Elizabeth Dore is Reader in Latin American History at the University of Southampton. She is the author of The Peruvian Mining Industry: Growth, Stagnation, and Crisis and editor of Gender Politics in Latin America: Debates in Theory and Practice.

Maxine Molyneux is Professor of Sociology, Institute of Latin American Studies, University of London. She is the author of State Policies and the Position of Women in the People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen, 1967–77.

Gender and the State in the Long Nineteenth Century 3

TwentiethCentury State Formations in Latin America 33

II Case Studies 83

Civilizing Domestic Life in the Central Valley of Costa Rica 17501850 85

Colonial State 108

Revolutionary Colombia 18101830 127

The Legal Construction of Patriarchy in Argentina 172

State Policies Rural Households and Women in Mexico 19301940 194

Women and the Home in Mexican Family Law 238

State Building and Class Compromise in PopularFront Chile 262

The Federation de Mujeres Cubanas 291

The Case of the Sindicato de Amas de Casa 322

A Study of a Brazilian Feminist Lobby Group 346

Contributors 369

Index 371

This collection promises to be a thought-provoking and well-used source for the continuing debates in this field. A great asset for researchers and students alike.”—Sarah Radcliffe, University of Cambridge



“This splendid volume is unique for its analytical savvy regarding the gendered history of power, authority, and cooptation in Latin America. Each chapter provides a provocative and detailed rendering of patriarchal societies and women’s agency from spaces as varied as households and legislatures. This book will be of wide interest to specialists on the region and, far more broadly, it will spur reinvigorated theoretical debate on the tortuous relationship historically between gender and the state.”—Matthew C. Gutmann, author of The Meanings of Macho: Being a Man in Mexico City
From the Publisher
“This splendid volume is unique for its analytical savvy regarding the gendered history of power, authority, and cooptation in Latin America. Each chapter provides a provocative and detailed rendering of patriarchal societies and women’s agency from spaces as varied as households and legislatures. This book will be of wide interest to specialists on the region and, far more broadly, it will spur reinvigorated theoretical debate on the tortuous relationship historically between gender and the state.”—Matthew C. Gutmann, author of The Meanings of Macho: Being a Man in Mexico City
“This collection promises to be a thought-provoking and well-used source for the continuing debates in this field. A great asset for researchers and students alike.”—Sarah Radcliffe, University of Cambridge --