Lecture
Towards a Polymaternal State: Sheinbaum, Stepmotherhood and the Mexican Presidency
- Prof. Paulina Aroch-Fugellie
- Date
- Tuesday 9 September 2025
- Time
- Address
-
Lipsius
Cleveringaplaats 1
2311 BD Leiden - Room
- 1.48
In this talk, Paulina Aroch Fugellie will explore the possibility of a “(poly)maternal State” under President Claudia Sheinbaum in Mexico. She will analyse it in contrast to the “patriarchal State” that has historically prevailed in the country, in complicity with (neo)colonialism and neoliberalism. Her central thesis is that matriarchy in Mexico operates as a tool of patriarchy, not its opposite. Patriarchy can instrumentalise a somewhat matriarchal organisation succesfully precisely because such an organisation appears to be its opposite.
Aroch Fugellie also proposes that monomaternal ideology is key in such an instrumentalisation. Therefore, the maternal state can only be fully realised through its polymaternal configuration. She examines these theses through the analysis of what she calls “profane maternities”, a category that includes stepmothers and payed domestic workers. Rather than a reality, she proposes that the “polymaternal State” is a possibility under Sheinbaum which promises to articulate two axes as distinguished by Argentinean philosopher Luciana Cadahia (2024): classic left-wing struggles along the “Capital-work” axis and feminist struggles along the “Capital-life” axis.
This event is kindly supported by NICA and BOCA
