Abstract

This chapter discusses the role of authoritarian rightwing women in constitutional courts by focusing on Luz Bulnes Aldunate, the first woman appointed to the Chilean Constitutional Court and one of the architects of the dictatorship's constitutional framework. By examining Bulnes's work, the chapter aims, first, to rescue Bulnes's contributions to the Chilean authoritarian constitutional project, which have been largely overlooked by Chilean constitutional scholarship and remain unknown in comparative constitutional work. Second, using Bulnes as an illustration, the chapter argues that constitutional anti-heroines are paradoxical figures who embody two overlapping tensions: on the one hand, a tension between feminist and women's leadership and, on the other, a tension between the latter and conservative views. This is so because while women like Bulnes contribute to upholding the patriarchal status quo, their presence in positions of power can contribute to the erosion of gendered beliefs about who can be "constitutional heroes.