In what Amitav Acharya has called a ‘multiplex world,’ the dominance of the liberal international order is increasingly challenged both from within and without by the presence of multiple and crosscutting scripts of what Europe and the world are and should be. In response to such multiplexity, the European Union needs to adapt in a way that acknowledges ‘European values’ as one normative vision on offer among many, while also aiming to subvert contemporary ‘culture war’ antagonisms. This is especially relevant in the promotion and enforcement of LGBTI equality. In a time when transnational anti-gender politics is becoming increasingly consequential, both within and beyond the Union as well as among its Western allies, the future of LGBTI equality promotion may rightfully focus energies on safeguarding existing achievements. While important, such a strategy risks reproducing homonormative divisions between those who are for and those who are against sexual and gender diversity, rather than offering a way out of the trenches. This paper therefore identifies two, at times conflicting, normative visions for the EU’s internal and global LGBTI equality promotion that the Union needs to pursue and navigate. Drawing on queer theories of temporality, Jacques Derrida’s deconstruction of futurity, and the work of agonistic theorist Bonnie Honig, the paper conceptualizes this as a tension between protecting ‘what remains’ (of LGBTI equality and its support) and striving for the ‘queer remainder’ (visions of European and global sexual integration that break with existing notions of what is possible). While the current challenges to what remains posed by anti-gender politics are well-documented, the paper discusses potential ‘queer remainders.’ It does so by identifying and rearticulating the justifications most prevalently used by the European Commission and the External Action Service to legitimize the rightfulness of European and global integration on questions of sexual and gender diversity, such as ‘values,’ ‘diversity,’ the need for ‘progress,’ and the protection of the ‘most vulnerable.’ Put into practice, the European Union would participate in actively shaping a vision of global sexual and gender diversity to come, rather than merely safeguarding a future of the liberal international order of the past.

After a brief description of the European Union’s 2020-2025 LGBTIQ equality strategy and the implementing measures adopted, the paper examines the specific actions aimed at combating discrimination against LGBTIQ people when exercising the right to free movement and residence in the EU.

To this end, it first discusses the proposal for a Regulation on private international law issues of parenthood, presented by the Commission on 7 December 2022, and its (potential) suitability to facilitate the recognition of legal ties among the members of “rainbow” families when they move within the EU.

Secondly, it will analyse the objective of the strategy to improve the recognition of the personal status and gender identity of trans, non-binary and intersex people between Member States, focusing on the compatibility of the existing legal framework with the fundamental rights of the persons concerned, in the light of the case law of the ECJ and the ECtHR.

The paper aims to identify the main obstacles to the implementation of the EU strategy on LGBTIQ equality, which are related to the conflict of interests at stake: on the one hand, the need to ensure the free movement and residence of LGBTIQ persons without discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, and on the other hand, the concern of Member States to preserve their competence in matters of family and status, as well as their cultural traditions and national identities.