Interview • Marta Malo and Verónica Gago, translated by Anouk Devillé • February 14, 2025 • Leer en castellano

The family is a concept that the far right has attempted to monopolize, and the idea of the “mother” is a central part of that dispute. We’re witnessing a coordinated offensive against politicized, feminist, and anti-racist maternities with deep social roots, among which the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo in Argentina are a key reference point. 

Fátima Ouassak’s book El poder de las madres: Por un nuevo sujeto revolucionario (The Power of Mothers: For a new revolutionary subject) gets to the heart of that battle. It pushes back on the monolithic figure of the mother, and calls on mothers—in plural and in resistance—to deploy their power as dragons to bring down authoritarian forces.

Ouassak is a political scientist, the daughter of immigrants, and a mother from a working class neighborhood. She is also a determined activist: she founded a local association in the banlieu of Bagnolet near Paris, a union of families called Front de méres [Mother’s Front], as well as Réseau Classe/Genre/Race, an intersectional feminist organization. She’s written two novels, Rue de Passage and Comme Ali, as well as two books of essays, El poder de las madres, which was recently translated to Spanish, and Pour une écologie pirate: Et nous serons libres.

The first time we met Ouassak she was speaking at the end of a demonstration. It was summer 2023, and French working class neighborhoods were once again rebelling against police brutality following the killing of 17-year-old  Nahel Merzouk by a cop in Nanterre. We were impressed by her clarity, determination, and the fierceness of her words. 

“My point of view is situated. As are all points of view, including those that claim they aren’t, and that they represent everyone,“ Ouassak writes in El poder de las madres. ”My point of view is situated, but I am addressing everyone.” 

Moved by the desire to make her work known, but above all by the urgency of intensifying international conversations among feminists in these times of patriarchal restoration, and the desire to connect disparate points in a shared struggle that seeks to change the whole world, we contacted Ouassak. 

We proposed to interview her and she quickly agreed. Our interview took place in December of last year in French via Zoom and then translated into Spanish (and now, to English). This is the  first of two parts of our interview with Ouassak, which has been edited for clarity and length.

Marta Malo and Verónica Gago: The title of your book, El poder de las madres (The Power of Mothers), echoes ideas of women’s power and the subversion of community. What do you mean when you write about the power of mothers in the current context? 

Fatima Ouassak: The French title references the power of mothers. It was a suggestion from my publisher, La Découverte. I wanted to talk about power and I wanted to emphasize the plural, referring not to “the power of the mother”, but rather, to “the power of mothers.”

First, I’m referring to power in the sense of political power. Right now, in the Western and especially European context, mothers, who appear as these tender, apparently small people, can transform the world should they wish to do so. When I began to say this in France, it was very uncommon. Mothers are called mamas, they are considered a small subject. They are of no interest to anyone, neither politically nor strategically, at least in the context of struggles. 

What I want to talk about is the power we have. 

Second, I speak of mothers in the plural because I am a materialist feminist that rejects the individual and individualizing dimension of neoliberalism. When I speak of power, I am referring to collective power, to a collective power that already exists in working-class neighborhoods in France. 

The title is more descriptive than prescriptive. It recognizes there are mothers who are already in struggle, rather than saying “mothers need to struggle.” Four or five years before writing the book, I co-founded the Front de mères in France. And it's not just Front de mères, there’s other organizations too. 

In 1984, there was a movement called Les folles de la place Vendôme [The madwomen of Place Vendôme] in France, and they did just what I describe in the book. I want to reaffirm the historic struggles that were waged by mothers that once existed as a strategic potential. 

MM and VG: As feminists, we understand the notion of the “mother” is fraught with ambivalence, caught between oppression and power, and dimensions that are reactionary and subversive. Could you elaborate a little more on the motherhoods about which you speak—motherhoods in plural—that are also subversive? 

FO: In 2012 there was a huge demonstration under the banner of Manif pour tous [demonstration for all, led by the French ultraconservative movement that’s focused on campaigns against queer marriage and childrearing, and emotional and sexual education in schools]. 

At that time the Front de mères didn't exist. I remember seeing families walk by, which in reality were overwhelmingly fathers, and I said to my compañeros: 'We must watch out, this is a dire threat to us.'

Of course, there were some Muslim fathers and racialized Muslim mothers who were part of the demonstrations and they were there for reactionary reasons. It was, in essence, a reactionary political organization demonstrating in a manner that was directed against us and our children. 

This is something we had to and still have to fight against, including within our own ranks and our own communities. That demonstration was an important factor in the creation of the Front de mères. Today, in France, the most dynamic movement of parents is called Parents Vigilants [Parents on guard]. It’s a large movement that brings together thousands of people who are racist, Islamophobic, LGBT-phobic, homophobic, transphobic and so on. It has a very combative presence in schools.

As feminist and anti-racist mothers we are facing this movement, which is a war machine founded and supported by Éric Zemmour [one of the most visible figures on the French far-right]. 

The other struggle we’re engaged in as feminist and anti-racist mothers, which I also examine in the book, is the way in which institutions and the state treat fathers and mothers. In my opinion, the unequal treatment that exists in relation to families depends on whether or not they’re critical of the established order. 

A mother or a father who supports an institution, who does not criticize it, is going to feel encouraged and supported. This also applies to Muslims, racialized people and people from working-class neighborhoods. 

Mothers like myself who question institutions, who are critical of school, of police, of the way working-class neighborhoods are run, are demonized. It's not just a question of skin color or social class, it's also a question of whether or not you have a critical perspective and question institutions. 

In El poder de las madres I draw on my experience as an activist to suggest that a mother who becomes involved politically in order to protect children, not only her own, but children in general, will be labeled an Islamist, a communitarian, and treated like the devil. It is important to point out this blind spot common among our feminist comrades, which is how racialized women are treated when they become involved in politics.