“Women
everywhere. Great sign. When women get involved, when the housewife pushes her
husband, when she grasps the black flag, hovering over the pot to plant it
between two sidewalks, it is because the sun will rise in a revolutionary
city”. The words of French journalist-writer Jules Vallès about the
women of Commune, remind us of the powerful presence of women in
demonstrations, strikes and uprisings in recent years.
For years,
especially after the economic crisis, as a result of the neoliberalism failure
(2008), with the austerity programs the working conditions and the social
benefits were downgraded and the cost of living increased dramatically. All of
these have lead millions of workers, primarily women, often single mothers to
unpresented uncertainty. Childcare is difficult, from taking them to
kindergarten (if they find), to school, food and clothing. On the other hand,
after an exhausting day at work, how can you take care of children and
family? Because there is an expectation
of society: “To work as if they did not have children and to raise their
children like they were not working.” Women’s labor conflicts are related to
the fact that the female paid employment has increased significantly, into a
patriarchal society full of inequalities and discrimination, into a society
where women suffer dual oppression (work-home), and are faced with social and
class issues such as sexual, gender discriminations, abuse and violence
(domestic, trafficking, prostitution…).
In Lebanon
women are in the front line of the demonstrations, inspiring the women of the
other Arab countries. In Algeria women do not just ask equal rights and to wear
whatever they want. They are on the streets against the regime itself. In France
the women’s presence in the “Yellow Vests” is notable and often in the
forefront of the protests. Today in France the working women constitute 51% of
the working class. On 1968 it was 35%. 49% of the women have part-time
precarious jobs, compared with 21% of men.
In the
recent uprisings of Latin America the role of women has been crucial. In
Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay, Mexico, Venezuela the international
organization "Bread and Roses" has roots within the working class,
does not support a separate female movement from the working class and fights
for the women's rights believing that the complete woman's emancipation, as
well as the emancipation of the working class is not possible within
capitalism.
This new
wave of women’s mobilizations is more radical, breaking the decades of domination
of “liberal feminism”, which has passed, by whatever means that the upper class
has, in the consciences of the people
that the "individual free choice" as the horizon of female
emancipation. Ignoring that all the rights which had been won, they are not
always available to all women that equality in "civil law" does not mean
equality in life. And that the capitalists whatever they give with one hand in
a period of prosperity, they will take it back with the other in a time of
crisis.
The female
workforce, due to the dual presence -work, home- plays a basic role by linking the
workplaces with other social strata. The struggle against women's oppression is
a part of class struggle. If these millions of women, who are an integral part
of the working class, stop, the whole society will stop. These are the women
who are rising up. For the right to work, better living conditions, childcare,
equal wages, the right to abortion, against sexist violence and abuse. For the
right to bread as well as to roses. "If the women's emancipation is
impossible without communism, then communism is unthinkable without women's
emancipation", as the Bolshevik, revolutionary Inessa Armand said.
Olga Stefanidou
