Afterthought: Fashion, Feminism and Radical Protest

We are currently witnessing an uncommon politicization of fashion as an expression of protest and dissent: fashion designers are making use of the runway as a site of resistance, and design clothes that communicate defiance against a global political climate characterized by the rise of far right, authoritarian and populist political movements. As a brief postscript to this special issue dedicated to fashion, politics and dissent, this essay is an attempt to make sense of a development that influences contemporary fashion and to point out some of the conflicts and contradictions that arise out of the convergence of feminism, fashion and radical protest. In order to comprehend the contemporary vogue of feminist fashion and fashionable feminism respectively, and to understand the dialectic between these two phenomena, the essay reconstructs how feminism has become fashionable yet again, and which forms of feminism and feminist activism have entered the cultural and political mainstream.