Latin American countries display wide variation in gender equality and organized women's capacity to mobilize and influence policy outcomes. Yet there are also many similarities in the region's political systems and sociocultural contexts that affect women's politics and its impact. These include presidential systems that, in theory, divide power among the executive, legislative, and judicial branches, but often concentrate power in the executive; deep social and regional inequalities; and the influence of organized religion. How these factors affect women's lives, however, is also shaped by vertical divisions of powers. Although only four Latin American states are federations (Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, and Venezuela),Footnote ¹ most other countries undertook decentralization in the last two decades, transferring service delivery and program implementation (but not taxing authority) to regional or local levels. Because in some cases decentralization occurred under authoritarian regimes, or in newly democratizing states in the midst of fiscal crises, it has not ultimately deepened Latin American democracy.

How do vertical divisions of power affect women's politics and lives in Latin America? Do multiple governance sites or formal federal structures offer advantages to women or create obstacles to gender equality? In this brief essay, I develop three related arguments in response to these questions.

First, scholars of Latin America confront a difficult task in disentangling the impact of state architecture from the broader issue of state capacity. The biggest obstacle to women's rights in the region today is ineffective implementation of existing laws and policies because of weak bureaucratic capacity; insufficient financial, technical, and human resources; and a lack of political will to enforce citizens' rights. While clearly not a sole cause of state weakness, federalism may create additional difficulties, particularly in the absence of oversight or coordinating mechanisms that ensure gender policies are implemented so that women can claim rights and benefits granted to them by law.

Second, the effects of vertical divisions of power vary by policy issue. Gender policy, according to Htun and Weldon (Reference Htun and Weldon2010), is not one issue but many. And, as Vickers (Reference Vickers2010) notes, federalism matters for women because federal constitutions may assign jurisdiction over specific types of policy to central or meso-level governments, creating different opportunities and challenges by issue. For instance, because Latin American states regulate abortion through the criminal law, which usually falls exclusively under central government jurisdiction, federalism matters less because reform advocacy must be directed to the federal level (except in Mexico, as I will discuss). But regarding domestic violence policies, we see more variation. Brazil's domestic violence law falls under the federal criminal code, giving all Brazilian women equal legal rights and protections, whereas in Argentina, domestic violence has not been incorporated into the criminal code, and each province has its own domestic violence law. Thus, women have very different legal protections and services depending on where they live (Franceschet 20101a; Smulovitz Reference Smulovitz2010).Footnote ² In principle, jurisdiction matters because it shapes women's legal rights. In practice, however, jurisdiction may matter less than state capacity because enforcing rights requires bureaucratic capacity and political will.

Third, scholars of federalism and gender policy must balance structural or institutional factors with contingent political factors. Given the powerful policy role of executives in Latin American governments, a sympathetic president can make an enormous difference. Former Chilean President Michelle Bachelet (2006–10) prioritized gender equality and ensured the availability of more resources to implement women's rights policies. But Argentine President Christina Fernández de Kirchner displayed little concern with women's rights policies, leading to poor implementation of the country's reproductive health policy (Página 12, December 8, 2008). Simply electing female executives does not guarantee improved policy outcomes for women.

Federalism and the Policy Process

The impact of federalism varies by stage of the policy process: Multiple governance sites may create opportunities at the agenda-setting and policy adoption stages while creating obstacles at the policy implementation stage. Understanding these dynamics, however, requires close attention to the specific features of a federation, including intergovernmental fiscal relations, the extent to which parties and partisan politics are federalized, and the level of autonomy that meso-level units enjoy in particular policy areas. Federalism is commonly assumed to create opportunities for movements to “venue shop” for sympathetic allies at various levels. But in Latin America, this can only occur where meso-level governments have jurisdiction over a particular policy area, not always the case for pressing gender issues.

For example, abortion is criminalized throughout the region, except in Cuba and, since 2007, in Mexico City. Most countries permit legal abortions for narrow reasons, such as to save a woman's life, but at least four countries permit no exceptions. Even the bold and historic move by Mexico City's Legislative Assembly to decriminalize abortion during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy was not an unambiguous gain,Footnote ³ since it triggered a conservative backlash, with more restrictive policies and increased penalties introduced in other states. Today, 18 of 31 Mexican states criminalize abortion in all cases, even if a woman's life is at risk. Many states also amended their constitutions, adding clauses stating that life begins at conception, making future liberalizing reforms much harder to achieve (Cuddehe Reference Cuddehe2009). Elsewhere, abortion law reform can only occur through decisions of national parliaments, or, possibly, the courts (as recently in Colombia; see Htun Reference Htun and Hagopian2009).

Meso-level governments normally have jurisdiction over health and education, allowing them to adopt laws and policies in other areas of reproductive rights, such as access to contraception and sexual education. Here, a “federalism advantage” (Vickers Reference Vickers, Krook and Mackay2011) may exist for organized women at the policy adoption stage if reforms are diffused to the federal level or across meso-level units. (The Mexican abortion case, however, shows that such diffusion also can constitute a “federalism disadvantage.”) An advantaging diffusion occurred in Argentina, where, despite extensive lobbying by feminists and sympathetic allies in the Ministry of Health, a law creating a national reproductive health program stalled in the federal Congress. Passed by the lower house, the bill faced substantial resistance in the Senate. Numerous provincial legislatures soon filled the gap, adopting their own laws addressing sexual health and reproduction (Piscopo Reference Piscopo2009; Schuster and García Jurado Reference Schuster and Jurado2006).Footnote ⁴ Many feminists believe that the national law was finally passed in 2006 because of the momentum emerging out of the provinces, as well as the pioneering sexual health policy adopted by the legislature of the City of Buenos Aires. There also is evidence of a downward “diffusion effect”: After Argentina's national Congress adopted a quota law in 1991, 22 out of 24 provinces adopted quota laws for their legislatures.

Beyond jurisdiction, other features of federalism create opportunities or obstacles for women. Potential federalism advantages may be undermined if party systems are federalized in ways that increase local elites' power in national politics. When subnational party leaders control nominations for national elections, as in Argentina and Brazil, federal legislators become accountable to local elites (Stein et al. Reference Stein, Tommasi, Echebarría, Lora and Payne2005). When local party bosses (almost always powerful male politicians) control national legislators from their provinces, they can influence the national legislative agenda. Because women's policy issues are rarely a central concern for local elites, this creates obstacles for feminist movements trying to place their issues on the national political agenda. In Argentina, for instance, crucial policy decisions almost always are “negotiated in meetings of the president or some key minister with provincial governors” (Stein et al. Reference Stein, Tommasi, Echebarría, Lora and Payne2005, 78).Footnote ⁵ Because Argentina also has Latin America's worst malapportionment for elections to the national Congress, governors of the smallest (and often most conservative) provinces wield disproportionate influence. Hence, public policies “tend to favor specific constituencies instead of more public-regarding objectives” (p. 79). Although somewhat less influential than in Argentina, state governors in Brazil and Mexico are powerful figures whose influence over nomination processes lets them shape the national legislative agenda and complicate feminist efforts to build broad national support for gender equality policies.

Federalism and Policy Failures: Obstruction versus Weak State Capacity

Perhaps the greatest disadvantage posed by federalism and other multilevel governance or decentralized governance structures in Latin America is the opportunities for meso-level governments to obstruct, reshape, or fail to apply national laws and policies. Implementation failures occur for different reasons: In some cases, intergovernmental fiscal relations do not facilitate robust implementation of federal policy objectives (i.e., meso-level governments may lack the resources to implement policy). In other cases, meso-level authorities refuse to implement policies to which they object. Yet there is a much broader problem: weak state capacity and inability to coordinate policy responses across levels of government (vertically) and across departments and ministries (horizontally). Implementation of policies to combat violence against women in Latin America, for example, is often poor because of weak state capacity and lack of political will, but rarely because subnational governments explicitly resist implementing national policy goals (Franceschet Reference Franceschet2010a).

While violence-against-women policies are based on a widely shared goal of preventing and sanctioning violence and are not subject to ideological dispute, women's reproductive rights, and particularly abortion, remain hotly contested. Despite declining church attendance, the Catholic Church remains “the most respected institution in Latin American societies” (Htun Reference Htun and Hagopian2009, 353), making politicians less willing to pursue policies to which it strenuously objects.Footnote ⁶ So, rather than trying to liberalize abortion laws, governments focus on preventing unwanted pregnancies through more sex education and by improving contraception availability. While Church opposition to public policies that promote sex education and contraception has been less strenuous, conservative politicians and the Catholic hierarchy vigorously oppose emergency contraception (the “morning after pill”), which the Church considers abortive. Here, decentralization permits local governments to disregard national policies openly and sometimes very publicly.

In Chile, for instance, despite a fairly centralized, unitary political system, public hospitals and clinics fall under the jurisdiction of municipal governments. In 2006, President Bachelet issued an executive decree requiring the free distribution of emergency contraception (EC) to anyone over the age of 14 who requests it, prompting overwhelming criticism and resistance from conservative politicians and the Catholic Church. Many municipalities led by conservative mayors publicly declared their intention not to comply with the president's decree, although it had the force of law (Franceschet Reference Franceschet, Silvia and Weeks2010b). Later, the country's Constitutional Tribunal declared the law unconstitutional. At that point, however, municipal autonomy was embraced by leftist mayors who wanted to continue making EC available. The president of the Chilean Association of Municipalities emphasized that mayors had the “administrative autonomy” to provide EC, although were not obliged to do so.Footnote ⁷ Eventually, a bill favored by President Bachelet to make all forms of contraception (including emergency contraception) available though public clinics was introduced in Congress. She also used her executive prerogatives to ensure that the bill moved quickly through the legislative process, demonstrating the importance of a president committed to women's rights. The bill passed in December 2009.Footnote ⁸