Radicals with Reach
International networks of ultra-conservative organisations are eroding liberal values in Central and Eastern Europe. In countries like Poland, they have expanded their political influence and changed society.
Much of the momentum has come from the Ordo Iuris Institute for Legal Culture, a Warsaw-based, powerful think tank of ultra-conservative lawyers that has led the charge against LGBT and women’s rights in the name of the “natural family”, both at home and in the region.
We follow the meanderings of a long campaign to roll back women’s rights and overturn the Istanbul Convention on domestic violence. As we go deeper into the networks of ultra-conservative groups, we find the same individuals and organisations popping up again and again.
Co-founder and editor-in-chief at FRONTSTORY.PL, Wojciech Cieśla is an award-winning Polish journalist who, since 2016, has worked with Investigate Europe. He is the co-founder and chairman of Fundacja Reporterów (Reporters Foundation). He is based in Warsaw.