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Anthropologist and political scientist, Gabriel Boric’s partner proposes to radically change the role of the wife of a president
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The position, he assures, must be carried out according to the times that are lived
“It is like a foreign, alien invasion“Said, bewildered, the still first lady of Chile, Cecilia Morel, when the “blowout” began, as the social outbreak November 2019. But the changes so feared by the elite did not come from outer space but from the bowels of a society that as of March 11 will be governed by a 36-year-old president, Gabriel Boric. His partner, the anthropologist and political scientist Irina Karamanos, has refused to fulfill the role traditionally played by the wives of the leaders.
At the age of 32, Karamanos has called to rethink what a first lady represents for a left-wing government and in a country where a constituent Assembly Paritaria intends to draft a Magna Carta with a strong gender imprint. “We have to see if the role that he fulfills is in accordance with the times we live in, or if the figure can be less charitable and move towards one that can push other issues,” he said. Time is running out, and that’s why Karamanos, who usually resorts to inclusive languageBefore Boric’s inauguration, he seeks to redefine his field of action and the space that women historically occupied in state rituals. “It is interesting that through this position the articulation between sectors can be promoted, perhaps having a greater impact on civil society organizations.”
The political and cultural transformations in the Chile that gave birth to the outbreak have had a strong role for women. The street shook when the collective Las Tesis she broke in with her performance “A rapist on your way”, since then a kind of global anthem of feminism. The Mapuche linguist and activist, Elisa Loncón, took over the reins of the Constituent Assembly last year as part of a long-standing gender drive that was invigorated as of 2019. Irací Hassler is the first communist mayor of Santiago de Chile since 2020. The doctor Izkia Siches played a fundamental role in the Boric’s campaign, the same as legislators Karol Cariola and Camila Vallejo.
The arrival at the Karamanos Coin Palace is part of this new genealogy. “I am a feminist and I belong to a political party because I have the conviction that power can be redistributed collectively and horizontally, “he often says. And that is why he has spoken of a” redesign “of the symbolic and practical place of the first lady. From her place from activist, critical intellectual and, also, millennial, will attempt to play a role “other than conservative spectrum, who sees the woman as a companion, under a heterosexual idea of the bond with the president “.
Happy new year full of future ✨ https://t.co/E939SYBKTt
– Irina Karamanos (@i_krmns) January 1, 2022
The most unexpected turn
The daughter of a family of Greek and German immigrants, trained at the University of Heidelberg, Germany, Karamanos met Boric in 2016, when both were part of the Autonomist Movement that emerged from student protests. Five years later, they have embarked on a journey from the edges of oppositional politics to the center of executive decisions. They must do so in a country that preserves its historical polarization. In fact, Boric defeated the far right Jose Antonio Kast with 55% of the votes and 11 points of his rival. The same distance that the dictator Augusto Pinochet he lost the plebiscite of October 1988 through which he tried to perpetuate himself.
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A good part of that 44% of Chileans who wanted Kast as president observe with silent perplexity the country that appears from March and in which the name of Karamanos promises to stop being a footnote of presidential activities. “From waitress to first lady“A television program crossed her out, Nice to meet you, in a kind of anticipation of the zeal with which it will be observed.
Although he keeps a low profile, every word from Karamanos seems to have a riveting effect. One of the peculiarities of Chilean institutions is that the president does not have an official residence. Only the memorable remember that Carlos Ibáñez del Campo (1952-1958) was the last head of state to inhabit the Palacio de La Moneda, in the center of Santiago. Boric has ruled out following that example and slipped his preference for a house in the vicinity of the Executive headquarters. “We want the protocols to be complied with, without exaggerating in any way the conditions or the comforts of the home,” said Karamanos. And he added: “We hope to maintain as normal a circulation as possible and not to move to very affluent sectors of the city“I would not like to be a neighbor of Cecilia Morel, the wife of Sebastián Piñera.
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