Women’s Struggle

For International Women’s Day 2026 we are publishing a speech by Christine Thomas, CWI England & Wales, at a recent meeting with sympathetic co-thinkers of the CWI on the state of the global movements against […]

There has been a litany of incidents of horrific violence against women and girls in Britain in recent years. The scale of misogyny in London’s Metropolitan Police is on full view following the jailing of […]

Looking around the world on International Women’s Day 2025 it would seem that women’s rights are under attack more than ever before in almost every part of the globe. Poverty, inequality, war and environmental destruction […]

From Socialism Today, magazine of the Socialist Party (CWI England & Wales). Originally published under the title “Boy Trouble”. Recently there has been a proliferation of articles, books, reports and surveys looking at boys and young […]

The Communist Women’s Movement inspired tens of thousands of women following the Russian revolution. CHRISTINE THOMAS looks at the latest volume in an ongoing series regarding the Communist International that pulls together previously unpublished material […]

If the development of a society can be judged by the extent to which women are involved in it, that is certainly the case with a revolution. In 1871, women – especially women workers – […]

We have recently seen significant victories for women internationally, such as the mass movements in Latin America, which forced governments to legalise or relax restrictions on abortion. The French parliament has voted overwhelmingly to enshrine […]

International Women’s Day 2024, 8 March, takes place in a world in turmoil. Since January, the conflict in the Middle East and horrifying onslaught on Gaza have intensified. The war in Ukraine is also showing […]

Angela Saini’s recent book is really a misnomer. While its title – The Patriarchs: How Men Came to Rule – seems to promise an explanation of how women came to be treated as unequal, second-class […]

The appalling actions of the president of Spain’s football body, Louis Rubiales, after the team won the women’s football World Cup, have highlighted aspects of women’s oppression. It was not a kiss. Rubiales sexually assaulted […]

The jailing for 28 months of Carla Foster, a 44-year old woman with three children, one with special needs, for terminating a pregnancy during Covid lockdown has shone a spotlight on abortion laws in England […]

To commemorate International Women’s Day (8 March) we are publishing an article written for Solidarität, the newspaper of the German section of the Committee for a Workers’ International (CWI). socialistworld.net ‘Woman, life, freedom’, ‘Black lives […]

Women around the world will be marking International Women’s Day in a variety of ways. Protest demonstrations can be expected in many countries against the oppression that women face, not least in Iran, where anti-government […]

Sozialistische Organisation Solidaritaet, the German section of the CWI, is publishing a new edition of the influential book, The Creation of Patriarchy by Gerda Lerner, first printed in 1986. Below is the introduction to the […]

Below, we publish the text of a Socialist Students’ (England & Wales) leaflet for ‘International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women’ on 25 November. socialistworld.net A recent National Union of Students (NUS) study […]

How will we afford to keep the heating on? This is a question facing thousands of working-class households this winter, even after the British Tory government’s colossal energy bosses bailout, writes Bea Gardner. The poorer […]

CHRISTINE THOMAS reviews two recent books by authors coming from different feminist perspectives and asks: what strategy is needed in the struggle to end violence against women, sexism and oppression in the new era? One […]

The Committee for a Workers’ International extends heartfelt greetings to working and poor women of all countries on the Day of International Working Women’s Solidarity. This special day in the calendar of socialists, established by […]

25 November was International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. Below we print extracts of a leaflet the Socialist Party (CWI England & Wales) produced for campaigning on the issue of gender violence […]

In the last of our series of articles on women’s struggles from across the world to mark International Women’s Day, Rashme Madhavan reports from India. socialistworld.net On the 8th of March, the capitalist media and […]

On December 30, 2020, the Argentine Senate voted in favour of a law legalizing free abortion previously approved in the Chamber of Deputies. The approval was resolved with 38 votes in favour, 29 against and […]

On International Women’s Day socialists salute the struggles undertaken by working-class women, both past and present, we also prepare for future struggles. We salute the 1917 heroic struggle of women textile strikers from the working-class […]

Despite freezing temperatures and the raging pandemic, thousands of women, men and LGBTQ+ people continue to protest against the stricter ban on abortion in Poland. A similar attack on women’s reproductive rights was defeated by […]

The Covid pandemic has shone a spotlight on all forms of inequality in capitalist society. If you live in a poor area you are twice as likely to die from Covid than if you live […]

In 1909 the Socialist Party of America organized the first National Women’s Day, attracting thousands of people to various rallies and events. One year later, German delegates to the 1910 International Socialist Women’s Conference suggested […]

International Women’s Day rally hosted by the Socialist Party in England and Wales and the Committee for a Workers’ International (CWI). Sunday 7th March 2021, 15-00 to 16-30 hrs (GMT) Facebook link: https://fb.me/e/gpD0Bxe5Q Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZAuc–vrzsjGdR2IMTQRyzEwpCLVI92M9mS With […]

The 8th of March this year marks the 110th anniversary of International Women’s Day (IWD). Over the years there’s been a sustained attempt to remove the socialist origin of the day and for it to […]

In the last years, we have made a number of steps forward in relation to women’s rights and equality in Ireland, North and South. The referendum to repeal the eighth amendment and remove the constitutional […]

Members of the CWI in Sindh are planning to hold their annual convention and the traditional Women’s March on Monday, International Women’s Day, March 8th In recent years, there has been a huge increase in […]

Women workers constitute the vast majority toiling in Sri Lanka’s main export industries – clothing and tea. They are the two main groups facing the biggest risks from the current Covid 19 crisis. Every day […]

This year marks the 150th anniversary of the Paris Commune when for a brief but heroic few weeks the working class took power for the first time. In the immortal words of Karl Marx, the […]

The announcement of the most vicious cuts in social spending since the fall of apartheid, while simultaneously cutting taxes on big business, is a declaration of war against the working class, especially women. The budget […]

This year marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of Rosa Luxemburg (5 March), one of the most famous political figures of the last century. For the international workers’ movement, she is renowned as a […]

A year has passed since the last celebration of working women’s struggle for a better deal in life. What a year of misery, death, and destruction!  But what a groundswell of hostility to the system […]

International Women’s Day, with its history of being rooted in struggle, has, in recent years, been diminished – much like the Pride marches for LGBTQ+ rights, have. Big business increasingly uses it as a cynical […]

Girls and young women involved in research into sexual harassment say they aren’t shocked by its results (The State of Girl’s Rights in the UK at plan.uk.org). The research found that as many as two-thirds […]

Women’s oppression is not new. It is as old as the division of society into classes. It takes many forms and so does the fight against it. It is significant that women who feel the […]

Featured article from February 2020 Socialism Today (Monthly journal of the Socialist PArty- CWI England & Wales. The relationship between fighting women’s oppression, identity politics, and the struggle for socialism is a feature of many […]

This year, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women (25 November) is taking place during the UK general election campaign. With the possibility of the election of a Corbyn-led Labour government, this […]

What force is needed to end the discrimination and division rooted in the capitalist system? Can the global women’s movements become the main agency for change? Is the organised working class now redundant? Christine Thomas […]

To mark International Women’s Day, Socialist Party members highlighted the impact of austerity on vital services for women. They have been speaking at trade union and trades council meetings to raise support for the ‘Women’s […]

 In the era of austerity and capitalist crisis, women are struggling against their oppression. Women are taking action – marching, striking, getting organised.

The year 2018 saw a sad new record being reached of women being killed – most of them by their partners or ex-partners. The Austrian government is using this to go onto another racist offensive. […]

On Friday, 8th March, women across the globe are striking, marching, protesting and celebrating International Women’s Day in unprecedented numbers. In a welcome development, they will be accompanied by more men than in the past […]

As the age of austerity arising from the great crash of 2007-2008 enters its second decade, a new movement of women struggling against their oppression is taking shape. But mistaken ideas on how oppression can […]

Below, CWI reporters provide a selection of 2018 International Women’s Day protests and events from across the globe. Socialistworld.net Germany International Women’s Day marked the 100th anniversary of women’s right to vote and galvanized activists […]

To round off our series on the struggles of women for a better deal and for socialism, we are drawing attention to two articles on historical struggles by women.

Get. Them. Out. The Tories have got to go. What other response can there be to the Tories’ annihilation of the services needed by women fleeing domestic violence? This equates to murder by political decisions.

India’s leaders have always boasted of the country being characterised by ‘unity in diversity’ and women are supposed to have been worshipped from time immemorial. The dominant Hindutva philosophy is based on the highly controversial […]

Over the days leading up to March 8th – International Women’s Day – the CWI web-site will be carrying articles from around the world under #IWD. We begin with the International Women’s Day 2018 statement […]

It is 100 years since the first women in the UK won the right to vote in parliamentary elections. It took years of struggle and the largest mobilisation of women in Britain’s history to achieve […]

The international executive of the Committee for a Workers’ International (CWI, the international organisation that the Socialist Party is part of) took place from 27 November to 2 December in Belgium. A prominent part of […]

September 28th is International Safe Abortion Day. The date originates from the Campaña 28 Septiembre, a campaign launched in Latin America and the Caribbean in 1990 for the decriminalization of abortion. The Women’s Global Network […]

Reports from Kuala Lumpur and Brussels

The women’s movement across the world is experiencing a big growth. In Europe and the Americas, millions have protested to say no to sexism, patriarchy and capitalism.

Video of 8 March rally in Seattle. Click on the link below to watch the video of Socialist Alternative Councilmember Kshama Sawant addressing the rally held in Seattle for International Women’s Day.

Socialists around the world demand an end to women’s oppression. The Guardian newspaper in Britain called March 8th this year “One of the most highly charged and political International Women’s Day in memory”. The accession of […]

Demonstrations world-wide swelled by anti-Trump anger. International Women’s Day (8th March) is being celebrated with special enthusiasm this year by members of the parties and organisations affiliated to the Committee for a Workers’ International (CWI). It […]

Working women’s fight for a world without oppression

A socialist approach

A life of socialist struggle

Articles from CWI sections celebrating IWD

Protests, strikes and equality

Fighting austerity and oppression world-wide

Christine Thomas’ book outlines how inequalities and discrimination against women have not disappeared and women’s struggles must be bound up with wider class struggle to be successful. Read the complete book online here.

Beware the anger of women against the bosses’ system!

"The Life and Times of Stella Browne: feminist and free spirit" by Lesley A Hall

For more than a century, 8 March has been the day to commemorate and celebrate the fight of working class and revolutionary women for a better deal and a socialist society.

Women worldwide resist devastating effects of economic crisis

Christine Thomas, author of the new book ’It doesn’t have to be like this – Women and the Struggle for Socialism’ spoke to Sarah Wrack about why such a book was necessary.

“We won’t pay for the bosses’ crisis!”

Only socialism can give women the right to choose when and whether to have children.

Fight the poverty trap!

Reclaim the day and its real significance

New CWI pamphlet on the fight for abortion rights.

International Women’s Day – 8 March – commemorates the struggles of women workers worldwide against low pay and exploitation.

The United Nations Human Development Report of 2006 places Nigeria at 151 out of 177 nation-states rated basically in terms of life expectancy, educational attainment, income, seats in parliament held by women, female professional and […]

In the 1920s women workers were only paid about half of what male workers earned.

Fighting programme of socialist change vital

The fundamental emancipation of women lies in the achievement of a classless society.

The fundamental emancipation of women lies in the achievement of a classless society.

To mark International Women’s Day (8 March) this year, the Committee for a Workers’ International is publishing a collection of nine articles contributed by members of our sections across the globe.

International Women’s Day will be celebrated on 8th March in Pakistan and other countries with large Muslim populations in a situation where Islamic religious parties and groups are still agitating against the blasphemous cartoons printed […]

The 2006 budget drawn up by Trevor Manual, the finance minister, has been lauded by the media and by the capitalists’ ‘advisers’ throughout the country.

A group of around forty women have been leading a struggle for jobs and pay at the Selfex factory in the south east of Caracas for several weeks.

For over a year the German service trade union Ver.di has been attempting through a campaign to set up workers’ councils (Betriebsraete) in the retail chain, Lidl in order to improve conditions of employment.

We are constantly told by the mainstream media that girls are outperforming boys at school and that young women now have more opportunities and choice than women of previous generations.

Have you ever thought what your mother’s life was like, or your grandmother’s?

Compiled from United Nations and other reports

Fight the system of poverty and inequality. Fight capitalism!

THE 21ST Century belongs to women. That’s what many pundits were saying in the run up to the year 2000. Much is made of the fact that there are marginally more women at work now […]

Will the banning of headscarves contribute to the emancipation of women?

The day of international working women’s solidarity – 8 March – is celebrated this year just days before the first anniversary of imperialism’s attack on Iraq.

QUITE A few newspaper column inches were given over to the Future Foundation study ’Talking Equality’, published by the Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC). I’m not sure how much credence we should give to a study […]

NIGERIA IS a neo-colonial country under the shackles of imperialism and its multinational agents. Women in Nigeria are marginalised and oppressed, as are women in capitalist society generally. Women are doubly oppressed, first as workers […]

Alexandra Kollantai is probably the best-known woman among Russian revolutionaries, the first woman elected as a full member of the Bolshevik central committee and the first female commissar (minister) elected after the October 1917 revolution.

International Women’s Day, 8 March, is commemorated this year on the eve of war. Such a horrific prospect brings into sharp relief all that is rotten in today’s world. But it must not prevent us […]

THE TRIAL of top snooker player Quinten Hann for rape, highlighted all the prejudices, backward attitudes and myths which still surround this issue.

March 8, International Women’s Day, this year should be celebrated to the sound of the cacerolazo – empty pans and lids being clashed noisily together. It is the sound of protest in Argentina – especially […]

March 8, International Women’s Day, this year should be celebrated to the sound of the cacerolazo – empty pans and lids being clashed noisily together. It is the sound of protest in Argentina – especially […]

The Committee for a Workers’ International – with parties, sections and members in 35 countries in all five continents – greets the working women of the world for International Women’s Day, 2001. Since the end […]

The ’World March of Women’ is a cry for justice on the part of half the world’s population. On International Women’s Day – March 8 – this year, demonstrations were held in more than 50 […]

Working women around the world have a right to expect a new century, especially a new millennium, to bring them a better deal in life. After all, the 20th century saw unimagined strides forward in […]

Included here are ten articles commissioned by the Committee for a Workers’ International for use on and around March 8th – International Women’s Day. They have been circulated to the sections and groups of of […]

The committee for a workers’ international commemorates International Women’s Day 1999 – Monday 8th of March – by calling on all socialists and class fighters to help restore the true significance of this day in […]