Abstract
The study of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Queer (LGBTQ) politics in Latin America has been one of democratization. Scholars of LGBTQ mobilization in the region have analyzed the emergence and evolution of these movements and their relationships with other social actors and states as countries moved away from dictatorial rule and into electoral democracy and (some) into consolidation. As has been extensively documented, LGBTQ movements, and their struggles for rights, were shaped by (and shaped) the various phases of the democratization process. As such, analyses of LGBTQ movements served as an effective prism through which to understand broader political phenomena.
Karen Kampwirth's masterful LGBTQ Politics in Nicaragua: Revolution, Dictatorship, and Social Movements does the same in one of (now) a handful of countries that have made a complete circle on democratization, and back: from dictatorship to revolution, from revolution to democracy, and from democracy back to dictatorship. In her detailed, richly documented, and highly engaging account, Kampwirth takes the reader through the various political phases this Central American country has undergone since the end of the Somoza dictatorship (1936–1979). The reader learns not only about LGBTQ politics, but also about the country's political evolution. For anyone interested in either, this book is a must‐read.
The book is the result of decades of fieldwork and “has a companion: 500 Years of LGBTQ+ History in Western Nicaragua” (p. 9) by Victoria González-Rivera. The companion was unpublished at the time of writing and this assessment is therefore partial.
In LGBTQ Politics in Nicaragua, Kampwirth takes the reader through the various phases of the country's contemporary politics by looking at the lives, experiences, and mobilizing strategies of queer Nicaraguans. In one of the most fascinating chapters, Chapter One, Kampwirth opens the book with the experiences of lesbian and gay guerilla fighters who helped overthrow the Sandinistas, and then relates their experiences as their “revolution” (1979–1990) won the struggle and consolidated power in the early 1980s. By looking at various aspects of daily life, and by engaging the complexities surrounding the semantics of descriptors for “homosexuals,” the author successfully demonstrates that, unlike other revolutionary movements in the region, the Sandinistas did not have a clear position on sexual diversity.
In the second chapter, Kampwirth looks at the turbulent decade of the 1980s as the HIV/AIDS epidemic ravaged Latin America's queer community. In it, the author shows that, despite sexual diversity having gained a certain degree of normalization through a fascinating queer television personality (Donald Casco)—a confidant of Nicaragua's First Lady—LGBTQ+ mobilization, just like the country's politics themselves, was shaped by exogenous forces: U.S. imperialism and Cuban influence. To wit, the first Nicaraguan Pride group was crushed by the Interior Ministry, which had direct links with Havana. It was not until the late 1980s that, with the protection of a state ally, queer people in Nicaragua could finally start to participate in public events.
The subsequent chapters take the reader through the ensuing phases of Nicaraguan politics. Chapter Three looks at the perils of queer life under the socially conservative Chamorro administration (1990–1997). A rarity in a region where same‐sex relations have for the most part not been criminalized since Independence, Violeta Chamorro decided to criminalize “sodomy” and “pro-LGBTQ speech” with up to five years in prison. As a result of that policy change, queer Nicaraguans would live for 16 years with the strictest regulatory system in continental Latin America. Nevertheless, as Kampwirth shows, queer people in the country managed, following the Latin American adage of “obedezco pero no cumplo” (I obey but I do not comply with), to carve up social space to organize collectively through support groups and, eventually, to focus on health‐related objectives.
The next chapters take the reader through queer life and mobilization during the sad years of Nicaragua's backsliding into authoritarian rule and analyze the factors that explain a remarkable (and unlikely) paradox: the emergence of what the author calls an “LGBTQ boom” of queer mobilization under the socially conservative and increasingly dictatorial regime under the single‐family Ortega-Murillo state. In Chapters Four and Five Kampwirth overviews the emergence of numerous LGBTQ organizations during the boom decade (2007–2017) that fought for a variety of causes, ranging from increased visibility and respect to equal working conditions and policy changes. The author compellingly argues that one of the factors that explains the boom was the deliberate attempt by the regime to gain international legitimacy through the provision of funding and other forms of support to LGBTQ organizations. This strategy, the author contends, was in fact key to consolidating power. Indeed, Kampwirth argues that this phenomenon cannot be understood independently from the regime's LGBTQ policies, for it helped it to pinkwash the country's image abroad all while reducing Nicaragua's once‐powerful feminist opposition and refusing to advance substantive rights to queer Nicaraguans. This is a nuanced, well‐researched, and fascinating account of LGBTQ politics in Nicaragua.
The book fills an important gap in the literature on queer politics. As the author correctly points out, most of the work in the area has primarily looked at the bigger Latin American countries. While important, few works have focused on Central American queer politics. As with most projects, the book has some wrinkles that, while minor, could have easily been ironed out. One in particular stands out: limited engagement with comparative work. The author cites some of the major work on queer politics in Latin America in the Introduction to place her book within existing literature but does not engage it in the rest of the book. This would have helped in drawing some important similarities and differences with queer Latin American organizing elsewhere. This, however, does not significantly detract from this high‐caliber work.
A final important note seems in order. In an era in which debates around “positionality” risk curtailing the possibility of some researchers to undertake work in some areas, Kampwirth's work clearly demonstrates that the debates can at times be misplaced. In LGBTQ Politics in Nicaragua, the author clearly declares that she does not belong to the LGBTQ community, yet she presents us with a compelling analysis of queer politics, one based on years of extensive fieldwork (that predate the “boom” of queer politics research in Latin America), a clear sense of social justice, and a keen sensibility for some marginalized Latin American lives.