All the President's Women. Hierarchies and Regimes of Justification in the Female Elite of Cambiemos (Argentina, 2015-2019)

Abstract

The article analyzes the regimes of justification publicly constructed by six of the elite female members of the Cambiemos government (Argentina, 2015-2019): Juliana Awada, the First Lady; Gabriela Michetti, the Vice President of the Nation; Carolina Stanley, the Minister of Social Development; Patricia Bullrich, the Minister of Security; Elisa Carrió, the leader of the Coalición Cívica; and María Eugenia Vidal, the governor of the province of Buenos Aires. Drawing on some concepts from pragmatic sociology, the paper shows, first, that these women performed a double role of justification in a highly masculinized space (that of a right-wing force in the space of Argentine politics) and of legitimization of an unequal social order. Second, they staged a “galaxy of justification regimes”, where the domestic and civic regimes predominated, but where the industrial, the inspired and the project-based regimes were also present. And third, they cannot be defined as typical “right-wing women”, since they mobilized a heterogeneous repertoire of principles of the common good, composed of both traditional and innovative elements that facilitated the legitimization role.