Los procesos de apropiación subjetiva de los derechos sexuales: notas para la discusión

This article attempts to reflect on the subjective processes through which people recognize and authorize themselves to make use of their bodies, sexuality and reproduction, and manage to demand the social, economic and institutional conditions to enforce these decisions. On the basis of the experience of qualitative research with men and women in various contexts in Mexico and Foucault’s work on ethical issues at different times in western societies, the author suggests that decisions regarding one’s own reproduction take different subjective paths from those related to the search for sexual pleasure, particularly because of the importance of Catholic morality in the history of Mexico. Moreover, the different meanings of pleasure and reproduction also vary according to gender and men and women’s experience of desire and procreation. In order to contribute elements to the debate on the concept of sexual rights, the author analyzes the importance of these cultural and subjective processes in constructing a civic ethics of sexuality, in the sense of promoting political participation in the establishing the conditions for the search for pleasure.