Machista violence killed Berta Cáceres
2017 Octubre Honduras
At daybreak on March 3, 2016, environmental activist Berta Cáceres was murdered in her home, an event that shocked Honduras and many people around the...

“Femicides tell us about the society we’ve constructed”
2017 Octubre Nicaragua
Some call it “violence against women” while others prefer the term “gender violence.” In the feminist current I’m part of we use the term “machista...

Sexual abuse of children is a Nicaraguan pandemic
2017 Junio Nicaragua
A team of eight women—four of us psychologists who are survivors of sexual abuse and have become experts on the subject and four other women, not necessarily...

When women are forced to migrate...
2017 Marzo Centroamérica
One cannot generalize what forced migration means for women. Many leave because of tragic experiences, others for reasons of sheer survival. Courage...

Nica-US relations in the Era of Trump
2017 Febrero Nicaragua
We’ve been observing Donald Trump for over 18 months as a pre-candidate then candidate for the US Presidency, almost three months as President-elect...

Only the maquilas are benefiting from our demographic dividend
2015 Julio Nicaragua
The information shared here was obtained in meetings, forums and focus groups held by the María Elena cuadra Movement of Employed and Unem¬ployed Women...

Zero Hunger: How are the women doing?
2015 Marzo Nicaragua
In 2007, Daniel Ortega’s government launched the “Zero Hunger” Food Production Program (PPA), as the main instrument of its food security policy. The...

Rape-imposed motherhood has a little girl’s face
2014 Septiembre Nicaragua
As you are reading this text, a girl, a teenager or a woman is being sexually abused somewhere in Nicaragua. And on top of the trauma of sexual aggression...

The reform of Law 779 sends society a very negative message
2013 Noviembre Nicaragua
The “Comprehensive Law against Violence toward Women” (Law 779) was passed unanimously by the National Assembly on June 22, 2012, and went into effect...

The case of Beatriz: Who gets to decide?
2013 Julio El Salvador
When the issue of abortion and the right to decide are put on the table, everyone turns into a philosopher, theologian, scientist or lawyer, experts...

Mothers without borders search for disappeared migrants
2013 Marzo Centroamérica
Teodora Ñaméndiz, one of the Nicaraguan mothers on the caravan, had not seen her son in 32 years. He left in 1980 and she had heard nothing from him...

The Family Code bill, as it stands, is interventionist, conservative and neoliberal
2012 Junio Nicaragua
I’m going to speak to you as a feminist, although I run the risk that some will think that means I hate men. We’re often told that feminism is the other...

Has municipal autonomy been damaged? And what have we women gained?
2012 Abril Nicaragua
I wasn’t a municipality advocate when we began the “Onda Local” (Local Wave) radio program some 12 years ago. But over the years I realized that...

Memories of a feminist generation
2012 Marzo Nicaragua
My mother is a lawyer who’s over 50 years old. The years have marked her, but she still faces life with a firm attitude and retains her unalterably...

We live in a country that murders women
2012 Marzo Honduras
Honduras is the most violent country in the world. Life, like a multitude of daily realities, has become disposable for a population that is the victim...

The health system’s many pending issues
2011 Octubre Nicaragua
I have been participating in Nicaragua’s public health system since 1981 as a student, an intern, a doctor in social service, a resident doctor, a...

Springtime Innocence Lost
2011 Marzo El Salvador
I served as executive director of IDSEMU between June 17, 2009, and December 22, 2010. During that time I learned firsthand that in politics there is...

The Partial and Personal Chronicle Of a Cuban in Nicaragua
2010 Diciembre Nicaragua
When I got to the immigration desk at the Augusto César Sandino Airport, I glanced around while the official was checking my documents, stamping seals...

The Health System Nicaragua Needs Is Preventive Not Curative
2009 Diciembre Nicaragua
Nicaragua’s health system is made up of various sub-systems: the armed forces—army and police—sub-system; the public health sub-system under the Ministry...

Resistance with the Scent of a Woman
2009 Septiembre Honduras
The protests against the coup in our country have been characterized from the outset by sizable women’s participation. We were the first to say with...

Fernando Lugo: Irresponsibility and Machismo
2009 Junio América Latina
Responsible paternity is an issue of public interest. The rights of children, just like those of women, are a public issue because they are recognized...

How Do Coast Women Understand Poverty?
2009 Abril Nicaragua
In the conventional literature, poverty is related exclusively to the lack of material goods and is measured by calculating the capacity to satisfy basic...

María: Mother, Wife, Indigenous Woman,Emigrant and Voluntary Returnee
2008 Octubre Centroamérica
We visited María in Xicalcal, a rural, almost urban village near the city of Zacualpa, located on a plain at the foot of the Chuacús mountain chain....

A Story of Hope: Six Months of Breaking Silences
2008 Marzo Nicaragua
All over the world, including Nicaragua, sexual abuse is the worst expression of the unequal power relations between women and men, adults and children....

In Memory of Cecilia Torres: Women’s Rights Defender and Femicide Victim
2007 Diciembre Nicaragua
Cecilia Torres Hernández was very humble but also very strong. Quite clear about what her citizenship status afforded her, Cecilia was firmly convinced...

Notes on a Scandal Of Historic Proportions
2007 Octubre Nicaragua
2006, October: A number of Sandinista women with the ear of FSLN National Assembly representatives tell them they have committed a gross human...

Rosa in the Land of Lovelessness
2007 Septiembre Nicaragua
Rosa, the only child of an illiterate Nicaraguan peasant couple working in Costa Rica who risked death in January-February 2003 due to a rape-induced...

On the Decriminalization of Abortion
2007 Mayo México
I’m a Mexican woman who’s not an activist in any political party. I have an education that’s largely humanistic: an undergraduate degree in law, a master’s...

Ten Years of Peace: Three Appraisals
2007 Febrero Guatemala
Gustavo Porras, a sociologist sat on the commission that accompanied the peace accords between 1997 and 1999. We begin with this measured structural...

Feminism Asks Questions Of the New Government
2006 Noviembre Nicaragua
The revolutionary years, when the FSLN leadership called on women to participate in building a new society “of equality with men,” are still fresh in...

A Dramatic Change and A Cultural Tragedy
2006 Noviembre Nicaragua
On October l6, Nicaragua’s Catholic bishops, accompanied by the leaders of some evangelical denominations, held a march against abortion in the streets...

The Words of Women from “Nicaragua’s Navel”
2006 Julio Nicaragua
Bocana de Paiwas is the navel of Nicaragua and, although the Bible doesn’t say so, it’s also the earthly paradise,” explain the women from this corner...

Michelle Bachelet: A Mother for Chile?
2006 Enero América Latina
When Michelle Bachelet took over Chile’s defense portfolio, her first meeting with the top command began with the following declaration: “I’m a socialist,...

“Chile is for all of us”
2006 Enero América Latina
The Concertation is a coalition of parties that emerged to fight for a better Chile. During the eighties we won democracy. The first years of the nineties...

The Visible and Invisible Aspects of Feminicide
2005 Diciembre Guatemala
Although the debate over terminology is ongoing and concepts are still being defined, “feminicide” is the word most commonly used in Guatemala to give...

Are Mothers of Sexually Abused Girls Really to Blame?
2005 Octubre Centroamérica
In June 2001, the Nicaraguan media latched on to the case of Gema, a little girl who became pregnant after being raped by a stranger, and probably also...

States and Laws Reproduce Violence against Women
2005 Septiembre América Latina
The words of Latin American women continue to have no value to those who legislate, govern and administer justice. A couple of weeks ago I was in Mexico...

Marcela Lagarde: A Feminist Battles Feminicide
2005 Mayo México
It is groups not individuals that carry out social struggles, and their success depends on the group’s power. Nonetheless, figures arise who imprint...

Survivors’ Words: A New Tool for Nicaragua
2005 Abril Nicaragua
Sexual abuse is epidemic—or, perhaps more precisely, endemic—in Nicaragua. In just a short time, evidence of this has been making its way into people’s...

Women Envision Another Possible World
2005 Febrero Internacional
What is the World March of Women? The World March of Women is a movement composed of women’s groups of diverse ethnic, cultural, religious, political...

Feminicide in Ciudad Juárez: A Multidimensional Challenge
2004 Agosto México
The modern state grew out of a sort of pact in which society, to ensure that its members could live together in peace, conferred upon the state the...

Sébaco’s Sweatshop: Dreams, Realities and Frustrations
2004 Abril Nicaragua
The only thing that makes maquilas different than the sweatshops producing for their home market in any country is that maquilas are offshore....

“We Urgently Need a Secular State For the Sake of Women’s Health”
2003 Septiembre Nicaragua
What has happened to Nicaragua’s public policy related to quality of life, health and education, particularly for women, in recent years? To answer...

She Said, He Said: A Survey on Sex and Gender
2003 Junio Nicaragua
To say that young men and young women think and act differently is so obvious that it is a cliché. To what point and in what way is this cliché crystallized...

Maquilas Are Like Aspirin: Temporary Pain Relief but No Cure
2003 Junio Nicaragua
Although it is generally thought that Nicaragua’s maquila sector started up under Violeta Chamorro’s government, these sweatshops, which essentially...

The Experiences and Achievements of the Women’s Network against Violence
2003 Abril Nicaragua
The Women’s Network against Violence was created in 1992 during the national meeting of “Women United in Diversity.” Between the FSLN’s electoral defeat...

From the Feminization of Poverty to Women’s Political Leadership
2002 Diciembre América Latina
Isabel is an Argentine woman from the province of Salta. She used to get up very early in the morning, wake up the kids and go to the factory. Later,...

Living and Surviving In a Multiply Wounded Country
2002 Diciembre Nicaragua
When we began working from the Valdivieso Center in 1997, one year before Hurricane Mitch, virtually no one was looking at the issues we wanted to deal...

A Traumatized Population Learning to Heal Itself
2002 Octubre Centroamérica
According to trauma expert Bessel A. Van der Kolk, “living through traumas forms an essential part of human life because history has been written with...

Twelve Days In a Concentration Camp
2002 Octubre Nicaragua
Is pent 12 days working in one of the export assembly plants—known as maquiladoras or maquilas—in Managua’s Las Mercedes industrial park....

Journalist, Legislator, Lawyer… And Sexual Abuser
2002 Junio Honduras
"Successful men" stand out in the circles of power in Honduras just as they do in all other Latin American societies. These are the men of politics,...

Sexism in the Spanish Language
2002 Mayo América Latina
It is so vivid it seems like yesterday, and yet it was almost 30 years ago, around 1973, that we were in that philosophy department assembly in Oviedo....

The Autonomous Women’s Movement Makes 10 Demands on the Government
2002 Abril Nicaragua
Over five decades have passed since the Nicaraguan autonomous women’s movement started building to fight for political and social democracy without...

Case 12,230: Zoilamérica Narváez vs. the Nicaraguan State
2002 Marzo Nicaragua
I decided to make my public denunciation only five days before I did so on March 2, 1998. I was a prisoner of desperation and anguish at the time, but...

Rural Women in Nicaragua: "Anything is possible..."
2002 Enero Nicaragua
“My name is María Epifania López, and I’m a 21 year-old single mother with a son. I work as a Peasant University (UNICAM) promoter and sit on the Buena...

The Wounds of Sexual Abuse
2001 Septiembre Nicaragua
On the periphery of the globalized world, Nicaragua struggles as best it can for democracy and development, longing to reach these two closely-linked...

Nicaragua’s Sexual Culture: A Loveless Legacy
2001 Julio Nicaragua
What should men be like, and what should women be like? The socially constructed notion of what men and women should be like includes permissible...

Vital Democracy: A Feminist Proposal
2001 Junio Internacional
The coexistence and cohabitation of women and men is universal in time and place, but it has not been nor is it now the most civic or peaceful. Although...

The Women of Malpaisillo: "Our Lives Have Changed"
2001 Mayo Nicaragua
Malpaisillo, a municipality in the department of Leon, is a lively center with a population of approximately 3,200. Set down in the middle of 888 square...

We Women Want Power
2001 Marzo América Latina
Up until the 21st century women participated in social processes as part of their groups, communities or towns. They had no specific participation that...

The Silence about Incest Needs to Be Broken
2000 Septiembre Nicaragua
Incest is an immensely serious problem in Nicaragua, as it is in the rest of Central America and in fact in the world as a whole. Although the available...

Educational Reform in Latin America: "It Needs to be Turned Around"
2000 Septiembre América Latina
The start of a new decade and of a new century is an invitation to reflect on past achievements and to prepare a future agenda based on new available...

The Option of Abortion: Urgent Reflections
2000 Agosto Centroamérica
Dear brother: I have often heard you addressing pastoral letters, exhortations and homilies to women, calling us "dear sisters." This provides me with...

Rethinking Power from a Feminist Vision
2000 Enero Nicaragua
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, a renewed feminist consciousness began to smolder among activists and academicians alike. Quickly it exploded—first...

Maquila Workers: A New Breed of Women?
1999 Septiembre Honduras
The Honduran Maquiladoras Association has 200 official maquiladoras—cross-border assembly plants for re-export—on its rolls. It also acknowledges...

Guatemala’s Women During the Long War: “Treated Worse than Animals”
1999 Julio Guatemala
Close to two hundred thousand dead and disappeared, one million displaced, over four hundred villages destroyed, two hundred thousand children orphaned...

Violence against Women: A Centuries-Old Plague
1999 Junio América Latina
The sight of someone slapping a woman's face now sparks general rejection and alarm. This public show of virtue, however, can conceal the private vice...

Cuban Women's History--Jottings and Voices
1998 Noviembre Cuba
THE WAY WE WEREWomen's efforts to achieve equal rights with men have a long tradition in Cuba. Their struggles were almost always linked...

A Declaration of Human Rights For the 21st Century
1998 Septiembre América Latina
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was born exactly fifty years ago, in 1948. A new initiative by Latin America's women is now touring the continent...

Women: The Other Face of Power
1998 Agosto Internacional
That the 21st century will be a "feminine century" is a reasonable prophecy. Women's increased presence in positions of responsibility has been the result...

Morals and Power
1998 Abril Nicaragua
Morals, in the sense of norms or duties that govern individual conduct in accord with socially shared principles, are seemingly opposed to power, understood...

The Zoilamérica Case: Some Protagonists Speak
1998 Marzo Nicaragua
Zoilamérica: "A prolonged aggression"My very dear friends: I'm writing this letter for those of you whose company, esteem and solidarity are...

A Test in Ethics For a Society in Crisis
1998 Marzo Nicaragua
AFTER A VERY LONG DRY SPELL, NICARAGUA, A COUNTRY IN A MULTI-FACETED CRISIS, made the world news several times in February. First was the extended strike...

FMLN Congresswomen Speak
1997 Septiembre El Salvador
The morning at the end of June when envío had its first contact with the FMLN congresswomen seemed like a special day: the third floor of the Legislative...

Families: Violence and Survival
1995 Septiembre Centroamérica
Families make up "economic units": when they form, have children and work to support themselves, family members enter into a relation of reproduction,...

New, Wider Households in Women's Hands
1995 Agosto Centroamérica
Despite all the changes Central American families have lived through in recent years, the region is slow to change the fertility patterns among the poorest...

Central America's Family and Women: What Does Reality Say?
1995 Julio Centroamérica
Increases in poverty, along with both social and political instability, define the current Central America scene. Seventy five percent of Nicaraguan,...

Three Stubborn Women Confront Impunity
1995 Enero Guatemala
The United Nations Mission in Nicaragua (MINIGUA) finally began working in the country on November 21, eight months after the UN agreed to "immediately"...

Seven Sins Against Women and Development
1994 Mayo Centroamérica
According to the United Nations, 75% of the world's population survives on only 15% of the world's wealth. In the 41 poorest countries of the world,...

Welcome to the Free Trade Zone
1994 Enero Nicaragua
Leaving the Managua airport, visitors are immediately greeted by a huge sign in English declaring "Las Mercedes Industrial Free Zone Welcomes You to...

The World of Imprisoned Women
1993 Mayo Nicaragua
One of the most notable aspects of the Nicaraguan penal system is the tremendous gender imbalance. Of a total population of nearly 3,000, it's rare...

Women in Nicaragua: The Revolution on Hold
1991 Junio Nicaragua
"It's a question of training woman to woman; understanding our bodies, knowing the laws that benefit us, understanding women's health... a whole number...

Challenging Machismo in the Barrios
1990 Enero Nicaragua
On a Thursday afternoon, the women overflow the small building which houses the March 8 Women's Center in one of Managua's poor neighborhoods, or barrios,...

Good News, Bad News, Population Views
1989 Febrero Nicaragua
A fertile and rich Nicaragua with forests, fish, minerals, tourist spots, hydro and geothermal energy all await only money, minds and muscle power. ...

Becoming Visible Women in Nicaragua
1987 Diciembre Nicaragua
It has been called the "second revolution" and the "revolution within the revolution." In the last two decades, revolutionary movements throughout the...

Women In Nicaragua: A Revolution Within A Revolution
1983 Julio Nicaragua
Nicaragua's culture has been influenced historically, socially, economically and religiously by women. In Nicaragua, the woman is a symbol: that of a...