Civil Society and Democratic Governability in the Andes and the Southern Cone Project

Vargas, Virginia and Maruja Barrig, “Una agenda feminista. El rescate de la utopía,” paper presented at the seminar "Reflexiones para una agenda feminista,” Centro Flora Tristán and Woman Kind, Lima, 1999.

Vásquez, Roxana, “Entrevista,” in Barrig, Maruja, El aborto en debate. Entrevistas a líderes de opinión, Lima : SUMBI & The Population Council, 1993.

1 This study benefited from the valuable help of research assistant, sociologist Luis Vicuña. I am also grateful for commentaries on a preliminary version by Sonia Alvarez, Ana Güezmes, Cecilia Olea, Sandra Vallenas and Virigina Vargas. Nevertheless, the responsibility for the analysis and opinions expressed here is entirely mine.

2 See two papers by the author based on research carried out in 1997 thanks to a Ford Foundation grant: "De cal y arena: ONGs y movimiento de mujeres en Chile" and "La larga marcha: movimiento de mujeres en Colombia" (ms) as well as Barrig, Maruja, "Los malestares del feminismo latinoamericano: una nueva lectura," paper presented at the Latin American Studies Association Meeting, Chicago, 1998. Relevant studies by Sonia Alvarez (University of California, Santa Cruz) include, among others, her papers from 1997 and 1998: "Advocating feminism : the Latin American feminist NGO 'Boom',” paper presented at the Fourth Annual Schomburg-Moreno Lecture, Mount Holyoke College, 1998, "And even Fidel can't change that. Trans/national feminist advocacy strategies and cultural politics in Latin America" (ms), "Los feminismos latinoamericanos se globalizan en los noventa. Retos para un nuevo milenio" (ms), "(Re) Negotiating Differences and Restructuring Resistance in the Latin American Feminist Movement Field," paper presented at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 1997. The Centro Flora Tristán (Peru) published a set of essays on feminism edited by Ceclia Olea, titled "Encuentros, (des) encuentros y búsquedas. El movimiento feminista en América Latina," Lima, 1998. Virginia Vargas and Cecilia Olea published an article on the same subject entitled "El movimiento feminista y el Estado : los avatares de la agenda propia," in Socialismo y Participación, No. 80. Lima : CEDEP, 1997, pp. 25-49.

3 The World Conference on Human Rights (Vienna, 1993), the International Conference on Population and Development (Cairo, 1994), the Social Summit (Copenhagen, 1994) and the Fourth International Conference on Women (Beijing, 1995).

4 Vargas Virginia and Olea Cecilia, Op Cit., and Barrig, Maruja, "Los malestares del feminismo latinoamericano: una nueva lectura," paper presented at the Latin American Studies Association Meeting, Chicago, 1998.

5 Alvarez, Sonia, "(Re) Negotiating Differences and Restructuring Resistance in the Latin American Feminist Movement Field," Paper presented at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 1997.

6 The author had access to the minutes of MT meetings as well as to its internal documents and reports. The two newspapers with the largest national circulation, El Comercio and La República were also reviewed for information about voluntary surgical sterilization (blocking fallopian tubes and vasectomies) as was statistical information about health of women, and a variety of publications cited in the text. Finally, I interviewed 14 individuals including members of the MT, government officials, experts from NGOs and universities, feminists, representatives of the Medical Association, and a representative of the Population Fund. I decided to keep the interviews anonymous and each is identified only by the number of the interview.

7 The MT includes representatives of the following Peruvian government institutions: the ministries of health, education, women, and foreign affairs; the Secretariat for International Technical Cooperation (SECTI); INEI; and the Commission of Women of the congress; as well as cooperating agencies: UNFPA, OPS, AID and the European Community; and the following civil society institutions: NGOs (Flora Tristán, Manuela Ramos, Red Nacional de Promoción de la Mujer, REDESS-Jóvenes, APROPO, IMPPARES) and universities (Catholic University, San Marcos, and the Institute for Population Studies of the Cayetano Heredia University).

8 Movimiento Manuela Ramos, "Seminario : Fortaleciendo las Coordinaciones entre Estado y Sociedad Civil en la Implementación de los Acuerdos de Cairo y Beijing," Lima : OPS, UNFPA, Mesa Tripartita, 1998, and Güezmes, Ana, "Los espacios de concertación desde la agenda feminista : presentación y análisis de la experiencia de la Mesa Tripartita de seguimiento a la CIPD," paper presented at the seminar “Reflexiones para la agenda feminista del nuevo milenio,” Centro Flora Tristán and Woman Kind, Lima, 1999.

9 All translations are mine.

10 Vargas, Virginia, “Entrevista,” in Barrig, Maruja, El aborto en debate. Entrevistas a líderes de opinión, Lima : SUMBI & The Population Council, 1993.

11 "Feminismo y política en el Perú : aportes para una necesaria discusión," nd, mimeographed document that circulated with the names of the members of this committee with the exception of the Movimiento Manuela Ramos.

12 Comisión Feminista de la UDP. I Encuentro Metropolitano de Mujeres Udepistas "Rosa Alarco," July 1981.

13 Vargas and Olea, Op Cit., p. 32.

14 Vásquez, Roxana, “Entrevista,” in Barrig, Maruja, El aborto en debate. Entrevistas a líderes de opinión, Lima : SUMBI & The Population Council, 1993, p. 153. For some of the feminists interviewed, the multiplication of strategies and positions was one of the factors that led to the dissolution of the Coordinating Committee of the Feminist Movement.

15 Though the efforts of NGO activists in the area of health services have as their basis the rights of women and respect for their dignity, questions can be raised about the viability of the proposals made. For example, indicators include the time allotted to each user of health services while reforms in this sector emphasize efficiency measured in brevity of time spent with each client. The contradictions between policies formulated for the benefit of women and the context of privatization and neoliberalism in which they are carried out leads to doubts about their effectiveness (Alvarez, Alvarez, Sonia, "(Re) Negotiating Differences and Restructuring Resistance in the Latin American Feminist Movement Field," Paper presented at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 1997, and Tamayo, Giulia, "La maquinaria estatal : ¿puede suscitar cambios a favor de las mujeres?," in Socialismo y Participación, No. 79. Lima : CEDEP, 1997, pp. 9-18.).

16 Thayer, Millie, "Traveling Feminisms : From Embodied Women to Gendered Citizenship," Paper presented at the Latin American Studies Association meeting, Chicago, 1998.

17 The emphasis on democratization implicit in the Family Planning Program made available to the public at large is a leitmotif in the official discourse. Already in his message to the country in July 1995, President Fujimori had announced that: "[...] the government will work to assure that families with a low income and lower levels of education have the same access to family planning methods as do classes with higher income [...] It would be hypocritical to turn a blind eye, knowing that different methods are used by different social classes. What is fair is to publicize, I said publicize, methods of family planning in detail. We have been and are a pragmatic government without taboos or 'well-known important people' [vacas sagradas]. Peruvian women should be masters of their destinies!" During the following weeks, the debate escalated with the inclusion of vasectomies and blocking fallopian tubes in government family planning services with only the consent of the woman involved (Azaña, Jorge et al., "Evolución normativa y programática de la planificación familiar en el Perú," Lima : Universidad Cayetano Heredia, Maestría en Gobierno y Gerencia de Salud, 1999. [mimeo]).

18 Alfaro, Rosa María, "Agendas públicas de género. Inicios de una nueva etapa pública: entre dificultades, dilemas y avance," Ford Foundation consultantship, 1996, p. 19.

19 Interview # 8.

20 Interview # 7.

21 Interview # 5.

22 Interview # 10.

23 Interview # 8.

24 Interview # 11.

25 Interview # 4.

26 Alfaro, Op Cit.

27 Interview # 10.

28 Interview # 7.

29 Interview # 12.

30 Published in newspapers in Lima on February 5, 1999.

31 Movimiento Manuela Ramos, Op Cit., pp. 14-15.

32 One member of the MT said that, in their opinion, it is the United Nations Population Fund who puts limits on the discussion, a kind of guarantor of equilibrium between parties, but in such a way that ‘civil society’ does not go too far, in an effort to maintain the MT which is successful from the point of view of the Peruvian representatives of the United Nations Population Fund.

33 Interview # 6.

34 Sinesio López, personal communication.

35 MINSA = Ministry of Health.

36 Interview # 7.

37 Statement by Monsignor Juan Luis Cipriani (Diario La República, Lima, February 2, 1998).

38 Azaña, Op. Cit.

39 CLADEM and CRLP, Silencio y complicidad. Violencia contra las mujeres en los Servicios Públicos de Salud en el Perú, Lima : 1998.

40 Tamayo, Giulia, Nada personal. Reporte de derechos humanos sobre la aplicación de la anticoncepción quirúrgica en el Perú 1996-1998, Lima : CLADEM, 1999.

41 It is not known how many of these cases are also included in the Tamayo investigation and vice versa.

42 El Comercio, December 22, 1997.

43 July 22, 1996, December 26, 1997.

44 El Comercio, January 19, 1998.

45 Communiqué of the Peruvian Episcopal Conference, August 24, 1995.

46 Miguel Irízar, Bishop of Callao, La República, December 10, 1997.

47 Bishop Juan Luis Cipriani, La República, January 20, 1998.

48 El Comercio, January 25, 1998.

49 La República, February 20, 1998.

50 Communiqué of the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru, El Comercio, September 11, 1995.

51 Communiqué of the Peruvian Episcopal Conference, September 8, 1995.

52 Press conference, Peruvian Episcopal Conference, La República, January 24, 1998.

53 Bishop Miguel Irízar, La República, December 10, 1997 and December 29, 1997. Emphasis ours.

54 Luis Solari, El Comercio, January 15, 1998. Emphasis ours.

55 La República, January 10, 1998.

56 Carlos Fernández Sessarego, El Comercio, January 19, 1998.

57 Luis Sánchez, Bishop of Arequipa, La República, December 10, 1997.

58 Recently, the now Bishop of Lima, Juan Luis Cipriani, explained that sexual relations that do not lead to procreation "are something like if a man is a breeding animal and the women a milking cow" (SOMOS Magazine [Lima], No. 672, October 23, 1999).

59 La República, February 20, 1998.

60 Statement by Gina Yañez of the Movimiento Manuela Ramos to La República, February 22, 1998.

61 Guerrero, Andrés, "Una imagen ventrílocua : el discurso liberal de la “desgraciada raza indígena” a fines del siglo XIX, in Muratorio, Blanca (ed.) Imágenes e imagineros. Representaciones de los indígenas ecuatorianos, siglos XIX y XX, Quito : FLACSO, Ecuador, 1994, p. 199.

62 Interview with Guilia Tamayo, Centro Flora Tristán, La República, December 30, 1997.

63 Interview with Ana Güezmes, Centro Flora Tristán, Revista Mujer Salud/RSMLAC (Santiago de Chile), No. 2, 1999.

64 Interview with Guilia Tamayo, El Comercio, June 22, 1998.

65 CLADEM and CRLP, Op Cit.

66 Interview # 3.

67 Susana Galdós, El Comercio, January 20, 1998.

68 El Comercio, January 16, 1998.

69 Interview # 1.

70 Interview # 6.

71 Interview # 4.

72 Interview # 13.

73 Interview # 9.

74 Interview # 12.

75 Vargas, Virginia and Maruja Barrig, “Una agenda feminista. El rescate de la utopía,” paper presented at the seminar "Reflexiones para una agenda feminista,” Centro Flora Tristán and Woman Kind, Lima, 1999.

76 Tarrés, María Luisa, "Hacia un equilibrio entre la ética y la negociación," Debate Feminista (Mexico City), Vol. 7, No. 7, 1993, cited in Vargas and Barrig, Op cit.

77 The centrality of the Catholic church not only in the debate but also in action is evident in the still unpublished report of the Ombudsman's Office on VSC. Of the 80 cases received in which the denunciation was presented by the person affected, their family or institutions, 35 were presented by representatives of the Catholic Church and only eight by women's NGOs.

78 In relation to her work with the state apparatus, the Bolivian feminist Sonia Montaño, states that in 1995, she felt cornered (arrimada al "filo de la mesa") by other political actors, the government, the political parties.

79 Interview # 1.

80 Interview # 6.

81 Interview # 2.

82 A question raised in interview # 6.

83 Interview # 4.

84 Interview # 2.

85 Interview # 5.

86 Interview # 11.

87 Interview # 7.

88 Interview # 8.

89 The operations to block fallopian tubes carried out by various health centers (not counting those carried out in health centers belonging to the Peruvian social security service) were: in 1996, 81,762; in 1997, 109,689; and in 1998, 25,995 (Azaña et al., Op cit.).

90 Speech of the President Alberto Fujimori during the Twenty First Session on Population and Development of the United Nations, June 30, 1999.