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STEPHEN BROWN 5 Democracy and Sexual Difference The Lesbian and Gay Movement in Argentina IN THE afternoon of 27 August 1996, about twenty Argentinean lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered activists stormed into the Constituent Assembly (Convenci6n Estatuyente) of Buenos Aires. They carried blown-up photos of Carlos Jauregui, the country's most prominent and respected gay activist, who had died of AIDS one week earlier. Followed by members of the press and television crews, the activists tracked down the members of the commission responsible for writing the new municipal charter and shamed each one of them into signing a statement in support of the prohibition of discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation , alongside gender, age, ethnicity, religion, and political ideology. A few days later, on 30 August, the assembly unanimously approved the nondiscrimination clause, and Buenos Aires became the first city in Spanish -speaking Latin America to protect nonheterosexuals from being discriminated against on that basis (Sarda 1996b, 1996c). It is clear in this narrative that lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender activism1 not only exists in Argentina but is sometimes quite prominent and yields tangible political results as well. This chapter aims to explain the emergence, expansion, and timing of the Argentinean lesbian and gay movement, my central thesis being that Argentinean lesbian and gay activism emerged in the late 1960s and early 1970s as a combination of a global and local cycle of protest, resting on the prior diffusion of lesbian and gay identity. New domestic constraints alone, however, overrode the favorable conditions and led to the rapid disappearance of activism in the mid-1970s. During the 1980s, lesbian and gay activists capitalized on certain new political opportunities-principally the return to democracy, the human rights discourse, and some international support-to build a movement. As such, the "political opportunity structures" approach to social movements constitutes a valuable analytical tool. However, the literature tends to gloss over the importance of identity and identity formation . Indeed, the diffusion of lesbian and gay identity is a prerequisite to activism, albeit insufficient in itself to create a movement. Moreover, opportunities are not enough to explain actions. Though one cannot make definitive statements from a single case study, I suggest that it is impor110 Copyrighted Material Stephen Brown 111 tant for social movement theory to make greater efforts to refrain from accepting identity as given, especially when sexuality is concerned, and to consider both its origins and consequences. Doing so will help provide a richer analysis of social movements generally, as well as a greater indication of the future of the lesbian and gay movement in Argentina. Lesbian and gay activism, especially in developing countries, is an understudied area. Of the major volumes on social movements in Latin America, only one considers mobilization around the issue of sexual orientation (see MacRae 1992). Even the most recent attempts at synthesizing contemporary social movement theory fail to address lesbian and gay movements in any significant way.2 In addition, major works on "social theory" by the likes of Jiirgen Habermas make no mention of sexuality, and works by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe and by Pierre Bourdieu barely even acknowledge it (Warner 1993: ix). It is not for a lack of organizing : formal lesbian and gay organizations have existed in the United States since the 1950s and have become prominent in North America and Western Europe in the last quarter of the twentieth century. In Latin America, "Every ... country except Panama and Paraguay," according to Peter Drucker, "now has an organized gay-lesbian movement, many of them active since the mid-1980s" (1996: 92). To my knowledge, no academic study of the lesbian and gay movement in Argentina has ever been published. PAST AND PRESENT The Grupo Nuestro Mundo was founded in November 1969, while Argentina was under a military dictatorship. Although informal gay and lesbian social groups had previously existed, this was the first gay political organization in Argentina-and, in fact, in Latin America. In 1971, the Grupo Nuestro Mundo merged with other groups to form the radical Frente de Liberacion Homosexual (FLH), subsequently bringing in ten constituent groups, including left-wing university students, anarchists, and religious associations, most of whose members were men. Even after the 1973 democratic elections and the return to power of Juan Domingo Peron, the FLH remained an underground organization, allying itself closely with the struggles of workers and feminists both nationally and internationally . Following Peron's death in 1974 and during his wife Isabel 's presidency...

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