Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the ability of Chilean judges to incorporate understandings of LGBTI issues into their everyday practice and the barriers to them doing so. This has become increasingly important since the Inter-American Court recommended that judges should receive training in LGBTI issues.

Paper long abstract:

In August 2011, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR) presided over its first case dealing with sexual orientation rights as human rights. The case of Karen Atala vs Chile was presented before the Inter-American System in 2004, following a Chilean Supreme Court ruling that effectively denied Ms Atala, herself a Chilean judge, the custody of her three children on the basis of her sexual orientation. In February 2012, the Court ruled that the Chilean state had violated Ms Atala's human rights, and for the first time in its history, the Court conceptualised LGBTI rights as human rights. Among its recommendations, it ordered the Chilean judiciary to train its staff in matters relating to sexual orientation. This paper draws on interviews conducted with Chilean judges in the late 2000s and explores attitudes within the judiciary towards LGBTI rights issues and litigation prior to the IACtHR ruling. It is concerned with how judges are able to incorporate understandings of LGBTI issues into their everyday practice and the potential barriers to them doing so. The feminist and critical underpinnings of the work are concerned with how dominant power structures and cultures are challenged or come to change. Within that, it focuses on the extent to which discourses establishing heterosexuality as the norm are being challenged, as adherence to moral conservatism has been a feature of both the Chilean polity and judiciary, as illustrated by the initial Supreme Court ruling which denied Karen Atala the custody of her children.