Programme to Unify the Womens Movement

abortion campaigns began to develop.

Yet now, two years later, the movement is fragmented and divided. It has almost disappeared from national politics. There have been few if any national meetings or newsletters and there is no national womens magazine.

Women have retreated from united activity and discussion into the safety of their own politics and the womens movement is now racked by divisions between anti-imperialist and republican women, feminists and social democrats. These political divisions, a reflection of the political divisions of the Irish working class created by partition, make it impossible for the womens movement to grow and develop. At every major development in the class and anti-imperialist struggle these political divisions reassert themselves inside the feminist movement. Fragile unity that has been built up around important issues (such as Violence against Women, Armagh, contraception) is lost. This has been the pattern for Irish feminists since the inception of the hunger strike campaign.

Yet this disunity takes place in a For the first time election proToday the Irish womens movement is at the crossroads. 1979 saw the movement begin to develop on a national scale. New organisations and campaigns developed, debate and discussion around the politics of feminism deepened and attempts were made to set up a national feminist federation. 32 county united activity around important questions such as women political prisoners in Armagh, Violence Against Women, the contraception and period in which struggles of working class women have developed apace.

Women have been active in the trades union movement, in the student movement, in operating advice centres, in fighting for better housing and welfare facilities. And these trends are bound to continue as the economic and social crisis which is forcing thousands onto the dole will hit women hardest and force them into struggle to defend their already impoverished standard of living.

Feminists must recognise the implications of this for their movement.

With working class women being thrown into struggle, with thousands being drawn into the anti-imperialist movement, it is essential that feminists build the 32 county independent womens movement into a national political force.

Peoples Democracy believes that the unity of the womens movement is of fundamental importance — we cannot achieve progress on any of the issues facing women while we are divided and fragmented. In fact, the experience of feminists over the last 10 years has been that this tendency of the movement to fragment i isa recurring one and this is not the first time we have been faced with this situation. How do we explain this? By recognising that divisions in the womens movement are not only because of political differences, but primarily because of the weakness of the Irish feminist current. This current, working in a situatiaa of extreme difficulty — partition — faces huge obstacles to winning the demands of womens liberation. This underlines the importance of uniting the feminist movement. But we cannot unite around action alone. The nature of the difficulties facing Irish women demands that we find political unity around the demands of womens liberation. That is why PD has drawn up a ‘Programme for Womens Liberation in Ireland’ which takes up all a spects of Irish womens oppression — not just one particular campaign.

Only by uniting around such a programme will women develop the political coherence and confidence necessary to sustain the problems of building an Irish womens movement. Only such a programme allows for unity by all currents of Irish women around their common oppression. This will go some way to overcome the tendency to fragment and divide in the face of these very real difficulties. PD will be organising discussions and meeiings around these points and invites all women to sponsor a conference io take place in September/ October 1981 around this programme and the need to unite Irish women in the fight against their oppression. women: to divorce. dominauon. PROGRAMME FOR WOMENS LIBERATION IN IRELAND (1) For a 32 county independent womens movement. (2) Remove the Church’s veto on state policy — democratic rights for all — de-criminalisation of abortion — access to free safe and legal contraception — the removal of all constitutional and legal impediments to the right (3) For the right of all women to work; for equal pay, against low pay. (4) For the right to nursery facilities funded by the state. (S) Against violence against women; organise against rape, domestic violence. State funding for rape crisis, womens aid and womens centres. (6) Active support for the struggles of working class women in community and social issues — housing, rents, health and welfare cutbacks. (7) For the right of men and women to determine their own sexual orientation — for the right of gays to live free from harassment by the state, (8) The oppressive conditions suffered by Irish women, ‘the slave of the slave’ have heen maintained and deepened by partition and imperialist — for an end to partition — for an end to imperialist presence in Ireland. | In such a situation women’s issues will