The first UN world conference on women (1975) as a cold war encounter: Recovering anti-imperialist, non-aligned and socialist genealogies
pages: 521-541
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.2298/FID1603521BKljučne reči:
Mexico City, UN Decade for Women, Cold War, agency, feminism, state socialism, Non-Alignment, Betty Friedan, Vida TomšićApstrakt
The essay addresses contemporary discussions on women’s transnationalism and women’s agency by looking at the first conference of the UN Decade for Women held in Mexico City in 1975, and at its specific embedding in Cold War geopolitics. Through an engagement with different feminist and activists voices, and particularly with the less visible anti-imperialist, Non-Aligned and socialist genealogies of women’s activism expressed during the meeting, the essay argues that the paradigm of Western feminist knowledge production needs to be revisited, in order to encompass multiple forms of women’s political agency that are not expressed through the liberal framework of women’s individual autonomy from the state. By juxtaposing Betty Friedan’s and Vida Tomšič’s stances during the Mexico City event, the paper shows that women’s political agency during the Cold War era took different forms, which included both the refusal and the acceptance of women’s activism within existing national and international institutions. Keywords: Mexico City, UN Decade for Women, Cold War, agency, feminism, state socialism, Non-Alignment, Betty Friedan, Vida Tomšič
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Mohanty Chandra Talpade (2003), ‘“Under Western Eyes’ Revisited: Feminist Solidarity through Anticapitalist Struggles”, Signs, 28 (2): 499-535.
Olcott, Jocelyn (2010), “Cold War Conflicts and Cheap Cabaret: Sexual Politics at the 1975 United Nations International Women’s Year Conference”, Gender & History, 22: 733-754.
Papanek, Hanna (1975), “The Work of Women: Postscript from Mexico City”, Signs, 1 (1): 215-226.
Popa, Raluca Maria (2016), “We Opposed It”: The National Council of Women and the
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Popa, Raluca Maria (2009), “Women Activists from Hungary and Romania in the International Women’s Year. Translating Equality between Women and Men across Cold War Divides”, in J. Massino and S. Penn (eds.), Gender Politics and Everyday Life in State Socialist East and Central Europe, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 59-74.
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Saadawi, Nawal El, Fatima Mernissi, and Mallica Vajarathon (1978) “A Critical View of the Wellesley Conference.” Quest: A Feminist Quarterly 4(2): 101-107.
Salvatici, Silvia (2009), ““Sounds like an interesting conference’. La conferenza di Citta del Messico e il movimento internazionale delle donne”, Ricerche di storia politica, 2: 241-251.
Tlostanova, Madina (2012), “The vanished Second world, global coloniality, and decolonial gender agency. Why did we disappear, or ‘Can the post-socialist speak’?” in B. Kasic, J. Petrovic, S. Prlenda and S. Slapsak (eds.), Feminist critical interventions. Thinking heritage, decolonising, heritage, Ljubljana, Zagreb and Belgrade: Red Athena University Press.
Zinsser, Judith (2002), “From Mexico to Copenhagen to Nairobi: The United Nations Decade for Women, 1975-1985”, Journal of World History, 13 (1): 139-168
Whitaker, Jennifer Seymour (1975), Women of the World: Report from Mexico, Foreign Affairs, 54 (1): 173-181.
Bier, Laura (2010), “Feminism, Solidarity and Identity in the Age of Bandung: Third World Women in the Egyptian Women’s Press”. In Christopher J. Lee (ed.) Making a world after empire: the Bandung moment and its political afterlives. Athens: Ohio University Press.
Bonfiglioli, Chiara (2016), “On Vida Tomsic, Marxist Feminism and Agency”, in F. de Haan et al., “Forum: Ten Years After, Communism and Feminism Revisited”, Aspasia, 10: 145-151.
Bonfiglioli, Chiara (2015), “Gendered citizenship in the global European periphery: Textile workers in post-Yugoslav states”, Women’s Studies International Forum, 49: 57-65.
Bonfiglioli, Chiara (2014), “Women’s Political and Social Activism in the Early Cold War Era: The Case of Yugoslavia”, Aspasia, vol. 8: 1-25.
Bonfiglioli, Chiara (2012), Revolutionary Networks. Women’s Political and Social Activism in Cold War Italy and Yugoslavia (1945-1957), PhD dissertation, University of Utrecht.
Bonfiglioli, Chiara (2011), ““Social equality is not enough, we want pleasure!’ Italian feminists in Belgrade for the 1978 ‘Comrade Woman’ conference”, Profemina, 2, 115-123.
Chakrabarty, Dipesh (2010) “The Legacies of Bandung. Decolonization and the Politics of Culture”, in C. J. Lee (ed.) Making a world after empire: the Bandung moment and its political afterlives. Athens: Ohio University Press.
Chari, Sharad and Katherine Verdery (2009) “Thinking between the Posts: Postcolonialism, Postsocialism, and Ethnography after the Cold War”. Comparative Studies in Society and History, 51, 6-34.
Coogan-Gehr, Kelly (2011), The geopolitics of the Cold War and the narratives of inclusion. Excavating a feminist archive, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Daskalova, Krassimira (2016), “Audiatur et altera pars. In response to Nanette Funk”, in F. de Haan et al., “Forum: Ten Years After, Communism and Feminism Revisited”, Aspasia, 10: 121-126.
De Haan, Francisca (2016), Introduction, in Francisca de Haan et al., “Forum: Ten Years After, Communism and Feminism Revisited”, Aspasia, 10: 101-111.
De Haan, Francisca (2012), “The Women’s International Democratic Federation (WIDF): History, Main Agenda, and Contributions, 1945-1991”, in Women and Social Movements, International (last accessed July 12, 2016). http://wasi. alexanderstreet.com/help/view/the_womens_international_democratic_ federation_widf_history_main_agenda_and_contributions_19451991
De Haan, Francisca (2010), “Continuing Cold War Paradigms in Western Historiography of Transnational Women’s Organisations: The Case of the Women’s International Democratic Federation (WIDF),” Women’s History Review 19 (4): 547-73.
De Haan, Francisca, et. al. (2016), ‘Torum:Ten Years After, Communism and Feminism Revisited”, Aspasia, 10.
Donert, Celia (2013) “Women’s Rights in Cold War Europe. Disentangling Feminist Histories,” Past and Present 218 (8): 180-202.
Fraser, Nancy (2003), Fortunes of Feminism: From State-Managed Capitalism to Neoliberal Crisis, London and New York: Verso.
Friedan, Betty (1977), “It changed my life”: Writings on the Women’s Movement, New York: Dell Pub. Co.
Funk, Nanette (2014), “A Very Tangled Knot: Official State Socialist Women’s Organizations, Women’s Agency and Feminism in Eastern European State Socialism”, European Journal of Women’s Studies, 21(4): 344-360.
Funk, Nanette (2015), “(K)not so: A response to Kristen Ghodsee”, European Journal of Women’s Studies, 22 (3): 350-355.
Haraway Donna (1991). “Situated Knowledges: the science question in feminism and the privilege of the partial perspective”, in D. Haraway (ed.) Simians, Cyborgs and Women. The Reinvention of Nature. London: FAB.
Ghit, Alexandra (2016), “Partisan Potential: Researching Communist Women’s Organizations in Eastern Europe”, in F de Haan et al., “Forum: Ten Years After, Communism and Feminism Revisited”, Aspasia, 10: 160-166.
Ghodsee, Kristen (2015), “Untangling the Knot: A Response to Nanette Funk”, European Journal of Women’s Studies, 22 (2): 248-252.
Ghodsee, Kristen (2014), “Research note: The historiographical challenges of exploring Second World - Third World alliances in the international women’s movement”, Global Social Policy, 14 (2): 244-264.
Ghodsee, Kristen (2012), “Rethinking state socialist mass women’s organizations. The Committe of the Bulgarian Women’s Movement and the United Nations Decade for Women, 1975-1985”, Journal of Women’s History, 24 (4): 49-73.
Ghodsee, Kristen (2010), “Revisiting the United Nations decade for women: Brief reflections on feminism, capitalism and Cold War politics in the early years of the international women’s movement”, Women’s Studies International Forum, 33: 3-12.
Greer, Germaine (1986), The Madwoman’s underclothes. Essays and occasional writings, New York: The Atlantic Monthly Press.
Jain, Devaki and Shubha Chacko (2009) “Walking together: the journey of the Non¬Aligned Movement and the women’s movement”, Development in Practice, 19 (7): 895-905.
Jain, Devaki (2005), Women, Development and the UN. A sixty-year quest for equality and justice, Bloomington, Indiana University Press.
Jeraj, Mateja (2006) “Vida Tomsic.” In F. de Haan, K. Daskalova and A. Loutfi, eds.
Biographical Dictionary of Women’s Movements and Feminisms in Central, Eastern, and South Eastern Europe: 19th and 20th Centuries, Budapest; New York: CEU Press/Central European University Press, 575-579.
Horowitz, Daniel (1998) Betty Friedan and the making of The feminine mystique: the American left, the cold war, and modern feminism, Amherst, University of Massachusetts Press.
Jovic, Dejan (2009) Yugoslavia: a state that withered away, West Lafayette, IN, Purdue University Press.
Mates, Leo (1972), Non-Alignment. Theory and Current policy, N.Y., Oceana publications.
Mohanty Chandra Talpade (2003), ‘“Under Western Eyes’ Revisited: Feminist Solidarity through Anticapitalist Struggles”, Signs, 28 (2): 499-535.
Olcott, Jocelyn (2010), “Cold War Conflicts and Cheap Cabaret: Sexual Politics at the 1975 United Nations International Women’s Year Conference”, Gender & History, 22: 733-754.
Papanek, Hanna (1975), “The Work of Women: Postscript from Mexico City”, Signs, 1 (1): 215-226.
Popa, Raluca Maria (2016), “We Opposed It”: The National Council of Women and the
Ban on Abortion in Romania (1966) in Francisca de Haan et al., “Forum: Ten Years After, Communism and Feminism Revisited”, Aspasia, 10: 152-160.
Popa, Raluca Maria (2009), “Women Activists from Hungary and Romania in the International Women’s Year. Translating Equality between Women and Men across Cold War Divides”, in J. Massino and S. Penn (eds.), Gender Politics and Everyday Life in State Socialist East and Central Europe, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 59-74.
Rich, Adrienne (1986), “Notes Toward a Politics of Location” in Adrienne Rich (ed.) Blood, Bread and Poetry. London: Virago.
Russel, Diana E.H. and Nicole Van den Ven, eds. (1976), Crimes Against Women: Proceedings of the International Tribunal. (last accessed 23rd of July 2016) www.dianarussel.com.
Saadawi, Nawal El, Fatima Mernissi, and Mallica Vajarathon (1978) “A Critical View of the Wellesley Conference.” Quest: A Feminist Quarterly 4(2): 101-107.
Salvatici, Silvia (2009), ““Sounds like an interesting conference’. La conferenza di Citta del Messico e il movimento internazionale delle donne”, Ricerche di storia politica, 2: 241-251.
Tlostanova, Madina (2012), “The vanished Second world, global coloniality, and decolonial gender agency. Why did we disappear, or ‘Can the post-socialist speak’?” in B. Kasic, J. Petrovic, S. Prlenda and S. Slapsak (eds.), Feminist critical interventions. Thinking heritage, decolonising, heritage, Ljubljana, Zagreb and Belgrade: Red Athena University Press.
Zinsser, Judith (2002), “From Mexico to Copenhagen to Nairobi: The United Nations Decade for Women, 1975-1985”, Journal of World History, 13 (1): 139-168
Whitaker, Jennifer Seymour (1975), Women of the World: Report from Mexico, Foreign Affairs, 54 (1): 173-181.
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2016-10-15
Kako citirati
Bonfiglioli, C. (2016) „The first UN world conference on women (1975) as a cold war encounter: Recovering anti-imperialist, non-aligned and socialist genealogies: pages: 521-541“, Filozofija i društvo/Philosophy and Society. Belgrade, Serbia, 27(3), стр. 521–541. doi: 10.2298/FID1603521B.
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Sekcija
POLITICS OF REMEMBRANCE: POSTSOCIALISM AND ITS REVISIONS
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Articles published in Philosophy and Society are open-access in accordance with the CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 License.
