Transnational Strategies of Civil Society Organizations Striving for Equality and Nondiscrimination: Exchanging Information on New EU Directives, Coalition Strategies and Strategic Litigation

During the Pride March in London last year, the Mayor of London Ken Livingstone implored the thousands gathered in Trafalgar square to ‘Follow the spark, follow the spark of San Francisco and Copenhagen and Amsterdam’ to bring about equality for gays and lesbians across Europe.1 These large public demonstrations and celebrations – Gay Pride events – held in many large and medium-sized cities across Europe each summer are important for broad social movements to create ‘social capital’ (Putnam 2000). This social capital is important for a movement, in terms of both creating a sense of individual identity and ‘bonding’ within the community and reaching out and ‘bridging’ to the broader society. These events have become an integral part of the Western European movement for equality for gays and lesbians and are now spreading across the continent. These events are also taking place where they have been resisted by local and national authorities – for example in Eastern European capitals such as Warsaw and Riga. Groups want to show their strength, show that they are visible and proud and proclaim their demands of equality towards state and society.