Transnational perspectives on trans, law and mobilization – Reparations and transfemi(ni)cides laws as tools for liberation

Attacks on trans people are one core element of the global rise of authoritarianism and fascistization of our current times. They show up in speech acts, hate crimes, and decisively also in the form of rollback of hard-fought for policies and laws for the protection and support of trans people, including restrictions around passports and identification and labor market protections. Additionally, there is new legislation explicitly targeting queer and trans people in multiple states, including the US, Russia, Argentina, Turkey, expressing the anxiety around the perceived “threat” that trans and queer people post to the nation. Against this background, this paper analyzes struggles for reparations for travesti/trans people in Argentina in connection with feminist struggles for access to free abortion and around transfemicide in Mexico. I argue that the way transfeminist movements have been using the law happens as one tool that is used to make claims to the state within larger struggles against cisheteronormative state structures and for liberation. This paper draws on Veronica Gago’s concept of “revolutionary Realpolitik” to explore the temporal dimensions of these struggles and the forms of mobilization of the law that they employ.