(pages 16-17 below), we mark International Women's Day (IWD) on March 8 by looking at a number of issues of particular relevance to
With the rebirth of the women's liberation movement in Britain in the 1970s International Women's Day was a day not only of celebration but of protest. Unfortunately over the last 10-15 years that tradition has been largely lost, and what many younger women will know about March 8 is that it is an occasion on which there is some vaguely academic lecture, or perhaps a party.
Socialist feminists and the left more generally need to reclaim the day as a symbol of the resistance and resilence of working class women, in the same way that May Day is a symbol for the working class as a whole.
The first International Women's Day was held on March 19, 1911 in a number of European countries. This date was chosen by German women because, on that date in 1848, the Prussian king, faced with an armed uprising, had promised but not carried through a number of reforms, including votes for women. A million leaflets calldistributed in Germany in the lead up to the day.
Russian revolutionary Alexandra Kollontai, who went to Germany to help organise the events in 1911, wrote in her pamphlet on the history of International Women's Day:
"During the largest street demonstrations, in which 30,000 were taking part, the police decided to remove the demonstrators banners: the women workers made a stand. In the scuffle that followed, bloodshed was averted only with the help of the socialist deputies in Parliament.
But the IWD that most people refer to, and which ensured the day continued, were the events in Petrograd in March 1917. Kollontai's biographer, Kathy Porter, writes
"When workers were locked out of the the women of Petrograd began to storm the streets. The wives, daughters and mothers of soldiers, previously as downtrodden and oppressed as prostitutes, demanded an end to their humiliation and angrily denounced all the hungry suffering of the past three years
"Gathering strength and passion as they swept through the city over the next few days in food riots, political strikes and demonstrations, these women launched the first revolution in 1917." This is not a tradition women in the 21st century can afford to lose. Future issues of Socialist Resistance will focus more strongly on the need for women to get organised and active in every arena, and to learn from and celebrate the struggles of the past.
page 4 of the scan
4 8 Scandal of Guantanamo Bay ice March 2004