Description
The attacks against ‘gender ideology’ and feminism have reshaped not only the discussions around abortion and sexual and reproductive rights in most Latin American countries, but also feminist strategies, discourses and articulations aimed at counteracting these conservative narratives. In this presentation I analyse the socio-political debate of abortion in Chile from 2015 (when the bill to liberalise abortion was introduced by president Bachelet) to the emergence of COVID-19 and the process of changing the Chilean Constitution in 2021. I discuss whether the anti-gender recrudescence could be better understood by the increasing importance of feminist voices in both academia and activism against the forceful imposition of women’s ‘natural role’ of reproduction and motherhood. I will discuss some of the feminist strategies against ‘anti-gender forces,’ particularly the cooptation of feminist struggles by conservative groups, who have claimed to be the ones resisting neoliberalism and the ‘real defenders’ of women’s rights. I contend that feminist organizations have shown the importance of resisting reactionary modes of biopolitics in contemporary Chile, particularly those that act upon the individual body through sex education, ‘the family,’ and the reinforcement of traditional gender roles. They do so by 1) understanding abortion as an issue of social justice; 2) addressing the politics of affects involved in the experience of abortion; and 3) considering the collective or relational aspects of choice and autonomy.
