International Women's Year

The UN declared 1975 the International Women's Year. The capstone event of the year was the International Women's Year conference, dubbed "the greatest consciousness-raising event in history," held in Mexico City. It attracted delegates from 133 countries, in addition to non-governmental organizations. The attendees included Betty Friedan, Jane Fonda, Angela Davis, and Soviet cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova. Among them were: royalty--Princess Pahlavi of Iran; the politically connected--Leah Rabin of Israel, Sri Lankan Prime Minister Sirmavo Bandaranaike, and Egyptian first lady Jihan el-Sadat; and the grassroots. What emerged from the conference was a realization that sisterhood was not more powerful than the issues that divided women, among them economic inequality, prostitution, reproductive rights, professional opportunities, Zionism, and disarmament. The conference was a major watershed in second-wave feminism, but in a larger sense, it marked the consolidation of transnational feminist organizing and a turning point in the role of NGOs in international activism, organizing, and governance. -- Adapted from the publisher's description.