Russia must be defended: Biopolitical Governance and Homosexuality in Saint Petersburg
Keywords:
homoseksuaalisuus, biopolitiikka, seksuaalivähemmistötAbstract
This article investigates the law prohibiting the propaganda of non-traditional sexual orientations to
minors in Saint Petersburg in 2012 through a Foucauldian biopolitical framework. It examines various
governmental techniques in Russia: visibility (what is highlighted and obfuscated), dynamics of
normalisation (what is made normal and what is made abnormal) and self-government (how nonnormative sexualities govern themselves). Taken together, these governmental techniques serve to
add homosexuality to the trope of Russia’s enemies, and thus connect it to the discourse of ‘Russia
must be defended’. The data for this paper comes from government documents and the commentary
surrounding the regional laws, and from 33 interviews conducted during 2012 via the social
networking site vKontakte. One of the clear themes from the interview data, which will be examined
through the theoretical framework using discourse analysis, was the feeling that they should remain
hidden in order to be tolerated and the rejection of Western methods of emancipation, such as gay
pride marches, by non-normative sexualities. In part, due to the link made, both by the authorities and
themselves that they are somehow un-Russian and foreign.
