PARTISAN!

Following Victorian Trades Hall Council’s 2026 International Working Women’s Day rally in Melbourne, Pauline Slaughter writes on the necessity of a unified communist women’s movement.

The decline of the international communist movement has coincided with a similar decline in the political consciousness of the women’s movement. Even while the conditions of working women, and, in fact, women in general, are worsening. The movement is dominated by a coalition of liberal-feminists and Labor bureaucrats.

Melbourne’s rally for International Working Women’s Day (IWWD) was about what one would expect for an event hosted by the Victorian Trades Hall Council. Their  slogans, chants, and speeches summarise their demands; “Real Australian Working Women need bosses to do better, we want the wage gap to close, 10 days of reproductive leave, and an increase in our wages.”

The rally goers were sincere fighters for improving the conditions of a section of working women – though they presumably would prefer for all working women to have improved conditions. Despite this, the event, fettered by a trade unionist consciousness, did not go beyond the amelioration of conditions for the most politically active layer of working women. These demands need to be supported, yet as communists it is our duty to push the movement further. When the movement cries “we demand wage increases!” we must support the demand, and in the same breath also shout “we demand the abolition of the wage system!”. The immediate economic demands emerging from the conditions of daily life must be tied into political demands which can bring about the liberation of women and the end of class society.

The IWWD rally paid no mention the international attack on women’s reproductive rights, nor did it mention the destruction of hospitals in Gaza or the blockade on Cuba. Flyers that contained information on how to aid the Neustra America convoy, a convoy that is bringing food, baby formula, and medicines to Cuba, were not allowed to be handed out.

Where is the internationalism? Are we for the liberation of billions of working women across the planet? Or are we to settle for some Australian women getting 10 days reproductive leave?

The Merger of the Working Women’s Movement and Communism

The working women’s movement emerged alongside the workers movement out of resistance to the subjugation of working women. This subjugation is unique in that it extends beyond the workplace and into the home, where working women are still expected to work. In their first job at the workplace, they are underpaid compared to their male coworkers – then, when they get home and start their second job they are not paid at all.

The subjugation of women in the household is itself an issue with the lacklustre consciousness of the working class. It was working men who attempted to force women out of the factories and back into the domestic sphere. The basis of this attempt is not that working men are sexist pigs (although many are!), but instead due to the necessity of maintaining higher wages for men. The work women are forced to do is necessary, which is partially why they are forced into this labour. 

If the working class took power, it could organise this work collectively and democratically instead of it being thrust upon working women.

The emancipation of women is impossible under the reign of capital, yet working women cannot be forced to work two jobs, one of which they are not paid for. Any comrade will struggle to fight for the liberation of the working class if they are worked to the bone.

A communist party representing the most politically advanced sections of the working class and the entire socialist movement would be capable of building the institutions to begin collectivising this task of organising domestic workers as workers. A communist party could call upon working men to take on this work, to do their fair share, giving working women greater time and freedom to engage in political struggle.

The current leadership of the working women’s movement, the liberal-feminists and the labour bureaucrats are incapable of leading this struggle. They tell us to negotiate, yet how can the class negotiate with those who have their boot upon our neck. They tell us to ask for better pay from the very class that forces us into wage slavery.

Liberal-feminists go to those who deny working women reproductive leave, and on their hands and knees beg for better treatment, they tell us to beg as well. Working women, and the entire working class, will not find their emancipation whilst they grovel, they must stand tall and with their own strength take it.

Communism is the only material basis for the liberation of women, for no other program both desires, and is capable of, the liberation of women. Communism seeks the socialisation of the production and reproduction of society organised on the basis of the wants and needs of that society. Only communism can tie the demands of the working women’s movement to the fight against imperialism, racism and all forms of chauvinism.

The working class needs unity; it needs to find itself as a class engaged in struggles at each instance where capital seeks its subjugation. Yet, without a communist program, this unity is impossible. Sectional interests of the class render it incapable of fighting for anything greater than temporary concessions from the bourgeoisie.

As it stands, both the communist movement and the workers movement are rather weak. Unionisation rates are down to 13.1% as of 2024, compared to the 51%  in 1976 (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2022), and the communist movement is in no better shape. The Communist Party of Australia (CPA) is long dead, and what we have instead is a multitude of sects that, when combined, equal at best a 10th of the membership that the CPA had in its heyday.

There needs to be a refoundation of the mass party, representing the unity of the entire socialist movement as it stands under a democratically determined program. This party needs to immediately begin the work of forming a communist women’s front that seeks to win over working women to a communist program and take leadership of the women’s movement.

The subjugation of women occurs to women of all classes, even if its form changes. A communist women’s movement that successfully takes leadership of the women’s movement would not only be capable of winning over vast numbers of the working class, but also sections of the petty bourgeoisie, and would be capable of turning a fraction of bourgeois women into class traitors.

For there to be a communist women’s movement, it would require a unification of the already existing forces of the revolutionary left on the basis of a common program that aims to bring about the abolition of class society and the liberation of women. Any attempt to build several communist women’s movements at once will fail. Communist Unity, the Freedom Socialist Party, the Communist Party of Australia, Socialist Alliance, Socialist Alternative, the Australian Communist Party, the Communist Party of Australia – Marxist-Leninist, Red Ant, Red Spark, and the Anarchist Communist Federation all have one thing in common – alone they are incapable of bringing about the liberation of women.

Notes

1. Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2022, November 12). Trade union membership, August 2020 | Australian Bureau of Statistics. http://Www.abs.gov.au; Australian Bureau of Statistics. https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/labour/earnings-and-working-conditions/trade-union-membership/latest-release