Where there is power, there is resistance: Reflections from the Antifascist and Antiracist Pride March in Argentina

This blog originally appeared on the LinkedIn page of Graciela Hopstein.

Graciela Hopstein, a 2024/2025 #ShiftThePower Fellow

The massive demonstrations that took place on 1 February 2025 in various cities in Argentina represent an authentic resistance movement against President Milei’s speech at the Davos Forum. On that occasion, the Argentine leader not only fiercely attacked feminism and climate justice agendas, but went as far as stating that “gender ideology corrupts children”, associating gender and sexual orientation diversity with pedophilia.

In response to the hateful statements made by the Argentine president at the World Economic Forum, in the presence of government and business representatives from various countries, Argentinian movements linked mainly to the LGBTQIA+ community, human rights and anti-racism came together to organize the first Antifascist and Antiracist Pride March. The mobilization had the support of labour unions and brought thousands of people to the streets in several cities throughout the country.

With the agenda “Say no to fascism” and “Hate in the closet, love in the streets”, it is possible to affirm that the impacts of the protest in Argentina are not restricted only to the local level, but have a planetary scale because they represent an authentic global movement of resistance in defense of democracy, human rights, gender and diversity agendas, taking a stand of rejection of the far right and conservative agendas.

“The conservative wave we are facing is certainly a reaction of power to the advancement of rights agendas (socio-environmental, racial justice, gender and ethnicity) that have the potential to challenge the dominant political system…”

The protests in Argentina should be understood as a strong response to the hate speeches of Milei and Trump that began to gain scope and strength earlier this year, following the inauguration of the American president. These speeches also involved promoting budget-cutting measures, focusing on humanitarian aid and persecuting political minorities. Certainly, the February manifestations represent a clear message to the patriarchal system, to contemporary capitalism based on the accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few, and to the unrestrained exploitation of natural resources and human and non-human beings.

What is interesting to highlight here is that, contrary to predictions, the discourse of hatred and the current regressive measures did not install fear, “alienation, loneliness, isolation, loss, powerlessness and distrust” (as described by Byung-Chul-Han[1]), but rather resistance. Surely, the Argentinian protest managed to express not only refusal, rejection, but also the affirmation of multiple, diverse and plural identities and ways of life, attacking the heart of established power on a planetary scale.

The LGBTQIA+ movements, marrones and marronas (brown racialized people), women, youth, precarious (informal) workers, and immigrants are indeed the “new barbarians” because they have the capacity to attack the heart of the Empire and its well-oiled control mechanisms. Maimed by the power machines, these protest movements have the ability not only to organize refusal but also to build subjective territories from the very escape routes to which they have been relegated, creating new paths of life through their own material existence.

According to Foucault, if there is a power relationship, there will always be the possibility of resistance. “Power and resistance confront each other through multiple and changing tactics,” however, for the philosopher, resistance comes before the power that is established through the capturing processes of the movements’ potency and transformation.

“Surely, in this scenario of urgency, it is a priority for global, regional and local philanthropy to come together and mobilize to allocate significant resources to social and political movements…”

The conservative wave we are facing is certainly a reaction of power to the advancement of rights agendas (socio-environmental, racial justice, gender and ethnicity) that have the potential to challenge the dominant political system and established social order. As Badiou states, every politics demands the existence of movement, understood as a collective action around common ideas that are neither foreseen nor regulated by the dominant power and its laws (the State). It is, therefore, an action that breaks with repetition and seeks new paths and ways of life.

In the current scenario marked by a regression in the access to the rights field and attacks on political minorities, it is essential that society recognizes the importance of resistance movements and the strategic role they play in processes of refusal and transformation.

Today more than ever, increasing political and financial support for these agendas and actors is essential to build new possibilities for the future. Surely, in this scenario of urgency, it is a priority for global, regional and local philanthropy to come together and mobilize to allocate significant resources to social and political movements, thereby contributing to reversing backlash trends, attacks on democracy, and creating new political dynamics based on equality and the recognition of diversity.

By: Graciela Hopstein, a 2024 / 2025 #ShiftThePower Fellow

[1] “O Espírito da Esperança contra a Sociedade do Medo”; Petrópolis: Vozes, 2023.