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Milei's Argentina from a feminist viewpoint

The oppression we see now in Milei's Argentina is an attack on human rights. Forty years ago, there was a military dictatorship and some of the people attending this evening session during the 69th CSW in New York have seen the results of that oppression. It is unbelievable that some of the rights they fought for are now possibly being reversed. ‘We need to remember the past in order to move forward’. 

On the evening of March 12, 2025, Mabel Bianco, a well-known feminist activist from Argentina who was selected by BBC as one of 100 ‘inspiring and influential women from around the world’ in 2019, leads a session about feminist responses to Milei’s Argentina. The right-wing politician Javier Milei was elected as president of Argentina in 2023, opposing mandatory sex education in schools and abortion (legalized in Argentina since January 2021). Moreover, he intends to rely more on private investments and even promised to eliminate ministries of education, health and public works. Because of the broad array of issues that are alarming feminists and human rights defenders throughout Argentina, the session included many speakers, a feminist colleague from Italy, a short message of support by the ambassador of France and delegates from Brazil and Mexico. The main message of the evening? Collaboration.

No matter what age, background, experience or role you have, everyone contributes to the improvement of the situation in Argentina, was the sentiment. The evening created a sense of urgency from all different perspectives, such as the judicial and legislative perspective, policy perspective, personal perspective, rural and urban perspective, and the indigenous perspective. I was impressed and overwhelmed by the force and commitment to take action.

Court case 

They spoke about a court case for which they had monitored different policies and did a review on gender based violence topics and teenage pregnancies. They documented the dismantling of those policies and presented their case to the national authorities in Buenos Aires. They stressed that the organizations collectively represented women and girls in their full diversity in the country. They feel that this was an important action, although it is still ongoing. They wanted to encourage conversations on these topics and policies and to force the government to sit with them before the Human Rights Commission. The government has to be held accountable. They presented the legal claim because they believe in their constitution, human rights and international mechanisms.

Abortion 

A speaker from Amnesty International discussed the situation of the laws in place in Argentina in relation to abortion services. They have seen that access to safe and welcoming care helps women who want to terminate their pregnancy. Around 250.000 women received this care in 2023 in Argentina. The current president in Argentina now talks about ‘the bloody agenda of abortion’, steering the public into a right wing ideology including disinformation and stigma around abortion. This leads to frightening and intimidating women and professionals who support women who opt for an abortion.

Currently, the national government has stopped financing sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR), comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) and trans care. Moreover, there used to be a project to decrease teenage pregnancies which successfully lowered them by 50% in four years. Pregnancy is a health risk for young girls and adolescents and it increases poverty. The new government, however, has stopped the project and all the people who worked on it.

Rights are not valid anymore 

There is a lot of misinformation and many (human rights and women’s rights) movements are experiencing challenges with this. Prices have been increasing and some people are not able to make ends meet at the end of the month. These are all tactics to oppress people. The government is now using arguments that rights are not valid anymore, especially relating to young people.

Three issues that were discussed by a young Argentinian feminist:

  1. Young people are not receiving relevant education and are therefore unable to sufficiently identity patterns of violence. Not only are they unable to identify these patterns in their own environments, violence is also rising in educational institutions. Violence and oppression takes on different forms and shapes, which make them harder to detect. She shared the message that political views and political life is also present in the educational context.
  2. Young people are the largest groups on social media and cyber attacks are rising. They do not feel safe or encouraged to lead social campaigns because of the violence they see. It is a strategy on social media by the government. We need to keep writing positive things, to make the amount of hate smaller.
  3. There is a decrease of political participation. We all experience the impact of backsliding, however we need to support each other when we are in the same room together.

Climate change not yet in Beijing 

One of the last speakers stood up and raised her voice: one group of women has not been mentioned yet: the Mapuche. The indigenous women from Argentina were unable to attend this session because they had another session at the same time. She  talked about indigenous groups in Argentina that face the results of exploitation of fossil fuels and climate change and related disasters, all caused by humans, such as forest fires and floods that force them to migrate to different places. The women are fighting for their land rights and the protection of their homes. She highlighted that although climate was not included explicitly in the Beijing Declaration of 1995, without climate justice, there is no social justice, and no women’s justice.

The final speeches continued to inspire the people that attended the session. Speakers shared the need to recover and continue moving together. The patriarchy is trying to react against women’s strength, but we are stronger. We have to continue defending what we have, and what we have achieved, with courage. The networks, in and outside of Argentina, of feminist and human rights organizations, it was shared, are our capital. Our shared source of wealth. 

By Britt Myren, Atria

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