We want ourselves alive and debt free!

Abstract

Verónica Gago is Professor of Social Sciences at the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina and author of Neoliberalism From Below (Duke 2017); Feminist International: How to Change Everything (Verso 2020); and, with Lucí Cavallero, A Feminist Theory of Debt (Pluto, 2021). She is an active member of the grassroots feminist movement Ni Una Menos, founded by a group of artists, activists and academics in Argentina. Ni Una Menos has described itself as a 'collective scream against machista violence'. It has regularly held protests against femicides, and has connected femicide to a range of other issues, including sexual harassment, abortion and reproductive rights, transgender and sex worker rights, the gender pay gap, gender roles, neoliberalism and debt. Its first demonstration was organised in the wake of a 14-year old pregnant girl, Chiara Paez, being beaten to death by her boyfriend, in Buenos Aires in 2015. This brought together 200,000 people. In 2016 the movement came to wider attention on social media through the hashtag #NiUnaMenos, and protests spread throughout Latin America, particularly in Chile, Uruguay and Peru, where it prompted what has been described as the largest demonstration in Peruvian history. In 2016 Ni Una Menos launched a national women's strike. After sustained campaigning, in 2020 abortion became legal in Argentina; and in 2021 a law was passed giving employment rights to travestis and trans people. Its campaigns to reclaim rights and resources continue. In this interview, conducted in July 2021, Jo Littler talks to Verónica Gago about Ni Una Menos, her work and activism.