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Motherhood, Social Policies and Women's Activism in Latin America

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  • © 2020

Overview

Editors:
  1. Alejandra Ramm

    1. Department of Sociology, University of Valparaíso, Valparaíso, Chile

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  2. Jasmine Gideon

    1. Department of Geography, Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK

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  • Analyzes maternalism from "above" and from "below" through specific social policies as well as women’s demands for social benefits from the second half of the twentieth century up until present day
  • Considers Chile as a case study that combines significant economic growth and poverty reduction with entrenched inequalities of gender, class and income
  • Focuses on maternalism in unexplored areas, including women’s activism against pollution, women’s growing involvement in miners’ unions, and maternalism from a non-heterosexual perspective

Part of the book series: Studies of the Americas (STAM)

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Table of contents (13 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xxi
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  2. Motherhood, Social Policies, and Women’s Activism in Latin America: An Overview

    • Jasmine Gideon, Alejandra Ramm
    Pages 1-11

  3. Latin America: A Fertile Ground for Maternalism

    • Alejandra Ramm
    Pages 13-37

  4. “Taking the Nature Out of Mother”: From Politics of Exclusion to Feminisms of Difference and Recognition of Rights

    • Jadwiga E. Pieper Mooney
    Pages 39-67

  5. Constructing Maternalism from Paternalism: The Case of State Milk Programs

    • Jael Goldsmith Weil
    Pages 69-95

  6. To Not Die in Childbirth: Maternal Health and State Policy, 1930–1980

    • María Soledad Zárate
    Pages 97-121

  7. Resistance to Sexual and Reproductive Rights: Maternalism and Conservatism

    • Gabriela Alvarez Minte
    Pages 123-144

  8. “Las madres del plomo”: Women’s Environmental Activism and Suffering in Northern Chile

    • Evelyn Arriagada
    Pages 145-165

  9. Technocracy and Strategic Maternalism: Housing Policies, 1990–2014

    • Alejandra Ramm
    Pages 167-194

  10. LGBTQ-IPV and the Case for Challenging Maternalist Family Violence Paradigms

    • Hillary Hiner
    Pages 195-217

  11. Women Miners: Motherhood, Labor Integration, and Unionization

    • Nicolás Angelcos
    Pages 219-243

  12. The Persistent Maternalism in Labor Programs

    • Catalina de la Cruz
    Pages 245-266

  13. Economic Modernization and Redefining Womanhood: Women, Family and Work in a Center Right-Wing Government

    • Carmen Gloria Godoy, Paula Raposo
    Pages 267-290

  14. Correction to: The Persistent Maternalism in Labor Programs

    • Catalina de la Cruz
    Pages C1-C1

  15. Back Matter

    Pages 291-296
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Keywords

About this book

This book is a critical resource for understanding the relationship between gender, social policy and women’s activism in Latin America, with specific reference to Chile. Latin America’s mother-centered kinship system makes it an ideal field in which to study motherhood and maternalism—the ways in which motherhood becomes a public policy issue. As maternalism embraces and enhances gender differences, it has been criticized for deepening gender inequalities. Yet invoking motherhood continues to offer an effective strategy for advancing women’s living conditions and rights, and for women themselves to be present in the public sphere. In analyzing these important relationships, the contributors to this volume discuss maternal health, sexual and reproductive rights, labor programs, paid employment, women miners’ unionization, housing policies, environmental suffering, and LGBTQ intimate partner violence.

Reviews

“This detailed and empirically rich volume brings together contributions that look at maternalism from a variety of angles, underlining the force with which it has shaped social identities, public policies and collective action in Chile. It is a testimony to the pervasiveness, but also to the malleability and ambiguity of maternalist idea(l)s, their historical and sectoral situatedness, their strategic uses and abuses in struggles over gender equality and women’s rights. The conclusion is clear: whether we like it or not, maternalism continues to be a concept and force that feminist research and practice will have to grapple with. As such, the book will be welcomed by both academics and activists in Chile and beyond.” (Silke Staab, UN Women, author of Gender and the Politics of Gradual Change: Social Policy Reform and Innovation in Chile (Palgrave Macmillan 2017))“This theoretically rich collection masterfully analyzes the complex and contested intersection of maternalism, state power,and women’s activism. Through an intensive focus on Chile, the authors explore the historical importance and continuing salience of maternalism in shaping how citizens make demands on the state and the policies and laws produced in response. Grappling with the fraught politics of maternalism, the authors provide new insights into how essentialized understandings of motherhood help reproduce the raced, classed, sexed, and gendered divisions of power in society.” (Gwynn Thomas, Associate Professor and Chair, Department of Global Gender and Sexuality Studies, University at Buffalo, SUNY, USA)

“Embraced or contested, maternalism is embedded in Latin America´s policy and politics. Focusing on the emblematic case of Chile, the editors of this volume bring together a diverse set of conceptual and empirical analyses capable of catapulting forward research and policy agendas addressing the numerous facets of maternalism. For scholars interested in learning about the changesand continuities of the topic across sectors and historical periods, this volume is a must read.” (Juliana Martínez Franzoni, Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales, Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Políticos, Universidad de Costa Rica, Costa Rica)

Editors and Affiliations

  • Department of Sociology, University of Valparaíso, Valparaíso, Chile

    Alejandra Ramm

  • Department of Geography, Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK

    Jasmine Gideon

About the editors

Alejandra Ramm is Associate Professor of Sociology at the Universidad de Valparaíso and Associate Researcher at the Social Sciences Research Institute (ICSO) at the Universidad Diego Portales (UDP), Chile. 


Jasmine Gideon is Senior Lecturer in Development Studies at Birkbeck, University of London, UK. 


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