Mulheres na liderança, relações de gênero e empoderamento de Reforma Agrária: o caso do Saco do Rio Preto em Minas Gerais

Abstract

The central focus of this study was to think over the existing relationships between women s political practices and changes in gender relations, both in public and private spheres, taking as reference the Saco do Rio Preto Settlement, in Northwest Minas Gerais. It sought to draw the Settlement historical course, showing the stages of mobilization, camping, and settlement, focusing on the changes in gender relations concerning the empowerment processes. The research studied different gender behaviors from the theoretical categories of sexual division of labor, decision-making process, access and control of resources, management of the activities of production, reproduction and commercialization, and the process of political representation. It could be seen that changes in gender relations in the private sphere were more intense in the period of camping, and that changes in the public sphere took place in all phases of the struggle for land process and embraced a larger number of women. Also, the research reinforced that struggle for land does not in itself contain a presumption of guaranteed access to women. On the contrary, changes for women are needed in several fields as in the family, in the community, in the market, and in various levels of the State organization. So, they have been facing confrontations in unexpected and unpredictable situations and places, which do not occur without dispute. As for the empowerment process, it could be seen that it happened in all phases of the struggle for land and goes on, both in the public and private spheres. This has been demanding from them more and more qualification, persistence and sophistication in their political and technical learning process.