Spring 2022 Forum Participants

SESSION 1: Women and Development: Empowering Individuals, Building Communities

Amneris Chaparro

Amneris Chaparro Martinez currently serves as the Head of Academic Affairs for UNAM’s Center for Research and Gender Studies. She joined CIEG in 2018 as a researcher for a project that critically analyzes three characteristics of contemporary feminism: neoliberalism, post-feminism, and dissident feminisms. This project is part of the National System of Researchers. Chaparro Martinez holds a PhD and MA in Political Theory from the Government Department of the University of Essex (UK) and a degree in sociology from UNAM. She did her postdoctoral fellowship at the Hoover Chaire of Economics and Social Ethics at the University of Leuven in Belgium and another postdoctoral fellowship at the Sociology Department of the Autonomous Metropolitan University, Azcapotzalco campus. Chaparro Martinez has taught undergraduate and graduate level courses on feminism, human rights, and political theory. She has also taught training courses on non-discrimination, workplace harassment, and gender awareness for personnel from different government agencies.

Luz Galindo

Luz Galindo is a professor at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. She completed her postdoctoral stay at the Center for Demographic, Urban, and Environmental Studies of the Colegio de México. Professor Galindo earned her doctorate in Political and Social Sciences from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).  She has collaborated in governmental, civil society, and academic spaces in different countries, including India, Spain and Portugal.

Yazmín Pérez Haro

Yazmín Pérez Haro is a specialist in gender and care policies. She has a doctorate in Anthropological Sciences, a master’s in Gender Studies with orientation in Public Policies, and is a psychologist specializing in education, with emphasis on teaching-learning processes with a gender perspective and non-discrimination. For more than 15 years she has dedicated her academic research to issues of uses and inequalities of time, care policies and female-headed households in Mexico City.  She has a Higher Diploma on Public Policies for Social Development at CIDE. She has collaborated as a tutor and thesis director in the Master’s Program in Public Policies and Gender at FLACSO Mexico headquarters and at PRIGEPP Flacso Argentina. As an activist, she formulated the feminist initiative for the inclusion of a Care System for Mexico City and helped achieve the recognition of domestic and care work as generators of goods and services for social production and reproduction, something which is now part of the text of Mexico City’s constitution. She is also the founder of CIIDIS (Center for Research and Advocacy for Development and Substantive Equality), which together with Oxfam Mexico collaborated as a creator and documentary producer with the series of short documentaries: “Tiempos Privados” on Care and Inequalities in Mexico.” Currently, she is part of the UNAM Care Co-Responsibility Program Advisory Group and LAIGN’s working group on Gender, Economy, Poverty, and Health.  She also works as Director of Innovation and Special Projects at the National Institute for Women in Mexico.

Marta Clara Ferreyra Beltrán

Marta Clara Ferreyra Beltrán holds a degree in in History and Master in Political Studies from UNAM. She has previously served as Deputy Director of Feminist Debate and Secretary of Equality of the PUEG of CIEG-UNAM. She has also been Director of the Promotion of Culture and Non-Discrimination of CONAPRED. She is currently pursuing a doctorate in Sociology at UNAM with a thesis on academic care and marriages and is General Director of Autonomy and Empowerment for Substantive Equality at INMUJERES.

Yolanda Kakabadse

Yolanda Kakabadse has previously served as Ecuador’s Minister of Environment. In 1992, Kakabadse served as the NGO Liaison Officer for the United Nations Conference for Environment and Development (the Rio Earth Summit). She served as President of the World Conservation Union (IUCN) from 1996 to 2004 and as President of WWF International from 2010 to 2017. Kakabadse was the first Executive Director of Fundacion Natura in Ecuador, and in 1993 she founded Fundacion Futuro Latinoamericano. Kakabadse is a member of the boards of several national and international organizations in both the public and private sectors. 

SESSION 2: Equality and Civil Society after COVID-19

Gisela Zaremberg

Gisela Zaremberg holds a PhD in Research in Social Sciences with a Mention in Political Sciences from the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO, Mexico) and a master’s degree in Social Policies from the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Currently, she works as Professor-Researcher at the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO, Mexico Headquarters). She is a member of the National System of Researchers (SNI) in Mexico, at level II. Her research interests include gender, democratic innovation, representation, and public policy networks. Among her latest publications are Networks and Hierarchies: participation, representation and local governance in Latin America (Venezuela, Brazil, Mexico and Nicaragua) and Votes, women and social assistance in Priista Mexico and Peronist Argentina (1947-1964) for which she received the Donna Lee Van Cott 2010 award for “Best Book on Latin American Institutions ” (by LAPIS, LASA).

Elisabeth Jay Friedman

Elisabeth Jay Friedman is Professor of Politics and  Latin American Studies at the University of San Francisco. She is the author of Interpreting the Internet: Feminist and Queer Counterpublics in Latin America (University of California Press, 2016) and the editor of Seeking Rights from the Left: Gender, Sexuality, and the Latin American Pink Tide (Duke University Press, 2019), published in Spanish as Género, sexualidad e izquierdas latinoamericanas: El reclamo de derechos durante la marea rosa (CLACSO, 2020). Her research interests include the intersection of social movements and digital infrastructure and the impact of new generations and transnational ideas on feminist communities and strategies.

Constanza Tabbush

Constanza Tabbush is a Research Specialist at UN Women and a member of the core technical team that developed the UNDP-UN Women COVID-19 Global Gender Response Tracker. She co-authored UN Women’s “Feminist Plan for Sustainability and Social Justice,” as well as the latest edition of UN Women’s flagship report, “Progress of the World’s Women.” In addition, she has published extensively on gender, social movements and social policy. Constanza has a PhD in Sociology from the University of London, and prior to joining UN Women she worked as a Research Associate at the National Research Council in Argentina.

Celia Giay

Celia Giay is a teacher, professor of music, journalist, and writer and has completed a postgraduate diploma in “Gestión y Dirección de Organizaciones con Fines Sociales” at the University of Salvador, Argentina. Celia is a member of the Rotary Club Arrecifes and a great advocate of women in Rotary and in society.  Mrs. Giay has served Rotary International as RI Director, RI Vice President, RI President’s Representative,Regional Rotary FoundationCoordinator, Chairman of RI Convention, Chairman of Women in Future Society Committee, Councilon Legislation Representative,RI Training Leader, Committee Chair and member, RI Convener of Rotary Institutes and Rotary Presidential Conference for New Generations  RI Representative at the Summit of the Americas  and Director Editor of Vida Rotaria, the official Rotary magazine that serves Argentina Paraguay and Uruguay. She is currently Representative of the RI Pte, National Coordinator for Regional Committees, Chairman of the Argentina-Brazil Interpaises Committee, and Chairman of the Peace Conference Pre Convention Houston 2022.

Verónica Siman

Verónica Simán is a sociologist with a PhD from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she specialized in demography. She worked for 14 years with the Government of El Salvador in the area of social public policy, and since 2008 she has worked with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in the offices of El Salvador and Guatemala. She is currently a representative for UNFPA’s Colombia office. In her different positions, she has participated in and promoted research related to women’s rights, with an emphasis on their sexual and reproductive rights, particularly in populations most left behind.

SESSION 3: Achieving Equality through Law and Advocacy

Gisela Zaremberg

Gisela Zaremberg holds a PhD in Research in Social Sciences with a Mention in Political Sciences from the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO, Mexico) and a master’s degree in Social Policies from the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Currently, she works as Professor-Researcher at the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO, Mexico Headquarters). She is a member of the National System of Researchers (SNI) in Mexico, at level II. Her research interests include gender, democratic innovation, representation, and public policy networks. Among her latest publications are Networks and Hierarchies: participation, representation and local governance in Latin America (Venezuela, Brazil, Mexico and Nicaragua) and Votes, women and social assistance in Priista Mexico and Peronist Argentina (1947-1964) for which she received the Donna Lee Van Cott 2010 award for “Best Book on Latin American Institutions ” (by LAPIS, LASA).

Karen Castillo

Karen Castillo is currently pursuing a master’s degree in law at UNAM and is interested in international and business law. Her proposal is from her master’s thesis.

Rita Astrid Muciño Corro

Rita Astrid Muciño Corro is a doctoral student at the Instituto de Investigaciones Jurídicas at UNAM. She earned a Master’s in Human Rights and Democracy from FLACSO and also has public policy experience. She has previously worked as a Rule of Law and Gender Specialist for USAID and currently works as a consultant on matters of gender and human rights.

Honorable Minister Maria Claudia Bucchianeri Pinheiro

Maria Claudia Bucchianeri Pinheiro is a substitute minister at the Superior Electoral Court (TSE, in Portuguese). She was appointed on August 3, 2021 by the President of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, to the current position and is the ninth woman to integrate the Plenary of the TSE in the course of 89 years of the Brazilian Electoral Justice. She is a lawyer, holds a master’s degree in State Law from the University of Sao Paulo (USP) and a specialist in Fundamental Rights from the University of Coimbra (IBCCrim). She has served as chief advisor to the Presidency of the TSE and is the Secretary General of the Brazilian Academy of Electoral and Political Law (ABRADEP, in Portuguese); member of the Brazilian Institute of Electoral Law (IBRADE, in Portuguese); member of the Electoral Law Commission of the Institute of Brazilian Lawyers (IAB, in Portuguese); member of the Constitutional Affairs Committee and the Special Committee on Electoral Law of the Federal Council of the Brazilian Bar Association (CFOAB, in Portuguese). Maria Claudia is also a member of the TSE Women, the TSE’s Gender Policy Management Commission and Vice-Director of the Electoral Judiciary School of the Superior Electoral Court.

(Portuguese)

Maria Claudia Bucchianeri Pinheiro é ministra substituta do Tribunal Superior Eleitoral (TSE). Foi nomeada em 3 de agosto de 2021 pelo presidente do Brasil, Jair Bolsonaro, para o atual cargo e é a nona mulher a integrar o Plenário do TSE no decorrer de 89 anos da Justiça Eleitoral brasileira. É advogada, mestre em Direito de Estado pela Universidade de São Paulo (USP) e especialista em Direitos Fundamentais pela Universidade de Coimbra (IBCCrim). Já atuou como assessora-chefe da Presidência do TSE e é secretária Geral da Academia Brasileira de Direito Eleitoral e Político – ABRADEP; membro do Instituto Brasileiro de Direito Eleitoral – IBRADE; membro da Comissão de Direito Eleitoral do Instituto dos Advogados Brasileiros - IAB; membro da Comissão de Assuntos Constitucionais e da Comissão Especial de Direito Eleitoral do Conselho Federal da Ordem dos Advogados do Brasil - CFOAB. Maria Claudia também é integrante do TSE Mulheres, a Comissão Gestora de Política de Gênero do TSE e Vice-Diretora da Escola Judiciária Eleitoral do Tribunal Superior Eleitoral.

Julia Peredo

Julia Elena Peredo Miranda studied Communications in NUR University in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. Afterwards, she worked in various businesses as a magazine editor and later worked in the public sector in the Judicial Body of Bolivia. Currently she is working in corporate communications within the Bolivian state-owned enterprise Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales.

Carla Carrizo

Carla Carrizo is a native of the Province of Córdoba, Argentina, with a degree in Political Science from the University of Salvador, where she has also served as Director of the Degree. She has taught at the Argentine Catholic University, the Di Tella University, and the National University of Buenos Aires. She is currently a National Deputy for the City of Buenos Aires and is a member of the Radical Civic Union Block. She entered Congress in the 2013 elections and was reelected in 2017. She serves as Vice President of the Block of Deputies of the Radical Civic Union, as 1st Vice President of the Bicameral Commission on the Rights of Girls, Boys and Adolescents, and as a member of the commissions on Human Rights and Guarantees and Women and Diversity. Carrizo’s legislative work areas include Control Organizations and Institutions, Equity and Gender, and Childhood and Adolescence as State Policies in Argentina.

SESSION 4: Protecting Women Migrants in the 21st Century

Moira Fradinger

Moira Fradinger is Associate Professor in the department of Comparative Literature. She grew up in four South American countries: Argentina, Uruguay, Peru and Venezuela. A native speaker of Spanish, she is also proficient in French, Italian and Portuguese. Before her academic life in the USA, she had started her career as a psychologist in Argentina, working in clinical practice with psychotic patients in public hospitals. In Argentina she was also a professional staff member in the National Ministry of Health and Social Action at the Under-Secretary for Women’s Affairs and taught at the University of Buenos Aires. She joined Yale first as a graduate student, and was hired in 2005 in Comparative Literature. She is the author of Binding Violence: Literary Visions of Political Origins (Stanford UP, 2010) and has written articles on Latin American film and literature, and on the reception of classical tragedy in Latin America. Currently she is finishing two projects: a book on 20th century Latin American rewritings of Antigone, with the working title of “Antígonas: A Latin American Tradition,” and an anthology of five Antigone-plays (from Haiti, Argentina, Uruguay, Peru, and Brazil) that she translated into English. She has also translated poems and short stories from Spanish into English. She has three book-length projects in research phase, including a study of Gender Debates in 21st century Argentina, a study on revolutionary Latin American cinema in the sixties, and one of the anarchist imagination, focusing on anarchist journals and their women writers on both sides of the Atlantic at the turn of the 20th century. She has won several teaching awards; the latest one was the Sarai Ribicoff Award for the Encouragement of Teaching at the Yale College (2012). She has taught courses on topics such as Radical Films from Latin America; Latin American and Caribbean Intellectual history (19th and 20th centuries); Latin American and World literature; Psychoanalytic theories of the subject; Freud and Science; Lacan and the Post-Freudians; Gender theories and their politics; Introduction to Narrative; Feminist Film makers.

Maria Susana Rosales Perez

Rosales Perez is a postdoctoral researcher at El Colegio de México, where she is affiliated with the Seminar on Labor and Inequalities of the Network of Studies on Inequalities. She holds a PhD in Social Anthropology from the National School of Anthropology and History in Mexico City. She has conducted research on the Mexico-Belize international border in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo. Her main areas of research include rural women, labor markets, new rurality, gender, and violence.

Alicia Giron

Alicia Giron is an economist with a PhD in Latin American Studies. Since 2017, Giron has served as the Director of the University Program of Asian and African Studies (PUEAA). Between 2014 and 2017, she was the Coordinator of the Asian Studies Seminar. She is also a researcher and former director of the Economic Research Institute (IIEc). Her research interests include financial economics, economic cycles, financial crises, sovereign debt, and financial systems. Her research is related to gender economics and its relationship with financial circuits at macroeconomic and microeconomic levels.

Lorena Aguilar

Aguilar is a global leader in human rights, inclusion, and sustainable development and has over three decades of experience in providing strategic contributions to national and international policies. She advocates for collaborations between government agencies, UN agencies, international organizations, and civil society in order to advance inclusive and equitable sustainable development. Aguilar has field experience in more than 50 countries across Latin America, the Caribbean, Eastern Europe, Africa, and Asia. She has also served as Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs of Costa Rica.

Teresa Inchaustegui

Teresa Inchaustegui graduated from UNAM with a degree in Work Sociology in 1994 and earned a degree in in Political Analysis from the Universidad Iberoamericana Sede Sta. Fe in 1987. Doctor of Science Research Social Studies with a specialty in Political Science from the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences, Mexico headquarters (1997). She has done research stays on social policy issues at the Latin American Center of Studies from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. (1996) and postdoctoral stay at the Department of Law and Public Policies of the Autonomous University of Barcelona, ​​on family policy issues (1998-1999) Professor and Researcher of the Interdisciplinary Program in Women’s Studies (PIEM) of El Colegio de México (1998-2000) and professor of the Master in Gender and Cultural Studies from 2000 to 2005. Founder and Professor of the Diploma in Gender and Public Policy at FLACSO-México from 2002 to 2009. Nowadays full-time professor and researcher in the Postgraduate course in Humanities and Social Sciences of the Autonomous University of Mexico City.

SESSION 5: Shattering the Glass Ceiling in Academia, Science, and Beyond

Claudia Valeggia

Claudia Valeggia is the Chair of the Council of Latin American and Iberian Studies at the MacMillan Center for International Studies of Yale University and is a USA Professor of Anthropology. Valeggia is originally from Buenos Aires, Argentina, where she received her degree in biological sciences at the University of Buenos Aires.  She received her PhD from the University of California, Davis in 1996 and then went on to do a postdoc at Harvard University. In 2005 she joined the Department of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania, and in 2014 she moved to Yale University where she is a professor in the Department of Anthropology. Her work is primarily concerned with human reproductive biology and the ecological and cultural context in which it develops. Her research program takes a biosocial/biocultural approach to understanding reproductive patterns, maternal and child health, and the health of Latin American indigenous populations. She thanks the Qom of the province of Formosa, Argentina for their collaboration, patience, and friendship.

Guadalupe Yapud Ibadango

Giadalupe Yapud Ibadango holds a PhD in Social Sciences from the Sociology and Gender Program of the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO-ECUADOR) with specializations in Andean Studies and Migration, Development, and Human Rights. She is a member of the Latin American Interdisciplinary Gender Network (LAIGN) at Yale University and UNAM and is a Bank of Montreal Visiting Scholar in Women’s Studies at the Institute of Feminist and Gender Studies at the University of Ottawa.

Federico Ernesto Viscarra (UTEPSA)

Federico Ernesto Viscarra is an economist with a degree from the Bolivian Catholic University. He has completed several postgraduate courses in management of natural resources and a holds PhD in Climate Change Science and Management from the Ca`Foscari University of Venice in Italy. He completed his doctoral research at Yale University in the United States on the issue of impacts and adaptation measures in forestry and agriculture to face change climate. He has been a consultant for the National REDD (Reduction of Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) Programs of Bolivia, Cameroon, Peru, and Colombia. For the last 6 years he has served as Head of Research and Entrepreneurship of the UTEPSA University in Bolivia. He is a member of the research commission of the Observatory University for Gender Equality in Santa Cruz, Bolivia where he has participated in research on the perception of women in university teaching. He is also the principal investigator in the project “Building public policies for the effective participation of women in the areas of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) in Bolivia”, funded by the International Development Research Center (IDRC) of Canada.

Mary Cruz de Urioste (UTEPSA)

Mary Cruz de Urioste holds a master’s degree in gender issues, social responsibility, family therapy, and development communities. She has more than 25 years of experience of university teaching and is researcher in projects with incidence in sectors of high social vulnerability. She is the founder and first president of the Gender Observatory of the public and private universities of the city of Santa Cruz, which conducts research and disseminates information on gender issues. She is currently the Head of the Department of Student Welfare, Coordinator of the Fundación Beca Program (model RSU DABE), and the Juntos al Futuro model of the Private University of Santa Cruz. She work to develop participatory research projects to create opportunities for vulnerable groups based on their dominant popular cultures. She has published works on psychology, university social responsibility, and gender perspectives in regional indexed journals.

Mariana Santa Cruz Terrazas (UTEPSA)

Mariana Santa Cruz Terrazas is a Doctor of Psychology with more than ten years of experience in research-action studies on women in Bolivia and Latin America. She is the leader of the Transdisciplinary Community of Research and Learning of the Bolivian Catholic University in the Santa Cruz headquarters, which conducts projects on vulnerability of women and adolescents, food security, local entrepreneurship, and indigenous rights. She also served as the Coordinator of the Transdisciplinary Project, which is part of the international research consortium between Belgian Universities and the University Bolivian Catholic “San Pablo” (VLIR-UOS project). She is the author and co-author of articles published in international journals about regional issues related to the vulnerability of adolescents, socio-constructivism as a research tool in psychology, and the challenges of women university teachers in Bolivia.

Javiera Gazmuri

Javiera Gazmuri has been a research assistant at the Center for Public Studies (CEP) since September 2020. She has previously taught courses on economics at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, where she also earned degrees in Applied Economics and Business and Administration. Her research experience focuses on gender issues in politics and educational issues, mainly related to higher education. She has investigated gender parity in popularly elected positions and gender gaps in education and health in Chile.

Maria-Noel Vaeza

Maria-Noel Vaeza has served as the Regional Director for the Americas and the Caribbean of the UN Women program since 2019. Vaeza previously worked as Director of the Program Division at the UN Women Headquarters in New York. Vaeza joined UN Women from the UNOPS Headquarters in Copenhagen, where she served as Director for Global Portfolio Services Office and Partnerships Practice Group and was responsible for the operational results of UNOPS global portfolios and for the establishment of UNOPS strategic partnerships. She previously served as the Regional Director of UNOPS for Latin America and the Caribbean. She spent 8 years at UNDP, where she held various posts including Senior Advisor, Deputy Resident Representative in Paraguay, and Senior Manager for the Recovery, Reconciliation and Reform Programme. Prior to joining the UN, Vaeza held multiple positions in Uruguay’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, including as Political Counselor at Uruguay’s Embassy to the US and as Delegate of Uruguay to the UN General Assembly. She was also the alternate Representative of Uruguay to the World Bank Board of Directors. She holds a Doctorate in Law and Social Science from the University of the Republic of Uruguay and a Master’s Degree in International Public Policy from Johns Hopkins University, Washington, DC.