The following article is a monthly editorial by Nos Révolutions, independent activist media based in Paris, France. As per custom, its contributors convened early last December, shortly after the 25 November mobilisation against gender-based violence, in order to discuss the current state of feminist struggles and the challenges that lie ahead. Their debates recognised the reality that feminists are currently experiencing a period of decline. Despite significant ideological victories in recent decades, these struggles have not had as much sway on the political agenda since the COVID-19 crisis, as evidenced by the dwindling participation in 8 March demonstrations worldwide.
For instance, in France, between the #MeToo movement and the onset of the pandemic, figures in the film industry such as Adèle Haenel voiced their opposition to the César Awards honouring a director accused of rape. Her radical and feminist stance against the ruling class naturally led her to rally alongside the working class and support their struggles. She even opted to leave the film industry, politicising this decision by engaging in workers’ mobilisations, such as the one against Emmanuel Macron’s move to raise the pension age in 2023. This radical choice underscores the incompatibility of a mainstream feminist agenda with a male-dominated industry controlled by capitalists. Today, while violence against women in the film industry is frequently denounced, it remains largely confined to industry circles, and fails to reach the working classes.
When the power of the bourgeoisie becomes overwhelming, the weight of its policies extinguishes the embers of progressive mobilisation and stifles the scope of popular demands. Hence, the urgent need for feminists to spearhead a revolutionary struggle.
Foreword by Anaïs Fley, coordinator of transform! europe’s working group on the radical, extreme and populist right and member of Nos Revolutions.
This past 25 November, thousands of women demonstrated across France upon the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. For almost ten years now, countless women have joined the struggle in order to express their anger and — notably with the #MeToo movement — to denounce the injustices which they had been suffering in silence.
In the wake of the most recent waves of feminism, these women are centring their struggles on a legal agenda (winning equal rights), but also an anthropological one (building a humanity without gender hierarchies) and an economic one (the fight for the remuneration and recognition of women’s work). With #MeToo, the feminist movement saw a vast strengthening and a wider circulation of its principles and slogans, in particular for the control and integrity of women’s bodies, as well as for ending the silence on sexist and sexual violence.
We have thus seen the feminist movement’s power growing insofar as:
1) Its international dimension has been extended and consolidated.
2) It has demonstrated its ability to combine with broader popular protests in several countries around the world.
3) The latest feminist wave has achieved an unprecedented combination of mass scale and radicalism.
Although the movement has not yet achieved a definitive victory, the current period nonetheless represents undeniable progress for women’s rights. Until 1975, women could go to prison for having an abortion or facilitating one. Until 1980, complaints of rape were almost non-existent and these crimes were not even recognised as such. Up till 1997, over 95 percent of representative assemblies in France were made up of men.
A few years ago, we didn’t even have accurate terms to denounce the murders committed by men against women: now the word ‘femicide’ has made its way into public debate. It wasn’t so long ago that the history of the women’s movement was forgotten, both in practice and in scholarly and academic production… So, some essential steps have been taken in advancing the feminist agenda. From one victory to the next, the old world has continued to crumble.
Like all recent social movements, this one fits into a particular international context: the authoritarian turn of Western democracies following the 2008 economic crisis. This situation of general crisis has helped to anchor the French feminist movement in the social left, through a general political commitment resolutely opposed to successive governments.
On the one hand, the women at the head of the movement have taken up the fight against prominent liberal leaders (Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Denis Baupin, Gérald Darmanin, etc.). By denouncing individuals’ deeds, they have created a shared consciousness that we are living in a political and economic system that allows impunity for the powerful. On the other hand, they have been involved in all the social movements (against the pension reform, against the use of constitutional article 49.3, against the ‘separatism’ law and ‘global security law’, in struggles against police violence, etc.). They have pointed out the consequences of these political attacks for women — and insisted on the need for the social movement to act in solidarity.
As feminism has made its presence felt in every sphere of existence, extending its intervention to issues that were not previously seen as feminist (pensions, the content of school curricula, the organisation of power, violence, etc.), it has helped to extend politics to all areas of life. It hence pursued the same objective as the radical left: an all-encompassing transformation of the ways in which decisions are made, products are produced, and society is formed.
It is worth noting that new strategic questions have been posed in this new wave of feminism, particularly in relation to other protest movements. These range from the intersectionality of struggles to the appropriateness (or not) of the household wage, the existence (or not) of a ‘class’ of women, etc. While these questions are important, particularly for Marxists, the position being expressed here can hardly claim to resolve them all. Instead, we propose to explore them in future texts, in order to grant them the importance they deserve.
Obstacles, divisions and deviations
The new feminist wave reached its peak with the spectacular turnout at the 8 March 2020 demonstration. However, this new context also posed hurdles of its own, and this level of mobilisation has not been reached since. While the feminist movement is still mass in scale and constant in its demands, its organisations, too, have been seriously weakened by the COVID period. More generally, this context, and in particular the series of lockdowns, disrupted all social relations and reinforced isolation, resignation and withdrawal into the family unit.
Moreover, the opponents of feminism are in battle array, and considerable resources are being laid out to defend patriarchal capitalism. Those who see themselves as losing out from the advance of feminist struggles (the masculinists and reactionaries) have been mobilising and working to set us back for years already. What is new, however, is the emergence of new currents which, having observed the popularity of feminist demands and the organic link between the social left and the feminist movement, are now themselves using the arguments of gender equality, threatening to fracture the common interests of the working classes and/or to derail the feminist movement.
In recent times, the bourgeoisie has been forced to integrate into its discourse the new feminist watchwords which enjoy majority social support, at the same time as resisting their implementation. We see this in the example of Emmanuel Macron’s hollow slogans against sexual violence in his 2017 general election campaign. These same watchwords can also be wielded in support of reactionary theories, such as when Éric Zemmour claims that the aim of the fight against immigration is to protect women. They can also be used to defend government offensives.
On 11 November, for example, a column in the pages of newspaper Libération demanded recognition of the mass femicide in Israel on 7 October. Among the signatories were Anne Hidalgo, Olivia Cattan and Anne-Gabrielle Heilbronner — all historic supporters of the Israeli government. While the atrocities committed by Hamas against Israeli women are despicable and must be firmly opposed, the stated feminist goal of this letter raises questions. The signatories used the pretext of feminism to support the Israeli government, at the very moment when this same government was massacring thousands of people in Gaza, bombing and killing tens of thousands of Palestinians, and forcibly displacing hundreds of thousands of others. This selective indignation exploits women victims of violence to serve another objective.
Another example: following the murder of Nahel by a policeman, some parts of the feminist movement expressed their embarrassment at the images of the urban uprisings, indeed in surprising terms. In their view, the cause of the urban uprisings was the masculinity and violence of men from working-class neighbourhoods. The idea was put forward that the ‘virilist’ dimension of the riots should be properly grasped, because it is men who kill men. So on this reading, the root of the urban uprisings lay not the murder of a young teenager by the police, racism, police violence or the abandonment of working-class neighbourhoods, but rather the masculinity of young men from working-class backgrounds. On a broader level, women did also play an essential role, providing logistical support as well as peacemaking and dialogue, at the time of the urban uprisings. This mobilisation was completely overshadowed within the social movement and obscured by the media.
Such series of occurrences, if not actually unprecedented, do threaten the feminist movement with crisis. In a political context of generalised crisis in which revolutionary issues are on the agenda, there can be no question of confining feminism to the feminine. Its strength lies in transforming all aspects of life, including men’s lives, and in fighting against all injustices, whether done against women or anyone else.
The challenges facing the international feminist movement
1. Feminism cannot be a vehicle for perpetuating the national and global economic order
The Western feminist movement, which today is essentially structured around the necessary fight against sexual violence, cannot ignore the restructuring of the global economy, which is responsible not only for the overall spread of poverty and wars throughout the world, but also for the emergence of a new global balance (or imbalance) that accentuates the divisions between women everywhere on the planet. This new era seems to have brought many ordinary working men and women closer to the archaic condition of domestic servants. These are the women and men who feed us, clean our streets and offices, deliver our food, look after our children, look after our parents, produce our clothes… In the capitalist system, this so-called ‘reproductive’ work — work that enables the reproduction of human beings and their labour power (the home, food, rest, cleaning, care…) — has historically been assigned to women and forms the material basis of their domination.
Today, many women entering the labour market find themselves partly freed from this work and emancipated from domestic labour. Yet this latter must indeed continue to be performed if society is to function. Two solutions are being put forward by reactionary forces: on the one hand, some continue to demand that women perform work in the home free of charge. On the other, women and men are assigned to this work in the form of salaried (or Uberised) employment, indeed under conditions that have worsened considerably. In particular, the sectors concerned make heavy use of immigrant labour. In both cases, they use sexist and racist rhetoric to justify assigning women and/or immigrants to reproductive work.
However, if our political camp does truly intend to liberate women, it must find ways to put an end to the international division of labour that forces women and men in the countries of the South to carry out an increasing proportion of the reproductive work required in the countries of the North. To do this, we put forward the idea that reproductive work must acquire a new status in society. This means putting an end to domesticity and transforming the way we produce and organise our work in order to create the institutions needed, in particular, to look after children and the elderly with dignity. This work must be divided equally between men and women.
2. Feminism is part of the class struggle, not part of its supposed reconciliation.
Despite its leaders’ proclamations the state is no ally of the feminist movement. Far from being neutral, it reflects the power struggles between the different social classes in the country, between those who hold economic and political power and those who do not. This is one of the reasons why, even if we win the cultural war over violence, there is no reduction in the number of feminicides, rapes, sexual assaults, etc. In other words, without winning political power, cultural battles are pointless. So, beyond the fight against male violence, the feminist struggle is a solid basis for the fight against all the violence produced by the system of capitalist exploitation. It is about class struggle, not their sham reconciliation.
Faced with the various ways in which women’s rights are exploited by the far right, the right and sometimes part of the left, it is imperative to assert a position of clear solidarity with the struggles against the government, colonialism, imperialism and racism. Indeed, we need to deny reactionary forces any possibility of claiming to be feminists. Like all revolutionaries, feminists have no homeland and fight against the bosses; moreover, they know better than anyone else that the ‘homeland’, the ‘boss’ and ‘patriarch’ [‘patrie, patron, patriarche’] stem from the same class society.
3. Forging feminism on resolutely internationalist and anti-imperialist foundations
Women are involved in all international struggles. A few weeks ago in Bangladesh, thousands of women textile workers stopped work and took to the streets to protest against their working conditions and demand wage rises. Textile workers’ unions have also sprung up across Asia, for example the Garment Labour Union (GLU) in India, which has an all-female executive committee.
With mining, oil, gas and agro-industrial extractivist projects spreading on every continent, many women are organising to put a stop to them. Why are they doing this? Because once extractive industries have penetrated territories, they destroy local economies, break down traditional forms of social reproduction and harshen the existing sexual division of labour between women and men.
From the Ecuadorian Amazon, to mining in Cajamarca in Peru, to the soya route in Argentina, to Kenya’s green belt, to the Nigerian Delta… myriad women have one shared reality in common, and they are all taking up the fight against powerful multinationals. Their massive presence and leading role in defending their territories reveal the impact that extractive activities have on their everyday lives.
These women’s mobilisations are at the heart of global social transformation and can be supported more intensively by women and social movements around the world. This work is within our reach, not least because the women’s liberation movement has acquired an international dimension, through the formation of feminist groups and movements in all parts of the world that have created feminist solidarity networks. The active relationship between women in different countries of the world who, together and based on their own realities, are getting organised in the struggle to build a new world through common slogans, already exists and can be intensified.
The French feminist movement has itself created various links worldwide: with Latin America and the fight against femicide (“Ni una menos”) and, more broadly, the fight against sexual violence. It has drawn inspiration from the English-speaking countries in the fight against sexual violence, transforming #MeToo into Nous toutes (“All of Us”). It maintains links with European countries such as Spain and Poland in the fight for abortion rights. Finally, it links up with Arab countries in the fight for the right to choose (the right not to wear a veil, as well as the right to wear one, with the same demand for choice, in France and everywhere else).
The international nature of the slogans, practices (feminist collages, use of hashtags) and songs (the revival of the song “Le violeur, c’est toi” (“The rapist is you”), which has become a global feminist anthem) is also made possible by the rise of online feminism. This shows the extent to which social networks can raise awareness on a global scale and mobilise millions of people across the planet.
Uniting the social movement
Finally, we are confronted with the fact that the social movement itself is not united, and is riven by various fractures and different strategies. The overall balance of power between progressive and reactionary forces has worsened considerably, and political organisations are seeing their forces weaken. Yet, everywhere we look, we see the rise of the ecologist, anti-racist and feminist movements, and at the same time the widespread awareness among the masses of the depletion of resources, the need to put an end to imperialist wars, and the fight against sexist and sexual violence and police and racist violence. All these injustices are ever more intolerable for the layers in struggle, because this web of oppression facilitates and justifies class exploitation in France.
These movements express the aspiration for a new, non-capitalist society. Yet these forces remain politically disorientated, scattered for want of a common political solution. This difficulty feeds into people stepping back from the feminist movement, in particular in the form of “activist burn-out”. To win, the revolutionary movement must be able to rely on the overwhelming majority of the masses in movement. We believe that it is now possible to group these numerous political and social forces around common slogans, despite the division of the political organisations.
Finally, it is through action that the masses must convince themselves and convince others that they are fighting better than others, that they see things clearly and that they are determined to win. This is what has enabled feminist slogans and demands to make real headway in political and trade union struggles, throughout France and across the world.
First published in Nos Révolutions, Translated by David Broder.
Image: March against gender-based and sexual violence, 23 November 2019, by Jeanne Menjoulet (CC BY 2.0)
