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143© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015 C.A. Brown (ed.), Globalization, International Education Policy and Local Policy Formation, Policy Implications of Research in Education 5, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-4165-2_9

Chapter 9 Education and Gender Rights in Latin America

Ezequiel Gomez Caride

Abstract The study explores the development of gender rights in Latin America’s legal and educational fi elds from the 1980s –when the previous legal frameworks were fi rst implemented– to the late 2000s, when Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay reformed their educational laws. In a relatively small number of years, Argentina (2006), Chile (2009) and Uruguay (2008) changed their national education legislation, including gender as a relevant element of the law for the fi rst time. The investigation analyzes, from a poststructuralist perspective, the situation that “suddenly” brought gender to the forefront as a major issue for educational policy in the southern part of Latin America. The chapter describes how gender was able to emerge as a category only when three elements – a set of powerful institutions represented by international organizations, a vast corpus of knowledge attached with a salvifi c rhetoric, and a set of local experts represented by women’s non-governmental organizations – were able to construct a language about gender that compelled national stakeholders to include gender rights in their educational national laws.

For 20 years the educational legislation in the South Cone (Argentina, Chile and Uruguay) did not take into account gender rights. Surprisingly, in the past few years the three countries changed their educational laws including a vast array of gender rights. In a relatively short amount of years, Argentina (2006), Chile (2009) and Uruguay (2008) changed their national education legislation. Through a discourse analysis this study analyzes the development of gender rights in Latin America’s legal educational scenario from the 1980s when the previous laws were fi rst imple- mented to the 2000s when the countries changed their educational laws. Following Popkewitz ( 1997 ), this “linguistic turn refers to a focus on language as a constitutive element in the construction of social life and ‘identity’” (p. 136). The study aspires to explore gender feminism in Latin America rather than women. I focus exclusively

E. Gomez Caride (*) School of Education , University of Wisconsin Madison , Madison , WI , USA e-mail: [email protected]

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on the national laws of education of Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay since they illustrate how politics played out in the educational sphere. My questions are oriented to explain the situation that “suddenly” brought gender to the forefront as a major issue of educational policy. Hence, my research studies what conditions allowed legislators to enact gender rights in the last few years? To what extent international organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) were crucial institu- tions in this emergence of gender rights?

In order to analyze gender emergence in Latin America I organized the study with six sections. First, I explain the understanding of gender deployed throughout the study. Second, I described the methodological approach. Third, I briefl y described the genesis of women’s struggle for education in Latin America. Forth, I turned to the political context of each country and tracked gender development through an analysis of educational laws. Later, my project aspired to study how international organizations and local NGOs infl uenced educational national laws in relation to gender rights. My project then analyzed the role of specifi c international organizations regarding gender and looked at the Latin American women’s interna- tional meeting of NGOs called Encounters . I did not establish a dichotomy between international actors versus local stakeholders. On the contrary, recent literature regarding the role of non-state actors promoting public policies “serves to break down the oft-used analytical dichotomy between what goes on in states (the domestic realm) and what goes on outside them (the international realm). In this new litera- ture, the borders of states are treated as potentially extremely porous” (True and Mintrom 2001 , p. 50). Studying this range of discourses in the implementation of educational policy allowed me to consider the development of gender in the Latin American scenario as a category to be seen and acted upon. In the development of educational legislation, I also came to see the very development of gender itself as a category that suddenly was legislated in Latin America.

Joan Scott in Gender and the Politics of History ( 1988 ) provides a useful defi ni- tion of gender as a “constitutive element of social relationships based on perceived differences between the sexes, and gender is a primary way of signifying relation- ships of power” (p. 42). Additionally, she goes further with four interrelated elements: culturally available symbols that evoke multiple representations; normative concepts that set forth interpretations of the meaning of symbols; a reference to social institutions and organizations that goes beyond kinship; a subjective identity that includes a historical point of view. This theoretical standpoint is the basis of current gender studies.

Since my study analyzes the development of educational national legislations, I focus on “the normative concepts that set forth interpretations” (Scott 1988 , p. 42), that is, I look at how the legislation depicts gender or not as a category. Following Scott, these concepts are “expressed in religious, educational, scientifi c, legal and political doctrines and typically take form of fi xed binary opposition” (Scott 1988 , p. 43). Hence, the analysis of educational laws is a suitable space to explore the normative concepts about gender that set forth interpretations in Argentina, Chile and Uruguay. Finally, my fi ndings do not have the aspiration of being full and

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closed answers; on the contrary, their role is more like the unveiling of new viewpoints that help to start to see the landscape from a broader perspective to foster a deeper understanding of how social changes occurred in Latin America.

9.1 Methodology

The particular situation in which my object of study is situated includes a vast array of entities, levels and relationships. Therefore, I examined laws, international orga- nizations, and NGOs using a methodology that considered the overlapping relation between the set of practices and the regime of truth. The normative infl uence of the educational laws is not disentangled from the everyday life of schools, and subjects and vice versa. In fact, borders are blurred and distinctions such as local experts/ international experts or international organizations/local organizations are not clear. All these complexities are relevant in the selection of my theoretical framework. I deployed poststructuralist authors such as Ian Hacking and Michel Foucault to study how, after decades of silence, in the last few years gender was forged as a category that refers to a specifi c kind of people in the educational laws. Applying Hacking’s ( 2006 ) fi ve ideas of dynamic nominalism to gender, I explored the notion of gender in Latin America as the “making up” of a specifi c kind of subject. I explored only three features of Hacking’s framework: (a) the institutions, mainly international organizations, (b) the knowledge produced or available regarding gender, and (c) the experts, represented by women’s NGOs.

In order to frame the emergence of gender rights in Latin America fi rst I focused on the political conditions that at a certain time and place make gender rights possible in the young democracies of South America. Following Foucault,

It was not a question of showing how these objects were for a long time hidden before fi nally being discovered [in this study gender]….It was a matter of showing by what conjunctions a whole set of practices – from the moment they become coordinated with a regime of truth- was able to make what does not exist (madness, disease, delinquency, sexuality, etcetera), nonetheless become something (…) It is not an illusion since it is precisely a set of practices, real practices, which established it and thus imperiously marks it out in reality ( 2008 , p. 19).

As I demonstrate, in the fi rst cluster of educational laws gender was completely ignored. The goal was to show how, suddenly in the last few years gender became a reality in the Latin American educational scenario.

In order to track the whole picture of gender in Latin America, social policy should have a broader perspective of analysis as opposed to an analysis of single institutions or actors ( Sabatier 1991 , p. 148). Certainly, studying gender evolution in Latin America, isolated from international organizations and its role, would undermine the complex process of gender emergence. However, the fact that inter- national organizations or NGOs do have a role in creating the category of gender does not imply a linear causality. In the same way, gender appeared in Latin America

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neither as a mere repetition of international actors or as a unique and totally isolated Latin American concept. Finally, historicizing the cultural practices that produce patterns of thought about gender also provided a way of interpreting the relation of the global and the local, as well as the universal to the particular (Popkewitz 2005 , p. 32).

9.2 Looking to the Past, Gender and Education in Latin America

Women’s education in Latin America evolved in three stages: (1) the initial or colonial period, (2) the debate around the content of women’s education, and fi nally (3) the establishment of educational institutions that admitted females (Miller 1991 , p. 36). In the colonial epoch, the education of the daughters of the elite usually was done by private tutors and the vocational training for poorer women was usually organized by female Catholic charitable societies (Miller 1991 , p. 39). The debate about the education for women changed drastically from a marianism perspective ( from Medieval cult of Mary ) in the sixteenth century with ideals of purity and chastity to a broader curriculum in the eighteenth century that included religious instruction, literacy, music, French and embroidery (Miller 1991 ). It was with the emergence of the national states around the mid-1800s that through Societies of Benefi cence government reformers such as the Argentinean Bernardino Rivadavia established the fi rst public elementary school for girls. However, only at the end of the nineteenth century with the introduction of government supported schools that admitted women from the emergent middle class and trained them to become teachers, did women fi nally acquire a path to social advancement education.

The process of greater access of women to secondary education and universities started between 1910 and 1940. This tendency was reinforced after 1945 when “female education in Latin America became a particular focus of international agencies such as: the Comision Interamericana de Mujeres (CIM) and UNESCO” (Miller 1991 , p. 60). The fact that since the mid-twentieth century international organizations have a relevant role fostering educational opportunities for women cannot be underestimated in the history of women's search for education in Latin America.

9.3 Recent Political Context and Educational Legislation

The fi rst set of analyzed documents for this study were the educational laws that appeared after the military regimes in Argentina, Uruguay and Chile. However, in the case of Chile, the educational law was promulgated during the last days of the military regime before the transition to democracy. The second set of laws could be

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considered as the product of settled democracies because these laws were promulgated in the three countries after several decades of democratic regimes. Certainly, my study did not consider these educational laws as the unique set of normative concepts that completely explain gender in Latin America. Neither did I try to circumscribe the variety or diversity of possible manifestations of gender rights only with the analysis of the educational legislation. In the next section, I divided the analysis of each country in three sections. First, I depicted a brief political context, next I described the fi rst national educational laws with respect to gender, and fi nally I examined the current educational law as related to gender rights.

9.4 Uruguay

9.4.1 Description of Political Context

In Uruguay at the beginning of the 1980s, the politics started a slow process of political openness after the military strike in June of 1973. In March of 1985, Uruguay returned to a democracy with the assumption of Julio Maria Sanguinetti, from the Red Party. The institutional environment at the time was tumultuous, but Uruguay has a long tradition of civil rights and respect to the laws. The Law for the Emergency of the Education (15,739) passed in 1985 in this political context. Finally, Tabare Vazquez, an oncologist trained in Paris, former Major of Montevideo, with the leftist political coalition assumed the presidency in 2005 defeating the traditional Red and White parties. After a complex arrangement, diffi culties and criticism from the right and the extreme left, the majority of the government coalition with the exception of the Communist Party passed the educational law in December of 2008.

9.4.1.1 Gender in the Law of Emergency for Teaching (LET) 15,739 ( 1985 )

Gender is the main concept absent in the fi rst Uruguayan Law of education. However, I found a broad enunciation against discrimination: “The National Administration of Public Education (ANEP) will: promote the respect of convic- tions and beliefs of others; foment in the students skills related to its social and civic responsibility and; eliminate all forms of intolerance” (LET, Ch. 2, art. 6, 1985 ). 1 After analyzing the law, I found several general enumerations of rights but gender does not appear specifi cally in any enumeration of rights nor in guidelines or in principles.

1 Translations of the Laws are mine.

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9.4.1.2 Gender in the Law of General Education of Uruguay (LGE) 18,437 ( 2008 )

A very different picture appeared in the new educational legislation. The law described the principles of Public Education affi rming, “[the State] will promote the transformation of discriminatory stereotypes related to age, gender, race, ethnic or sexual orientation.” (LGE, Ch. 4, art. 18) Additionally, the Law established nine principles that permeate all the different levels and curriculum of the National System of Education. Some examples of these principles are: human rights educa- tion, environmental education, artistic education and sexual education. Later, the Law stated: “Sexual education will have as a goal to provide adequate tools to promote in teachers and students critical refl ection regarding gender relations and sexuality for a responsible enjoyment of the latter” (LGE, Ch. 7, art. 40).

Then, when the document enumerates the rights and obligations of students, mothers, or fathers, the article says “pregnant students will have right to continue with their studies, especially to access and stay in the educational institutions, to receive supplementary support and to have absences before and after the birth without risking their regular attendance requirement” (LGE, Ch. 9, art. 74). Another interesting remark appeared when the document referred to the parents. The law expresses an original enumeration of the actors. The law referred to “the rights of mothers, fathers or responsible” (LGE, Ch. 9, art. 75).

Undoubtedly, gender now had a drastic manifestation in the educational arena of Uruguay. In the fi rst law of education, gender was absent; however, the new law has a detailed description and statements regarding the goal of sexual education to promote critical refl ection of gender relations in teachers and students. In addition, the State appeared as an active actor that had to eliminate gender or sexual stereo- types that might imply discrimination.

9.5 Argentina

9.5.1 Description of Political Context

In 1983, democracy returned to Argentina after 7 years of military rule. Raul Alfonsin of the Radical Party was elected president on the 1983 elections and started to reorganize the State. However, democracy was still weak and Alfonsin suffered several military strike attempts and was compelled to pass an amnesty law to fi nish the trials to military authorities. In a huge economic crisis, Carlos Saul Menem of the Peronista Party won the elections and assumed the presidency in 1989. The government of Carlos Saul Menem implemented a comprehensive liberal program. In the educational area his government approved three different laws: the Decentralization Law (1992), the Higher Education Law (1995) and the Federal Law of Education- LFE- (1993), which was the most comprehensive one. Those laws promoted a vast transformation of the educational system.

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Within this neoliberal ideology the country ended in a huge political crisis in 2001 with unemployment rising to 25 %, street riots, six presidents in 2 weeks, and an international economic default. Nestor Kirchner assumed the presidency in 2003 with a leftist political program. In December of 2006, Nestor Kirchner promulgated a new law of Education. After an extended debate between different actors of soci- ety, including teachers unions and media, the new legislation promoted a change from the previous neo-liberal educational law.

9.5.1.1 Gender in the Federal Law of Education of Argentina (LFE) 24,195 ( 1995 )

The LFE depicted a broad enunciation against discrimination. The law aimed for “the concretion of equal opportunities and possibilities for all the citizens and, the rejection of every form of discrimination” (LFE, Ch. 1, art. 5). The same article stated “the triumph over all the discriminatory stereotypes in pedagogical materials” (LFE, Ch. 1, art. 5). However, the actors involved or the subjects of such efforts were not defi ned. A point to remark is that in several sections the Law referred to both the masculine and feminine, for example (boys and girls) (LFE, Ch. 7, art. 40). However, the educational law did not refer specifi cally to gender. Additionally, the text did not tackle any specifi c mention of sexuality or sexual education. Furthermore, since the law does not mention any specifi c type of discrimination, the goal of fi ghting discrimination seemed blurred and utopian. Therefore, after analyzing the Law, I can state that in spite of the sexual identifi cation of students (boys and girls) gender did not emerge as a relevant issue tackled by the law, at least in an explicit way.

9.5.1.2 Gender in the National Law of Education, Argentina (LNA) 26,206 ( 2006 )

A different portrait emerged in the National Law of Education. One of the new goals of education is “to ensure the same educational conditions respecting the differ- ences between persons, without accepting gender discrimination or other forms of discrimination” (LNA, Ch. 2, art. 11). Additionally, article 11 “promotes…the elimination of all the forms of discrimination in all the educational levels”.

Regarding gender and cultural diversity, in the section of Continual Education of Adults and Youth, the Law affi rmed that the curriculum and the institutional approach of schools should have as a goal “the incorporation of gender equality and cultural diversity” (LNA, Ch. 9, art. 48). Furthermore, regarding Rural Education, the Law affi rmed that one of its goals is “to promote equal opportunities and possibilities for all ensuring gender equality” (LNA, Ch. 10, art. 50). In the same section, the document states that “the [Secretary of Education] will organize non- formal educational services that enhance job training and cultural promotion of rural population, focusing on the conditions of women” (LNA, Ch. 10, art. 51). Moreover, the Law established that the Secretary of Education will promote policies oriented to “battle situations…of gender discrimination” (LNA, Ch. 2, art. 79).

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In addition, the Law established that “the State will guarantee all the material and cultural conditions necessary for students success independently of their social background, geographic location, gender or cultural identity” (LNA, Ch. 1, art. 84). Furthermore, the Law stated that all the different jurisdictions of the State “should include materials and strategies that promote relationships grounded in equality, solidarity, and respect between every sex in agreement with the Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination against Women and other Laws related to women’s rights” (LNA, Ch. 2, art. 92).

In sum, the National Law of Education took a strong stance for gender rights. This effort can be tracked in the active role that the Law provided to the State and jurisdictions to combat gender discrimination, the inclusion of strategies and curriculum related to gender issues, and fi nally the incorporation of others Laws (24,632; 26,171) related to women’s rights.

9.6 Chile

9.6.1 Description of Political Context

The last day of the military regime in Chile (1990) the Organic Constitutional Law of Education (LOCE) was promulgated by Pinochet’s administration. However, the LOCE continued in force until April 2009 during the presidency of Michelle Bachelet, probably because of the diffi culties of gaining political majority support in such a heated area.

The new Law of Education ( 2009 ) is the result of a special commission formed after the “Penguins Revolution”, named for the high school student riots during 2006. Those riots ended with the resignation of the Minister of Education, Martin Zilic. The students’ goals were basically to win more support from the State for public education and reduce the marketization of public education. Since the Chilean political system makes very diffi cult any drastic change, the current law was the result of a complex arrangement reached by Bachelet’s government with the right leaning parties.

9.6.1.1 Gender in the Organic Constitutional Law of Education (LOCE) 18,962 ( 1990 )

The LOCE can be described as an educational law that potentially could produce spaces in favor of gender discrimination. In the LOCE there were no references to gender or sexual education. The only right that referred to gender established that “pregnancy and maternity will not be impediment to access and permanence in educational institutions whatever the level and educational institutions should accommodate for these cases” (LOCE, Ch.1, art. 2). Later, the Law affi rmed that “the teaching provided by educational institutions do not have limitations other that

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those imposed by moral, good practices, the public order and the national security” (LOCE, Ch.1, art. 6). Consequently, gender was not considered in the legislation and in fact, the emergence of gender rights could be obstructed by the diffuse and equivocal enunciation of terms such as “good practices” or “moral”.

9.6.1.2 Gender in the Chilean General Law of Education (LCGE) 20,370 ( 2009 )

In contrast, the new National Law of Education affi rmed that the State should “guarantee the equality of opportunities and inclusive education ensuring specifi - cally the reduction of inequalities resulted of economic, social, ethnic, gender or geographical location” (LCGE, Ch.1, art. 4). In addition, the Law affi rmed that teachers and other school staff should have moral suffi ciency, and one of the require- ments regarding moral competence is that teachers had not been convicted because of domestic violence (LCGE, Ch.3, art. 46). Besides, the Law established as a goal of elementary education the recognition of equal rights for men and women (LCGE, Ch.3, art. 46). In sum, the recent law introduced gender issues with a very different scope. This inclusion goes beyond the enunciation of pregnant students’ rights of the LOCE, reaching issues of gender discrimination and domestic violence.

9.7 Gender Eruption in Latin American Legislation

Throughout the three national laws I described, a crescendo of gender crystalized in the new educational legislation. This process goes from a complete absence in Uruguay or the weak appearance of women’s pregnancy rights in Chile and Argentina prior to 2000, to a much wider and potent scope of gender rights beginning in the mid 2000s. After almost two decades of democracy in the three countries, only in the last few years did gender become legislated as a topic in the educational national laws. Consequently, the expected questions are: Why suddenly in the last few years do I fi nd an eruption of gender rights in the educational legisla- tions? Is this a sudden appearance in the laws or is this a progressive process of accumulation? Is this process determined by the international organizations or is it more infl uenced by horizontal pressures from NGOs? Or, are both international organizations and NGOs acting simultaneously? If so, to what extent does each one infl uence social policy regarding gender?

9.8 International Organizations

In Latin America, international organizations were key players in the emergence of gender rights. In a globalized world seemingly most of the research accepts the relevance of international organizations. However, it is not clear how this infl uence

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is absorbed by national States. Throughout the last decades a signifi cant corpus of knowledge regarding gender was created in developed countries and in international agencies. As I mentioned earlier, already during the 1950s gender had become a target for international organizations. In order to track the infl uence of international organizations, I focused on the work of UNESCO, the World Bank and the Organization for Education and Cooperation (OECD) because the undeniable impact of these institutions with their vast resources refl ects the role of such inter- national organizations.

Regarding gender, the scope and diffusion of activities and documents issued by international organizations is almost overwhelming, ranging from gender e- conferences to the UNESCO World Atlas of Gender Equality in Education. In fact, UNESCO has a special Division for Gender Equality that “carries out capacity- building and coordinates cutting edge research in order to provide informed policy advice to Member States” (UNESCO n/a ). The website of the Division for Gender Equality includes resources such as publications, multimedia, useful links, conven- tions, declarations, and events. Currently, one of the main policies of UNESCO is The Education for All Goals . These goals have a clear stance in favor of reducing gender disparities by 2015. For example, the fi fth goal aspires to “eliminate gender disparities in primary and secondary education by 2005, and achieve gender equal- ity in education by 2015, with a focus on ensuring girls’ full and equal access to and achievement in basic education of good quality” (UNESCO n/a ). Moreover, UNESCO promotes worldwide events like the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

In a similar vein, since the 1980s’ gender has become a pressing topic at the World Bank. The World Bank has a division called Gender and Development. According to the World Bank website the strategy of the World Bank to foster gender equality is through:

lending and grants, and knowledge and analysis. Only in the last fi ve years (2006–2010) more than USD 65 billion, or 37 percent of the World Bank’s lending and grants, were allocated to gender-informed operations in education, health, access to land, fi nancial and agricultural services, jobs, and infrastructure” (Implications of World Development Report 2012 ).

The amount of money is signifi cant and more so if it is oriented to developing countries. As an example, during the period of 1999–2005 the World Bank lent more than $5.5 billon only to girls’ educational programs (“IDA and Gender” 2009 ). Additionally, the World Bank has specifi c policies in almost 90 countries oriented to achieve Education for All goals.

Finally, the OECD has a Division called Gender equality and Women’s empow- erment that provides articles, statistics, events, reports, policy briefs, etc. In order to foster gender equality OECD has launched an interdisciplinary project called “Gender Initiative” oriented to “strengthen gender equality in education, employment and entrepreneurship” (OECD 2012 ). This initiative is a comprehensive project, and some of its goals are to produce knowledge about gender equality and it barriers, establish standard indicators to measure progress in gender areas, and to draw conclusions for policymakers.

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All these discourses and resources construct a travelling corpus of knowledge and infl uence countries and their policies. As a remarkable note, gender issues are present as a key factor to foster development in most of the documents issued by international organizations. Yet, at the same time, this knowledge from international organizations is commonly presented in Latin American countries within a salvation narrative. In a way this international corpus of knowledge acts as a religious Decalogue that aims to show the right paths countries have to follow to achieve “salvation” or “development”. Certainly,

The social and educational sciences have embodied a redemptive culture; that is, science is to save and rescue the child and society….The roles of science and the scientist are sanctioned in a way that was previously reserved for religious cosmologies of social and personal change. (Popkewitz 1998 , p. 2)

This salvifi c rhetoric related to international organizations and its policies enhance the impact of this corpus of knowledge produced by international organiza- tions. At the same moment, this salvifi c rhetoric makes diffi cult the critical analysis of such knowledge produced by international organizations.

9.9 Non-governmental Organizations

Throughout the last few decades the wide scope and variety of NGOs related to gender in the three analyzed countries created a corpus of information beyond the scope of this chapter. Therefore, in order to analyze the role of NGOs I focused on an international gathering called Encounters that acted as a buffer of dozens of NGOs related to gender organizations from Latin America. Since the fi rst meeting in 1981 in Colombia, this gathering has taken place on a biennial or triennial basis in different countries of Latin America. One interesting feature of these Encounters is the criteria of self-fi nancing “to defl ect any suggestion that the Encounter was being manipulated by outside interests” (Miller 1991 , p. 218). The aim of the Encounters is to participate in shaping a real Latin American perspective regarding gender. These spaces are highly relevant because they “have served as critical trans- national sites in which local activist have refashioned and renegotiated identities, discourses, and practices distinctive of the region’s feminism” (Alvarez et al. 2003 , p. 537). Because the fl ux of information (experiences and strategies) has fl owed from different Latin American countries, these international gatherings also reori- ented movement practices, cultural discourses, and State policies (Alvarez et al. 2003 , 540). The relevance of transnational networking has been described as “the primary force driving the diffusion of gender-mainstreaming bureaucracies” (True and Mintrom 2001 , p. 50). The case of Latin America’s recent history confi rms the importance of transnational networking.

However, this aim of autonomy of NGOs is balanced many times since funding usually comes from international organizations. Just as an example, one of the most prestigious Chilean NGOs that works on topics about gender ( Humanas ), points in

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its web page to seven main donors. All the seven are international organizations such as UNESCO or the European Community.

Furthermore, they are more combative than international organizations in their attitude towards government. NGOs are often closer to local situations and serve as watch dogs and policy advocates shaming national and local governments that do not achieve international standards regarding human rights (Suárez et al. 2009 , p. 209). This closer relationship with local stakeholders makes NGOs able to pro- duce specifi c interventions in relevant political moments. For example, in Argentina, the Argentinean Network of Gender Science and Technology (RAGCyT) organized conferences during the legislative debate (2006) with the explicit goal of including gender perspectives in the new Argentinean educational law. Finally, “feminists not only increasingly entered the State apparatus and mainstream parties but also began providing the civil society–based component of feminist policy advocacy and research by founding NGOs” (Lebon 1993 , 1998 ; Alvarez 1999 ; Alvarez et al. 2003 , p. 548).

Following these insights, gender NGOs were able to construct grounded strategies and to impact effectively in the Latin America political scenario providing experts and pressing legislators and stakeholders. In this regard, the fact that women’s groups were perceived by politicians as appealing to groups of voters certainly infl uenced their receptivity and desire to comply with them (Nelson 1996 ).

9.10 Conclusion

The political conditions during the studied period of each country were very different; however, I fi nd a shared revision process of educational legislation in recent years in Argentina (2006), Uruguay (2008), and Chile (2009). In the three countries, I uncovered a crescendo of gender rights during the last few years. This process goes from a complete absence in Uruguay or the discrete appearance of women’s pregnancy “rights” in Chile and Argentina to a much wider and potent spectrum of gender rights in the current legislation. However, this progress was recently crystal- lized after several years and different democratic governments. After more than two decades of democracy in the three countries, only in the last few years does gender become a legislative topic. I discovered that the enunciation of gender rights in Latin America was the result of decades of struggles that went beyond the educa- tional scenario. The educational laws help to show this complex historical process of gender rights.

The key outcome of these educational laws is the recognition of women as sub- jects beyond pregnancy. In her last chapter of Ser Política en Chile ( 1990 ), Kirkwood states that “the feminist movement in Latin America has almost a decade,…but everywhere it is starting the conversion of women into subjects” (p. 235). The anal- ysis of the educational laws showed that only in the recent educational laws did women become a recognized as subject by the States. Previously, only pregnant women were considered. Thus, in the case of pregnant woman, a specifi c situation

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was being considered, the pregnancy and not a complete subject. This subject status gained was a previous condition to receive any right. Without a subject of rights any formulation of rights or obligations at the legislative level was impossible. Therefore, the appearance in the scenario of woman as an individual subject is a crucial result since it produces as an outcome gender right’s recognition from the State. This recognition of the woman as a subject of rights presented in the current laws through different abovementioned examples is of utmost importance in the development of gender rights in the three countries.

In sum, following Hacking’s ( 2006 ) framework, gender was able to emerge as a category only when these three elements – a set of powerful institutions represented by international organizations, a vast corpus of knowledge attached with a salvifi c rhetoric, and local experts represented by women’s NGOs – were able to produce a language about gender that compelled national stakeholders to include gender rights in their educational national laws. In doing so, a process of slow accumulation better explains the making up of gender and the role of international organizations and NGOs in the educational laws of Latin America.

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