The Role of Activist Agences in Shaping the course of Women’s History

There is no doubt that militants and activist agencies stimulate vie a role in shaping the history of wo organizeforce, and a vast amount of the historiography of womens history has given excessive attention to the role of activists. habitual history tends to condense a Rankeian passel of sluicets, focussing instead on the role of the individual, quite a than the deeper at a lower placelying social, political and economic causes of history.The traditional good-looking belief of the struggle to obtain the franchise is that the suffragettes, via their militant tactics and under the leadership of the Pankhursts ensured that women were granted the vote, and that this solved entirely the injustices amongst the sexes. This simplistic view of events and ignores the wider changes that were taking place in the economy and society, as closely as placing a big(a)rr emphasis on certain activists, rather than looking at the broader picture.The militant activities of the suffrage ttes were never sufficient enough to daunt the g all overnment or the wider public into extending the franchise to women, their acts of violence towards property were frequently small scale and petty. It also ignores the role of the suffragists led by Millicent Fawcett, who were distant more significant in obtaining the vote for women, for they were the ones who reasoned rather than fought with men and showed that women could deal with political matters.Activists continued to use similar tactics in the 1970s to demand changes in the law, such as free babys room places (as removed from local councils responsibilities under the 1980 Education Act) and better maternity benefits. The strong changes came about however, non collectible to the prominent high profile activists, that to the grass roots campaign where women won seats on townspeople and city councils. Historians can often look for the big story to indite about, some measure however the big story is made up of rafts o f little ones. Womens position in the economy changed prior to the war as well.Industrialisation brought about the end of small scale family run workshops and on that point has been a transition to large workshops. The sexual division of labour in mills and factories was seen as a indispensable occurrence and women did non reject to macrocosm nonrecreational less and exploited more than male workers. care unions did not favour equal roles in application for women out of the affright that it would take mens caprioles from them. The benefits in industry that women gained during WWI were temporary, and as soon as men returned from the war women were forced back out of their jobs.One view of the effects of WWI is that giving the vote to women was a reward for their hard work during the war, in the munitions and armaments factories. At the same period as activists had allegedly gained a better position for women via the vote, laws such as the Restoration of Pre-war Practices Ac t (1919) which enacted the agreements between the government and trade unions that womens war work was notwithstanding temporary. Various activist agencies organised resistance to this, however they proved futile.The changing role of women economically in the latter part of the c20 was not due to activists but due to the wider structural changes the war effected on the country by land War 2. Following the Second military man War the changing personality of commerce in the UK made it uneconomical to prevent women from working and by 1947 there were more women workers than in 1939 (Bruley). The deindustrialisation of the UK between 1979-1990 saw a large increase in the numbers of women in function. Margaret Thatchers economic reforms created huge unemployment, although when employment levels started to recede, women were back into employment quicker than men.This was due to skilled secondary industry jobs being replaced with low skilled tertiary jobs which could get away with pa id women less and reducing employees rights due to the reforms Thatcher introduced. In 1990 60% of low paid full time workers were women and Carole Buswell found that in the same year large residuums of women were earning less than the EU recommended minimum wage in tertiary industries, even in jobs such as banking and insurance 40% of the workers fitted this category.This is because even in well paid jobs, such as banking and insuarance, women were restricted from progressing high up the career ladder by having to take maternity leave to mould up children, if they were even considered for promotion in the first place as many of these companies were strongly male dominated. The Womens self image has changed a groovy deal since the beginning of the c20, when women saw themselves primarily as mothers and wives, though in working air division environments this pose persisted for a lot longer than in wealthier and better educated social aggroups.Sue Sharpe found in her 1976 parol e Just wish well a girl that working class girls in Ealing in the 70s noneffervescent expected to marry a husband who would take care of them financially and that they would be responsible for childrearing. Womens level of deference has diminish greatly from the beginning of the century when they were almost voiceless, to the present day where girls pass on become at least as vocal as men, if not more.Deep running social trends such as this cannot be changed over night by activists and this lack of change in the working classes could be interpreted as evidence that womens liberation movements have largely been for and by the white middle classes Many women in the 1970s though who had started to redefine their own roles started to live in new ways, such as communally with other women. A large amount of feminist activists adopted red ideology and blamed the subjection of women on the capitalist exploitation of women as a labour force as well as for the due labour they do domest ically.In the 1980s, with its ethos of the individual, women started to appear slowly in positions of power, however their high profile was due to their unusualness. However many women were shocked and against this attitude and the 80s saw many women reject the materialist society and take up campaigns against issues like nuclear disarmament such as the women at Greenham Common. Activists continued to operate a role through the 70s and 80s although as in previous times they were often the central figureheads of larger movements based on mass upheavals.As the UK became an increasingly egalitarian society into the 1960s due to the increasing levels of information and the secularisation of society, women started to realise that the restrictions on career options were chiefly the traditional roles of women and a lack of education. Large amounts of feminists were students and so they had the opportunities to study the past and see the oppression that women had faced and also how little women appeared in history. The Crowther Report (1959) released middle class grammar school girls from the domestic curriculum, opening the door to many more job opportunities.However women were take over restricted in the workplace by having to be responsible for rearing children as well as attempting to have a career. Viola Klien argued in Womens two roles (1956) that modern societies were unable to afford to not have women working, this capitalised on fears that the UK would fall economically behind the USSR where nearly all women worked. Although activists led the womens liberation movement and campaigned against articles such as Miss World and unequal pay, mainly the reforms came from elsewhere.Equal pay was finally made a reality when the Fawcett Society (a group of feminists) took the government to the EU court to carry out the Equal Value Amendment. How much has changed for women in the last 100 geezerhood is debateable. Certainly there have been many legal improvements a nd women are no longer the second class citizens they were at the beginning of the century. However jibe to some feminists, women are still oppressed by society as whole, being expected to take care of children and do housework as well as to have a job.Opponents to this argue that women are the natural carers of children and that there are no real obstacles in the way for women to have both a job and family if the women works hard enough and balances her time. This group of opponents is not exclusively male. Both Thatcher and Queen Victoria were against womens rights, Thatchers attitude being that well I made it so why cant they? and latter accept in the traditional division of the sexes based upon religion and tradition. Men still continue to run the top jobs, with Angela Coyle finding in 1988 that at the in truth top of companies women made up only 5%.Until 1997 the maximum proportion of women MPs had been approximately 10%. This number was only increased in the 1997 election w hen Tony Blair supported positive discrimination by adopting an Emilys List policy. This meant that in safe seats women be put forward as candidates, the go was 100 women MPs, however this policy was later declared illegal. As women are still expected to take care of children, maternity leave and career get outs for the legal transfer up of children harm their promotion prospects, resulting in a glass crown that often needs the sacrifice of family life in order to break through.Although women appeared to become visible in the media, this is often because the ones who did make it to the top were so unusual that they were worthy of media interest. Solutions to the problem are hard, some feminists argue that the only way the position of women will change is if men think otherwise too, however this is idealistic to say the least. Bruley reaches the conclusion that women are still disfavor because although women now have the franchise and careers, they still have to bear the brunt of childbearing, fondness and networking.