In a continent fatigued by overlapping emergencies—pandemics, war, digital upheavals, and democratic erosion—the question of leadership is no longer abstract. It is deeply gendered, painfully structural, and undeniably urgent.
Berlin, August 2025 – Ursula von der Leyen’s tenure as President of the European Commission is drawing to a close. Her time in office has been marked by historic milestones: navigating Brexit aftermath, managing pandemic recovery funds, confronting Russian aggression in Ukraine, and pushing for digital regulation on a continental scale. And yet, beneath these institutional triumphs lies a more disquieting reality—Europe’s much-touted feminist credentials are showing signs of systemic fatigue.
In a recent Eurobarometer survey, only 37% of European women under 35 say they trust EU institutions to protect their rights in the age of artificial intelligence. In contrast, over 60% say they feel increasingly surveilled, underrepresented, or “instrumentalized” by tech policy narratives that promise inclusion while enabling exclusion. It is a paradox worth pausing over.
For all the photo ops with female commissioners, female heads of state, and the now-ubiquitous “Gender Equality Strategies” printed in glossy multilingual PDFs, the real power dynamics remain largely untouched. The digital turn of the last five years—accelerated by generative AI, predictive policing, and biometric governance—has in many cases deepened the precarity of those already on the margins, especially women of color, migrant women, caregivers, and single mothers. The feminist discourse celebrated in Brussels conference halls rarely travels to Calais, Lesbos, or the outskirts of Marseille.
According to data from the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE), female political representation in key AI policy-making bodies remains under 28% across the EU. Meanwhile, women constitute over 72% of those employed in the lowest-paying digital moderation jobs—exposed to trauma, working without contracts, and often silenced by NDAs.
Who leads in this crisis landscape? Is it enough to have female faces in power if the policies they uphold remain structurally extractive, technocratic, and market-driven?
Take the example of Finland’s former Prime Minister, Sanna Marin. She captivated global media as a young, progressive woman steering her country through pandemic turbulence and NATO accession. But the backlash she faced—over her private life, fashion choices, and party habits—was not merely tabloid spectacle. It was a symptom of a Europe that still polices female leadership through archaic lenses, where credibility is fragile and constantly tested.
Or consider Roberta Metsola, President of the European Parliament, who has championed digital rights while simultaneously supporting legislation that expands surveillance powers under the guise of “child protection” and “anti-terrorism.” The political cost of such contradictions often falls disproportionately on women—particularly those who try to advocate from within the institutions rather than from the streets.
Yet feminist leadership in Europe is not dead. It is simply less visible—and far more decentralized than Brussels likes to admit.
It emerges in community-led digital cooperatives in Barcelona, where women build open-source platforms to protect privacy and autonomy. It pulses in Polish abortion-rights collectives that have digitized mutual aid under rising authoritarianism. It lives in the voices of Afghan and Iranian asylum seekers, interviewed by feminist journalists in safe houses across Europe, who challenge the boundaries of Western feminist solidarity itself.
These are not isolated anecdotes. They are warnings. They suggest that if European feminism wishes to survive this era of data capitalism, militarized borders, and algorithmic governance, it must decenter itself from the boardrooms of Davos and the corridors of Strasbourg. It must return to the field—not metaphorically, but literally. To the Wi-Fi blackspots. To the shelters. To the courtrooms and deportation centers.
And crucially, it must recalibrate what it means to lead. Leadership is not merely about occupying high office. It is about redistributing voice, revisiting strategy, and refusing co-optation. It is about rejecting the dichotomy between “technological innovation” and “care work”—and instead designing policy that sees both as interdependent, not opposed.
If Europe is indeed entering a post-neoliberal phase, as some policy analysts cautiously suggest, then the feminist question becomes strategic, not symbolic. Who will shape the AI ethics frameworks? Who decides what counts as a “safe digital space”? Who defines the family in asylum law or the metric for dignity in the welfare algorithm?
These are not bureaucratic questions. They are existential. They are feminist.
Because feminism in crisis mode is not a campaign—it is a survival tactic. One that Europe can no longer afford to overlook.
Élise Moreau, French investigative journalist and international correspondent at Phoenix24. Specialist in European affairs, gender equity & digital democracy.