Cochabamba feminists politicize precarity

Illustration by Lorena K for Ojalá.

Opinion • Claudia López Pardo • March 7, 2024 • Leer en castellano

We met Rosa in late February at the first planning meeting for this year’s March 8 demonstrations. She is 29 years old and part of the great wave of women that bring strength, rage, desire and militancy to the streets of Cochabamba annually. 

During our assembly, we discussed what motivates us. Rosa tells us that she has been stuck in part-time jobs for more than a year. Like other young women, after finishing her university degree, she can only find work in the informal economy, which does not provide a proper salary or access to social services.

Rosa's comment prompted us to reflect. Last year, another compañera evoked something similar in a sign that she carried, that read: "I am not a low-wage worker." Her slogan illuminated this contradictory moment, in which we must politicize the work that we do as women in all facets of life.

Connecting this reflection with the crises we are living through is an embodied exercise, and it is not easy. Managing the effects of economic uncertainty can feel like walking through mud. Feminist discussions about current crises help us link the pandemic, problems with the healthcare system and the impact of ecocide. 

It is not simple to hold our center in such a dense assemblage of crises. Our unstable situation creates feelings of uncertainty that we learn to manage and politicize from the spheres of reproductive work and affective labor. Our economic autonomy is fragile. Our lives are precarious. 

To reflect on how we sustain life in the current context, it makes sense to begin from the crises’ impact on our bodies. We can broaden our outlook from there. It is with this in mind that we began preparations for the March 8 mobilizations.

Swimming against the tide 

Current economic, ecological, political and social crises, and the effects of the pandemic, have a devastating impact on our health, even though the dominant discourse denies this fact and the extent of the damage. 

We live in a veiled neoliberal political context that reinforces patriarchal, colonial and capitalist modes of domination. The women who participate in the feminist movement come from different generations of urban women whose lives are increasingly precarious. The lack of access to land, stable employment, housing and food exacerbates our profound material instability. 

In a conversation about how to define the current juncture, Carolina, who is 30 years old, made the observation that "although there is a crisis, there is food." Her comment revealed that those who are helping us get through this crisis are peasant producers and communities working in family agriculture. 

Last year’s wildfires and drought affected the production of basic food crops and increased their cost. On Saturdays and Sundays, first thing in the morning, there are  women vendors selling various products from middlemen or directly from their own gardens at reasonable prices, though they are increasing.

Who makes us precarious? 

The question of precarity was raised by Fabu in our second assembly. Bolivia faces a uniquely complex set of challenges. It is unclear why the government does not clarify what is happening in the economy, although we do know that the "economic bonanza" based on extractivism has come to an end.

Even so, the government continues to bet on the extractivist modes of development, focused principally on eastern Bolivia. Today, key national debates revolve around the role of dollars in the economy, the rising price of imported goods and the possible devaluation of the Bolivian peso. At the same time, authorities are navigating the outcome of their inability to sustain public sector jobs and salaries, this is revealed by the renegotiation of labor contracts in healthcare, education, and government.

The reality is undeniable. The economic crisis is indirectly weathered by small-scale farmers and by women who do their best to make money and food last as long as possible. Injustices continue, and so does violence.

These crises are borne by women’s bodies and by the communities that guarantee the reproduction of life.

What brings us together 

Our conditions are brutal, and this impacts our ability to organize. But our desire to come together remains is strong.

For us, 8M is not an isolated event but rather a moment in an immensely creative process that makes manifests our daily political work and strength. It is the sum of autonomous, self-managed political practices that prompt us to challenge time-worn notions of gender and political parties. 

In our assemblies, we create a space to deliberate, make decisions and advance concrete proposals. The meetings renew the organic perspective of feminist politicization. This goes beyond the politics of unions and parties, which is so ingrained in the “common sense” in Bolivia. 

Our assemblies allow us to weave together with one another. This is why we insist on treating them as a kind of guide or compass. 

This year, in particular, building our movement has meant sustaining relationships and connections at different depths. This can be a contradictory process, especially during crises that individualize and isolate us. The slogan that we finally agreed upon was: “in the face of the precariousness of life, on 8M we march—angry and organized—together.”

After she spoke, Rosa left the assembly in a hurry to get home. The previous year, she realized that she could no longer afford to live alone and decided to reduce her expenses by moving in with others. When we saw her leave, we thought: we are all Rosa. In big or small ways, we all have something in common with her. What brings us together is the certainty that we can only sustain life by reactivating communitarian forms and drawing on our knowledge of how to collectivize politics.

For us, as women and sexual and gender dissidents, organizing for 8M is an affirmative experience that fills us with strength and vitality.