[The following extracts of an account of the second conference of Latin American and Caribbean women, held in Lima, Peru, July 19-22, are taken from the October 17 issue of International Viewpoint, a fortnightly magazine published in Paris under the auspices of the United Secretariat of the Fourth International. The fuller report from which the extracts were taken originally appeared in Combate Socialista, the newspaper of the Revolutionary Socialist Party (PSR), Colombian section of the Fourth International.]
• All the hands, all the voices, all the blood can be songs in the wind, sing with me, sing.
• With this song, my American sister ...
which will make Mercedes Sosa* live forever, the vigorous applause of 600 women of different nationalities closed the four days of discussion of the second feminist conference of Latin American and Caribbean women which took place in Peru. These four days were punctuated by agreement and disagreement, problems and pleasures, laughter and tears, confusion and hope.
The biggest delegations, each of about 60 women, came from Colombia, Chile, and the Dominican Republic. This diversity allowed a real assessment to be made of the true state of the feminist movement in the Latin American continent. It is a social movement which is still at the stage of propaganda, which is looking for its identity through diversity. The most interesting aspect of this conference was precisely the expression of the different conceptions and nuances which run through the feminist movement.
However, perhaps with the aim of trying to please everyone, the sisters who hosted the conference organized 18 workshops around the central theme: patriarchy. It should be noted that many women took up this problem in their contributions and tried to overcome it by proposing a discussion entitled "What has happened in feminism from Bogotá [where the first conference took place] to Lima?" During this discussion some progress could be made in looking for unity, beyond the initial differences.
While the plenary session did not discuss all the conclusions from the different commissions, this initiative, and others, succeeded in at least getting a general consensus on the adoption of motions of solidarity with the people and the women of Nicaragua and El Salvador, with the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo in Argentina, and with the democratic movement and feminists of Chile. Greetings were addressed to the Latin American conference of solidarity with Central America and the Caribbean which took place in Bogota in the same period. And support was expressed for the struggles of the peoples of the world for their liberation. The proposal was also adopted of a continent-wide housewives' strike on September 1, 1984.
The maturity displayed in the response to sectarian attempts to divide or manipulate the conference was also remarkable. These attempts came from women who do not call themselves feminists. There were on one side comrades who considered that the revolution and socialism would completely resolve the oppression of women and that feminism should therefore adopt precise class positions. On the other hand there were all sorts of teachers and researchers who considered this conference as a sort of laboratory of experience and did not hesitate to explain they were not feminists.
As can be seen, a lot of things happened during this gathering, and we can still ask how worthwhile some of them were. But, at the end of the day, we can say it was a rich experience, with many different aspects, whose influence will make itself felt on each participant, at a personal level as well as the different women's groups and in the women's movement as a whole, in the period between now and the next conference, which will take place in Brazil in 1985.
Notes
* A popular Argentine singer.