Life in Brazil on International Women's Day | Global development | guardian.co.uk

Life in Brazil on International Women's Day

Carmen Barroso is from Sao Paulo, Brazil. She is the director of the International Planned Parenthood Federation, western hemisphere region

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• guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 8 March 2011 00.01 GMT
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Carmen Barroso.

When I grew up in a middle-class family in Brazil, my parents expected me to be a good housewife and get a teaching degree in case I didn't marry and needed to work. They also expected me to remain a virgin until I married. It was not that my parents were especially conservative, they were typical.

Women now have many more options. New careers are open for them, they have greater freedoms regarding their sexuality, they can avoid an unwanted pregnancy more easily. Unfortunately, these options are not equally available for all women, but they are much more widespread.

I think the most important change is in the way women think of themselves. What was the privilege of a small group of rebellious women like myself became a great asset for large numbers of women of different social classes. They tend to see themselves as autonomous human beings who are free to decide about their lives and who have the right to be respected and treated without discrimination.

Here again, progress is not uniform, and even very liberated women who live in egalitarian relationships with their partners may still face huge obstacles. I see several areas where progress has been slower.

One is the beauty mandate that hangs over the heads even of very accomplished women. Plastic surgery is very common in Brazil. Another is the difficulty of sharing care work. When it comes to taking care of babies and infants, or sick and old parents, the burdens are still on the shoulders of individual women, who are rarely supported by their partners or social institutions. A third is domestic violence, a plague that haunts many women – especially those who are economically dependent of men. A fourth is the stigma and illegality still surrounding abortion, to which many women still have to resort.

And finally, in political participation there has been some important progress – the president is now a woman – but it is still elusive for many women. Dilma Rousseff's election did not open the doors to women's participation in politics on equal terms, even though it was a remarkable achievement.

via guardian.co.uk