Women's strike

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Women's strike in Montevideo (Uruguay) on March 8, 2018.

A women's strike is the organized suspension of the work of women in order to draw attention to problems or to achieve corresponding political goals. It differs from the sex strike as well as from the strike in the usual - refusal to work - sense.

Strike of the 700 in Austria, 1893

The so-called “Strike of the 700” was the first organized women's strike in Austria. As a result of the beginning of the organization of women in a Viennese finish factory , led by Amalie Seidel and Adelheid Popp , a total of 700 workers from three finish factories went on strike during the events. Her demands were the day off May 1st , the reduction of daily working hours from 13 to 10 hours and better pay, as well as the reinstatement of Amalie Seidel after her resignation. The demands were enforced after a three-week strike.

Poster Women's Strike for Equality 1970

Women's Strike for Equality 1970

On August 26, 1970, about 50,000 women in the United States took part in the Women's Strike for Equality. Important goals were the right to abortion , equal opportunities at work and free childcare. The day of the strike took place in New York and other parts of the country and was supported by the feminist National Organization for Women .

Icelandic women's strike in 1975

On October 24, 1975, on the occasion of the International Year of Women, around 90% of the female population in Iceland stopped working for a day. A committee of the five most important women's organizations in the country organized the day of protest known as “women's day of rest” to demonstrate for more equality, fairer pay and better childcare. Around 25,000 women and some men take part in the demonstration in Reykjavík .

Swiss women's strikes in 1991 and 2019

Swiss women's strike in 1991, rally in Zurich
Swiss women's strike 2019, rally in Basel
Federal Councilor Viola Amherd (with a light jacket) and the President of the National Council Marina Carobbio Guscetti (right next to her) on June 14, 2019 on the Bundesplatz in Bern

During the nationwide Swiss women's strike on June 14, 1991, hundreds of thousands of women took part in strike and protest actions. The idea for the strike came from some watch workers in the Vallée de Joux , who were outraged by the unequal wages. The occasion was the tenth anniversary of the constitutional article “Equal Rights for Men and Women”. The motto of the strike was “If a woman wants, everything stands still”. Most women's organizations supported the call for a strike by the Swiss Federation of Trade Unions ; only the Federation of Swiss Women's Associations spoke out publicly against the project. Information events provided information about the hesitant implementation of the article by the federal government and various actions expressed the displeasure of the Swiss women about the Federal Council's tactics of delaying equality issues. It was the largest political mobilization in Switzerland since the general strike of 1918 .

In June 2011, a national women's day of action with a demonstration was held, which was supported by around 50 organizations, including, for the first time, the Association of Farmers and Rural Women. This was a reminder that some of the concerns of the women’s strike in 1991, particularly in the area of ​​equal pay, had still not been met.

A second women's strike was held on June 14, 2019. The demands formulated by the Swiss Trade Union Confederation (SGB) are entitled “Wages. Time. Respect. ” a. about a financial appreciation and higher social recognition of women's work, more time and money for care work , the fight against sexism and sexual harassment . The focus was on the wage inequalities between women and men documented by the Swiss wage structure survey and the Département d'économie quantitative at the University of Friborg (CH) : According to the study, women in Switzerland earn an average of 19.6% less than men, with 42.9% these wage differentials are unexplained. In addition, 71.8% of jobs with high gross wages of over 8,000 francs are still in male hands. According to the organizers, over 500,000 participants took part in demonstrations and rallies across the country.

Women's strike in Spain 2018

On International Women's Day 2018, more than 5.3 million people in Spain took part in a women 's strike under the motto When women strike, the world stands still.

See also

literature

on the strike of the 700 in Austria, 1893
on the Swiss women's strike in 1991
  • Media women of the SJU and the SSM (ed.): The women's strike in the media = Lo sciopero delle donne nei mass media = La grève des femmes dans les mass media . Bern 1992.
  • Christian Koller : 25 years ago: The women's strike day on June 14, 1991 , in: Sozialarchiv Info 2 (2016). Pp. 7-11.
  • Elfie Schöpf: Women's strike: A beginning ...: Background, portraits, interviews . Bern 1992.
  • Maja Wicki (Ed.): When women want, everything gets rolling: The women's strike on June 14, 1991. Limmat Verlag , Zurich 1991, ISBN 3-85791-192-1 .
  • Brigitte Studer: women on strike . In: NZZ Geschichte, No. 21, March 2019, pp. 56–67.
  • Brigitte Studer: Women's Strike (1991). In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .
  • Brigitte Studer: Strike as a celebration: the Swiss women's strike of 1991 . In: Theresa Adamski et al. (Ed.): Gender stories of enjoyment: On the 60th birthday of Gabriella Hauch . Vienna: Mandelbaum Verlag, 2019. pp. 52–65.
on the Swiss women's strike 2019

Web links

Commons : Women's Strike  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. Strike of the 700 on dasrotewien.de , accessed on February 24, 2019
  2. ^ Catherine Gourley: Ms. and the Material Girl: Perceptions of Women from the 1970s to the 1990s . Twenty-First Century Books, 2008, pp. 5-20
  3. ^ Sascha Cohen: The Day Women Went on Strike . Time on August 26, 2015, accessed February 24, 2019.
  4. ^ Alva Gehrmann: Feminism in Iceland: Uprising of women. Der Tagesspiegel , October 18, 2015, accessed on March 7, 2017 .
  5. ^ Kirstie Brewer: The day Iceland's women went on strike. BBC , October 23, 2015, accessed March 7, 2017 .
  6. Women's strike 2011: The banners could still be the same . February 7, 2012 ( woz.ch [accessed November 8, 2016]).
  7. a b Christian Koller: 25 years ago: The women's strike day of June 14, 1991 . In: Swiss Social Archives , June 1, 2016
  8. ^ Brigitte Studer: Women on strike . In: NZZ Geschichte, No. 21, March 2019, p. 67.
  9. Swiss Federation of Trade Unions: Arguments for the women's strike. In: 14juni.ch - the union site for the women * strike. Retrieved March 20, 2019 .
  10. Second nationwide women's strike on June 14, 2019. In: ekf.admin.ch. Federal Commission for Women's Issues EKF, April 9, 2019, accessed on June 14, 2019 .
  11. Sylvie Fischer: We are all responsible for fair conditions . In: syndicom magazine . No. 11 . Syndicom , Bern May 2019, p. 8-14 .
  12. Lise Bailat: Ce qui restera de la grève des femmes et d'une Suisse enflammée de violet . In: Pietro Supino (ed.): Le Matin Dimanche . No. 24 . Tamedia, Lausanne June 16, 2019, p. 4 .
  13. Sebastian Schoepp: Letizia of Spain. In: sueddeutsche.de . March 9, 2018, accessed March 14, 2018 .