20 years building evidence, community and rights
In 2004, South Africa had been a democracy for just ten years after the fall of the oppressive apartheid regime. It was a country with enormous social inequalities and a massive HIV/AIDS crisis, but at the same time, it was one of the most progressive countries in terms of abortion rights.
In South Africa, abortion has been legal since 1996, which is why in 2004 it was chosen as the venue for the International Consortium for Medical Abortion (ICMA) Conference.
Eighteen people from South America traveLled to southern Africa to participate in the meeting. Some knew each other, for others it was the first time they had met. They came from countries with different and varied realities regarding access to the right to abortion. And that meeting, in the similarities and differences of Latin American contexts, was foundational to a story that is now 20 years old: that of the Latin American Consortium against Unsafe Abortion (Clacai).
Susana Chávez – She arrived in the South African city of Johannesburg from Peru, with a background as an obstetrician and activist for sexual and reproductive rights.
“For many of us, it was the first time we had been in a territory where abortion was permitted. And that gave us a completely different perspective. We visited the clinics, learned about the healthcare system, and saw how women arrived at the facilities and were treated with a degree of normalcy in a health service. And I found it to be a different and fantastic experience,” recalls Chávez, from the Collegiate Secretariat of Clacai.
The doctor Mariana Romero – She arrived in the African city from Argentina: “I didn’t know Susana, nor did I know other people who came from Latin America, but that meeting in Johannesburg brought us together.”
Raffaela Schiavon – A gynecologist, she travelled from Mexico to the ICMA conference. She defines that moment as the emergence of Clacai.
This initial impetus to organize into a Consortium arose in a context marked by the “Gag Rule,” a US government policy enacted in the 1980s to prohibit federal funding of organizations that support abortion rights. Chávez recalls that “it led to the invisibility of the term ‘abortion.’ So, first we had to reclaim the word abortion, making it part of our language without stigma and as a matter of human dignity. We also had to reclaim the understanding that those working on abortion issues need dignified, open spaces to bring together the academic, activist, and medical communities, which at that time were our immediate reference points for openly discussing abortion issues, talking about evidence, discussing science, sharing our findings, and also sharing our experiences.”
Conferences to build community
Building community was the idea behind holding conferences. At that time, abortion was a topic of discussion for the feminist movement or a certain sector of committed healthcare professionals. It was necessary to bring those two worlds together and expand their reach.
It was a challenge from the start. “How do you have a common agenda in countries with such diverse regulatory and policy implementation contexts?” Romero asks, and in those early days they tried “different ways of governing; some worked better, others didn’t.”
Peru hosted the founding meeting of 2006 ClacaiThere were 46 representatives from 13 countries.
George Hale, from the current Collegiate Secretariat, remembers it as “very small; rather, it was the fact of being present in spaces where we could articulate and dialogue with great respect and understanding the different positions that existed.”
Romero was going through a special personal time: she was trying to become a mother, which is why she remembers the conference very well, and that there was fog in Lima, which made them go back and forth to the airport until they managed to catch the plane that took them back to their countries.
The Argentine doctor and Chávez agree that the first steps “were not easy, there was mistrust and, at the same time, a conviction of the need to unite.”
The names of the founders appear in their memoirs. Cristina Villarreal, Silvina Ramos, Luis Távara, Miguel Gutiérrez, Giselle Carino, Marta María Blandón, Maria Luisa Sanchez, Edgar Kestler, as some of the people who accompanied and promoted the origin of Clacai.
With the Consortium underway, they met again in 2008 in Uruguay, at the First Conference.
Mariana Romero had already become a mother and traveled with her baby. In the documents from that meeting, she has handwritten notes indicating the progress made on the structure and the issues pending discussion in Montevideo.
And the official text of the Conference reads: “…our actions have often run parallel, without achieving the necessary synergies between research, advocacy, and services.” The path of intersectionality was always the horizon that has been reached 20 years after the first meeting.
The Second Conference was also held in Peru, in 2009. The final document includes a call to action for states to guarantee secularism as the foundation of democracy and a series of recommendations to ensure women’s right to sexual health and access to safe abortions. It also recognizes the medical, scientific, and activist communities.
“We call on civil society to take responsibility for informing itself and demanding respect for its human rights, specifically its sexual and reproductive rights. We call on the international community to mobilize to stop and demand justice,” are some of the slogans in the conference’s final text, in response to the offensive that was beginning to be expressed in an organized manner by groups opposed to the right to abortion.
Once underway, Colombia hosted the third Conference; the fourth was in Peru; the fifth in Guatemala; the sixth in Ecuador; the seventh in Panama, and the eighth in Colombia.
From these sustained meeting spaces emerge various networks: the Legal Network; the Regional Network for decision-making in reproductive health, the Network of journalists and the Network of obstetricians.
Sonia Ariza, coordinator of the Regional network for decision-making in reproductive healthBelieves that Clacai “It helps ensure that evidence engages with the times, tensions, and opportunities inherent in public policy processes,” which allows “not only the translation of complex information into useful tools for decision-makers, technical teams, organizations, and communicators, but also the strengthening of capacities for its interpretation and strategic use in diverse and, in many cases, adverse political contexts.”
High-impact regional initiatives also emerged, such as the Health Cause, and local initiatives were created, such as the Rape Cause, Protect Them Now, Girls Not Mothers, and others that are consistently maintained, such as Reproductive Health is Vital; Times of Abortion; Abortion and Disability, and the Timeline of Legal Milestones.
From the perspective of people with disabilities, Diana Cely It highlights that combining these perspectives “is a genuine commitment to reproductive justice and the autonomy of all bodies,” as well as providing “a critical stance on how ableism, sexism, and social inequality intersect in access to sexual and reproductive rights.” The participation of people with disabilities “strengthens a feminist, intersectional, and anti-ableist agenda in Latin America aimed at transforming policies, services, and narratives to guarantee true equity and the full exercise of these rights.”
Bad Faith, RepoClacai y RePower These are resources that were created, maintained, and continue to be maintained during this 20-year process.
“Clacai It’s very striking because it grew and expanded from the members themselves, responding to the needs of the abortion rights movement and its membership. We’re very proud because we’re contributing to filling a void that existed in the world on this topic. Not only because of the content, but also because of the way it’s written, which is a collective effort,” explains Ramón Michel.
According to George Hale, the Consortium “has demonstrated its capacity for adaptation and reinvention over the past 20 years, overcoming adversity and striving to find the best way to keep all its members connected. It is characterized by its horizontal structure, plurality, and political-ethical commitment. It is a leading global network that operates through working groups and seeks to be intergenerational and intersectional, engaging in dialogue with other movements.”
From this conviction and learning, from the need for reconversion, the Intermovement Encounters emerged, which took place in Peru in 2024 and 2025.
There, the abortion rights agenda engages in dialogue with other agendas such as the environment, security, technology, religiosity, disability, the LGBT community, Afro-descendant people, indigenous people, rural life, and much more.
Dana Repka, Clacai Legal NetworkShe speaks of the participation of her generation, of the youth who allow “the network to remain a living, dynamic space, connected to the real challenges of each context. It’s not just a generational issue, but the possibility of renewing questions, languages, and strategies, without losing the political memory that has been built.” She sees Clacai “as a space for training, belonging, and collective action. Learning happens by doing, in dialogue with historical trajectories and struggles. This combination of accumulated experience and new perspectives is one of its greatest strengths and a commitment to its present and future.”
“If there is renewal, it’s because we listened to each other.” With this phrase, Romero summarizes the philosophy of Clacai.
SOURCE: Chronicle: 20 years of Clacai – Clacai – continues online