ORIGIN OF FEMINISM

One of the most important social movements of the past two centuries and certainly the social
movement which has brought about the most enduring and progressive transformation of
human society on a global scale is FEMINISM. It is customary to divide the history of feminism
into a First, Second, and Third Wave, with each period signaling a different era in the struggle
to attain equality between the sexes. Today feminism means many different things to different
people, but at its core, if one goes back to its origins in the late 18th century, it is primarily a
social movement for the emancipation of women. That movement was slow to start, and it
wasn’t until the late 1880s that the term ‘feminism’ actually appeared. Before then, the more
usual term was ‘women’s rights’.

This was certainly the case in one of the earliest self-consciously feminist works, namely Mary
Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), which was written at the height
of the French Revolution. Wollstonecraft conducts her critique on two fronts: on the one hand,
she criticizes patriarchal society; while on the other hand, she criticizes women for buying into
femininity which, in her view, turns women into mere ‘toys’. Wollstonecraft’s solution was
better education for young women, not the granting of equal rights. So in this sense, one might
say feminism begins not with Wollstonecraft but rather with the various Women’s Suffrage
movements that sprang up in the early 1800s.

A century of struggle
Achieving full voting rights for all women regardless of age, race, or marital status took more
than a century of struggle. In point of fact, however, even after women obtained the right to
vote in most parts of the world at the turn of the 20th century, it was still several decades before
full equality was obtained. And many would say that it has not yet been obtained.

It is worth mentioning that throughout the long First Wave of feminism women fought against
several other injustices as well, of which three are key. (i) Women were restricted in terms of the
ownership of property, requiring them to marry so as to inherit, thus preventing them from
attaining true independence. (ii) Women did not have full rights over their own body, which
meant they had no legal protection against sexual violence. (iii) Women were discriminated
against in the workplace, which not only meant women were paid less than men for the same
work, it also restricted them from applying for certain jobs, denied them promotion, and made
no allowance for maternity leave.
The Second Wave of feminism
Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique(1963) is generally credited as the tipping point for this
second round of political struggle. Echoing Wollstonecraft, she argued that women were
victims of a false belief in the promise of femininity and urged them to look beyond their
domestic situation for fulfillment. The National Organization for Women (NOW) was formed in
1966 and became the central focus, in the US, for feminist activism. Its goal was the ratification
of an Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution, which it did not manage to achieve in full,
but it nonetheless made giant strides towards it. Second Wave feminism also took the view that
equality between the sexes would only come about if there was a sea change in cultural
attitudes on the part of both women and men.

FEMINISM IN CHINA
Feminism in China began in the 20th century in tandem with the Chinese Revolution. Feminism
in modern China is closely linked with socialism and class issues.

History
Prior to the 20th century, women in China were considered essentially different from men.
Despite the association of women with yin and men with yang, two qualities considered equally
important by Daoism, women were believed to occupy a lower position than men in the
hierarchical order of the universe. Women were to be submissive and obedient to men, and
normally not allowed to participate in government, military or community institutions.

A number of women, and some men, started to speak out against these conditions in the late
19th and early 20th centuries, but to little avail. The situation only began to change as result of
the Xinhai Revolution in 1911. In course of this widespread uprising against the ruling Qing
dynasty, several women rebel units were raised such as Wu Shuqing's Women's Revolutionary
Army, Yin Weijun and Lin Zongxue's Zhejiang Women's Army, and many others.

The revolt of women has shaken China to its very depths. In the women of China, the
Communists possessed, almost ready-made, one of the greatest masses of disinherited human
beings the world has ever seen.

Beginning in the 70s and continuing in the 80s, however, many Chinese feminists began arguing
that the Communist government had been "consistently willing to treat women's liberation as
something to be achieved later, after class inequalities had been taken care of." Some feminists
claim that part of the problem is a tendency on the government's part to interpret "equality" as
sameness, and then to treat women according to an unexamined standard of male normalcy.

In 2001, China amended its marriage law, so that abuse was considered grounds for divorce. In
2005, China added new provisions to the Law on Women's Right Protection to include sexual
harassment. In 2006 "The Shanghai Supplement" was drafted to help further define sexual
harassment in China. In 2015, China enacted its first nationwide law prohibiting domestic
violence, although it excluded same-sex couples and did not address sexual violence. In 2019, a
government directive was released banning employers in China from posting "men preferred"
or "men only" job advertising, and banning companies from asking women seeking jobs about
their childbearing and marriage plans or requiring applicants to take pregnancy tests.

Feminism in France
Feminism in France can be roughly divided into three waves: First-wave feminism, which
largely concerned itself with obtaining suffrage and civic rights for women, spanning from the
French Revolution through the Second Republic and Third Republic, with significant
contributions stemming from the revolutionary movements of the French Revolution of 1848
and Paris Commune, culminating in winning the right to vote in 1944.

Second-wave feminism spanned from the 1940s until the 1990s, and came about as a
reevaluation of women's role in society, reconciling the inferior treatment of women in society
despite their ostensibly equal political status to men. Pioneered by theorists such as Simone de
Beauvoir, second wave feminism was an important current within the social turmoil leading up
to and following the May 1968 events in France, and political goals included the guarantee of
increased bodily autonomy for women, particularly as enabled through increased access to
abortion and birth control.

Third-wave feminism spans from the early 2000s onwards, and continues the legacy of the
second wave while adding in elements of postcolonial critique, approaching women's rights in
tandem with other ongoing discourses, particularly those surrounding racism.

In November 1789, at the very beginning of the French Revolution, the Women's Petition was
addressed to the National Assembly but not discussed. Although various feminist movements
emerged during the Revolution, most politicians followed Rousseau's theories as outlined in
Emile, which confined women to the roles of mother and spouse. The philosopher Condorcet
was a notable exception who advocated equal rights for both sexes.

The feminist movement expanded again in Socialist movements of the Romantic generation, in
particular among Parisian Saint Simonians. Women freely adopted new lifestyles, inciting
indignation in public opinion. They claimed equality of rights and participated in the abundant
literary activity. On the other hand, Charles Fourier's Utopian Socialist theory of passions
advocated "free love."

Some women organized a feminist movement during the Commune, following up on earlier
attempts in 1789 and 1848. The Women's Union also participated in several municipal
commissions and organized cooperative workshops.

In 1909, French noblewoman and feminist Jeanne-Elizabeth Schmahl founded the French Union
for Women's Suffrage to advocate for women's right to vote in France.

During the Third Republic, the suffragettes movement championed the right to vote for women,
but did not insist on the access of women to legislative and executive offices. The suffragettes,
however, did honour the achievements of foreign women in power by bringing attention to
legislation passed under their influence concerning alcohol (such as Prohibition in the United
States), regulation of prostitution, and protection of children's rights.

Despite this campaign and the new role of women following World War I, the Third Republic
declined to grant them voting rights, mainly because of fear of the influence of clericalism
among them,[4] echoing the conservative vote of rural areas for Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte
during the Second Republic. Following the November 1946 elections, the first in which women
were permitted to vote, sociologist Robert Verdier refuted any voting gender gap: in May 1947
in Le Populaire, he showed that women do not vote in a consistent way but divide themselves,
as men, according to social classes. Marital power was abolished in 1938. However, the legal
repeal of the specific doctrine of marital power does not necessarily grant married women the
same legal rights as their husbands but was gradually abolished with women obtaining full
equality in marriage only in the 1980s. Women were not allowed to become judges in France
until 1946. Married French women obtained the right to work without their husband's consent
in 1965.

A strong feminist movement would only emerge in the aftermath of May 1968, with the creation
of the Women's Liberation Movement in 1968. In the frame of the cultural and social changes
that occurred during the Fifth Republic, they advocated the right of autonomy from their
husbands, and the rights to contraception and to abortion.

The paternal authority of a man over his family in France was ended in 1970 (before that
parental responsibilities belonged solely to the father who made all legal decisions concerning
the children).

A new reform in France in 1985 abolished the stipulation that the father had the sole power to
administer the children's property.
French Feminist Theory
In the English-speaking world, the term "French feminism" refers to a branch of feminist
theories and philosophies that emerged in the 1970s to the 1990s. French feminist theory,
compared to its English-speaking, is distinguished by an approach which is more philosophical
and literary. Its writings tend to be effusive and metaphorical being less concerned with
political doctrine and generally focused on theories of "the body.

Joan Scott, a professor at the Institute for Advanced Study, stated: "There is a longstanding
commitment to the notion that the French do gender relations differently — especially from
prudish Americans — and that has to do with the French understanding of seduction.
Seduction is the alternative to thinking about [sexual harassment] as sexual harassment."
Christine Bard, a professor at the University of Angers, echoed those thoughts, saying that there
is an "idealization of seduction à la Française, and that anti-feminism has become almost part of
the national identity" in France. Sexual harassment in the workplace was made subject to legal
sanction in France starting only in 1992. France outlawed street sexual harassment in 2018,
passing a law declaring catcalling on streets and public transportation is subject to fines of up to
€750, with more for more aggressive and physical behavior. The law also declared that sex
between an adult and a person of 15 or under can be considered rape if the younger person is
judged incompetent to give consent. It also gives underage victims of rape an extra decade to
file complaints, extending the deadline to 30 years from their turning 18.

FEMINISM IN CUBA
Global feminist endeavors have influenced the development of international legal standards
affecting the circumstances of women and contributed to the gender mainstreaming of human
rights initiatives. At the same time, feminist transnationalism has often been identified as the
source of tension as efforts have at times resulted in support for a neoliberal agenda
propounding empowerment and self-esteem issues, which in turn, has raised questions about
who is defining the agendas and strategies for women's struggles for rights. Cuban feminism is
uniquely shaped by its national history, including the experience of colonialism and
globalization, both mainstays for unequal global political economies. Cuban feminists draw
upon their historical political culture as a consequence of experiences of the 19th century wars
for independence from Spain, during which were widely recognized for their heroism and
combativeness. Cuban feminism is also a product of women’s participation in repeated
mobilizations against the United States in the early twentieth century, culminating in the
revolution of 1959 that has given form to an advanced state of gender equality. Cuba is ranked
as the most gender equal country in Latin America and near the top world-wide. A study of
Cuban feminism reveals the contradictory nature of globalization upon efforts to achieve
gender equality. A globalized feminism has helped to create the spaces of autonomy that were
adapted by Cuban feminists to address gender-based violence. Heightened attention to
domestic violence coincided with the “Special Period” in the 1990s in response to the economic
collapse occasioned by the demise of the Soviet Union, Cuba’s key trading partner and provider
of subsidies. During this period, the United States expanded the embargo against Cuba. Because
U.S. sanctions were perceived as a threat to national security, efforts to examine state practices
that contributed to domestic violence were dampened by the perceived need to maintain
national consensus in the face of an external threat. Cuban feminists nonetheless continued to
call attention to the issue of domestic violence in a global context, which had assumed epidemic
proportions to which the Cuban people could not be indifferent. By reframing national concerns
for women’s inequality as a global issue, Cuban feminists were successful in raising concerns
that might otherwise be relegated to the background, or perhaps even ignored altogether. The
globalization of human rights norms has enabled Cuban women to employ strategies to reduce
the possibility of creating a false dichotomy between national interests identities and gender
interests identities. But the globalization of a neoliberal political economy has also contributed
to disproportionate burdens born by Cuban women. The revolution enabled women to make
significant gains in the political economic life of the nation. However, the Special Period and
recent global economic crisis has acted to erode many of these gains. Indeed, the crisis has been
inordinately experienced by women who have been expected to meet the challenges of food
shortages and an increased work-load. Globalization has thus raised new difficulties that have
counterposed gender equity and family survival.

Cuban feminists have relied on an emerging global consensus on the need to eradicate domestic
violence and to develop strategies for social and legal reform for women. At the same time,
globalization has resulted in new challenges for Cuban women who face hardship and
uncertainty. Cuban feminism continues to endeavor to adapt in a globalized world, and to
choose those strategies that will advance improved circumstances for women and the nation.

Like China before the revolution of 1949 and throughout the colonized world, women in Cuba
faced an especially acute oppression at the hands of patriarchal tradition. The basic social
structure of Cuba was informed by the historical practices and ideologies of capitalist Christian
Europe.

In that society women were most definitely second class citizens. In Cuba women were
expected to be in the home, as mothers and wives. When they did work they worked low status,
underpaid jobs. As a result many Cuban women were forced to turn to the sex trade. All of this
was enforced in Cuban society by the dominance of the capitalist media, capitalist laws and the
influence of the Roman Catholic Church since the early days of Spanish colonialism.

However with the final victory of the courageous revolution of January 1st 1959, lead by Fidel
Castro and Ernesto “Che” Guevara and which saw heavy participation and leadership by
women, the protracted process of uprooting patriarchal social relations and liberating women in
Cuba was begun. As Castro himself once said ““a people whose women fight alongside men –
that people is invincible.”

The ongoing socialist revolution in Cuba is an inspiring example of what can be achieved for
women’s rights when the capitalist agenda no longer dictates. From 1959, when the Cuba
Revolution achieved political victory over the US-backed Batista dictatorship, women have both
defeated preconceptions that they can’t be revolutionary leaders, and helped their country lead
the world in the areas of feminism, environmental sustainability, political participation, health
and education.

The brutality of the Batista regime propelled many women to join the revolutionary struggle.
Their initial roles in non-combatant underground work and caring for the male soldiers did not
satisfy many of the women and they demanded equality in the armed struggle, against the
opposition of many of the men. Fidel Castro spent one seven-hour meeting persuading leading
opponents that women had the discipline (in fact, more of it) – and also the right – to fulfil this
role . The women’s platoon of the Rebel Army became known for its discipline and courage,
sometimes leading ahead where men feared to go. Thus it was early in the revolution that many
men were forced to change their opinion of women’s capabilities.

On January 2, 1959, the day after the general strike which forced Batista and his cronies to flee
Havana for the US, Castro called for the end of women’s oppression and – for their full
participation in the nascent revolution. “A people whose women fight alongside men – that
people is invincible”, he avowed in a speech from the Santiago de Cuba city hall. However, the
expectations that both men and women generally held at that time were those of the capitalist
world. The capitalists needed working-class women to assume primary responsibility for
unpaid domestic labour in rearing the next generation of workers so as to reduce pressure on
the capitalist state to direct wealth towards social welfare and away from private profits. They
therefore promoted the view that women’s “natural” social role was being mothers/carers
subordinate to their husbands – the “breadwinner” – within each individual family unit.

General acceptance that working women should be restricted to low-status and low paid work
was also important in reinforcing the idea that women primarily belonged in “the home”.
Capitalist dominance of the media and other cultural products, capitalist laws and the influence
of the Roman Catholic Church in Cuba all helped reinforce these ideas. The Cuban
revolutionaries recognised that the impact of capitalism’s needs and the sexist ideas it promoted
on women’s lives was so far-reaching and oppressive that fundamental changes were needed.

From the beginning of Cuba’s new revolutionary democracy, women assumed leadership roles,
involving themselves in the popular militias to defend the revolution, and in the
neighbourhood-based Committees in Defence of the Revolution. But this initial demonstration
of women’s leadership capacity was recognised as inadequate for eradicating the discrimination
against women that was thoroughly ingrained into Cuban social life. A group of women
revolutionaries founded what was to become the main women’s rights organisation in Cuba, to
build on the gains for women made during the struggle against Batista.

The Federation of Cuban Women (FMC), a non-government organisation open to all women
over the age of 14 and numbering nearly 4 million, organises at every level of society. The FMC
works on various issues directly affecting women such as access to jobs and domestic violence.
The Cuban constitution guarantees it an “advisory” role in the formulation of government
policy, and the National Assembly of People’s Power tends to adopt most of its proposals. It is
hard to find a comparable situation in any other country.

Partly via the FMC, women led the revolution from its early days, spearheading national
literacy and health campaigns in which tens of thousands of FMC members led other Cubans in
health and literacy brigades to rural areas, helping the rural workers and peasants in their daily
work while teaching them to read and educating them about disease prevention, and
decreasing infant and maternal mortality rates. As a result of the 1961 national campaign, the
Cuban adult literacy rate increased from 75% in 1959 to 96% by the end of 1961. Today, the
literacy rate is 99.8% and Cuba leads the world in the ration of female to male enrolments at all
educational levels, at 121%.

And Cuba now has an outstanding health system which places a high priority on women’s
needs. Women have access to many forms of contraception, and abortion is legal and accessible.
Very few people in Cuba have HIV or AIDS, and less than a quarter of those are women. All
healthcare is free, a remarkable achievement given that the criminal US blockade on Cuba
includes a trade ban, 90% of which encompasses medical supplies and food. The UN Statistics
Division records the infant mortality rate at four per thousand, lower than the US rate of six per
thousand.

Children are educated about sex in Cuba from the elementary level, and encouraged to develop
attitudes about sex that encompass mutual respect, the idea of sex as human expression, and
safer sex. This stands in sharp contrast to the sexist moralism of pre-socialist capitalist relations,
which embraced the sexual double-standard, tended to treat women as sexual objects, and
threw women to the fate of enforced child-rearing or backyard abortions. Divorces are easily
obtainable and usually initiated by women.

The Cuban Revolution also took steps to get women out of prostitution, providing them with
alternative livelihoods. Revolutionary Cuba has heavy penalties for pimping. Prostitution was
nearly eradicated, until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. The USSR was previously
Cuba’s largest trading partner, on which Cuba had enormous reliance as a consequence of the
crippling US economic blockade. With Cuba’s increased reliance on international tourism to
earn foreign currency, the problem of prostitution and sexist advertising to promote tourism re-
emerged.
One response by the National Assembly was the adoption of the FMC’s proposed measures to
reduce sexist advertising. The FMC has also implemented outreach programs to the women
engaged in prostitution, and made other recommendations to the government about adjusting
its legal responses and overseas advertising to tourists. The lasting power of centuries of sexist
socialisation under capitalism also gives the Cuban Revolution ongoing feminist tasks. Men still
fail to take enough responsibility for contraception and don’t avail themselves of the free
vasectomies available to them. It is not only sex tourists to Cuba, but also some Cuban men,
who believe it is acceptable to hire women to deliver them sexual pleasure.

Writing of Cuba’s approach to the misogynist violence it inherited from the capitalist world,
Cuba solidarity activist Donna Goodman explains in the March 2009 Dissident Voice that,
“Crimes of violence against women, especially rape and sexual assault, are severely punished in
Cuba. The Federation of Cuban Women travels the country to find out if there is hidden
violence and to set up mechanisms for reporting and for community intervention.” She notes
that discrimination based on gender, ethnicity or religious preference is outlawed by the Cuban
constitution, and further laws back other measures of gender equality.

Although most Cubans no longer hold the pre-revolutionary attitude that women should stay
at home and not engage in broader society, the assumption that women should assume most
responsibility for domestic tasks is enduring. Some Cubans have been reluctant to elect women
to some of the national leadership bodies because they think their domestic responsibilities
would impede their leadership activity. One response to this problem was the 1975 Family
Code, which set into law equal participation in domestic tasks. Another response has been the
“best candidate” media campaign run by the FMC, aimed at urging voters not to allow
historical expectations to affect their decisions. Cuban feminist leaders recognise the importance
of continuing this work to change ingrained attitudes.

Despite this, Cuba still leads on most feminist measures. As a consequence of decades of taking
women seriously as revolutionary leaders, it has the third-highest proportion globally of
parliamentary seats (in a lower or single house) held by women, at 43%. As of December 2010,
the US rate is 17% and Australia’s is 25%. Women represent 49.5% of all graduates at higher
educational levels and 62% of university students.

In 1956 women made up only 17% of the paid workforce. Today they comprise 46.7%. This is
partly enabled by the FMC which runs free childcare services for children under seven years – a
far cry from Australia’s expensive childcare. And unlike in Australia, women don’t tend to take
the worst-paid jobs – 65.1% of professional and technical staff, and 43% of scientists are women.
They also comprise 51% of Cuba’s doctors. In fact, efforts to get women to study medicine were
so successful that in 1999, when over 70% of medicine graduates were women, Cuba had to
introduce quotas for men!

FEMINISM IN JAPAN
Feminism in Japan began in the late 19th century near the end of the Edo period. There have
been traces of concepts in regards to women's rights that dates back to antiquity. The movement
started to gain momentum after Western thinking was brought into Japan during the Meiji
Restoration in 1868. Japanese feminism differs from Western feminism in the sense that less
emphasis is on individual autonomy.

Prior to the late 19th century, Japanese women were bound by the traditional patriarchal system
where senior male members of the family maintains their authority in the household. After the
reforms brought by Meiji Restoration, the status of women in Japanese society also went
through series of changes. Trafficking in women was restricted, women were allowed to request
divorces, and both boys and girls were required to receive elementary education. Further
changes to the status of women came about in the aftermath of World War II. Women received
the right to vote, and a section of the new constitution drafted in 1946 was dedicated to
guarantee gender equality.

In 1970, in the wake of the anti-Vietnam War movements, a new women's liberation movement
called ūman ribu (woman lib) emerged in Japan from the New Left and radical student
movements in the late 1960s. This movement was in sync with radical feminist movements in
the United States and elsewhere, catalyzing a resurgence of feminist activism through the 1970s
and beyond. The activists forwarded a comprehensive critique of the male-dominated nature of
modern Japan, arguing for a fundamental change of the political-economic system and culture
of the society. What distinguished them from previous feminist movements was their emphasis
on the liberation of sex. They did not aim for equality with men, but rather focused on the fact
that men should also be liberated from the oppressive aspects of a patriarchal and capitalist
system.

In 1979, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women was
adopted by the United Nations General Assembly. The convention was ratified by the Japanese
government in 1985. Despite these changes, Japan received failing marks as late as 1986 in
Humana's World Human Rights Guide.

Formation of the New Woman Association

In 1919, with the help of Ichikawa Fusae and Oku Mumeo, Raicho Hiratsuka created the New
Woman Association: Shin Fujin Kyokai. Their goal was to achieve rights of protection and
inclusion through identifying a female class. The following January, Ichikawa and Hiratsuka
drafted the two demands of the New Woman Association.

Firstly, they wanted to amend the Public Peace Police Law, a revised version of the 1890 Law on
Political Association and Assembly, which banned women from joining any political party or
attending or participating in political events.

Secondly, they wanted protection from husbands and fiancés with venereal diseases. The
Revised Civil Code of 1898 stated that a woman who commits adultery is subject to divorce and
up to two years in prison. However, a woman was unable to divorce her husband if he
committed adultery. Challenging patriarchal society, the New Woman Association wanted
reforms so that women could reject infected husbands or fiancés. They prepared petitions and
any opposition was met by arguing that such measures would enable women to become better
wives and mothers.

The Red Wave Society

The Red Wave Society, Sekirankai, was the first socialist women's association. Yamakawa Kikue
and others organized the association in April 1921. The Red Wave's manifesto condemned
capitalism, arguing that it turned women into slaves and prostitutes. Rural families were forced
to contract their daughters to factories due to financial difficulties. These girls were required to
live in dormitories, unable to leave except to go to work. They worked 12-hour shifts in poor
conditions.

Many caught brown lung, a disease caused by exposure to cotton dust in poorly ventilated
working environments, and other illnesses related to working in textile factories. The state
refused to enact legislation needed to protect women in the factories. There were no on-call
doctors in the dorms and no medical compensation for contracting brown lung or any other
illnesses. The Red Wave Society mainly focused on suffrage and women's rights.

Other groups were formed concentrating on their own demands. Some women pushed for
political rights while others looked to end prostitution. Housewives campaigned to improve
their roles at home. After the devastating 1923 Great Kantō earthquake, Kubushiro Ochimi, a
member of the Women's Reform Society, and many other women, turned to the relief effort.
Socialists like Yamakawa, middle-class Christians and housewives worked together to organize
and provide relief activities.
Women's suffrage
Although women's advocacy has been present in Japan since the nineteenth century, aggressive
women's suffrage in Japan was born during the turbulent interwar period of the 1920s.
Enduring a societal, political, and cultural metamorphosis, Japanese citizens lived in confusion
and frustration as their nation transitioned from a tiny isolated body to a viable world power.
After the Meiji Restoration in 1868, the concept of rights began to take hold in Japan.

Policymakers believed that women's education was imperative to the preservation of the state
because it would prepare girls to be knowledgeable wives and mothers capable of producing
diligent, nationally loyal sons. Although policymakers did not necessarily have the same
motives as women's rights advocates in their call for women's education, the development of
such education opened the door for further advancements for women in Japanese society. Also
occurring at the end of the nineteenth century was the fight for women's protection from some
of the cultural practices that had long subordinated women.

As the topic of women's rights began to gain a larger following, women's advocacy groups
slowly developed and tuned their interests to other issues impacting women in Japan. The
interwar period, which followed the conclusion of World War I, brought about what has
become known as the women's suffrage movement of Japan. Feminists opposed the nation's
provision of civil rights to men exclusively and the government's exclusion of women from all
political participation.

By 1920, the fight for women's political inclusion was at the forefront of the suffrage movement.
In 1921 women were granted the right to attend political meetings by the Japanese Diet
(parliament). The ban on women's involvement in political parties, however, was not
eradicated. Their fight continued to progress and make strides until women were finally
granted the right to vote in 1946.

FEMINISM IN THE UNITED STATES

It refers to the collection of movements and ideologies aimed at defining, establishing, and
defending a state of equal political, economic, cultural, and social rights for women in the
United States. Feminism has had a massive influence on American politics. Feminism in the
United States is often divided chronologically into first-wave, second-wave, third-wave, and
fourth-wave feminism.

First-wave feminism
The first wave of feminism in the United States began with the Seneca Falls Convention, the
first women's rights convention, held at the Wesleyan Chapel in Seneca Falls, New York, on
July 19 and 20, 1848.

This Convention was inspired by the fact that in 1840, when Elizabeth Cady Stanton met
Lucretia Mott at the World Anti-Slavery Convention in London, the conference refused to seat
Mott and other women delegates from America because of their gender.

The women's suffrage movement began with the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention; many of the
activists became politically aware during the abolitionist movement. The movement
reorganized after the Civil War, gaining experienced campaigners, many of whom had worked
for prohibition in the Women's Christian Temperance Union. By the end of the 19th century
only a few western states had granted women full voting rights, though women had made
significant legal victories, gaining rights in areas such as property and child custody.

In 1866, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony formed the American Equal Rights
Association, an organization for white and black women and men dedicated to the goal of
suffrage for all. In 1868 the Fourteenth Amendment was passed, this was the first Amendment
to ever specify the voting population as "male". In 1869 Wyoming became the first territory or
state in America to grant women suffrage.

Second-wave feminism
Second-wave feminism in the United States began in the early 1960s.

A major disappointment of the second-wave feminist movement in the United States was
President Nixon's 1972 veto of the Comprehensive Child Development Bill of 1972.

The main disappointment of the second wave feminist movement in the United States was the
failure to ratify the federal Equal Rights Amendment. It states, "Equality of rights under the law
shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex."

Many historians view the second wave feminist era in America as ending in the early 1980s
with the Feminist Sex Wars, a split within the movement over issues such as sexuality and
pornography. These disputes ushered in the era of third-wave feminism in the early 1990s.

Fourth-wave feminism
Fourth-wave feminism refers to a resurgence of interest in feminism that began around 2012
and is associated with the use of social media. According to feminist scholar Prudence
Chamberlain, the focus of the fourth wave is justice for women and opposition to sexual
harassment and violence against women.

Issues that fourth-wave feminists focus on include street and workplace harassment, campus
sexual assault and rape culture. Scandals involving the harassment, abuse, and murder of
women and girls have galvanized the movement.

Criticisms
Critics of mainstream feminist discourse point to the white-washed historical narrative that
omits and/or minimizes the roles played by women of color within and without the feminist
movement, as well as the differing obstacles faced by women of color.

These historical omissions are particularly evident in accounts on First-Wave feminism which
often ignores the roles played by fundamental activists such as Ida Bell Wells-Barnett. These
criticisms stretch into second- and third-wave feminism, which is dominated by narratives
minimizing the role of women of color while celebrating achievements as a whole through the
gaze of white female leaders. Consequently, by the 1970s and 1980s, African-American women,
such as bell hooks, developed a social consciousness by publicly voicing dissatisfaction with
black women's representation in feminist discourse.

FEMINISM IN THE UNITED KINGDOM

As in other countries, feminism in the United Kingdom seeks to establish political, social, and
economic equality for women. The history of feminism in Britain dates to the very beginnings of
feminism itself, as many of the earliest feminist writers and activists—such as Mary
Wollstonecraft, Barbara Bodichon, and Lydia B.

The advent of the reformist age during the 19th century meant that those invisible minorities or
marginalised majorities were to find a catalyst and a microcosm in such new tendencies of
reform. One of those movements that took advantage of such new spirit was the feminist
movement. The stereotype of the Victorian gentle lady became unacceptable and even
intolerable. The first organised movement for British women's suffrage was the Langham Place
Circle of the 1850s, led by Barbara Bodichon and Bessie Rayner Parkes. They also campaigned
for improved female rights in the law, employment, education, and marriage.
Property owning women and widows had been allowed to vote in some local elections, but that
ended in 1835. The Chartist Movement of 1838 to 1857 was a large-scale demand for suffrage—
however it only gave suffrage to men over 21. In 1851 the Sheffield Female Political Association
was founded and submitted an unsuccessful petition calling for women's suffrage to the House
of Lords.

Upper-class women could exert a little backstage political influence in high society. However, in
divorce cases, rich women lost control of their children.

Ambitious middle-class women faced enormous challenges and the goals of entering suitable
careers, such as nursing, teaching, law and medicine. Physicians kept tightly shut the door to
medicine; there were a few places for woman as lawyers, but none as clerics. White collar
business opportunities outside family-owned shops were few until clerical positions opened in
the 20th century. Florence Nightingale demonstrated the necessity of professional nursing and
warfare, and set up an educational system that tracked women into that field in the second half
of the nineteenth century. Teaching was not quite as easy to break into, but the low salaries
were less of the barrier to the single woman than to the married man. By the late 1860s a
number of schools were preparing women for careers as governesses or teachers. The census
reported in 1851 that 70,000 women in England and Wales were teachers, compared to the
170,000 who comprised three-fourths of all teachers in 1901. The great majority came from
lower middle class origins. The National Union of Women Teachers (NUWT) originated in the
early 20th century inside the male-controlled National Union of Teachers (NUT). It demanded
equal pay with male teachers, and eventually broke away. Oxford and Cambridge minimized
the role of women, allowing small all-female colleges to operate. However the new redbrick
universities and the other major cities were open to women.

By the end of the nineteenth century women had secured equality of status in most spheres –
except of course for the vote and the holding of office.

Before 1839 after divorce rich women lost control of their children as those children would
continue in the family unit with the father, as head of the household, and who continued to be
responsible for them.

Traditionally, poor people used desertion, and (for poor men) even the practice of selling wives
in the market, as a substitute for divorce. In Britain before 1857 wives were under the economic
and legal control of their husbands, and divorce was almost impossible. It required a very
expensive private act of Parliament costing perhaps £200, of the sort only the richest could
possibly afford. It was very difficult to secure divorce on the grounds of adultery, desertion, or
cruelty. The first key legislative victory came with the Matrimonial Causes Act of 1857.

Electoral reform
The United Kingdom's Representation of the People Act 1928 gave near-universal suffrage to
men, and suffrage to women over 30. The Representation of the People Act 1928 extended equal
suffrage to both men and women. It also shifted the socioeconomic makeup of the electorate
towards the working class, favouring the Labour Party, which was more sympathetic to
women's issues. The 1918 election gave Labour the most seats in the house to date. The electoral
reforms also allowed women to run for Parliament. Specifically, the Parliament (Qualification of
Women) Act 1918 gave women over 21 the right to stand for election as an MP.

Social reform
The political change did not immediately change social circumstances. With the economic
recession, women were the most vulnerable sector of the workforce. Some women who held
jobs prior to the war were obliged to forfeit them to returning soldiers, and others were
excessed. With limited franchise, the UK National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies
(NUWSS) pivoted into a new organisation, the National Union of Societies for Equal
Citizenship (NUSEC), which still advocated for equality in franchise, but extended its scope to
examine equality in social and economic areas. Legislative reform was sought for
discriminatory laws (e.g., family law and prostitution) and over the differences between
equality and equity, the accommodations that would allow women to overcome barriers to
fulfillment (known in later years as the "equality vs. difference conundrum”).

The Equality Act 2006 (c 3) is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, a precursor to
the Equality Act 2010, which combines all of the equality enactments within Great Britain and
provides comparable protections across all equality strands. Those explicitly mentioned by the
Equality Act 2006 include gender; disability; age; proposed, commenced or completed gender
reassignment; race; religion or belief and sexual orientation. Among other things, it created a
public duty to promote equality on the ground of gender (The Equality Act 2006, section 84,
inserting section 76A of the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, now found in section 1 of the Equality
Act 2010.)