diff --git a/gnu/local.mk b/gnu/local.mk
index 7cb5cad2ee..234d283ee6 100644
--- a/gnu/local.mk
+++ b/gnu/local.mk
@@ -798,6 +798,7 @@ dist_patch_DATA =						\
   %D%/packages/patches/dbus-helper-search-path.patch		\
   %D%/packages/patches/dbus-c++-gcc-compat.patch		\
   %D%/packages/patches/dbus-c++-threading-mutex.patch		\
+  %D%/packages/patches/dconf-meson-0.52.patch			\
   %D%/packages/patches/debops-constants-for-external-program-names.patch \
   %D%/packages/patches/debops-debops-defaults-fall-back-to-less.patch \
   %D%/packages/patches/deja-dup-use-ref-keyword-for-iter.patch	\
diff --git a/gnu/packages/gnome.scm b/gnu/packages/gnome.scm
index dd9ac29f4e..37873e42bc 100644
--- a/gnu/packages/gnome.scm
+++ b/gnu/packages/gnome.scm
@@ -2851,6 +2851,7 @@ and RDP protocols.")
                     "mirror://gnome/sources/" name "/"
                     (version-major+minor version) "/"
                     name "-" version ".tar.xz"))
+              (patches (search-patches "dconf-meson-0.52.patch"))
               (sha256
                (base32
                 "1azz4hb9z76yxn34yrrsiib3iqz5z4vpwn5q7cncp55w365ygg38"))))
diff --git a/gnu/packages/patches/dconf-meson-0.52.patch b/gnu/packages/patches/dconf-meson-0.52.patch
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..c636edc108
--- /dev/null
+++ b/gnu/packages/patches/dconf-meson-0.52.patch
@@ -0,0 +1,19 @@
+Fix build failure with Meson 0.52.
+
+Taken from upstream:
+https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/dconf/commit/7ad890fb7a2ec90a777a756a1fa20a615ec7245e
+https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/dconf/merge_requests/54
+
+diff --git a/client/meson.build b/client/meson.build
+index f3b7122cb05bfa7bb481c487e3cd052aa1ad58e5..de6387e2cac2aba12b83f2614c277bada434fd16 100644
+--- a/client/meson.build
++++ b/client/meson.build
+@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ libdconf_client = static_library(
+ 
+ libdconf_client_dep = declare_dependency(
+   dependencies: gio_dep,
+-  link_whole: libdconf_client,
++  link_with: libdconf_client,
+ )
+ 
+ libdconf = shared_library(