For the Many
American Feminists and the Global Fight for Democratic Equality
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4155354 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Landon R Y Storrs (University of Iowa , Iowa City, Iowa, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2022 |
| Volume | 109 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 713-714 |
| Publication date | 2022-12-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of American History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0021-8723 • E-ISSN: 1945-2314 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/jahist/jaac443 |
| OpenAlex | W4311807210 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 5 |
This ambitious book's two goals are to celebrate the impact and persistence of what Dorothy Sue Cobble calls the “full rights” (as opposed to “equal rights”) tradition of U.S. feminism across the twentieth century, and to demonstrate that these American feminists collaborated in an international network of social democrats (p. 3). Cobble synthesizes literature on dozens of familiar American activists and researches their international relationships, often forged through conferences under International Labor Organization (Ilo) and United Nations auspices. Her sprawling narrative traces the interactions of women such as Rose Schneiderman, Frances Perkins, Maida Springer, and Esther Peterson with a galaxy of feminists from the Americas, Europe, and Asia. Cobble takes the well-known Women's Trade Union League (Wtul) as her anchor and identifies two 1919 labor conferences as the crystallizing moment for their international network. Wtul feminists drew inspiration from Britain's Margaret Bondfield, India's Parvatibai Athavale, and Japan's Tanaka Taka, among many others, at the International Congress of Working Women and the ensuing struggle over resolutions at the first Ilo conference. While acknowledging the limitations of the congress—Black women internationalists were absent, labor men were imperfect allies, national interests clashed—Cobble claims it set an agenda that full-rights feminists pursued for decades through labor and government bodies at home and abroad. Twelve dense chapters trace that pursuit through setbacks and opportunities afforded by global depression, war, Cold War, decolonization, and neoliberalism
Democracy · Economic history · Feminism · Great Depression · Militarism · Militarization · Neoliberalism (international relations · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Gender Studies · Historical Gender and Feminism Studies · History · Labor Movements and Unions · Law
| Citations per year | 1.67 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2023 - 2024 (2) |
| Highly cited | No |