Since the 1960's, international gender advocates has called for the creation of governmental institutions that would elaborate politics promoting women's interests. This article focuses on the Brazilian institutional response to this international trend and the role of the feminist movement in the state of São Paulo in the implementation of such organization. This institutionalization was extremely important in bringing women's issues into the public sphere, but on the other hand has become the center of a debate concerning the autonomy of the movement and the way that an organization promoting gender equality should be structured inside in a government context.
Feminist movement; Democracy; Council on the Condition of Women in São Paulo State; Brazil