On this International Working Women's Day - Women must Answer the call toUnite and Fight Militarism and Exploitation!
On this International Working Women’s Day, 2024, the International Women’s Alliance (IWA) salutes our members across the globe who are organizing women in their numbers, escalating campaigns, and cooperating together locally and internationally to strengthen the militant women’s movement in the midst of heightening crises. Women around the world are in a life-or-death struggle against the economic violence, state neglect and militarism inflicted on us by a global system that continues to prioritize profits over peoples’ needs!
Today, over 100 years since the first IWWD was celebrated, we continue to face the same enemies: imperialism and capitalist exploitation. The US continues to prepare for war by signing new military agreements, escalating wargames, and passing an $831 billion dollar military spending budget for 2024 (all while cutting critical public services and opting to privatize services like healthcare, education, and transportation). NATO member countries and other US allies are similarly increasing military budgets and privatizing public services. Now, more than ever it is critical that women from the oppressed classes around the world join together in strengthening the unity of the International Women’s Alliance!
Economically women around the world are facing escalating inflation and price hikes for basic necessities, forcing many to leave their homes to find livelihood as low wage workers and domestic workers. Millions more are displaced from their homes as refugees and asylum seekers. The countries most responsible for the devastation caused by war and economic plunder take no accountability. On the contrary, they put up barriers, physical and bureaucratic to stop the flow of migrants and scapegoat them as the problem for lack of housing and services in the host countries. Host governments have failed to provide decent housing and working conditions and instead have forced millions into precarious situations where their labor is exploited in dirty, dangerous and difficult jobs, forced to live in squalor and denied necessary services such as translation, communication, job opportunities, and basic services
In the face of escalating food and gas prices, our members in the Philippines have raised the call “Sahod Itaas, Presyo Ibaba”( or “Increase Wages, Decrease Prices”) demanding that the government of the Philippines stop treating the economy as a business venture and start using public funds to address the needs of ordinary people. Along with the fight for basic livelihood, Filipinos continue to oppose the bankrupt, anti-people Marcos Jr. Government. Marcos’ Charter Change (cha-cha) seeks to re-write the Philippine constitution, concentrating power in the hands of fewer bureaucrats and laying out a red-carpet welcome to foreign investments. Filipinos all over the world are opposing Cha-Cha and continuing to fight for national democracy in the Philippines!
The increased militarism around the world puts more women in the crosshairs of military violence, rape, forced displacement, and institutionalized violence. Many of our members have taken up campaigns which seek to directly address how militarism impacts their communities. African National Women’s Organization (ANWO), based in the USA, uses their “ArrestCPS Campaign” to target the fascist policies of the Child Protective Services programs across the US which profile and target Black families as a continuation of US colonization domestically. ANWO’s campaign seeks to put power back into the community and ensures that families are not violently separated.
Since October the world has mobilized in popular support of the Palestinian struggle for liberation. The genocidal attack on Gaza following the Al-Aqsa Flood on October 7 has impacted women in all Palestinian territories - according to Palestinian Prisoners Institutions “This year has been the bloodiest for Palestinian women throughout the history of the years of occupation, in light of the comprehensive aggression and ongoing genocide against our people in Gaza, alongside war crimes and severe violations they have faced, including field executions, systematic arrests, and accompanying heinous violations, including sexual assaults.”
We salute the political prisoners, mothers, healthcare workers, journalists, teachers and the countless other women in Palestine who have given the ultimate sacrifice while trying to keep their families and communities safe amidst a genocidal attack. IWA members such as Palestinian Youth Movement, Women Against Military Madness, Revolutionary Enheid, Roots for Equity, Women of Diverse Origins, SERUNI, GABRIELA, and countless others have firmly supported the Palestinian people’s right to resist US-based Israeli Genocide. We join the ranks of our members in carrying the demands for ceasefire, to end the siege on Gaza, and the release of all Palestinian political prisoners as an overall step in ending the occupation of Palestine by US - backed Zionist Forces.
Now, more than ever, we need a militant women’s movement that can unite organizations with common causes across the globe to intensify our blows and ensure we are able to win a bright future for all women and our communities!
In an effort to strengthen and unite our membership globally we are hosting an international assembly this June 17-18 in George Town, Penang, Malaysia. We encourage all members, friends, and interested organizations to attend our International Assembly as a contribution to the overall fight for the liberation of women from historic oppression!
On March 8, IWA claims the legacy of the Second International Conference of Socialist Women in Copenhagen in 1910, who established International Working Women’s Day 114 years ago. We assert that a woman’s place is in the struggle for national and social liberation and in direct confrontation against our greatest oppressors.
Working Women Unite and Fight Militarism and Exploitation! Confront the Crisis and Fight Imperialism!