Garda Ghista
World Prout Assembly
May 2006

In "Prospects for Renewed Feminist Activism in the Heartland: A Study of Daytonian Women's Politics," authors Anne Runyan and Mary Wenning conduct a study of women's political perspectives, participation and activism in Montgomery County, Ohio (USA), focusing particularly on Dayton, Ohio. The study is based on a survey carried out by the Women's Research Network at Wright State University. The research showed that there has been a substantial decline in activism and radicalism in Dayton, a town referred to as the "heartland of America." Instead, there has been increased racism, class divisions and the rise of the New Right. The authors posit that the results of the Dayton study have implications for the status of women's activism at the national level.

Dayton has a population of 166,000. The Miami River bisects the city, with the poor and working class blacks primarily on the west side of the river and the poor and working-class white Appalachians on the east side. The city has decreased in population since the seventies. Runyan and Wenning refer to Judith Ezekiel's book, Feminism in the Heartland (2002), wherein she writes that women in Dayton in the 1970s and 1980s were focused solely on making life better for Dayton women. The founders of the women's movement in the 1960s and early 1970s were radicals looking for women's liberation. They wanted equity with men along with profound social change that would see the end of sexism, racism, poverty and domestic violence. They wanted "participatory democracy" instead of the extant demeaning authority and hierarchy.

Runyan and Wenning write that the women's movement did not start in the university. It began in the community, where the women founded the Dayton Women's Liberation (DWL) organization. Black women did not participate, because the DWL members respected black separatist ideology, and felt racism would not be removed until white women confronted their own white privilege. To highlight their demands, the DWL staged a one-day conference at Wright State University with the theme, "The Needs of Women in the Miami Valley." The conference brought some recognition of the driving force behind the demand for new and better services for women. But it did not attract new funding or fame to DWL. Rather, DWL became marginalized as more prominent women in the society took up women's issues. The DWL closed down in 1980. Thereafter new women's organizations took birth, such as the Dayton Working Women (DWW), whose goal is to support working-class women's rights, along with Freedom of Choice (FOC), which supports reproductive rights and abortion rights. DWW and FOC closed down by the end of the 1980s. In other words, feminism got mainstreamed, and in that process lost its dynamism, its radicalism. It lost its one-pointed focus on fighting for oppressed, suffering women, and instead focused on abortion rights and working women's rights. There is no mention of the critical issue of domestic violence, where women face perhaps the greatest oppression. There was some change, as Runyan and Wenning write, in that what was fought for in the seventies is today a given for women. Women in Dayton continue to alleviate women's poverty and confront anti-choice demonstrators. But most of their time now is taking up in resisting the onslaughts of the New Right, or shall we say, the extreme right wing, as the New Right seeks to take women back into the 18th century. As an example, the White House Office for Women's Initiatives and Outreach was disbanded almost immediately after Bush took office. The President's Interagency Council on Women, established in anticipation of the Fourth World Conference on Women, was likewise disbanded. These actions by Bush do not come in the mainstream newspapers, hence the common people, and the women of America, have no idea what Bush has done to the status of women. Runyan and Wenning quote the National Council of Research on Women (NCRW) as saying that there is a "disturbing pattern of decisions by federal agencies to close down, delay, alter, or spin data about what is happening to American women." Not only have executive-level women's policy bodies been shut down but also complete misinformation has been disseminated on issues such as women's reproductive and sexual health via agencies like the Health and Human Services, the Centers for Disease Control, and the Food and Drug Administration. Vital information on women?s economic status is withheld by the Department of Labor, along with reports on discrimination against battered women by the Department of Justice. In addition, the Census Bureau cites the present wage gap between men and women (76 cents for women to every dollar for men) as a sign of great progress. Another most glaring example of the blatant chauvinism and sexism of the present Bush regime is evident by its refusal to ratify the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. As at the national level, so also at the local level, women's policy bodies are being dissolved by Republican state governors. Hence, at both the federal and state level, support for women's issues and women's research is vanishing. Neoconservatives consider women's issues unimportant.

The survey conducted by the WRN contained a core set of questions in eight areas: economics, health, education, housing, reproduction, political participation, crime and demographics. Runyan and Wenning's research focused on two aspects: political ideology and participation, which includes organizational membership, voting behavior, party affiliation, and feminist identification. Women contacted were additionally asked which of the seven areas were the most important to them. Health care came in first place followed by education, employment and crime (including domestic violence). Their results tallied with a national survey conducted by the National Council for Research on Women (NCRW), which found the top issues for women nationally to be health, employment and violence against women in that order.

While women's employment is high in Montgomery County, most of the women work in low-paying service and retail positions. On a positive note, the authors found that feminist consciousness markedly increased during the period 1970-1990. Far more women expected and wanted women's equality. About 30 percent of women surveyed were classified as non-feminists, defined as lacking feminist consciousness, compared to 63 percent in this category in the year 1972.

Another fact revealed in the study was that with more education, women became more conservative. With high school education or less, women tended to be Democrats or without party affiliation. However, 42.8 percent of women with at least some college education were affiliated to the Republican party. One wonders here, does one need to be poor in order to be radical? Does life become too comfortable after a university education and resulting good job and middle-class income? Does it cause women to forget their impoverished sisters? Today, based on their education, white women are evenly divided between the Republican and Democratic parties while non-white women tend to be Democratic. Most women see themselves as moderates and want others to see them thus. Again the question arises: if all women wish to be moderates, who is going to fight for the most oppressed, the poorest of the poor, who invariably are women? Many of these so-called moderates simultaneously claim to be feminists. In addition, they hold very conservative views on women's issues. The word "feminism" became fuzzy and blurred. It no longer means something radical. It no longer represents the desire to bring revolutionary, positive change in the lives and status of women. Today the word "feminism" can mean anything. The survey results indicated that greater religiosity, "greater education, liberal political thinking and feminist identification did not translate into significantly higher levels of political action" among the women. In contrast, non-white religious women tended to be more politically engaged.

In the 1970s there was a strong correlation between religiosity, feminist identification and progressive struggles for social justice. However, today this correlation is gone. Traditionally religious women generally no longer relate to activism. The radicalism of the 1970s where women fiercely demanded equality, better jobs, and an end to domestic violence was smothered. It got "absorbed, professionalized, and thus depoliticized." (Sealander and Smith 1989). Seventy three percent of survey respondents did not belong to any women's organization. Only one fourth of the self-identified feminists in the study said they belong to organizations. Of these, less than 20 percent belonged to a women's organization.

Despite this apparent apathy towards political radicalism and engagement towards solving women's problems, nearly all the women who took part in the study reported that they are "concerned" with women?s issues. The number one concern was health care. Is it not a natural choice, given the fact that America is a country that does not even provide health care as a given to all its citizens? Employment, education, housing and crime were also important issues of concern. While one fourth of the women had experienced domestic and sexual assault at some point, it was not the highest concern for women overall.

At present women take action primarily by (1) voting, (2) donating money to a relevant organization, (3) volunteering to work for such an organization, and (4) writing letters of concern to government officials and politicians. The women who were not active, on being queried why, said: (1) they have no interest, (2) they have no time, (3) they have no money, (4) their health is too bad, or (5) they have no confidence to get politically engaged.

In Runyan and Wenning's study there was a direct correlation between religiosity, education and political activism. Women with higher education coupled with church membership tend to be volunteers, will speak to government officials, donate clothing to battered women, protest through teaching, or get engaged in actively learning about women's issues. Women who are already religiously engaged tend to be more politically engaged because they have acquired valuable civic skills through their church work. Their main activity is volunteerism and donating money to political causes.

Runyan and Wenning conclude that the radical feminist activism of the 1970s is indeed gone in Dayton, Ohio. The women are more educated and greater numbers are now in the work force. However, few belong to organizations. Reasons given are no time, financial worries, health issues, apathy, and a feeling of alienation from women's causes. Overall, Dayton women today feel that their actions, their voice, cannot make a difference in the community. The radical vision of working for major social transformation is gone. It is replaced by "liberal professionalism, continued race and class divisions, reversion to single-issue politics, and an aging population of women." Women today seem to be "bowling alone" as compared to working and organizing together. Ezekiel speculates that perhaps with population growth the women's movement has become too vast to be contained in one single structure. Membership in organizations like NOW tend to be merely "checkbook" memberships.

Bickford and Reynolds, in their related article "Activism and Service-Learning: Reframing Volunteerism as Acts of Dissent," point out that women today are happy to volunteer and do service work - community service and internships with non-profits. But, they have no interest to extend that service into the realm of activism - asking why things are the way they are and then taking a stand, resisting oppressive powers in the community. Yet, as Paulo Freire says, getting an education is more than about studying followed by service. It is about a social contract. In the words of Dr. Ron Daniels, it means that we should get ourselves politically engaged. It is our obligation. We need to get students to ask the harder questions: not just "How can we help these people"? but "Why are conditions this way"? And the next question must be: What can we do to change these conditions for the better? An important distinction Bickford and Reynolds make between activism and service is that in doing service, there is a difference between server and the person served. In activism, there is no difference. There is connection. We are all in this together. In service, people may ask, "Why is she poor?" But in activism, people will ask, "What causes poverty?" Then, instead of serving, or in addition to serving, people can work collectively towards changing the defective (we can also say criminal!) economic structure that creates poverty.

Without hard activism, radical activism, how will the lot of women improve in America? How will women get the guarantee of health care? How will they be guaranteed jobs and a living wage? And how will they be guaranteed safety from violent husbands and ex-husbands? Why do women no longer feel that deep concern, that passion, to change everything for themselves, to better their lot? Are they too busy being drugged by television? Have we become such a self-centered, selfish society that today it is only about individual women getting ahead rather than the collective body of women? Do we have a handful of wealthy women running for political office while millions of others struggle in poverty or without even the right to health care? Philosopher and educator Shrii Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar said:

"There are many who think that a few women who are made ministers or members of parliament [or Congress] will serve as the shining examples of equal rights and feminine progress. But is this a correct outlook? A proper educational system is the only way to expedite progress. A woman of any country who becomes a minister or an ambassador is no index to the real status of the women of that country. To elevate women?s dignity in society is neither so easy nor so cheap."

Is it the rise of the political New Right that presents such a formidable barrier to women seeking even basic human rights? It would appear that feminism and women's organizations have been shorn of all real activism - their previous glorious platform of fighting racism, poverty, violence, war and capitalist imperialism.

We need to educate women on their fundamental rights, and then encourage them to fight for the rights of other oppressed peoples, such as victims of sexual assault, domestic violence and American wars. Working collectively, women can change this country. They can change the world. Women can become the leaders of the world. But, we have to believe in ourselves and our own potentials and capacities. Women must above all seek education; i.e., formal education in universities, and, equally important, informal education called consciousness-raising. We need to connect academics with grassroots organizations both at local, national and global levels. Consciousness-raising means, meeting in small groups and talking, engaging in dialogue. Women need to sit down together in a living room, or in a restaurant, and learn from each other; find out through dialogue if they are oppressed, how they are oppressed, and why. Once they understand this much, they can collectively brainstorm and work to end that economic, social or cultural oppression. Once women get realization of their oppression, many will be motivated to fight for change, particularly when they see that they are not alone. It is debatable to this author how important it is to talk about feminism and its myriad meanings and definitions. What seems much more tangible would be for women to collectively talk about oppressive aspects of their lives, "uncovering and analyzing structures of oppression," because realization will lead to action. It will lead to fight. Women can learn how poverty breeds exclusion. They can learn how being single - divorced, widowed or never married - also leads to exclusion. How being old leads to exclusion. Or how being an immigrant, a minority, also leads to exclusion. The goal here is to break down these barriers of social and cultural exclusion built up by society, until people begin to function as one collective body, one group of pilgrims moving along the same path towards their desideratum. Let women be the vanguard of this revolution.

Notes

1 Anne Sisson Runyan and Mary V. Wenning, ?Prospects for Renewed Feminist Activism in the Heartland: A Study of Daytonian Women?s Politics,? NWSA Journal 16.3 (2004) 180-214.

2 Dr. Anne Sisson Runyan is director and associate professor of the Center for Women?s Studies at the University of Cincinnati. Her books include Global Gender Issues and Gender and Global Restructuring: Sightings, Sites and Resistances.

3 Dr. Mary V. Wenning is campus director of the American Humanics Program and assistant professor in Urban Affairs and Geography at Wright State University.

4 National Council for Research on Women 2004,2.

5 Anne Sisson Runyan and Mary V. Wenning, p. 18.

6 Anne Sisson Runyan and Mary V. Wenning, p. 19.

7 The term ?bowling alone? is used by Robert Putnam in his book Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (2002).

8 Donna M. Bickford and Nedra Reynolds, ?Activism and Service-Learning: Reframing Volunteerism as Acts of Dissent,? Pedagogy 2.2 (2002) 229-252. Duke University Press.

9 Donn M. Bickford and Nedra Reynolds, p. 2.

10 Donna M. Bickford and Nedra Reynolds, p. 7.
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Garda Ghista is a freelance journalist, author of The Gujarat Genocide: A Case Study in Fundamentalist Cleansing, and Founding President of the World Prout Assembly. She can be reached at editor@worldproutassembly.org.