Feminist Movement - a Global Struggle

Feminist Movement - a Global Struggle

An Essay on the Feminist Movement
Julie A. Robinson
SOC 101
Allan Mooney

November 29, 2008

The Feminist Movement – A Global Struggle
In recent decades, feminists in the United States and around the world have created a global network to push for gender equality, often working through international organizations such as the United Nations (UN) or the independent nongovernmental organizations (NGO’s). The UN formed its Commission on the Status of Women in 1946 to monitor the treatment of women and promote women’s rights in all nations (United Nations, 2001).
Back in the 1800’s, in the United States, feminist activities were stirring in order to give women the right to vote. It wasn’t until 1920 that the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution – the Women’s Suffrage Amendment - was passed. There were women that lost their lives to the fight for women to have the right to vote. Women, as human beings, believed that they should have the same rights as men.
The feminist movement has not been limited to the United States or even to Western democracies. The democratic, egalitarian, and individualist ideologies that emerged in Europe and the United States in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries have been influential in may parts of the world. Many nations have used their own religious beliefs and traditions, combined with ideas for elsewhere, to justify gender equality. The Arab world, for example, was certainly influenced by European belief and example in the 1800’s and early 1900’s (Barakat, 1993; Hourani, 1991).
Gender inequality is more widely recognized as unacceptable today than in the past. One of the reasons for this change has been the efforts made by women and men around the world to draw attention to the inequalities and to change the social practices that support them (Sullivan, 2007).
Billie Jean King is known as a visionary, innovator, and a champion for social change and equality. In Doha, Qatar - The United Nations...

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