Precarious Politics in Nicaragua: The Anti-Feminist Roots of Populist Violence

• In Event: The Decay of the Pink Tide and the Rise of the Right in Latin America

Abstract

The generalized political violence that exploded in Nicaragua in 2018 followed patterns established during attacks against feminists and other critics dating back several years. In Nicaragua, politics is always complicated by the ongoing presence of Daniel Ortega. Ortega’s second presidency has been less revolutionary and more populist – and personalist – than the Sandinista regime of the 1980s. Ortega has participated in a redefinition of both Sandinista and Nicaraguan identity that moves from the explicitly revolutionary to something more conservative and traditional. Gender roles and women’s rights have been at the center of this transformation, with the scope of women’s rights being narrowed and avenues for feminist mobilization being cut off. I argue that Ortega’s targeting of autonomous feminist organizations did more than simply curry favor with conservatives and traditional Catholics. This shift also marginalized some of his strongest critics and attempted to silence the allegations against him regarding the sexual abuse of his step-daughter, while also cutting off the possibility of political or criminal sanction for it. Just as the FSLN and the Nicaraguan government have come to be dominated by Ortega’s personalism, so have conflicts with civil society been driven by Ortega’s personal conflicts.
Ortega came to power the second time in the context of a leftist wave across much of Latin American commonly known as the “Pink Tide.” While these governments were considerably heterogeneous, they often include leftist populist appeals. (Levitsky and Roberts 2011) Nicaragua has neither the resources nor the level of economic development necessary to provide the level of social benefits that a Chavez – or a Lula or a Bachelet – could, limiting one potential source of legitimation for Ortega. (Kaufman 2011) As the regional reversal of the populist left wave increasingly limited his access to international financial and political support, he increased repression of his opponents, including first autonomous feminist organizations and potential electoral opponents before extending to include most of independent civil society in 2018.
The lens of familial legitimacy provides important insight into how Nicaragua differs from other “Pink Tide” governments in terms of the anti-feminist nature of Sandinista populism. Given the tremendous diversity that exists among recent leftist governments in Latin America, understanding the ways in which familial politics intersects with ethnic politics, institutionalized parties, or redistributive politics can help us to understand the roots of official populist violence. “Familial legitimacy” extends beyond personalist politics to include, among other things, the ways in which power flows through a leader who defines himself as a patriarchal father of a nation cast as his children. (Thomas 2011) In Nicaragua, familial legitimacy took on an outsized prominence in the face of an initially weak electoral victory by a well-institutionalized party whose leader sought to rule as a populist without a populist majority behind him. Appealing to familial legitimacy helped Ortega to accumulate more popular support even as it opened a door to personal – and familial – criticism against him.
Nicaragua’s women’s movement was initially bolstered and strengthened by the revolutionary Sandinista Front for National Liberation (Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional, FSLN) during its first time in government in the 1980s. Many Nicaraguan feminists then broke away from the main Sandinista-backed women’s organization and began to operate as an autonomous feminist sector within the context of a “boom” in non-governmental organizations after the end of the revolutionary Sandinista government in 1990. By the second presidency of FSLN leader Daniel Ortega (2007 - ), these autonomous feminists found themselves facing extreme hostility from a party that once supported them. This treatment was a means of defending the personalist legitimacy of President Ortega in the face of the autonomous feminists’ insistence in reminding the nation of Ortega’s step-daughter’s accusations of sexual abuse. By 2018, these same patterns of attacks began to be employed against a much broader group of Ortega’s critics, with deadly results. The Nicaraguan case presents a theoretically useful example of a populist left government that employs personalist and familial modes of legitimation to attain and maintain power in spite of a limited ability to deliver on populist promises. The consequence has been the destruction of Nicaragua’s fragile democracy.

Author

• Rachel E. Bowen, Ohio State University