Battle for Equality Still Dominates Women's Movement

As 45,000 women gathered in Berlin on March 19, 1911 for the first International Women’s Day and waved red flags emblazoned with the words "equal rights", prudent German citizens could hardly believe their eyes.

Undaunted by the criticism from the conservative press of the time, initiator of the protest and German socialist, Clara Zetkin -- inspired by an American commemoration of working women in 1908 -- went ahead with her clarion call for women to get equal pay and have more of a say in the political process.

It was picked up by thousands of women in Denmark, Austria, Sweden, and Switzerland as a wave of protests and strikes followed. In 1917, a protest in Russia changed the face of the women's movement. Thousands of Russian women left their homes and factories to protest against food shortages, high prices, the world war and the increased suffering they had to endure.

After 1917, International Women’s Day secured its place on March 8 on socialist calendars and soon came to be uniformly celebrated around the world. With the resurgence of feminism in the late 1960s came a renewed interest in International Women’s Day and it soon spread to countries far beyond European borders.

Demands of women's movement remain unchanged

Zetkin’s efforts bore fruit in Germany when in 1918, women’s right to vote was formally recognized and since 1949, the German constitution says that "men and women are equal".

But more than 50 years after the latter event, the women’s struggle seems to be grappling with the same issues that it began with. The basic demands of the movement have remained the same --equal pay for equal work, equal education and training opportunities, social security for women, equal political rights and peace.

German Minister for Women and Family Affairs, Renate Schmidt said in a recent interview with the press agency, Dpa that women in Germany had still not achieved equal rights despite fighting for them for more than 90 years. "We still have a lot of work ahead of us: women earn significantly less than men, and only 11 percent of women are in leading positions. Much still needs to be done about that," she said.

Legislation missing the main point?

Politicians from all parties have realized the importance of addressing women’s issues such as maternity leave, child welfare, legal abortion rights, childcare, women’s ministries and prosecuting marital rape. Women’s quotas have been implemented: almost 31 percent of German parliament members are women and at some universities in the country, women exceed men in terms of numbers.

But despite the progress, women say that all the legislation governing equality and measures to protect women lack one crucial thing: the full social and financial recognition of their actual services.

Women without formal training are still paid less than their untrained male counterparts, highly-qualified women are still excluded from top posts, women still find it difficult to harmonize a career and home and they still make for two thirds of unpaid work in the country -- whether it’s in child care, at home or voluntary work.

Germany makes it tough for mothers to work

The new minister for Women’s Affairs in the German state of Lower Saxony, Ursula von der Leyen, mother of seven, said that Germany lagged far behind on an international scale when it comes to enabling women to manage both a home and a career. She also said that Germany "needs to catch up when it comes to child-care."

The minister said that Germany needed full-day schools and more flexible opening times for kindergartens and primary schools. Today spots in crèches and day nurseries in Germany are available for just about 3,8 percent of children aged between 0-3.

She called for an end to the discrimination of house wives and mothers and at the same time said that society should stop portraying working mothers with children as "evil stepmothers".

Birthrates higher when mothers can work

The European Union Commissioner for Employment and Social Affairs, Anna Diamantopoulou echoes the sentiment. She told DW-RADIO that birth rates are higher in countries such as France which make it easier for mothers to pursue a career.

The average birth rate in France is 2 children per woman, whereas in Germany it’s 1.2 percent per woman and the trend is falling. "We must help employers’ to allow their woman employees to harmonize job and home under the present conditions," she said. Diamantopoulou announced that she would strictly monitor the implementation of EU regulations governing maternity leave and allowing parents time with their children.

Much done but long way to go

At the same time Diamantopoulou stresses that much has been achieved in Europe as far as women taking on more jobs goes.

"Millions of new jobs have been created on the European level in the last 12 years, 80 percent of them have gone to women. It’s the first time that so many women in Europe have found a job in so short a time. But that doesn’t mean we’re satisfied. Statistics and facts show that there are still huge problems in all EU member states," she said.

Indeed the latest report about the European labor market leaves no illusions about the status of women. On an average, women earn less than their male colleagues. The differences are relatively small in public services -- 16 percent, while in the private sector the gap rises to 24 percent.

In highly skilled jobs the difference is a sharp 28 percent, while the widest rift is most evident when it comes to leading positions -- here men earn 34 percent more than women in the same posts, if women can get these jobs at all.

Diamantopoulou summarized the situation clearly when she said, "as long as gender stereotypes and traditional expectations dictate which profession a woman takes up or what subject she studies, as long as the social infrastructure in most member states is unsatisfactory, we cannot speak of equal chances."