Making Globalization Work for Women: The Role of Social Rights and Trade Union Leadership

Making Globalization Work for Women explores the potential for trade unions to defend the socioeconomic rights of women in a global context. Looking at labor policies and interviews with people in unions and nongovernmental organizations, the essays diagnose the problems faced by women workers across the world and assess the progress that unions in various countries have made in responding to those problems. Some concerns addressed include the masculine culture of many unions and the challenges of female leadership within them, laissez-faire governance, and the limited success of organizations working on these issues globally. Making Globalization Work for Women brings together in a synthetic and fruitful conversation the work and ideas of feminists, unions, NGOs, and other human rights workers. Book jacket.

Valentine M. Moghadam is Professor of Sociology and Women's Studies and Director of Women's Studies at Purdue University. Her previous books include the award-winning Globalizing Women: Transnational Feminist Networks, which received the American Political Science Association's Victoria Schuck Award for the best book on Women and Politics 2006. Suzanne Franzway is Associate Professor of Sociology and Gender Studies and Portfolio Leader for Research Education at the University of South Australia. Her previous books include (with Dianne Court and R.W. Connell) Staking a Claim: Feminism, Bureaucracy and the State and Sexual Politics and Greedy Institutions: Union Women, Commitments and Conflicts in Public and Private. Mary Margaret Fonow is Professor and Head of Faculty of Women and Gender Studies and Director of the School of Social Transformation at Arizona State University. Her previous books include (with Suzanne Franzway) Making Feminist Politics: Transnational Alliances between Women and Labor and Union Women: Forging Feminism in the United Steelworkers of America.