Global Feminism, Plural
Leadership
http://alainet.org/publica/femlead/en/
Irene León Trujillo
ALAI
The World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Forms of Intolerance offers to feminist proposals the opportunity to face some of the major pending issues, such as diversity and the intersections between gender relations and the most crucial forms of discrimination and exclusion, expressed in the framework of globalization.
Indeed, if the political development of feminism is acknowledged for its close connection to pluralism and diversity, it is above all with the settling in of globalization and its homogenizing intention, that the need to analyze and contribute with responses to structural gaps becomes more evident. These responses underlay the plausibility of implementing a global unifying project, launched over a series of historical inequities.
Focusing on the links of gender relations with racism, xenophobia and intolerance, implies not only making visible the diversity of contexts in which feminist proposals develop, but also taking into account the multiplicity of perspectives and priorities inherent to each of the interrelationships they produce. Gender relations are inextricably intertwined with realities of class; ethnic and cultural origin; geopolitical location; situations of human mobility; individual choices; and of insertion of each human group in the processes of current economic, social and cultural integration.
In this sense, the topics proposed for this World Conference have the virtue of opening a space for connecting historical issues, which have remained in the background for too long and which, in some cases, have even been perceived as distant from feminist proposals, in spite of being constitutional parts of women's realities at a global level.
Such is the case of issues raised by migratory processes, which go hand-in-hand with inequities subscribed by globalization, in which openings to the free flow of capital and goods are not accompanied by the corresponding free flow of people. Women, in addition to the xenophobic manifestations related to these dynamics, face treatment as half-citizens, whose limitations are increased by their ethnic, social economic situations, place of origin, position in the market. In such context, the position of disadvantage that affect women from the South, women of color and all excluded women cannot be denied.
The issue of racism, in turn, crosscuts and affects human relations as a whole. It is impossible to isolate it from the dynamics of feminist leadership development itself, and even from the definition of priorities which has predominated until now; for, although the issues posed by feminist proposals are of universal character and thus pertain to all women, the limitations of inclusion of those affected by multiple forms of discrimination -designed by the gaps interposed by structural racism- are reflected in the obstacles to their direct participation and, hence, to discourse itself, an indispensable element for the expression of proposal leadership.
Likewise, if feminism has been perceived as a trend from the North, in certain cases associated to the middle class, not sufficiently expressing women's diversity, it is because only in recent years it has begun to head towards expressions of the complexities inherent to the multiplicity of situations that affect women in the world. Issues such as those inherent to racism have been, almost invariably, part of a parallel agenda, generally raised by those affected by them, who in turn, in most cases, have raised the issue as a demand to the others and not necessarily as an issue of general interest.
Historical Structural Gap
The differences expressed in the visibility and representation of global feminist leaderships are correlated to the historical structural gap, among whose manifestations not only the limited participation of women from discriminated ethnic groups is perceived, but is also proportional to the banishing of legitimacy of discourses, cosmologies and forms of expression of cultures devaluated since the time of colonial processes.
In the same way, issues pertaining to the practice of diversity, conceived as a space where all the singularities may interact under equal conditions, is part of present and future challenges, for the integration of such aspects as sexual or age diversity, have just begun to be outlined as central issues of proposals integrating such singularities, in discourse and actions in general.
The latter is undoubtedly one of the major achievements deriving so far from the civil society preparatory process towards the World Conference, which mainly convenes movements connected to a discourse of diversity and which has been generating a space for proposals and claims that conjugates all the singularities. In the outcomes of the NGO Forum of the Americas for Diversity and Plurality, for example, sexual diversity, age, ability and other diversities are integrated both in the general discourse and in the follow-up actions. Thus, it is not too surprising to find these elements in declarations and plans of action of indigenous, afro-descendant and Roma peoples.
This starting point is also reflected in the language of the governmental Draft Declaration and Plan of Action, in which case, its value lies more in the irruption of these issues in the debates of the Community of Nations, than in the inclusive outcomes the final documents might express. Indeed, in this scenario one finds both the intention of affirming the supposedly cultural positions of some, and the economic and hierarchical interests underlying the negation to recognize responsibilities in the historical existence of racial discrimination and intolerance, of others.
The dynamics which have characterized the two preparatory meetings as well as the intersessional meetings for the Conference, demonstrate that the globalization process is far from erasing the differences between the interests of the North and those of the South. It is an open secret that issues such as historical reparations and the establishment of sanctions to contemporary practices of racism, xenophobia and intolerance, expressed in regional documents from the South, are being ducked by European and North American governments.
To sum up, for us, the possibility of making visible what is at stake for social relations in the globalization process and of sustaining feminist proposals and leadership modes in accordance with this reality, make participation in this process an interesting challenge. Indeed, one must acknowledge that in reference to the creation of a different world, feminism has not only covered vast grounds, but also, on its way, has learned to build upon pluralism and diversity, which are antithetical to racial discrimination, xenophobia and intolerance.
"The feminist movement should seek to change the climate in the movement and in the world so that feminist leaders can emerge, be more diverse, be larger in number, and more effective in their work. So, when women address questions of leadership, it is important for them to also address the social structures that make leadership possible."
"Feminists must do everything possible to expand the diversity of leaders, which is one of the concrete ways of opening up the democratic space within the movement itself", are some of the purposes expressed in the conclusions of the Global Feminist Leadership Development Seminar, which took place in South Africa in 1997. Most of them agree with the issues that bring us together today, which will undoubtedly lead us to sustain the development of a plural, diverse and inclusive feminism and world, for the advancement of humanity as a whole.