News | Inequality / Social Struggles - Gender Relations - Labour / Unions - International / Transnational - Europe - Western Europe - Eastern Europe - Southeastern Europe - Europe for the many - 30 Jahre Transformation in Osteuropa - Global Solidarity - Feminism When the Belt Can’t Get Any Tighter

Mapping the impacts of austerity on women’s lives across Europe.

Feminist strike in Madrid, March 8 2018
Feminist strike in Madrid, March 8 2018, Foto: Álvaro Minguito

„Without us, the world stops working“ – This was the slogan under which millions of Spanish women launched a general strike on 8 March 2018. The strike was more than just a strike, however, giving women the opportunity to discuss different related topics and engage in processes of self-organization around questions like work, care, and consumption.

No other left-wing social movement has protested and organized against patriarchal structures on a global scale as successfully as the feminist movement in recent years. The reasons behind this dynamic are diverse and vary from country to country, but nevertheless exhibit a certain European commonality.

Beginning with the 2007 financial crisis which later expanded into the euro crisis, many countries enacted harsh austerity measures. In Southern Europe and Ireland, this austerity was largely the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. In Eastern Europe, on the other hand, it was the pressure to succeed placed on the EU new member states and their desire to gain rapid integration into the European economic market which compelled respective governments to accept tight budgets.

Accession candidates such as Serbia and neighbouring states like Ukraine subjugated themselves in anticipatory obedience to the EU and its demands, in order to avoid endangering progress towards membership and further rapprochement.

Whatever the individual case may be – the mantra of saving money for the sake of balanced budgets, improved competitiveness and debt avoidance has devastating consequences on women’s working and living conditions as well as gender relations more generally. The national studies on the effects of austerity on women commissioned by the Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung are devoted to exploring these developments in more detail.

Under the title „Austerity, Gender Inequality and Feminism after the Crisis“, the authors not only evaluated data on women’s levels of employment and income, but looked more closely at how cost cutting measures have directly affected equality, as well as rule changes and new regulations in the same spirit.

How do savings policies affect gender roles in the family? Who takes responsibility for raising and caring for both young and old when the state ceases to provide support? What does it mean when gender equality commissioners and the support programs tied to them have their funding cut? Where do women go when there are no crisis centres available for victims of domestic violence? Who will look after unwanted children if abortion is ruled illegal?

The studies depict a topography of what effects the European austerity diktat has had on gender relations, and formulate demands for a left-wing feminist politics rooted in social justice and gender equality.

In addition to a German study, further studies are available in English from Greece, Spain, Ireland, Ukraine. Studies on Croatia, Russia, Poland and Lithuania will follow shortly.

When the Belt Can't Get Any Tighter

Mapping the impacts of austerity on women’s lives across Europe  - a search for traces across the countries of the European continent. A presentation of the studies is accompanied by interviews with the respective authors. 

Feminist Respsonses to Austerity in Spain - Interview with Inés Campillo Poza

Duration

7:43

Details
Inés Campillo Poza talks about the impacts of austerity measures implemented by the Spanish state on women and highlights how the feminist movement responded.

Feminist Responses to Austerity in Greece - Interview with Aliki Kosyfologou

Duration

5:34

Details
Aliki Kosyfologou talks about the impacts of austerity measures on women in Greece and highlights opportunities for the feminist movement to organise.

Feminist Responses to Austerity in Ireland - Interview with Pauline Cullen

Duration

5,27

Details

Pauline Cullen talks about the impacts of austerity measures on women in Ireland and highlights opportunities for the left and feminist movement to organise.

Crisis, War and Austerity: Devaluation of Female Labor and Retreating of the State - Interview with Oksana Dutchak

Duration

8:06

Details
Interview with Oksana Dutchak, Author of the Ukraine Study. She is the Deputy Director of the Center for Social and Labor Research (Kiev), and a researcher in the fields of labour issues and gender inequality.