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Over 100 arrests had been made on the picket line at the Grunwick film processing firm in North London as Socialist Woman went to press. The anti-abortionists have stepped up their campaign to get Beyon's restrictive Bill through Parliament. The occupations at the Weir Maternity Home and Hounslow Hospital in London continue, as does that the Elizabeth Garrett Anderson women's hospital. These are only a few of the Indications of the depth of the present social and economic crisis which is taking its toll amongst women.
It is not an unfamiliar pattern. That much was evident when over 3,500 women met in Paris at the end of May. Coachloads of women from Barcelons, Madrid, Rome, and many other major European cities discussed for three days how they were fighting back against these attacks. We discussed our successes and The second national conference of the drew lessons from our errors. And everyone went away more committed to pursuing and strengthening international links in the women's movement.
Another point which came across in Paris was the need for us to go back to many of the fundamental questions relating to women's oppression. If we want to ward off the present attacks of the ruling class — in which social democracy and the Communist Parties remain complicit - we need to be clear about where we are going. We have to re-discover our traditions as socialist feminists. And we have to re-examine the very roots of women's oppression so that we can map out a clear strategy. This is the kind of clarity which can lay the basis for taking the fight beyond one simply for women's rights - to that of women's This issue of Socialist Woman reflects violates some age-old and God-given the need to have clarity on fundamental questions - theories of women's oppression, the role of the autonomous women's movement, its relationship to the revolutionary organisation, and the need to retain the autonomy of the women's movement even after the seizure of state power by the working class as a whole. Many more general questions relating to revolutionary strategy have been posed in the debate around positive legislation for women's abortion rights. One of the papers produced on this issue for the conference of the National Abortion Campaign is reprinted below.
If any of these articles provoke you — take your pen to paper and join in the debate in the columns of Socialist Woman!
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