Virginia Vargas
Virginia "Gina" Vargas Valente (born July 23, 1945, in Lima) is a Peruvian sociologist and a leading figure in the country’s women’s movement. She studied at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru from 1963 to 1968, shifting from drama and literature to political science. In 1978 she founded the Flora Tristán Center, a nonprofit that studies, educates about, and advocates for women's rights; she directed it until 1990. Vargas has been a strong advocate for reproductive rights in Peru and is known worldwide for her work with women.
Her research explores social movements in the Southern Cone and the role of women in economic development. In the 1980s she traveled across Peru with a regional program of CEAAL, organizing seminars on methods and theory for the women’s movement. From 1990 to 1998 she worked as an organizer and activist throughout Latin America, founding the Latin American division of DAWN and leading campaigns against the sterilization of women in 1998. She later taught at the International Institute of Social Studies in The Hague and served as a visiting professor at the University of Wisconsin, among others. Vargas has participated in the feminist network Articulación Feminista Marcosur and received the UNIFEM Award at the 1995 Beijing Fourth World Conference on Women, where she was the Latin American and Caribbean NGO Coordinator for the NGO Forum. Since 2001 she has been a member of the World Social Forum’s International Committee and sits on the Advisory Council of the Institute for Democracy and Global Transformation at the National University of San Marcos.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 08:37 (CET).