Upon entering office in 2007, socialist Rafael Correa launched his Citizen Revolution in Ecuador, with the aim of establishing a postneoliberal order. His antineoliberal political discourse called for a “living well” (i.e., buen vivir in spanish; sumaq kawsay in Quichua) development model that favored solidarity over competition and sustainability over economic growth. It also called for increased political inclusivity and a form of redistribution that reaches a broader range of citizens. In line with other Latin American populist-socialist leaders, such as Hugo Chávez of Venezuela and Evo Morales of Bolivia, Correa claimed that his revolution “has a woman's face.” Yet personally, Correa is a devout Catholic and trained economist who opposes abortion and homosexuality and favors a traditional familial model—one that reinforces a notion of “modern economic man” that is both Eurocentric and heteronormative.

The center-left Concertación held the presidency in Chile from the end of the Pinochet dictatorship in 1990 until 2010. The coalition's loss of the office provides a unique opportunity to evaluate its performance. I focus in this essay on the government of socialist Michelle Bachelet, Chile's first woman president, who held the office from 2006 to 2010. I am interested in the contradictions in the evaluations of her presidency by feminists (including feminist scholars) and Mapuche activists (and scholars of Mapuche politics). While both groups shared a mix of hope and skepticism at the beginning of her government, one of the things that most struck me in field visits to Chile as her term progressed was growing enthusiasm on the part of Chilean feminist acquaintances and growing bitterness on the part of Mapuche ones. I am particularly concerned with what this means for indigenous women who find themselves at the intersection of these two identifications, and suggest that their positionality and experiences represent a long-standing and still unanswered challenge to feminist methods and praxis.

The final round of Peru's 2011 presidential campaign featured two dramatically different candidates. Ollanta Humala was a leftist nationalist who sought to increase redistribution to the poorest and most marginalized. Keiko Fujmori was a right-wing proponent of the free market and the torchbearer of her father's presidential legacy of overcoming economic crisis and terrorism in the 1990s. According to the extant scholarship on the relationship between left parties and gender equality, we should have expected the leftist candidate to support gender equality policies more strongly.