From Human Rights to Emancipation: Four Decades of Feminist Movement Configurations in Latin America

Abstract

This article explores the evolution of feminist movements in Latin America over the past four decades, focusing on their shifting organizational structures and evolving perspectives on women’s rights, democracy, and citizenship. It asks: how have evolving conceptions of democracy and citizenship been shaped by transformations in the movement’s organizational configurations? Although early feminist discourse was rooted in a human rights framework that linked women’s rights to the democratization struggles against authoritarian regimes, this framework has grown increasingly multifaceted over time. Latin American feminists have ultimately redefined democracy and citizenship, conceptualizing them not merely as political inclusion but as a broader pursuit of emancipation from all forms of oppression. The central argument is that these transformations are deeply tied to organizational shifts, as the feminist movement transitioned from a marginal faction within broader women’s movements in the 1980s to a dynamic, heterogeneous network of multiple feminist collectives by the early 2020s.

Introduction

In the past four decades, feminists have been pivotal in shaping the political and social landscape of Latin America. Throughout the region’s successive sociopolitical shifts, activists have contributed to the democratization of social relations (Biroli 2013; García and Valdivieso 2005; Molyneux 2001). They have broadened conceptions of citizenship and governance at crucial junctures, when the roles of the state, market, and society were drastically redefined (Barrancos and Buquet 2022; Jaquette 2009). Their vision of democracy includes a society free from coercive powers, where all citizens are equally included (Sagot 2014). Feminists have advanced an explicit dimension about “sexual citizenship,” which involves reshaping public life to ensure it is no longer dominated by heterosexual males (Friedman and Tabbush 2019, 12). In this struggle, feminists across the region have defied patriarchal structures that perpetuate direct and indirect discrimination and exclusion (Bohn and Levy 2021a). The feminist movement’s success in reshaping the democratic landscape raises critical questions about its organizational structures and their role in framing ideas. Drawing on existing studies and my own previous research, I ask: how have evolving conceptions of democracy and citizenship been embedded in transformations in the movement’s organizational configurations?

Scholars have long contended that the Latin American women’s movement is a collective force led by and for women advocating for women’s well-being, regardless of whether participants explicitly align with feminist ideologies (Barrancos and Buquet 2022; Horton 2015; Jaquette 2009; Molyneux 2001; Safa 1990). Within this broader movement, feminists have played a pivotal role in promoting a shared collective identity and constructing “a common floor of equal citizenship” (Lamas 2012, 18). In Latin America, feminists are those who advocate for gender equality with a strong focus on challenging and transforming patriarchal structures (Vargas 2002). They have forged distinctive alliance-building strategies, not only among themselves but also with other social and political movements (Bohn and Levy 2021a; Carosio et al. 2012; Rioja et al. 2024; Sagot 2017). This dynamic is often described by activists as driven by “militant energy,” reflecting their unwavering commitment to sustaining and expanding the movement: “What gives meaning to our actions is an important feminist activist spirit.”¹ Additionally, they emphasize the importance of “being autonomous in our thinking,”² resisting the passive adoption of mainstream ideas from the global gender regime. They have also searched for an intersectional perspective on democracy rooted in anti-colonial and anti-racist thought, brought about by Afro and indigenous feminists (Bastian Duarte 2012; Curiel 2019; Espinosa Miñoso 2009; Gargallo 2007).

This article examines how feminist organizational practices across different periods have underpinned evolving perspectives on women’s rights, citizenship, and democracy. It explores the connections between the organizational configurations of feminism and their distinct frameworks of democracy and citizenship. To address this puzzle, this article leans on profuse studies in the field of feminist movements, as well as the author’s previous work on the subject.³ It offers an overview and appraisal, aimed at taking stock of its key developments over the past forty years.

The literature on feminist movements in the region is extensive,⁴ as these movements have drawn the attention of scholars both within and beyond the region, fostering a transnational intellectual community. The Latin American Studies Association has consistently promoted critical reflections on feminisms, social movements, and the state. Similarly, the Latin American Social Science Council has facilitated working groups throughout Latin America and the Caribbean, shaping a distinctive regional feminist scholarship. Additionally, in recent decades, universities across the region have flourished with vibrant gender, women’s studies and feminist programs, research initiatives, and gender and feminist journals. This article, however, focuses on a subset of this work, prioritizing panoramic overviews and striving for a balance between publications in Spanish and English.

Many studies focus on feminists’ mobilization strategies, their demands, and organizational challenges (Barrancos and Buquet 2022; Bohn and Levy 2021a; Ewig and Friedman 2023; García and Valdivieso 2005; Jaquette 2009; Zaremberg and de Almeida 2022). This research examined how women’s collective action took advantage of opportunity structures and how their agenda and coalition-building efforts responded to transformations of the economy and the state (Carosio et al. 2012; García and Valdivieso 2005; Horton 2015; Molyneux 2001; Pousadela and Bohn 2023). Likewise, the question of “how to organize” within the Latin American feminist movement has attracted significant scholarly attention (Alvarez 1999; Conway and Lebon 2021; Valdivieso 2016; Zaremberg and de Almeida 2022). These studies have shown that feminist movements are rarely unified under a single organization that provides unilateral direction or structure. Instead, the organizational form is often diffuse, comprising multiple groups that vary in size, structure, strategies, and framing (Alvarez 2014; Zaremberg and Lucero 2019). Organizational decisions have proven to be politically sensitive (Chaparro 2021; Espinosa Miñoso 2009). For instance, at the Seventh Latin American Feminist Encounter held in Chile in 1996, a significant schism arose over differing perspectives of how the movement should ultimately look (Alvarez et al. 2003).

Our main argument is that, over time, feminism has expanded, with multiple organizational forms, and articulated more nuanced understandings of democracy and citizenship. Initially emerging as a small faction within the broader women’s movement, feminism has evolved into a powerful and diverse network spanning the region. These networks frame democracy as a process of emancipation from all forms of oppression, embracing a radical reinterpretation of the human rights framework.

To explore how the shifting configurations of Latin American feminist movements have influenced evolving notions of democracy and citizenship, this article focuses on three key dimensions: the tension between formal organizations and informal collectives, the dual role of feminism as both a societal and multi-sited movement, and its identity as either an organizational field or a heterogeneous assembly of groups and individuals. Feminists everywhere have long debated the significance of organizational forms for enacting prefigurative ideals such as egalitarianism, horizontal consensus, and rotating leadership, acknowledging that the movement combines formal, informal, and hybrid collectives (Bordt 1997; Ewig and Ferree 2013; Mason 2007). The sites where feminism is enacted are equally critical for shaping the movement. Whether feminists engage solely within the social realm or participate in institutions significantly influences the construction of shared frameworks (Armstrong and Bernstein 2008; Staggenborg 2001). Certainly, the cross-pollination of ideas is more likely with “velvet triangles” across different realms (Ahrens 2023; Holli 2008). Lastly, movement boundaries are also relevant for the bricolage of ideas. The movement’s ideational creativity may be shaped by whether groups and collectives define themselves as part of a clearly bounded field, adhering to explicit criteria of feminism and women’s claims, or operate as fluid networks within a heterogeneous assembly characterized by diverse action regimes (Alvarez 2014; Bunjun 2010; Zaremberg and de Almeida 2022).

Latin America is highly diverse, characterized by distinct processes across countries and subregions, such as the Southern Cone, Andean region, Central America and the Caribbean, and Mexico. This diversity is further reflected in the wide range of feminist experiences and identities, shaped by intersecting factors such as class, race, and sexual orientation. Acknowledging these complexities, this article offers generalizations to outline the main organizational contours of the movement over four decades. This approach risks oversimplification, for it does not delve into specific contexts and strands of the movement.

Because the article examines how feminists’ frameworks were shaped by ways they organized over four decades, from the transition to democracy in the 1980s to present times, I present the analysis by decade. For each period, I examine the main ideas and link them to the movement configuration. While I do not claim to make causal arguments, I seek to illustrate the relevance of how organizational features influence the way ideas circulate and combine.

“Democracy in the country and at home”

The transitions to democracy spanned from the 1980s through the early 1990s, marking the “third wave” of democratization (Huntington 1991). During this time, Southern Cone countries ended military regimes, and the early 1990s saw the resolution of civil wars in Central America through Peace Accords. The feminist movement largely re-emerged as an oppositional force against authoritarianism and, as part of the women’s movement, contributed decisively to the opening of the polity (Lebon 2010; Molyneux 2001; Waylen 2007). Women demanded the return of competitive elections and peace, engaging in mass protests, along with other social movements, such as students’ and workers’ unions.

Organizing against oppressive and oligarchic regimes united women and feminists around the human rights discourse as a foundational framework (Craske and Molyneux 2002; Jelin 1987). As an Argentine activist recalls: “[in the 1980s] the feminist discourse framed demands as human rights. During the democratic transitions, there were interactions between feminists and human rights activists.”⁵ Combining this perspective with the classic motto “the personal is political,” Latin American feminists questioned the conservative norms governing the relations between the state, the economy, and society, as well as the multiple forms of discrimination against women (Jaquette 1994).

For feminists, democracy implied women’s voices being heard both in the public and private spheres (Kirkwood 1983). In countries such as Chile, where women mobilized under the lexeme “democracy in the country and at home,” feminists helped connect authoritarian and patriarchal structures in the state, at home, and in political parties (Valdés 1993). This claim was innovative at the time, as it broadened the debate around democracy conceived only as a competitive electoral regime that confined the polity to the formal political system alone.

On expanding the dimensions of citizenship, feminists made women’s reproductive roles politically and socially relevant, initiating a cultural process of valuing women’s unpaid and care work (Guzmán 2003). By opening the black box of the “private sphere,” feminists expressed that “domestic violence” and “intrafamily violence” constituted fundamental violations of human rights (Rico 1992).⁶

Feminists also inscribed women’s rights within broader social justice struggles (García and Valdivieso 2005; Jelin 1987; Maier 2010). They reimagined full citizenship as the right to live free from poverty, as they combined multiple rights such as employment, education, access to health, and state-sponsored childcare (Ewig and Friedman 2023, 343). While human rights discourses in the Western North often emphasized civil and political liberties as part of political democracy, feminists in Latin America understood them more broadly, with social and economic rights as part of the normative basis of democracy (Craske and Molyneux 2002).

Certainly, feminists questioned the democratic structures of the state. Some activists envisioned a “cuarto propio” (a room of one’s own) and were adamant about women’s policy agencies (Guzmán 2001; Pitanguy 2003), inspired by the transnational exchange at the UN Nairobi Conference in 1985. Others advocated for democratizing the state from the “outside,” without losing autonomy (Alvarez 1990). While this tension would replicate in the next decades, activists coincided with the relevance of democratic forms of governance.

Movement configuration

This integration of recognition and redistributive claims (Fraser 2000) into a women’s human rights discourse reflected the convergence of diverse groups of women into a broader women’s movement—one that included feminists but ultimately transcended them. In fact, during the transition to democracy, women organized as women (Baldez 2001; Craske and Molyneux 2002; García and Valdivieso 2005). Feminists were a numerical minority, mostly White, intellectual, middle-class women. Some belonged to political parties illegalized under dictatorships, returning from political exile (Molyneux 2001).⁷ Many grassroots women from urban impoverished areas also mobilized, organizing informally to provide goods and services for their families and communities (Raczynski and Serrano 1992). These groups included Afro-descendant women and, in rural areas, Indigenous women (though many of them joined mixed organizations) (Lebon 2010). Activists from the human rights movement played a pivotal role in shaping the women’s movement ideas (Ewig and Friedman 2023; Jelin 1987), exemplified by Argentina’s iconic Madres de Plaza de Mayo, who leveraged their maternal identity as a powerful form of political resistance, demanding justice for their disappeared children (Di Marco 2011).

Whereas the women’s movement was decentralized, it was not fragmented, as feminists forged ties across various social segments, building alliances and anchoring exchanges in emerging nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). NGOs became increasingly prevalent in the mid-1980s. These organizations, staffed by professionals, gathered women from all walks of life.⁸ As a Paraguayan activist explains, these early NGOs later became known as “clásicas” for their historical trajectory that allowed “larger alliances”⁹ across multiple strands of the movement. However, they might have unintendedly introduced some degree of “hierarchy in their interaction with base groups,” as argued by a Salvadoran feminist.¹⁰

Intersectoral and cross-party alliances of women further nurtured this comprehensive women’s human rights framework. In Brazil, feminists from political parties, grassroots organizations, and professional women’s associations united to articulate a gender equality platform. This effort, often referred to as the “Lipstick Lobby” (lobby do batom), significantly influenced the inclusion of gender equality provisions in the 1988 Constitution (Carneiro 2003). The Coalition of Women for Democracy in Chile (Valdés 1993), the Multisectorial of Women in Argentina (Marx, Borner, and Caminotti 2007), and the Concertation of Women in Uruguay also exemplified spaces for the cross-pollination of ideas.

Feminists’ long-standing transnational efforts were important for the circulation of ideas. Activists organized region-wide feminist gatherings, known as the Latin American and Caribbean Encuentros, starting as early as 1981 in Bogotá and held every three years since. These broad-based meetings, featuring workshops, plenary sessions, and various activities, attracted a diverse range of women, including those who did not necessarily identify with feminism (Vargas 2002). These Encuentros would serve as spaces for both collaboration and conflict, particularly around class, race, and sexual identity lines, which eventually would enrich the feminist framework in the region (Alvarez et al. 2003; García and Valdivieso 2005; Sternbach et al. 1992).

Radicalizing the human rights framework

During the 1990s, democratically elected governments implemented market-oriented reforms under the “Washington Consensus,” which led to widespread inequality and unemployment. Feminists became an important segment of the women’s movement in terms of scale, action, and discourse, and expressed their “discontent” given the high levels of violence against women, their lack of sexual autonomy and unmet reproductive needs, as well as the persistent economic hardships (Vargas 2002). Peruvian activist Virginia Vargas suggested it was necessary to rethink citizenship and democracy in more radical terms (Vargas 2002). Likewise, Paraguayan feminist Line Bareiro asserted that democracy remained “incomplete” and “fragile” given the persistent exclusion of women and their interests (Bareiro 1998).

Leaning on the human rights discourse, feminists forged the notion of “active citizenship” (Valdés and Donoso 2009), claiming “the right to have rights” in a wide range of issues (Maier 2010). As the 1995 Platform for Action of the Fourth World Conference on Women consecrated the state as a major actor in bringing about gender justice (Molyneux and Razavi 2005), feminists constructed ideas about social accountability of public actions to guarantee compliance with women’s rights (Valdés and Donoso 2009). With notions of democratic governance, feminists thought of a more porous state for the demands of civil society (Guzmán 2003). They envisioned women’s organizing as the political force necessary for participation and deliberation (Valdés and Donoso 2009, 166–67).

In this decade, bodily autonomy gained discursive prominence through evolving understandings of both gender-based violence and sexual and reproductive rights. Always conceived as a human rights violation (and then consecrated as such in the Belém do Pará Convention in 1994),¹¹ violence against women became framed as a consequence of broader gender hierarchies and systemic patriarchal control (Araujo, Mauro, and Guzmán 2000). Concurrently, with the 1994 UN Cairo Conference on Population and Development as backdrop, feminists put sexual and reproductive health as an essential component of human rights, with a focus on autonomy in decisions about sexuality and procreation without coercion, discrimination, or violence (Gutiérrez 2021). With these ideas, feminists positioned women’s control over their own bodies as fundamental to citizenship and democratic participation (Lamas 2008).

Feminists continued bridging gender equality with broader demands for social justice and economic rights (Sagot 2014). In the context of austerity measures and inequitable wealth distribution, they highlighted how structural inequalities exponentiated by neoliberal policies intersected with gender-based oppression, emphasizing the need for collective solutions (Conway and Lebon 2021).

Movement configuration

The radicalization of the human rights framework was encompassed by a diversification of organizational forms, mobilization structures, and communication channels. Both formal and informal groups expanded across a broad spectrum of thematic areas, including reproductive rights, violence against women, and economic inequality. They also diverged along class, race, and ethnic distinctions (Jaquette 2009). Additionally, identity groups of Indigenous, Afro, and lesbian women consolidated their national and regional movements (Espinosa Miñoso 2016; Lind 2003).¹² For instance, the First Meeting of Black Latin American and Caribbean Women was held in the Dominican Republic in 1992, while the First Continental Meeting of Indigenous Women of the Americas took place in Ecuador in 1995. All this produced a more complex organizational landscape for feminism, to which we must add an expansion of transnational networks forged by the UN global gender regime (Molyneux 2001).

During this decade, many groups adopted a formal structure and professional style to enact feminism, mostly NGOs, which produced the NGO-ization of the movement (Alvarez 1999). These organizations were, for the most part, founded by feminists or by activists who identified with feminist goals and played a crucial role in cultural work (Lamas 2021). As one activist from Ecuador recalls: “In the 1990s, several feminist gatherings were held, and the colleagues from CEPAM’s board [Centro Ecuatoriano para la Acción y la Promoción de la Mujer] were very active in the creation and strengthening of the feminist movement.”¹³ Because their resources enabled them to reach broader audiences (García and Valdivieso 2005), NGOs fostered ties with grassroots collectives, thus helping overcome fragmentations along class lines (Coe 2020). Likewise, feminists in NGOs promoted umbrella organizations, uniting women with different interests into common goals and more radical demands, such as the Articulation of Brazilian Women in 1994 (Bohn and Levy 2021b). However, other feminists criticized NGOs, arguing that these more resourceful, professionalized structures often imposed hierarchies within the movement (Alvarez 1999). Some grassroots activists expressed concerns that NGO leaders, frequently from more privileged classes and educational backgrounds, might overlook their specific needs (Espinosa Miñoso 2009; Ewig 1999; Molyneux 2001).

Concomitantly, the return of democracy brought about opportunities for activists to enter formal political institutions, as legislators or as officials in newly formed women’s policy agencies. Mostly aligned with progressive parties (Jaquette 2009; Lamas 2021), these governance feminists, particularly at the local level (as in the left-wing governments of São Paulo in Brazil, Rosario in Argentina, and Montevideo in Uruguay), helped organize and mobilize grassroots women around citizenship, participatory democracy, and social reproduction (González and Bruera 2005; Rodríguez Gustá 2019). Nonetheless, some feminists expressed concerns about governance feminists because gender institutional structures often remained underfunded, thus leaving women’s needs unsatisfied, while others asserted that they overlooked social class (Schild 2015) and ethnic differences (Richards 2005). Despite such well-founded criticisms, governance feminists developed, at the subnational level, what Massolo (2006) calls “virtuous triangles” or cross-collaboration among various groups of women, around ideas of active citizenship. At the national level, interactions between governance feminists (and NGOs) and social movement activists built women’s rights platforms at crucial moments such as the constitutional reforms in Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, and Paraguay (Guzmán 2003; López Rodríguez and Meriño Fontalvo 2023; Vela 2006).

Tensions about feminist organizing and the proper sites of activism were common in the regional Encuentros (Alvarez et al. 2003). Open conflicts occurred between “outsiders” versus “insiders,” “integrated” versus “autonomous,” “hegemonic” versus “non-hegemonic,” and “institutionalized” versus “base” activists (Espinosa Miñoso 2009; Gargallo 2007). These open disagreements and debates would help to introduce more nuance in feminists’ understanding of democracy and a more radical perspective on the human rights language (Vargas 2002), by putting the reality of women’s differences along class, racial and ethnic origins, and sexual orientation on the agenda.

Feminism “as a civilizing change”

At the beginning of the millennium, when a wave of electoral victories for center-left coalitions ushered in the “Pink Tide” period, women were already mobilized, as signaled by rural Brazilian’s women Marcha das Margaridas in 2000, led by rural and Indigenous women. These new governments prioritized social inclusion and redistributive reforms, favored by an export commodity boom and economic growth. Countries such as Bolivia, Brazil, and Ecuador explicitly focused on including marginalized populations along ethnic and racial lines. Feminists aspired for a more inclusive political environment, which was realized at least partially under some of these governments, such as Brazil and Uruguay (Rodríguez Gustá, Madera, and Caminotti 2017). However, it remained constrained in others, such as Nicaragua and Ecuador, where political openness was more limited (Friedman and Tabbush 2019).

At the 2000 UN General Assembly Session, Latin American feminists demanded “Justice, Rights, and Democracy” (Vargas 2012). This call evolved over the decade, culminating in the conception of feminism as a project that opposed systemic inequalities and structural injustices, framing it as a “civilizing change” (Carosio et al. 2012) and a “new civilizational framework” (Carneiro 2003).¹⁴ From this standpoint, feminist ideas expanded in scale and ambition, as activists advocated for a fundamental reordering of social values, structures, and norms, embracing broader principles of justice, equity, and human dignity. Feminists confronted not only patriarchal structures but also the capitalist economic systems that sustained and deepened various forms of inequality, social exclusion, and deep-seated poverty, all of which undermined Latin American’s democratic institutions (Sagot 2014; Valdivieso 2016). This broader project of transformation incorporated intersectionality more openly, that is, a recognition of multiple systemic oppressions related to racism and colonialism that affected dramatically the lives and bodies of Indigenous and Afro-descendant women (Carneiro 2003; Curiel 2007).

Bodily autonomy served as a connecting dot for multiple demands, from labor exploitation to discrimination and lack of reproductive freedom. Connections between sexual freedom, territorial justice, and anti-extractivism were reflected, for example, in the emblematic regional campaign My Body, My Territory (Mi cuerpo, mi territorio) of the network Articulación Feminista Marcosur. Also, bodily autonomy reframed gender violence as a life free from all forms of violence, including institutional and political violence, rape and sexual assault, and sex trade and trafficking (Lamas 2021).¹⁵ By incorporating queer theories and praxes, feminists deconstructed notions about sexuality and gendered bodies, as well as binary understandings of identity, expanding their focus to encompass the fluidity and complexity of these categories (Johnson and Sempol 2023). Additionally, sexual and reproductive rights gained prominence: the right to safe abortion became as integral to citizenship as suffrage, exemplified by Uruguay’s “The Voting Hand” campaign, linking the legalization of abortion to the principles of democratic inclusion (Vacarezza 2020).

Democracy remained central to the concept of “civilizing change.” Feminists opposed authoritarianism and illiberal governments (such as the coup in Honduras in 2009 and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega’s shift to conservative populism), denouncing attacks against female human rights defenders. The state remained a site of discursive interests, with concepts such as the secular state as a requisite for inclusive democracy, particularly in light of rising fundamentalist conservative actors (Celiberti 2003). Feminists remained critical of the lack of women’s participation in institutions of political representation, for which reason the concept of “women as second-class citizenships” was part of the feminist ideational arsenal for demanding “parity,” as a Colombian activist explains: “We believe it is very important that the state recognizes us as political actors, as an explicit recognition that we are full citizens, and citizens with the ability to contribute.”¹⁶

Movement configuration

Between the 2000s and 2015, Latin American feminism experienced exponential growth, described by a Honduran activist as “feminist inflation” due to the rising number of women embracing feminist claims and identities. This expansion blurred the lines between women’s movements and feminist movements: “This is the twenty-first century. Even before the first decade of the century was over, feminism had already expanded, and this includes expansion within mixed popular organizations.”¹⁷ Organizations built upon group identities and specific needs also expanded, leading to what is often referred to as “feminisms with last names” (Ríos Tobar, Godoy Catalán, and Caviedes 2003). These diverse strands of feminism coexisted and included communitarian feminism, decolonial feminism, popular feminism, Afro-feminism, Indigenous feminism, among others (Bastian Duarte 2012; Curiel 2019; Di Marco 2011; Gargallo 2007; Paredes 2018). As such, the feminist movement evolved into a diverse and interconnected network of loosely linked groups, and even into “nested” networks (Zaremberg and de Almeida 2022), each one contributing with its own unique focus to a broader movement framework.

This expansion involved a process of “side-streaming” (Alvarez 2014), wherein the movement scaled up horizontally by collaborating with other social movements. Activists engaged in mixed organizations (Conway and Lebon 2021), expanding the gender equality agenda in social movements, labor unions, student organizations, universities, and political institutions. Since the feminist project sought to transform the broader social order, it required, as one Brazilian activist explained, “militant feminism … fighting for a gendered space” within these mixed organizations rather than remaining isolated in “women-only ghettos.”¹⁸ Through side-streaming, the voices of marginalized groups—such as poor women, Afro-descendants, Indigenous women, and rural and working-class women—were amplified, enriching feminism with a more nuanced understanding of women’s diverse needs and rights. Certainly, NGOs experienced a decline, primarily due to reduced external donor support. Some of them shut down while others merged; however, they continued to serve as crucial nodes within the movement.¹⁹

Among formal institutions, governance feminists grew in numbers, along with gender equality structures across different segments and levels of the state (Fernós 2010). In those center-left countries that opened opportunities for women’s rights, intersectional alliances between social movement activists and governance feminists nurtured new ideas about polity and public policies (Friedman and Tabbush 2019; Rodríguez Gustá et al. 2017). These alliances helped expand notions of citizenship, particularly in the constitutional reforms of Venezuela (1999), Ecuador (2008), and Bolivia (2009) (Rousseau 2011).

Transnational networks continued to flourish. Feminists participated in alter-globalization projects, such as the World Social Forums, which served to reimagine the gendered nature of the social order (Celiberti 2003).²⁰ Feminists convened at five regional feminist Encuentros, participated in UN follow-ups to the Cairo and Beijing conferences, and attended the Regional Conferences on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean, organized by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean.

In short, the movement’s organizational configuration played a pivotal role in shaping its transformative framework. The fluid, multi-sited nature of feminist organizing—spanning grassroots groups, NGOs, transnational networks, and governance structures—connected diverse struggles. This horizontal configuration enabled feminists to articulate intersectional perspectives, solidifying feminism as a civilizing project rooted in the lived realities of racialized and discriminated groups and their demands for systemic changes.

Feminism as emancipation

Since the mid-2010s onward, the region experienced the rise of far-right governments in countries such as Brazil and, more recently, Argentina, while center-left regimes persisted in others such as Mexico, alongside illiberal governments in Nicaragua and Venezuela. Economic stagnation, compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic, deepened inequalities, unemployment, and poverty. Amidst this context, feminism has emerged as a mass movement, marked by unprecedented street mobilizations and the widespread identification of women—across generations and life circumstances—with feminist causes.

In 2015, Argentina’s Not One Woman Less (Ni Una Menos) movement against femicides had an extraordinary ripple effect on the region. In Brazil, the 2015 Feminist Spring featured numerous protests, including the Black Women’s March and the Marcha das Margaridas. Similarly, in Mexico, the 2016 Violet Spring Against Machista Violence galvanized activism through the hashtag #VivasNosQueremos (We want ourselves alive). In Chile, the 2018 Feminist May protests, organized “against the culture of rape,” denounced sexual violence both nationally and within universities (Larrondo and Lara 2019, 31). The Green Wave marches for legal abortion further united women across social strata, with young people playing a prominent role.

While there is continuity in the movement’s framing with the recent past, in this period, feminists appeared to articulate more explicitly the idea of “emancipation” from all forms of oppression, now grounded in a clearly consolidated intersectional perspective (Carosio 2020; Sagot 2024). Feminists identified intersecting forms of oppression, rooted in Latin America’s histories of capitalism, racism, and colonialism, as a fundamental challenge (Curiel 2019; Gago 2019). Feminism further accommodated queer and LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer or questioning) ideas about gender identities, sexual preferences, and orientations (Johnson and Sempol 2023). The connection between bodily autonomy and the sustainability of life sparked deeper reflections on social reproduction and its crisis, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic. The final statement of the 15th Feminist regional Encuentro, held in El Salvador in 2023, embodies this intersection both in its content and linguistic form, notably through the use of nonbinary language: Ante la crisis del tejido de la vida: ¡unidas, unides, resistiendo y avanzando! (Faced with the crisis of the fabric of life: United, united,²¹ resisting, and moving forward!).

Bodily autonomy continued as a unifying thread for multiple demands and strands of feminism. Always linked to colonial violence and capitalism (Sagot 2024; Segato 2014), violence against women was increasingly conceptualized as a collective issue, that is, a group violation, rather than an act committed against individual women. Such collective consciousness was reflected in hashtags such as #SiTocanAUnaTocanATodas (If they touch one, they touch all) and #RespondemosTodas (We all respond) (Barrancos and Buquet 2022). The Green Wave movement, which began in Argentina with the National Campaign for the Right to Legal, Safe, and Free Abortion, spread across Latin America as a powerful call for reproductive rights. The chant “It will become law!” (Será ley) encapsulated a collective aspiration: that legalizing abortion was not merely a health issue or a moral debate, but a fundamental dimension of citizenship in any truly democratic society. Thus, as part of emancipation, abortion rights became intrinsic to democracy, human rights, and social justice (Sutton and Vacarezza 2021).

Feminists continued championing democracy as an inclusive polity, advocating for diverse voices and interests in the face of rising “fundamentalisms” whose illiberal measures threatened democratic values (Biroli 2020). To illustrate, they were at the forefront of resistance to the far-right government of Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, who repeatedly targeted gender rights and openly attacked feminists (Zaremberg and de Almeida 2022).

Movement configuration

The Latin American feminist movement was characterized by mass mobilization and a broad base of activists forming a diverse and heterogeneous assembly. This period marked a significant generational renewal, as young and very young women from diverse social classes and identities increasingly identified with intersectional perspectives of feminism. These young activists played a key role in broadening the understanding of “difference,” challenging the dominant norms of ethno-racial identity, gender, sexuality, and citizenship status (Friedman and Gustá 2024).²²

The movement transcended specific organizations and collectives as it formed a broader interpretive cross-cutting space with fluid boundaries. It included formal and informal groups, institutions, as well as individual activists, all of them unified by a feminist identity. Group geometries became amorphous and in flux, making it challenging to discern where one collective ended, and another began. Many groups, especially those created by young people, were short-lived.²³ They encouraged active participation and personal commitment and became “incubators” for other collectives reaching multiple audiences (Rodrigues and Gonçalves 2021).

The words “sororidad” (sorority) and “compañeras” (solidaristic friends) became symbols of the bonds that held multiple activists together. Sororidad, reflected in the powerful statement “Sister, I believe you” (Hermana, yo te creo) “conveys women’s political ability to stand up for each other, to have each other’s back, and to work across differences toward a common vision” (Sutton 2020, 5). Sorority networks emerged as prominent forms of organizing, providing support to mitigate the adversities of women’s daily lives, including access to abortion and protection from gender violence (Cubillos Almendra, Tapia, and Letelier Troncoso 2022).

Feminists made extensive use of digital platforms for organizing. Movements like #MeToo and #MiPrimerAcoso (#MyFirstHarassment) demonstrated the power of social media in connecting activists across borders (Barrancos and Buquet 2022). Digital activism enabled grassroots organizing and broader participation in protests and campaigns (Rodrigues and Gonçalves 2021). Digital networks gave rise to forms of cyberfeminism, that is, the gathering of people online to denounce violations of rights and develop resistance strategies.²⁴

In short, in Latin America, the feminist movement became what Latour (1999) calls a “proliferation of hybrids” reflecting creative organizational dynamics and regimes of action. Instead of nodal sites that coordinate collective actions, the movement gathered around the protests associated with the “feminist calendar,” such as March 8, June 3, or November 25, which became structuring forces facilitating the aggregation of ideas. A framework of emancipation was nurtured by young women, Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and LGBTQ+ feminists. As the Fourteenth Feminist Encuentro in Montevideo (2017) concluded, activists are “Diversas pero no dispersas” (“Diverse but not dispersed”).

Conclusions

This article sought to answer key questions regarding the organizational configurations of the Latin American feminist movement and their evolving intersections with ideas of democracy and citizenship over the last four decades. By examining these intersections through different historical periods—from the transitions to democracy in the 1980s to the present-day mass movement configurations—the article uncovers the movement’s adaptability and creativity in organizational forms and connections, as well as its profound influence on conceptualizing democracy and citizenship across the region. Feminists mobilized human rights discourses in an ever-expanding conception of citizenship. With time, feminists managed to combine multiple entitlements in their demands for citizenship: class and politics, identity, culture, and generations. By radicalizing the human rights framework, they constructed a complex discourse about the right to emancipation as living free from all forms of coercion.

Despite differences among feminists, alliances and interactions produced an increasingly interconnected movement, whose diversity had numerous nodes of feminist action. In terms of the contrast between organizing through formal and informal structures, feminists adopted both types, along with hybrid models that link formal NGOs with grassroots collectives and digital networks. These various organizational expressions connected in ways that enabled ideas to circulate across class and identity lines, linking gender equality to broader social and economic concerns. Regarding the axis of feminism as a social or multi-sited movement, feminists developed strategic alliances across multiple realms, from social movements and unions to academic institutions and state positions, which fostered cross-pollination of ideas and more complex frameworks of understanding. Also, the movement’s boundaries opened to diverse forms of collaboration and engagement. This transformation allowed the movement to become a vibrant bricolage, integrating contributions from a wide array of actors and sites, ultimately enriching feminist discourse.

In the 1980s, feminist activism emerged as a small yet pivotal part of a broader women’s movement. Characterized by informal collectives and loosely coupled networks, these early feminists focused on human rights and democratization. During this time, they framed their struggles within a women’s human rights discourse, advocating for the democratization of both public and private spheres. This foundational work enabled feminists to challenge not only political repression but also deeply entrenched patriarchal norms, demanding that democracy extend into personal relationships, families, and communities. As the 1990s unfolded, the organizational landscape diversified significantly. The rise of NGOs and governance feminists marked a shift toward institutional politics, where activists engaged with state structures to influence policymaking. Feminists critiqued the limits of procedural democracy, pushing for “active citizenship,” which emphasized women’s participation in public and political life as a central demand. By the early 2000s, feminism had transformed into a multi-sited movement characterized by various organizational forms and a plurality of feminist perspectives. This era marked a significant deepening of feminist critiques of democracy and citizenship, conceptualizing democracy as a radical, participatory process that must address systemic inequalities related to gender, class, and race. Feminists promoted the idea of a “civilizing change,” challenging both patriarchal structures and neoliberal economic systems, advocating for a more intersectional approach to democracy that encompassed multiple forms of oppression. From 2015 onward, the feminist movement continued to push for a broader and more inclusive understanding of democracy and citizenship. Movements such as Not One Woman Less and the Green Wave for abortion rights underscored the links between bodily autonomy and full citizenship, framing struggles for abortion rights as essential for realizing full democratic participation. Furthermore, contemporary activists expanded the discourse by making feminism a process of emancipation from colonialism, racism, and capitalism. Feminism as a movement became a heterogeneous assembly of activists and groups, where alliances formed across multiple social divides expressed in a mass movement.

Overall, feminists in the region spanned various social backgrounds, including intellectuals, grassroots community leaders, indigenous and Afro-descendant women, and youth, creating a mosaic of identities and perspectives that shaped the movement’s ideas in time. These diverse identities and structures allowed the movement to sustain and change its transformative vision of democracy and citizenship, positioning it as a powerful force for systemic change across the region.

Notes

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Elisabeth J. Friedman, Valeria Llobet, Verónica Mundt, Alba Ruibal, and Gisela Zaremberg for their insightful comments on earlier versions of this article. Any mistakes are the sole responsibility of the author.

Data availability

The data underlying this article cannot be publicly shared as the research relies on sensitive, personal, or identifiable information that must remain confidential.

References