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looks at the latest volume in an ongoing series regarding the Communist International that pulls together previously unpublished material about this relatively unknown international women’s movement in the period 1920-22.
The Communist Women’s Movement 1920-1922: Proceedings, Resolutions, and Reports
Edited by Mike Taber and Daria Dyakonova
Published by Haymarket Books, 2023, £40
“On the evening of 30 July 1920… a chorus of women’s voices singing The Internationale fills the streets of Moscow. Women proletarians, in an orderly and elated procession celebrate the opening of the International Conference of Communist Women at the Bolshoi Theatre. At about 8 o’clock that evening, the hall is filled from top to bottom… The stage is occupied by women delegates from Germany, France, Britain, the United States, Mexico, Austria, Denmark, Sweden, Hungary, Finland, Norway, Latvia, Bulgaria, India, Georgia, the Caucuses and Turkestan, as well as representatives of various organisations and institutions welcoming the First International Conference of Communist Women”.
It’s hard for us today to appreciate the profound international significance of the Russian revolution in the immediate post-revolutionary period, but this report gives a glimpse of the inspirational effect it had on socialist women. Those in capitalist countries struggling to end their double oppression as workers and as women now had a living example of what the overthrow of capitalism could achieve.
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