From barriers to bridges: Actors actively shaping intersectional equality policy-making in R&I

Abstract

In this Working Paper, we argue that there needs to be a shift in how we understand intersectional policies. Rather than evaluating whether institutions have designed and implemented a fully-fledged “intersectional policy”, we adopt an alternative approach that identifies “traces of intersectionality”: existing policies and practices through which intersectionality is already being enacted. While these traces may be partial, informal, or even fragile, they provide entry points to further develop and can constitute the building blocks of broader change processes towards institutional change (Beeckmans et al. 2026). This approach overcomes the risk of reproducing binary logics of presence versus absence, when intersectionality is destined to remain an unattainable ideal or a rhetorical “buzzword”. In doing so, it highlights how intersectional equality policy-making is not only a matter of policy design and implementation, but a political process involving actors’ agency, negotiation strategies, and collective action to counter intersecting inequalities within R&I