Article review
Just after the world war in 1919, women from about nineteen countries and three continents met at Washington DC to discuss matters regarding rights of women labor working across the world. The purpose of the meeting was to propose ideas about how women conditions can be improved that work as laborers in a variety of work settings. Women who choose to work go through various hardships. They take care of their families and the work at the same time. Despite huge burden, they still are paid less than their male colleagues.
Thus the meeting took place where women labor right reformers met to discuss women rights that work as laborers. The actual goal of the meeting was to increase and upgrade the standard of living for women laborers. The meeting comprised of about two hundred women to discuss rights of women workers and how working conditions can be improved for them. Society moments were already going on in Asia and Europe. Looking at the worse conditions of working women mainly in the United States, a joint federation was formed to improve working conditions for women. The name of the federation was international federation for working women. The federation worked hard to observe the issues and problems of working women and to take the initiative to rectify or address those issues. Huge research has been done about how working men conditions can be improved. Lots of researchers mainly laborer scholars and historians have focused their ideas related to improving conditions for working men category. Scholars that wrote about women internationalism also ignored non-elite and women working in labor force. They have focused mostly on elite and upper-class women involved in civil rights or other political movements. Working women mainly from labor class have received least attention from scholars, researchers, and historians.
A league was formed in 1993 to help women workers to improve their working conditions and to force employers to provide equal rights to working women. Wage differences were also highlighted by the league. The league was formed in the United States. It was formed after being inspired by British women federation. The league worked hard to fight for working women rights. The league for the very first time in the history of the United States brought together elite women and working women. Both elite and working women worked together to first for the rights of women employed in labor force. They joined hands on the same platform to struggle for the rights of working women labor force. However, the league faced several issues. The league itself was not free from racial, religious and class differences. Only those women could hold executive positions who have worked as women unionists and have been at the top positions. Thus class differences still prevailed in the leagues. Despite these issues and differences, the league was still able to get a huge number of memberships from working women and labor class along with immigrant working women. The league was formed in the progressive era. This league was known as national women trade union league or NWTUL.
National trade women trade union league was not only a league that focused on issues of the women working in the United States. It became a league that focused on working women issues throughout the world. The league starting issuing a monthly journal. The name of the journal was life and labor. The journal was sent to different countries of the world including India, China, Japan, Russia and other countries. The journal comprised of news about labor moments going on throughout the world. The journal designated a column to combine news about the international world. This column was known as near and far. The column contained news about the world and labor force located in different parts of the world.
National women trade union worked in close collaboration with British women to fight for working women rights. In the beginning, there was no formal meeting. Both American and British women exchanged letters, publications, and other such material to throw light on women issues. The league also worked closely with German union representatives. German delegates visited the United Nations and talked about working women conditions. However when the United States declared war on Germany, the league worked hard to improve conditions of women particularly employed in armed forces.
A conference was organized by robins in 1919 in which address was made to women congress. The address was attended by about two hundred participants from twelve countries. The address discussed rights of women, particularly in labor force. In the same year, the women congress passed a resolution on women rights and labor standards for working women. Various issues were covered in the resolution. The resolution included forty hours working time for women labor in a week. An eight hour per day shift was recommended by the resolution. Equal, wage, benefits, maternity and child benefits, the minimum age for labor and other such issues were highlighted in the resolution. The resolution was a success in declaring equal rights for labor women.
During the era of 1970 to 1980, there was again a trend towards feminism movements that engaged many women from the labor force to fight for equal rights for working women. Global women movements emerged, and many women participated in these movements o raise their voice for women rights especially for those who work at different work settings along with men, yet they are not paid and benefited the same way as men.
The article presents valuable information regarding how movements for women rights emerged, what leagues and groups were formed to raise their voice for women rights and how women rights were fought by these groups. The history is presented in chronological order. The article provides a clear history focusing on major movements that took place across the globe to fight for working women rights. I believe that the article has presented the history of how various movements and leagues emerged to support equal rights for women, but has failed to capture the struggle of women, particularly in this field to fight for feminism. The article provides a history and does not provide any evidence about why feminist movements emerged and what caused women to raise their voice.
The text does not provide convincing ideas or opinions about why women engaged themselves in leagues and other groups to fight for working women rights. It’s just history in chronological order. The article does demonstrate difficulties and hardships through which women had to go through before raising their voice for working women rights, but the article does not provide any evidence or event that reflect why working women should be treated equally to men at a workplace. The article only focuses on the formation of various global and local groups, conferences and addresses that were made in the history to support women rights. The article should have presented views about why women deserve a position equal to men. The article should also have highlighted specific laws that emerged as a result of these movements and what were their different clauses. The article focuses on events around World War 1 and fails to focus on issues beyond that. To make it more convincing, the article could have included the working conditions of women in the present era as compared to previous times (Cobble).
Works Cited
Cobble, Dorothy Sue. “A Higher “Standard of Life” for the World: U.S. Labor Women’s Reform Internationalism and the Legacies of 1919.” The Journal of American History (2014): 1052-1085.
