Carmen Deere, women’s studies expert and director of the Center for Latin American Studies and the University of Florida, recently spoke with IPS News about the status of women’s rights in Bolivia. Despite the advances for gender equality included in a new constitution, adopted in February, Bolivian women are still faced with a “long journey to secure an influential participation in government,” says Deere. The expert gave an example of women’s restricted role in describing the influence of the Bartolina Sisa National Confederation of Bolivian Peasant Women and the group’s leader, Leonilda Zurita. Even though Zurita and her group played a substantial role in the election and re-election of President Evo Morales, the Bolivian leader has said she now “feels marginalized by the government she helped build.”

Deere says that “women are still not given their place,” adding that barriers persist in preventing women from having full access to decision-making power. Citing one reason for this lack of power, Deere explains her theory on the importance of land rights:

“My theory is that land ownership is an element that facilitates women’s participation, because of the relationship that exists between ownership and power.”

The issue of land rights has long affected Zurita and members of her group, known as the Bartolinas, says Deere. Initially fearful of breaking with tradition and honored customs, the women struggled to assert their equal rights to land. Following participation in the Fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing in 1995, Bolivian women initiated a grassroots movement to secure their rights to property.

Deere says that a cultural movement is needed to ensure that women are respected as equals among men in all spheres of public and private life. Only when concerns for human development and equality “permeate everything” will men and women be able “to develop equally as human beings,” says Deere.

Read the full article: Q&A Bolivian Women a Force Behind Power, But Still Powerless - IPS News