This paper examines the mutual aid network developed by the Tulipas do Cerrado collective during COVID-19 pandemic in the Federal District, Brazil. This initiative is contextualised within the long history of sex workers’ activism in the... more
This paper examines the mutual aid network developed by the Tulipas do Cerrado collective during COVID-19 pandemic in the Federal District, Brazil. This initiative is contextualised within the long history of sex workers’ activism in the country where, in the absence of state public policies, sex workers have found ways to survive in normal and in exceptional times, deploying strategies of dialogue, confrontation, and direct action both in parallel to and against the state. The Tulipas do Cerrado collective, during a multidimensional global crisis, ensured people’s survival by developing a network of care and support for marginalised groups. As such, they not only responded to an immediate and pressing social need, but, and perhaps more importantly,
envisioned and practiced an alternative policy model for care and sex work. Their experience is a vivid example of novel approaches to public policy that interrogate the centrality of top-down technocratic solutions for social problems, by turning the gaze to alternative models produced
within and by civil society.
envisioned and practiced an alternative policy model for care and sex work. Their experience is a vivid example of novel approaches to public policy that interrogate the centrality of top-down technocratic solutions for social problems, by turning the gaze to alternative models produced
within and by civil society.
Research Interests:
This Resource Document examines the measures that 17 Latin American and Caribbean countries have taken towards implementing C189: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador,... more
This Resource Document examines the measures that 17 Latin American and Caribbean countries have taken towards implementing C189: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay. Of these countries, only three – El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras – have not ratified C189.
Silvia Federici nasceu em Parma, na Itália, em 1942, e nos anos 1960, foi viver nos Estados Unidos, onde mais tarde fundou com Mariarosa Dalla Costa e Selma James o International Feminist Collective (Coletivo Feminista Internacional),... more
Silvia Federici nasceu em Parma, na Itália, em 1942, e nos anos 1960, foi viver nos Estados Unidos, onde mais tarde fundou com Mariarosa Dalla Costa e Selma James o International Feminist Collective (Coletivo Feminista Internacional), responsável pela campanha global Wages For Housework que reivindicava salário para o trabalho doméstico realizado por mulheres sem retribuição ou reconhecimento como uma demanda da economia feminista. Desde então, é uma figura central no desenvolvimento do conceito de reprodução social como uma chave para compreender as relações de classe, de exploração e de dominação no capitalismo. De 1987 a 2005, foi professora de estudos internacionais, estudos das mulheres e filosofia na Universidade de Hofstra, nos Estados Unidos, onde hoje é professora emérita. Nesta entrevista, Eliane Gonçalves e Mariana Prandini Assis conversam com Silvia sobre sua trajetória pessoal e intelectual, teoria marxista e reprodução social, Simone de Beauvoir, maternidade, lutas emancipatórias contemporâneas, e cidades feministas.
Levando a sério o desafio de recontar, por meio de narrativas históricas feministas, um passado capaz de impulsionar um ‘futuro além do patriarcado’ (GROSZ, 2000), este ensaio retoma o histórico de inserção da abordagem de gênero na... more
Levando a sério o desafio de recontar, por meio de narrativas históricas feministas, um passado capaz de impulsionar um ‘futuro além do patriarcado’ (GROSZ, 2000), este ensaio retoma o histórico de inserção da abordagem de gênero na criação do IPDMS. Oferecemos uma reflexão sobre como o GT Gênero e Sexualidades do Instituto tem atuado para ampliar e fortalecer essa agenda de pesquisas jurídicas no Brasil na última década e apontamos alguns de nossos principais desafios para o futuro.
This paper addresses the unfolding of translocal legal dynamics of power and resistance, examining the case of Brazilian people's lawyering and its encounter with and appropriation of strategic litigation, highlighting what is gained and... more
This paper addresses the unfolding of translocal legal dynamics of power and resistance, examining the case of Brazilian people's lawyering and its encounter with and appropriation of strategic litigation, highlighting what is gained and what is lost in the process. While strategic litigation has its historical roots in the Global North, as part of the movement of public interest litigation, it has increasingly become a translocal legal practice through its transnational diffusion, pushed by transnational actors such as universities, foundations, and international NGOs. As a translocal legal practice, strategic litigation is reshaped in its encounters with local scenarios, actors, and dynamics, and acquires new meanings and features as it is adapted to respond to local challenges. At the same time, the diffusion of the practice also transforms local legal styles of lawyering that adopt it, thus posing the question of how power and identity are negotiated in transnational legal encounters.
Misoprostol is a medicine with a "double" social life recorded in several places, including Brazil. Within formal and authorized health facilities, it is an essential medicine, used for life-saving obstetric procedures. On the streets, or... more
Misoprostol is a medicine with a "double" social life recorded in several places, including Brazil. Within formal and authorized health facilities, it is an essential medicine, used for life-saving obstetric procedures. On the streets, or in online informal markets, misoprostol is treated as a dangerous drug used to induce illegal abortions. In the Brazilian case, despite a rich anthropological and public health analysis of the social consequences of misoprostol's double life, there are no studies on the legal implications. This article offers such descriptive analysis, presenting and examining a comprehensive dataset of how Brazilian courts have treated misoprostol in the past three decades. It consists of an encompassing mapping of the "when, where, how, and who" of misoprostol criminalization in Brazil, pointing to the unjust consequences of the use of criminal law for the purpose of protecting public health.
Abortion-related obstetric violence is an under-documented global phenomenon that seems more frequent in settings that legally restrict abortion. Seeking to document and critically assess this phenomenon, we analyse testimonies of... more
Abortion-related obstetric violence is an under-documented global phenomenon that seems more frequent in settings that legally restrict abortion. Seeking to document and critically assess this phenomenon, we analyse testimonies of obstetric violence shared by abortion seekers in Latin America. Data were collected through the communication channels of Women Help Women (WHW), a feminist non-profit organisation that supports self-managed abortion where access is restricted. We conducted in-depth review of 20 cases of women from Brazil, Chile and Ecuador who reported being subjected to several forms of obstetric violence while seeking abortion and post-abortion care in formal health facilities. This obstetric violence included denial of care and failure to meet standards of care, criminalisation, gaslighting, physical violence, and discrimination. We show how abortion-related obstetric violence is used as a means to punish and control feminised subjects that contradict social and legal mandates regarding abortion and gender. We also highlight the role of modern legal and medical systems in reproducing oppressive structures that deny people proper care.
Abortion rights in international law have historically been framed within a medico-legal paradigm, the belief that regulated systems of legal and medical control guarantee safe abortion. However, a growing worldwide practice of... more
Abortion rights in international law have historically been framed within a medico-legal paradigm, the belief that regulated systems of legal and medical control guarantee safe abortion. However, a growing worldwide practice of self-managed abortion (SMA) supported by feminist activism challenges key precepts of this paradigm. SMA activism has shown that more than medical service delivery matters to safe abortion and has called into question the legal regulation of abortion beyond criminal prohibitions. This article explores how abortion rights have begun to depart from the medico-legal paradigm and to support the novel norms and practices of SMA activism in a transformation of the abortion field. Abortion rights as reimagined in SMA activism increasingly feature in human rights agendas related to structural violence and inequality, collective organising and international solidarity, and democratic engagement.
Apresentação do dossiê Raça, gênero e sexualidade: direitos e lutas sociais, publicado no Volume 7, Número 2, da Revista InSURgência.
This article explores the criminal regulation of misoprostol as a controlled drug in Brazil as a new form of abortion criminalization. A qualitative analysis of Brazilian case law shows how the courts use a public health rhetoric of... more
This article explores the criminal regulation of misoprostol as a controlled drug in Brazil as a new form of abortion criminalization. A qualitative analysis of Brazilian case law shows how the courts use a public health rhetoric of unsafe abortion to criminalize the distribution of misoprostol in the informal sector. Rather than an invention of the local bench, this judicial rhetoric reflects global public health discourse and policy on unsafe abortion and the double life of misoprostol as both an essential medicine and a controlled drug. In contrast to previous studies, the article shows that abortion criminalization is not the cause, but rather the consequence of misoprostol’s double life. In the last section, it draws on an outlier judgment of the case law to chart a regulatory future for misoprostol and its supply in the informal sector as a site of harm reduction and safe abortion in public health policy.
Research Interests:
This article presents and discuss a network of care created by Tulipas do Cerrado (or Tulipas), a street sex workers' collective based in Brazil's capital, to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. A consequence of their marginalization,... more
This article presents and discuss a network of care created by Tulipas do Cerrado (or Tulipas), a street sex workers' collective based in Brazil's capital, to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. A consequence of their marginalization, street sex workers engage in practices of care and self-care as a survival strategy, extending those to members of other equally marginalized communities, such as drug users and homeless people. We claim that the autonomous care structure created by sex workers should not only be recognized and appreciated, but also provides us a valuable example of what transformative, self-organized mutual aid looks like.
Research Interests:
As the world faces an unprecedented public health crisis with the COVID-19 pandemic, governments debate what to do in order to secure access to essential services, such as abortion care. This commentary argues that rather than simply... more
As the world faces an unprecedented public health crisis with the COVID-19 pandemic,
governments debate what to do in order to secure access to essential services, such
as abortion care. This commentary argues that rather than simply instituting temporary
measures such as telemedicine, officials and formal health systems should take it as
an opportunity to make permanent improvements that are long overdue in abortion
provision. As such, they should learn from and support activist strategies on self-managed abortion and their unique models of care. These experiences, in addition to
improving abortion access, particularly where it is restricted by law, regulation or
stigma, show how demedicalized, respectful and dignified care that enables people's
power looks like.
governments debate what to do in order to secure access to essential services, such
as abortion care. This commentary argues that rather than simply instituting temporary
measures such as telemedicine, officials and formal health systems should take it as
an opportunity to make permanent improvements that are long overdue in abortion
provision. As such, they should learn from and support activist strategies on self-managed abortion and their unique models of care. These experiences, in addition to
improving abortion access, particularly where it is restricted by law, regulation or
stigma, show how demedicalized, respectful and dignified care that enables people's
power looks like.
Reconhecendo os limites do liberalismo e filiando-nos à perspectiva da política da diferença, discutimos a adoção de cotas legislativas para mulheres em eleições proporcionais no Brasil como uma política de ação afirmativa, cujo objetivo... more
Reconhecendo os limites do liberalismo e filiando-nos à perspectiva da política da diferença, discutimos a adoção de cotas legislativas para mulheres em eleições proporcionais no Brasil como uma política de ação afirmativa, cujo objetivo é reduzir a assimetria de gênero no acesso aos cargos políticos institucionais. Apresentamos um breve histórico da luta feminista pela causa, o marco legal brasileiro e uma avaliação crítica – qualitativa e quantitativa – dessa política.
Research Interests:
Understanding that legal categories are created and shaped through a process that is not only juridical, but also social and political, this paper offers an overview of the category ‘violence against women’ in the jurisprudence of the... more
Understanding that legal categories are created and shaped through a process that is not only juridical, but also social and political, this paper offers an overview of the category ‘violence against women’ in the jurisprudence of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. By doing a critical in-depth analysis of the most relevant cases for the category’s development, besides relying on information gathered through interviews conducted with the Courts’ lawyers, the paper suggests that the category is a translocal one, in the sense that its content has been determined through a complex interaction between transnational formulations and local variables.
By taking the 2014 US Customs and Border Protection 'Dangers Campaign' as an exemplar of what we see as an emerging new form of border control management, we argue that the sovereign state is re-branding the politics of migration under... more
By taking the 2014 US Customs and Border Protection 'Dangers Campaign' as an exemplar of what we see as an emerging new form of border control management, we argue that the sovereign state is re-branding the politics of migration under the guise of a humanitarian imperative. Three intertwined phenomena allow for this humanitarian and moralistic shift: first, a strategic designation and staging of a state of nature; second, an emphasis and utilization of the materiality of death; and third, the de-branding of state sovereignty so as to employ neoliberal market mechanisms as means to depoliticize its strategy for migration control.
Valendo-nos do conceito de feminismo enquanto “campo discursivo de ação”, postulamos que o pensamento crítico feminista é uma parte constitutiva desse campo na América Latina. E, por meio de elementos da cartografia, propomos um... more
Valendo-nos do conceito de feminismo enquanto “campo discursivo de ação”, postulamos que o pensamento crítico feminista é uma parte constitutiva desse campo na América Latina. E, por meio de elementos da cartografia, propomos um mapeamento de como esse pensamento intervém, constrói, se relaciona, enfim, habita o 'campo feminista', ressaltando suas contribuições para o próprio campo e, particularmente, para o pensamento social crítico latino-americano. Argumentamos que essa proposta não apenas contribui para se pensarem alternativas no contexto de crise capitalista que vivemos, mas também torna visível a contribuição feminista para a "criticidade" do pensamento crítico latino-americano.