Cisgenderism at work: inclusion and inequality in Argentina’s public sector

• In Event: Organizations, Occupations, and Work Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (90 minute): Table 21: Gender Inequality

Abstract

This article examines the workplace experiences of transgender and non-binary individuals in Argentina’s public sector following the landmark Transgender Employment Quota Law. The study investigates how formal inclusion policies translate into everyday organizational practice. Drawing on 37 semi-structured interviews conducted with trans and travesti workers between 2021 and 2023, I identify a paradox of progress and argue that legal recognition and cisgender-based discrimination are not mutually exclusive but co-constitutive. Even within inclusionary environments, cisnormative organizational logics persist, regulating gender and constraining full belonging.
The findings detail three primary ways this inequality manifests, what is defined as intelligibility labor, trans workers face an asymmetrical burden of educating cisgender colleagues and justifying their identities to achieve basic professional recognition. Two, differential evaluation, employees navigate a "double bind" where they are subject to both heightened scrutiny, the pressure to overperform, and lowered expectations regarding their technical skills. Last, sexualization of trans women, in particular, as they encounter objectification and harassment often linked to historical stigmas and the presumption of a background in sex work.
The study concludes that legal quotas alone are insufficient to dismantle the gendered foundations of organizations. True inclusion requires a fundamental shift that moves the responsibility for change away from trans individuals and toward a restructuring of institutional norms, procedures, and cultures. By analyzing a "progressive" case, this research contributes to political sociology and organizational theory by illustrating how rights are both enacted and limited within institutional contexts.

Author

• Martina Speranza, University of Florida