The abolition in Poland of abortion and contraception rights would have serious consequences throughout Europe. International solidarity with Polish women is urgently needed, in particular to aid in the building of an independent mass women's movement there. Faced with the socio-economic crisis, their massive return to the home, unemployment, the male monopoly of public life and the clerical offensive, they have to overcome great difficulties if they are to mobilize in defence of their material and moral inter-
There is no tradition or experience of a women's movement that puts forward demands or of exercising the right to self- determination. Without substantial support from Western feminism, they will have an even harder job turning the balance of forces in their favour. *
The fate of an independent women's movement
ON the eve of International
Women's Day the second national (GDR-wide)
Congress of the
Independent Women s
Association (UFV) opened in Leipzig's Women s
Centre. 163 women from the east and 16 from the west attended for three days (as observers or guest speakers), to discuss the Association's perspectives. Many brought children with them
— a difference from the
Federal republic, where few feminists are mothers, This account first appeared in the May 5 Issue of the east
German revolutionary
Marxist publication Avanti.
PAULINA WEISS
HE UFV is only 18 months old.
The account that different women gave of its work until now was on the one hand of a constructive effort (in the initial phase) and on the other of discouragement (in the period after the re-unification).
In a very short period of time a whole network of women's projects were set up;
women put forward proposals from a feminist perspective at the Round Tables;
equality in state representation was established and a UFV representative was delegated to the East German council ministers, the UFV stood in elections and won representation in the communal parliaments and the national parliament.
Eva Schäfer wrote in the congress documentation: "The UFV was an independent political interest group with GDR-wide scope. It openly strove for a feminist view
of social questions, which had to be taken into account by parties and organizations. In this period it was an important political instrument; its all-GDR organization, bringing together women of different party, ideological, religious, national and sexual orientations, gave it the strength to make its proposals really effective. Women's projects put forward their demands for material support with the backing of a political force that had a recognized place in the political landscape."
Does this seem too optimistic? A little
"UFV representatives faced the danger of becoming token women for political parties cager to annex women's issues. Here there would be a narrowly defined sphere of feminist activity and this activity would be supportive of the system rather than subversive.
projects wanted free space where women could discover themselves and create a women's culture. But they were being turned into instruments for use as safety nets for an anti-social society."
Harmless Greens
Has the UFV already been integrated? Is it doomed to become as harmless as the West German Greens? Is there nothing more to demand than equal rights to
Gröschner from the Lila-
"After the chase from one clection to another we have had to recognize that we are in the minority, even among women. We have lowered our voices and begun to live in the new conditions. We have learnt to use spray cans, some think of suicide, others of planting bombs; we find no third way. The women's groups organize coffee mornings, the projects fight with each other, and once again there are those on top and those underneath."
This seems like an announcement of the end of an independent women's movement. Some say that the hour of the UFV has passed and that it should draw the conclusions and wind itself up. Perhaps it has run aground on the contradiction between utopian radicalism and the disillusionment of ordinary life.
Anett Gröschner: "Our pages-long proposals for a new, more equal society have become so much paper and after one year are source material for the historians. We grimace when we read what we wrote then, and say: utopian! Nothing remains of all that. Instead guerilla warfare has begun over the remaining gains for women: abortion and nursery provision. And day after day women are losing their jobs, without an organization being able to make the slightest difference. Our role, it seems, is to control women and get the misery off the streets so that no one sees it. We are to clean up behind a state and society that are throwing the consequences of their policies onto
The UFV considers its present structure as insufficiently resistant to the incursions of the the patriarchal West German state. Many women have dropped out of the association. Others react by becoming anti-political. There are already categories — Politwomen, projectwomen, Deskwomen. They are beginning to drift apart and contacts become rarer. Some want to see more serious work in parliament, others look to the extra-parliamentary strug gle. Some demand money from the state, others avoid state money, because it always serves state interests and is there potential protests of Still others remember that state subsidies are not a gift of the state since they are paid for by taxes; the money belongs to us.
There was discontent over the fact that those who were best able to work in the UFV were women who had more self-confidence because they had learnt how to operate in male-dominated organizations; women and above all women who had started in the structures of the former ruling party, the SED, and its mass organizations. "This had the result that women often operated in the coordinating councils just as they would in their former organizaaccording to Anett Gröschner. "Some used the UFV as a springboard, others successfully suppressed their past, which had not been so unpolitical as they made it seem to journalists. And they arranged it so that women who knew about their past would not make it a voting issue, because we were already under pressure not to foul our own nest or get involved in witchhunts."
### Mass unemployment
What remains today of the UFV? It has hardly any public presence. At a time when mass unemployment is growing every day among women, when anti-abortion laws are being discussed, when all contraceptives now have to be paid for (previously, pills, coils and diaphragms were free), when nurseries are closed, the UFV has been marginalized and lost its political weight.
According to a women from Jena: "We have now lost our contacts with the Politwomen and the representatives. All that exists now are the projects, but cut off from the political levels of the associa-
Also in Neubrandenburg the work falls to a handful who are totally committed. Despite this Birgit Galin was euphoric about an action that took place on March 7: "five thousand women, men and children demonstrated in front of the town hall against the raising of nursery fees. They stormed the main hall shouting: 'resign! We don't want you any more! Why can the Federal Republic find 17bn marks for the Gulf war and nothing for children? Seven billion are needed to
WOMEN: East Germany keep the facilities for children. ' The mayor had left an hour before. The councillors said that they would decide on March 27. The people called out: 'then we will come back again in twice the numbers.' One
"Tomorrow is Friday'. The crowd answered 'yes, March 8 must be a day of struggle not a holiday.
"That was a semi-revolution and it was
State thwarts initiatives
Irina Eckert poured on some cold water: "we got a project for retraining unemployed women off the ground [in which women would be trained on computers]. We had a lot of difficulty in getting money from the state. But the project was ruined because it was boycotted by the unemployment exchange. went on such courses would lose their benefits. And now? The state money is there, but we cannot do anything with it."
Everywhere traps are set and obstacles set up to hinder the UFV and make progress difficult. So projects run into the sand. Now the Association, like all other citizens' initiatives in the Federal Republic, faces the judicial requirement to decide whether to become a political party according to the FRG's law on parties (which does not recognize the category of political association) or a registered Society. This is also a manoeuvre. Whoever does not believe themselves capable of forming a conventional party, or does not want to form one, will be pushed off the political stage. This is a question of life or death for the UFV. It demands a fundamental thinking through of its demands, aims, structures and methods. There were 1,200 women present at the founding congress in December 1989; only 163 at the second congress. A process of political differentiation would lead to further shrinkage.
The UFV must decide whether it wants to be mainly a political association or a loose networking and coordination body for actions and projects, or a social assistance body for women. Eva Schäfer: "If the women's movement wants to have an impact on society, then it must work out clear political ideas.
"In' that case, the women's association cannot be a mere umbrella body for the whole spectrum of those who make reference to women."
Between now and September, when the third congress will be held, women have time to consider these questions.
Highlights of this congress were a list of demands from the working group on employment and a petition that was adoptconcerning the abortion laws. It includes among other demands:
• General shortening of the working week with no loss of pay as the response to unemployment; • A guarantee of the funding of all nur. 27 July 8, 1991 • #210 International Viewpoint
WOMEN: East Germany / Switzerland series after June 1991; adequate old age pensions;
• An end to the subsidy of marriage and a recognition of alternative ways of time limit; no law 218;
• Payment for abortions by the social security;
• Out-patient abortions;
Big demonstrations took place in all the cities. More than 3,000 women occupied the Federal Square in Bern, where the government and parliament buildings are located, preventing a number of luminarlife;
• Unrestricted rights to abortion; no
Swiss women hold provision of contraceptive
Free means.
ies, among them German foreign minister Dietrich Genscher and UN secretary general Xavier Perez de Cuellar, from going in to attend the international day in celebration of the 700th anniversary of the creation of the Swiss Confederation one day strike IT TOOK until June 14, 1971, for Switzerland to grant the right to vote to women. Ten years later, article 4 of the constitution was changed to read: "men and women have equal rights. The law provides for equality, in particular in the sphere of the family, education and work. Men and women have the right to equal pay for work of equal value." CHARLES-ANDRE UDRY
A FURTHER DECADE later,