"This is a very exciting collection that will fill an important gap in what has emerged in comparative studies of women and Latin American democracies. Maier and Lebon provide provocative overview essays, and the chapters trace a range of cases from Argentina and Brazil to Nicaragua and Venezuela, showing how institutions. leaders and culture all shape the opportunities and challenges women face."---Jane Jaquette, editor of Feminist Agendas and Democracy in Latin America<BR><BR>Women's Activism in Latin America and the Garibbean brings together a group of inter disciplinary scholars who analyze and document the diversity vibrancy and effectiveness of women's experiences and organizing in Latin America and the Caribbean during the past four decades. Most of the expression of collective agency are analyzed in this book within the context of the neoliberal model of globalization that has seriously affected most Latin American and Caribbean women's lives in multiple ways.<BR><BR>Contributors explore the emergence of the area's feminist movements dictationships of the 1970s, the Central Americean uprisings, the urban, grass roots organizing for better living conditions, and, finally, the turn toward public policy and formal political involvement and the alternative globalization movement. Geared toward bridging cultural realities, this volume represents women's transformations, challenges, and hopes while considering the analytical tools needed to dissect the realities, understand the alternatives and promote gender democracy.