a vertical process of norm adaptation, the study of the discursive Europeanisation presented in this paper can therefore be described as the cognitive usage of the concept of the European Union institutions by political actors in order to foster nationalist and homonegative discourses.

5 The study is divided into several chapters whereby we depart with the aim to familiarise the reader with the existing literature focusing upon ethno-nationalist projects and homonegative discourses in CEE countries. Further on, we provide the context of the Slovak LGBT policy before presenting the reader with the frame analysis of the press releases and press conferences organised by two of the crucial organisations involved in the Slovak Referendum of 2015 – the Alliance for Family and the Conference of Bishops of Slovakia. Several conclusions are provided to the reader on the crucial outcomes of the frame analysis as the study aims to provide the scholarship with novel incentives into the study of the cleavage-building processes.

Nationalist projects, heteronormativity and othering

6 A considerable amount of literature has been produced so far on the topic of gender and nationalism, often focusing on the specific positions women and men occupy within nationalist and ethnocentric discourses (e. g. Yuval-Davis and Anthias, 1989; Yuval-Davis, 1997; Yuval-Davis, 2002; Mosse, 1997, 1998; Mostov et al., 2006; Kulpa, 2011). In her study Masculinity and nationalism: gender and sexuality in the making of nations, Joane Nagel (1998) deconstructs the national ideology which, according to her, functions based on the logic of inclusion or exclusion. The author argues that nationalism is both a goal to achieve statehood, and a belief in collective commonality, which can only be achieved via assigning everyone their gendered places [4] (Nagel, 1998). As a specific form of narrative, the discourses of nationalism assign everyone his/her place within the construction of a political entity (Mosse, 1997). The process of othering are put into place throughout a variety of cultural, legal, and political discourses which construct the boundaries of nations (Yuval-Davis, 2002). It is thus clear that the interplay of the constructs of gender, ethnicity, and class became crucial within the scholarship studying nationalist projects. This understanding of nation-building as a discursive process embedded within the constructs of class, race, and gender also draws heavily on the crucial work of Anthony Smith (2010), which focused on what he perceived to be an inherent connection between ethnic and nationalist projects. [5]

7 Before we advance further to analyse a specific set of discursive events linked to an ethno-nationalist project, we believe it is crucial to declare adherence to the work of Richard Mole (2011) who approached nationalist projects within their historical perspective. Within his work, the author assumes that the European nationalism of nation-states constructed in the nineteenth century was based on the gender-specific division of labour and heteronormativity. According to the author, the narrative of a heterosexual family is reproduced within the context of the bourgeois nationalism. The constructs of femininity and masculinity are therefore presented as crucial by many scholars who focus on the construction of gender relations within nationalist narratives. [6] Nevertheless, it is essential to hereby mention the concept of the paradox of the masculine situation (Graff, 2006). This established concept is linked to the notion of “homosocial desire” originally put forward by Kosofsky Sedgwick (2015), who draws on the idea that heterosexuality (though not necessarily homophobia/homonegativity) is the conditio sine qua non for patriarchy. According to this notion, the heteronormative narrative of a male collective (the homosocial) requires the prohibition of any intimacy among the men involved. The construct of femininity, on the other hand, plays out differently within the discourse of nationalism, as Yuval-Davis and Anthias submit (1989).

8 The process of discursive cleavage-building between the notions of ethno-nationalist projects and homonegativity is also implicitly present within the work of Gould and Moe (2015) who add that, “genes carry ethnicity” (Gould and Moe, 2015, 274). The authors therefore conclude that the narrative of nation gives license to ethno-nationalist (or ethnic-genealogical) [7] projects and justifies homophobic action as an ethno-nationalist necessity.

9 For the purposes of ethnic reproduction, heterosexual family is often presented in an essentialist manner to materialize the building blocks of the nation (Nagel, 1998). [8] This is also due to the need to frame reproductive heterosexuality as the forefront principle that assures the national survival (Kahlina, 2014). As such, the sexualized and gendered boundaries of the national belonging tend to divide the nation into good and bad citizens, as well as good and bad families (Davydova, 2012; Yuval-Davis, 2002). [9] Richard Mole (2011) describes this as the discursive practice of othering homosexuality to construct a perceived national threat. Within this conceptualisation, sexual citizenship is particularly crucial in the construction of the nation, since “political actors seek to redefine the moral boundaries of the nation” (Hubbard, 2001, 65).

10 The conceptualisation of homonegative othering within ethno-nationalist projects perceived through the lenses of feminist scholarship serves a particular end within this study. We hereby understand the sexual citizenship to be the contesting ground which is constantly renegotiated through the framing and cleavage-building processes which will be further elaborated upon within the particular example of the 2015 Slovak Referendum. As such, we will look upon the cleavage-building processes in order to identify the position of the European Union and its institutions which are grasped by the political actors as a specific form of discursive usage.

Cleavage-building and the “usage of Europe”

11 As we have already mentioned in the introduction, many studies have been produced in relation to the homonegative ethno-nationalist discourse in CEE countries. The scholarship focusing on this particular topic has notably looked into the recent developments in countries influenced by the European Union policies as new member states or acceding countries. [10] These include Poland (Binnie and Klesse, 2013; O’Dwyer and Schwartz, 2010; O’Dwyer, 2010; O’Dwyer 2012; Graff, 2006; Graff, 2009), Latvia (O’Dwyer and Schwartz, 2010; Mole, 2011), Lithuania (Davydova, 2012), Bulgaria (Johnson, 2012), Romania (Andreescu, 2011), Croatia (Slootmaeckers and Sircar, 2014) and Serbia (Kahlina, 2013; Kahlina, 2014; Berg et al., 2014; Gould and Moe, 2015). While these case studies looked into various discursive events of a particular time and space, they all happen to explore the interplay of ethno-nationalist and homonegative discourses. Yuval-Davis (2002) reminds us that nations are situated among specific contexts and can be constructed by shifting nationalist discourses. For example, within the study of western nationalist projects, Kulpa (2014a) identifies the concept of homonationalism, which perceives the domestic LGBT community as a “source of life”, as opposed to differently (mostly ethnically) constructed “others” [11]. It is thus clear that the construction of specific nationalist narratives is often processed via threats posed by others (Berg et al., 2014). However, as it will become clear in the following sections, this paper focuses predominantly on the process of cleavage-building and othering of the “homosexual” within the context of Slovak ethno-nationalist projects as described within the works of various scholars (Smith, 1986; Smith, 2010; Yuval-Davis, 1997).

12 A poignant example from another CEE country is provided by Richard Mole, who concludes that, in Latvia, “homosexuality is seen as a threat to the nation” (Mole, 2011, 541). As he posits, the Latvian example provides scholars with the possibility to study the interrelatedness of the discourses of ethno-nationality and homonegativity. He further argues that a similar development can be observed within other post-Communist countries that struggled for independence within the Eastern bloc. Numerous variables were introduced within the aforementioned comparative case studies; furthermore, as we have also already pointed out, the vast majority of these case studies were written under the influence of Europeanisation studies. As such, they consider the influence of European Union institutions to be crucial to the recent development. Maxime Forest (2015), for example, argues that international norms, and particularly the norms adopted as a result of external EU pressure, need to be considered a crucial variable when analysing the LGBT policies in post-Communist countries. Michael Petz (2014), for example, argues that EU citizenship became increasingly constructed via its positive approach to (LGBT) minority rights. This, as Conor O’Dwyer (2012) adds, is due considerably to the influence of the EU and its associated institutions (such as the Council of Europe), which have increasingly promoted non-discrimination norms in post-Communist countries. Robert Kulpa (2014b) denounces this as the “leverage pedagogy”, a form of a “carrot and stick” whereby the EU institutions construct CEE countries as “not European enough” with regards to the LGBT rights. Many scholars have approached the topic of Europeanisation within their CEE case study as a form of “window of opportunity” (Kingdon, 2010), which is grasped at the national level by LGBT activists who make strategic use of different EU resources (Forest, 2015). Most notably, Slootmaeckers et al. (2016) argue, that LGBT rights have become a strong incentive and a topic of direct political contestation in EU Member States’ policies. As the authors claim further on, the opponents of this shift can only resist by depicting LGBT rights as Western, or by linking the meaning of modernity to the “traditional values”.

13 The applied “variable of Europe” within EU Member States’ equality policies seems to be widely recognised by many scholars. Furthermore, several scholars in the aforementioned studies focus on the discursive practice of cleavage-building. Since LGBT rights and tolerance of homosexuality have become the symbol of what it means to be European (Mizielińska and Kulpa, 2011; Kulpa 2014a, 2014b), scholars focusing on CEE countries tend to report the discursive practice in a homonegative rhetoric that frames Europe and homosexuality together in order to create the construct of a “foreign threat”. [12] As Darja Davydova (2012) adds: “the political priorities of the European Union are [often] presented as evidence of its moral corruption” [13] (Davydova, 2012, 40). In context of the recent development in Latvia, Richard Mole (2011) concludes that political actors have been extensively using the reference of threat (previously representing the Soviet Union) when attacking LGBT activists. Furthermore, Katja Kahlina (2014) describes the case studies of Croatia and Serbia, in which she documents the process of cleavage-building between “Europe/West and homosexual depravity” in contrast to “national identity and traditional purity”.

14 As Conor O’Dwyer (2012) concludes, controversial issues such as LGBT rights have the tendency to produce political backlash in CEE countries, thereby rights retrenchment as foreign norms are being applied. LGBT activists are known to use the EU accession and related discourses of Europeanisation as leverage in order to pressure political groups (Saurugger and Radaelli, 2008; Kuhar, 2012). However, within this study, we will present the position of anti-LGBT activists within the perspective of discursive Europeanisation, whereby we will focus on the concept of “strategic usage of Europe” (Saurugger, 2005, 294). The concept of usage is presented as a social practice of seizing the European Union (and its associated organisations and their institutions) as a set of opportunities – institutional, ideological, political and organisational (Woll and Jacquot, 2010) in order to acquire political leverage.

15 This conceptualisation of Europeanisation stems from the discursive-sociological institutionalism developed extensively within the feminist scholarship (see e.g. Schmidt, 2010; Lombardo and Forest, 2012). The focus of this neo-institutional approach is to study the change in discourse and the transmission of norms and ideas by key political actors (Saurugger, 2005). According to Saurugger (2005), Europeanisation is perceived as an evolution of new layers of politics on different levels. Maxime Forest (2006) defines Europeanisation as the “set of political and legal resources drawn from the interactions with European Union and used by various actors” (Forest, 2006, 173). Thus it is experienced by actors as a form of a model or a resource and cannot be perceived as the traditional top-down norm transfer, typical for Europeanisation literature (Forest, 2006).

16 The authors Cornelia Woll and Sophie Jacquot (2010) distinguish three types of usage of Europe:

17

• Cognitive usage: ideas are used as persuasive mechanisms in the process of political framing of particular issues or within argumentation (Typical actors: political entrepreneurs, epistemic communities or advocacy coalition).
• Strategic usage: this type of usage creates policy tools in order to mobilise resources (e.g. build political coalitions), (Typical actors: decision-makers and bureaucratic actors).
• Legitimising uses: political decisions need to be communicated and justified (Typical actors: lobbyists and politicians).

18 Therefore, in this study we look upon the discursive practice of cleavage-building within the rhetoric of anti-LGBT groups as a particular form of cognitive and legitimising use of Europe. While this particular approach is not common in Europeanisation studies, it is in line with Saurugger and Radaelli’s (2008) constructive perspective of Europeanisation, which they define as a “creative usage of Europe” (Saurugger and Radaelli, 2008, 215). Stemming from the conceptualisation of the discursive-sociological institutionalism, which combines the prerequisites of discursive and sociological institutionalisms and thus focuses on the role of actors and discursive framing of policy issues (Lombardo and Forest, 2012), this study aims to provide a critical reading of the Europeanisation processes which holds the tradition of feminist scholarship. Contrary to the common use of this approach in Europeanisation literature, we will focus on the discursive practice of constructing Europe as a threat linked to the promotion of LGBT rights. We argue that this new perspective on the concept of “usage” may be particularly interesting within the study of Europeanisation, which is seen as the application of new layers of policymaking in EU Member States.

Political activism of LGBT persons in Slovakia after 1990

19 Most influential attempts for political activism of the LGBT community were conducted at the beginning of 1990 during the last years of the former Czecho-Slovak government. The official publishing initiatives were taken up by the Prague-based organisation Lambda in 1990 (Jójárt, 2002). This organisation was also joined by a number of gay Slovak activists, who campaigned together in order to remove the discriminatory provision of age requirement in consensual same-sex sexual relations (Gould, 2015). [14] Activities of the LGBT movement in the Slovak Republic as of 1993 were considerably influenced by the era of Prime Minister Vladimír Mečiar, who held strong control over the non-governmental sector (Forest, 2015). [15] Though there were some early attempts at creating special services for the LGBT community, such as a support helpline in 1992, lack of interest of public authorities led to funding issues, which considerably influenced the stability of the movement (Jójárt, 2002).

20 Between 1997 and 2000, members of several non-governmental organisations lobbied the national structures to consider laws establishing same-sex unions, though the initiatives ended without success. Nevertheless, John A. Gould (2015) concludes that while the electoral defeat of the Mečiar government in 1998 lead to the preservation of Slovak democracy and set it back on the path to the EU membership, it did not change the political opportunity structure, which was unfavourable to the LGBT community. In 2000, several existing organisations merged under an umbrella organisation called Iniciatíva Inakosť in order to be more successful in lobbying public authorities. However, the political development at that time in the country proved to be unfavourable to the LGBT community, [16] as the Slovak establishment signed a concordat with the Vatican, which, according to its Article 11, binds the country to foster the institute of marriage and family as set forth in the Christian canon (Ministerstvo kultúry Slovenskej republiky, 2011).

21 The period that followed the accession of Slovakia to the European Union in 2004 seems to be rather successful in terms of institutional emancipation of LGBT rights in Slovakia (Forest, 2015). While establishing the Copenhagen criteria for CEE countries that aspired to join the union, human rights and their assurance became one of the indicators. Considered one of the notable statements produced by the European Union institutions, the 1998 resolution of the European Parliament declared the Union’s refusal to accept any policies that directly violated rights of lesbian and gay citizens (Andreescu, 2011). As Peter Vermeersch (2003) argues, it was precisely within the 1990s framework of the EU enlargement process that “the most distinctive suggestions were made for the adoption of particular types of minority policies in CEE” (Vermeersch, 2003, 8). In line with European Union norms, Slovakia also passed a new anti-discrimination law in 2004, which explicitly bans discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation and gender identity in the areas of work-related relationships, social security, healthcare, goods, services and education (Pietruchová, 2007). [17]

22 Furthermore, more recent controversy arose in 2012 with the debate about the National Strategy for the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights. The document was in the end not adopted in 2014, as it was abandoned after conservative catholic groups presented their dismay towards policies promoting “the [sic!] so-called LGBT rights” (Sekerák, 2015, 36). The year 2014 also saw the constitution amended, as it now holds an explicit description of marriage as a sole union between a woman and a man. The amendment, therefore, not only excludes the possibility of recognising a relationship between same-sex partners (Kuzelewska, 2015), but also marginalises the existence of these couples within the Slovak society. [18]

23 With regards to the views of the general population towards the LGBT minority in Slovakia, the 2006 Eurobarometer showed that two years after the accession of Slovakia to the EU, only 19 % of the respondents agreed with the institute of same-sex marriage (Mole, 2011). Furthermore, the European Social Survey, which was conducted in 2008, also shows that 29,4 % of the respondents disagree or strongly disagree with the statement: “Gays and lesbians should be free to live life as they wish”– compared to Hungary (25 %), Bulgaria (13,9 %) or Poland (29,8 %), (Andreescu, 2011). While the aforementioned data does not provides us with an image of the Slovak society as holding positive attitudes to the LGBT minority, a survey conducted in 2012 estimated that 48 % of the respondents agreed with the institution of registered partnership for same-sex couples (SITA/TASR, 2012).

Slovak Referendum on the protection of family 2015 and its proponents

24 In the following section, we will focus on presenting two of the most active lobbying groups officially promoting the Slovak Referendum on Family in 2015. The referendum was launched based on Article 95 of the Constitution of the Slovak Republic, which states that it is allowed to hold a referendum based on a popular initiative supported by 350,000 citizens entitled to vote. Nevertheless, the same constitutional document indicates that it is not allowed to hold a referendum on the topic of fundamental rights and freedoms (Kuzelewska, 2015). Despite this, over 400,000 signatures were collected and delivered to the office of the President Andrej Kiska in August 2014. [19]The main organisation responsible for the collection of the signatures presented itself as a collective of almost 100 Christian and pro-family organisations under the umbrella term Alliance for Family (further only Alliance).

25 While the LGBT minority was mostly represented in the media by the already mentioned non-governmental organisation Iniciatíva Inakosť, the strategy of the organisation was to call for the boycott of the referendum, since, according to the organisation, the plebiscite was unconstitutional (Denník N, 2015). This view was, of course, not maintained by the Alliance, who proclaimed the aim of not challenging any particular group of citizens and deprive them of their rights but rather safeguard the traditional family. [20]

26 The Constitutional Court consequently ruled that three of the proposed questions can be submitted for a plebiscite (Human Rights Watch, 2015):

27

• Do you agree that only a bond between one man and one woman can be called marriage?
• Do you agree that same-sex couples or groups should not be allowed to adopt and raise children?
• Do you agree that schools cannot require children to participate in education pertaining to sexual behaviour or euthanasia if their parents do not agree?

28 However, ultimately, the referendum attracted only 21,41 % of eligible voters, of whom over 90 % gave their supporting “yes” to all three questions (The Guardian, 2015). Despite the extensive budget the Alliance assigned for the campaign (Smrek, 2015), the referendum was not successful as it did not reach the required 50 % threshold of eligible voters.

29 Prior to the referendum of 2015, the Alliance launched an extensive campaign under the slogan: “It’s clear to the kids”, pointing to another statement: “Children have the right to a mother and a father”. Via this statement, the Alliance opted to frame the referendum as a human rights-based issue, focusing on the protection of the rights of children.

30 The representatives of the Slovak Roman Catholic church were also among the active proponents of the referendum. According to Smrek, “The Church has provided the Alliance with moral as well as financial support and has effectively used its dense network of churches and church schools to raise awareness about the plebiscite” (Smrek, 2015). The Conference of Bishops of Slovakia (further only Conference) was openly politically active via its pastoral letters, which were particularly vocal on the topic of the “culture of death” and “gender ideology” [21] and which will be further looked upon in this paper. The Conference has been, so far, very active in the political matters of the country [22] (Pietruchová, 2007), often publicly calling on the worshippers to overcome their habit of being politically inactive (Gould, 2015).

31 With regards to European Union integration and the process of accession, the Conference has, to this day, issued three pastoral letters. While the Conference welcomes the prospects of the accession in all three letters, it is also very concerned about the position of Christianity within the Union. The letters call on the audience to elect their representatives wisely, since the creation of the Union may also lead to the creation of another “Tower of Babel”. [23] As early as 2002, the Conference seemed to be alarmed by the then-recent resolutions of the European Parliament that supported same-sex unions and reproduction rights. [24] The rhetoric of the pastoral letters is therefore very cautious and calls on the European Union and its future citizens, the Slovaks, to always adhere to the principles of Christianity. [25]

32 The discursive framing of LGBT rights and EU institutions present within the media materials issued by the two aforementioned organisations will be further considered for the frame analysis central to this study.

Discursive cleavage-building – depraved Europe vs. pure Slovakia

33 The following section will examine the official rhetoric of the aforementioned organisations – Alliance for Family and the Slovak Conference of Bishops. The aim of this section is to analyse the most common frames applied within the official press releases, position papers, press conferences (Alliance) and pastoral letters (Conference), which accompanied the campaign for the Referendum of 2015. The frame analysis is hereby applied according to Goffman’s (1986) definition, as a method which looks into how we choose to talk about issues. The methodology of this study was inspired by the critical frame analysis [26] developed for the projects MAGEEQ and QUING [27] which aimed to analyse the gender equality policies of EU Member States. Within these projects, critical frame analysis was developed in order to analyse the discursive power dynamics in policymaking (Verloo, 2007). A mixed approach of qualitative and quantitative method of frame content analysis is applied within this study (Johannessen, 2015), which allows us to use a more flexible coding when identifying the core frames.

34 The aim of this section is to look upon the already mentioned cleavage-building of discursive separating “European depravity” from the “Slovak tradition/ purity”, which needs to be conserved against the external forces. For the purposes of the critical frame analysis, only the official statements of 2014 and 2015 mentioning external political actors and entities were chosen. This resulted in the collection of a dataset of 8 press releases, 6 position papers, 8 press conference speeches and 1 promotional video for the Alliance and 5 pastoral letters of the Conference. In order to demonstrate the shift in the Conference rhetoric, we have also opted to include a pastoral letter from the winter of 2013.

35 Within the studied sample of press releases and position papers issued by the Alliance, we were able to identify numerous frames that were coded in relation to Slovakia / the Slovak nation and external political entities (e.g. other states and international organisations). These frames included: “norms forced from above”, “legislature and justice activism”, “collapsing European civilisation”, “protection of national development” and “threat to the Slovak nation”. While the brief listing of these frames tempts us to assume their interconnection, the analysis presented below clearly shows that the presence of some frames is merely sporadic and only serves to highlight other frames.

36 As the most common frame appearing in these advocacy materials of the Alliance, we identified “norms forced from above”, which can be mostly described by the various ways in which the Alliance denounced the norms and authority of European Union institutions (most notably the Court of Justice of the European Union - CJEU), Council of Europe and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). This frame is also very tightly linked to another commonly appearing frame, that of “legislature and justice activism”. An example is provided in the press release commenting on the constitutional amendment of 2014: “The adopted amendment of the Constitution is a step forwards, nevertheless, it will not protect the Slovak family and marriage from the euro-legislature rage and justice activism”. [28] These two aforementioned frames are often linked to the dictate of ECtHR and CJEU, which often comes along with the suppression of the right to freedom of speech demanded by the Alliance. Within these frames, international norms are perceived as a form of external pressure on the country, which Slovakia must resist. [29] International documents, such as the Istanbul convention and the reports adopted by European Parliament’s LIBE committee (e.g. Estrela and Lunacek) are described as norms adopted “behind the backs” of EU Member States, against the will of their citizens. [30] The decisions of the international courts are depicted as a form of activism that is alienated from the values of Slovak citizens. [31] Other EU Member States (notably Austria, France and United Kingdom) are presented as countries that have fallen victim to these forced norms [32]

37 The two aforementioned frames were also extensively visible within the press conference speeches and promotional videos of the Alliance held between September 2014 and February 2015. Nevertheless, these public speeches went further in naming the external forces as “Brussels” and “the West”. [33] The European political elites were depicted as hegemonic in decision-making, without the wish to listen to EU Member States and their demands. [34] The Alliance does, therefore, position itself as directly antagonistic to the Brussels-imposed norms that are contrary to the values the Alliance portrays. This is also summed up in a statement made by one of the speakers of the organisation when complaining about the media’s reluctance to air their spot: “[the ban on freedom of speech] that was imposed on us can happen to anyone, including the organisations publicly opposing Brussels”. [35]

38 Another, yet very sporadically appearing frame was that of “a collapsing European civilisation”. This frame is supported by expressions, such as the title of this paper: “Regrettably, it seems that breaking one border causes others to tumble”. [36] Whereby Slovakia stands alone as one of the last moral fortresses that will “[...] send a clear message to Europe that family and a relationship between a woman and a man are the basis of the European civilisation”. [37] While “the Slovak nation is dying out”, [38] “Slovakia is progressive and will not be influenced”. [39] The fight against the norms enforced from above (i.e. same-sex marriage and consequential adoption rights) is hereby legitimised as they are presented as backward and threatening.

39 The frame of “protection of national development” directly linked to the containment of “detrimental forces” is traced only in one case – a position paper from 2014. Here, the Alliance claims that “all the problems, including the problems of pension schemes and migrants, can be resolved only by a country which knows and cherishes the value of a family, marriage and children as its future... The aim is to stop the demographic collapse of Slovakia and take the burden off the social security system via functioning families... [40] Here the Alliance also implicitly alludes to Roma families in Slovakia, which are often accused of being dysfunctional and abusing the system of social benefits.

40 Symbols of national identity and the country are rarely used by the Alliance. While the first press conference was held in the garden of the Presidential Palace with the Slovak national anthem audible in the background, [41] these symbols are visible only in one promotional video [42] and later disappeared from further press conferences held by the Alliance.

41 Similar frames were identified within the pastoral letters issued by the Conference of Bishops of Slovakia. In order to demonstrate the easing of the rhetoric of the Conference over the past months, we also included the pastoral letter of the First Advent Sunday of 2013, [43] which extensively depicts the frame of “threat to the Slovak nation”. Hereby, the nation resonates as a living entity, which was given its “dignity by God”. [44] Evil forces are falling down on Europe and “within whichever nation they succeed, that nation shall loose its dignity before God and the whole world”. [45] The aim of this pastoral letter is to denounce “the culture of death”, which is presented by forces external to the nation (such as LGBT lobby and gender ideology). The letter concludes: “With a threat like this, former generations were not hesitating to die for the protection of their country... With an opposing attitude we would dishonour our ancestors who sacrificed their lives for the protection of this country”. [46] While this is the main organising frame of the 2013 pastoral letter, the letters issued in 2014 and 2015 in relation to the topic of the referendum and same-sex marriages/adoptions rarely use this frame, and rather focus on the frame of “threat to the children”, which is portrayed by various narratives of threats that Jesus experienced as a child. [47]

42 The “norms enforced from above” frame is also visible in the pastoral letter of February 2015, which calls on the worshippers to attend the referendum, as Slovakia is called on to “offer Europe the gift of faith in Christ...”. [48] These “laws of death” [49] are depicted as being forced on Slovakia by external actors and Slovak Christians are called on to think of the future generations and contain the threats through their political participation. [50] This frame is linked to another frame, “the protection of national development”, which must be assured by Slovakia, providing Europe with progress through its “traditions and culture”. [51]

Conclusion

43 The aim of this study was to present the rhetorical cleavage-building of “depraved Europe” and “pure/traditional Slovakia” in the rhetorical expressions of the Alliance for Family and the Conference of Bishops of Slovakia during the two-year period that surrounded the so-called Slovak Referendum on Family. We hereby present the cleavage-building as a form of discursive Europeanisation, whereby the anti-LGBT political activists “seize Europe” as a set of opportunities in order to acquire political leverage (Woll and Jacquot, 2010). The cleavage is therefore built upon the interplay of ethno-nationalist and homonegative discourses, commonly present in the political arena of CEE, as well as other regions.

44 Based on the perception of Europeanisation as a usage put forward by Woll and Jacquot (2010), we were able to identify numerous frames that are applied both by the Alliance and the Conference in order to frame the issue and support a claim or provide an argumentation. The most commonly recurring frames: “norms enforced from above” and “legislature and justice activism” were both applied as a form of a cognitive and legitimising resource – therefore as ideas that were used as a persuasive mechanism in the process of the political framing of particular issues (Woll and Jacquot, 2010). The fact that the Alliance carefully distinguished between the supposedly legitimate and illegitimate rulings of the ECtHR [52] further supports this thesis. As such, the Alliance positions itself as an organisation which is opposing the system “adopting norms behinds the backs of the citizens” and aims to present the EU institutions and organisations as an elitist other, which is also backward and threatening. Thus creating a political opposition which serves its particular ends.

45 The two consecutive frames “threat to the nation” and “protection of national development” are less frequent, though they both coincidentally appear more frequently before the launch of the official campaign. In its 2013 letter, the Conference extensively uses the frame of “threat to the nation”; nevertheless, the threat only appears in the form of an unnamed “other” represented by the so-called gender ideology and the culture of death. External political actors are never explicitly named, which provides the religious authority with the discursive leverage constructed through the process of othering and the multitude of possibilities for “the other”.

46 The last recurring frame is that of the “collapsing European civilisation”, whereby Slovakia and its citizens have a moral duty to spread their values based on a traditional family (as a core of European civilisation). As the Western civilisation faces a great discussion about its values, it is Slovakia that will send a message about what should be at the forefront of European progress. Within this frame, the current development of Europe is heading towards decay and denial of the basic standards of human dignity. Slovakia is therefore positioned as an opposing force to the current wave of European development. Interestingly enough, this frame positions Slovakia as a country that is to lead progress in Europe. This is contrary to the common conceptualisation of CEE countries as backward in relation to the “normative ideal of the West” (Mizielińska and Kulpa, 2011, 20). This framing can be understood as the discursive power balancing between the EU-West and CEE countries, whereby the Slovak actors promoting the ethno-nationalist framing of LGBT issues seek to reinforce their position and legitimacy by presenting their own understanding of what is modern and progressive.

47 Therefore, we may hereby argue that this conceptualisation and cleavage-building comprise a discursive strategy of the Alliance and the Conference to position themselves against the discourse of backwardness. However, this supports the claim of Slootmaeckers et al. (2016) who argue that the opposition towards the LGBT advocacy supported by EU institutions can be orchestrated either via depicting LGBT agenda as “Western” or by linking progress and modernity to the so-called traditional values.

48 The present study hereby demonstrates the discursive practice of cleavage-building visible within the rhetorical positions of anti-LGBT activists. The provided analysis looks upon this cleavage-building as a form of cognitive resource grasped by the national activist groups in order to help frame their cause of containing same-sex marriages and consequential adoption rights for these unions. This conceptualisation can be also perceived as a form of discursive Europeanisation presented as usage that is also demonstrated in numerous studies hereby mentioned and conducted as case studies of CEE countries and their LGBT policies.

49 The influence of the EU anti-discrimination policies on various actors in CEE countries has been widely demonstrated. Nevertheless, in view of this understanding of actors’ agenda, we propose to promote the notion of discursive Europeanisation stemming from the discursive-sociological institutionalism among the tools which can help foster feminist scholarship within CEE countries. The outcomes of the cleavage-building analysis are especially striking within the context of LGBT and gender equality policies within this region, as the notions of “traditional and progressive” and “European and national” tend frame the agenda of these policies in a specific direction.