Most of the world’s women today are very far from achieving equality, let alone liberation. The wage gap between men and women is one thing, but inequality and oppression are about so much more than that. From the fear of leaving our drinks unattended when we are on a night out; to the anxiety of walking home alone, having to put up with constant sexist comments and stares; to doing the majority of housework; to doctors not taking ‘women’s diseases’ seriously and generally being treated as of lesser worth, the list goes on and on…

Some feminists argue that the term and notion of ‘prostitution’ should be abandoned and replaced by that of ‘sex work’. In other words, prostitution should be treated as any other form of work and recognised as such. According to the feminist activist Morgane Merteuil (among others), prostitution would even be a tool in the fight against capitalism and for the emancipation of women. In this article, we intend to respond to these ideas from a Marxist point of view.

Fifty years ago, the US Supreme Court passed its famous Roe v Wade ruling, providing abortion rights to women in America. Today, these same rights are being ripped up. The fight to end women’s oppression must be a fight for socialist revolution.

What is being called “Egypt’s #MeToo movement” has made headlines around the world since 2020, with high-profile sexual predators being called out online. Meanwhile, the country’s regime has been pushed onto the back foot on the question of sexual violence and women’s oppression during recent years. This question is bound up with the fate of the Egyptian Revolution. Those who want to rid Egypt of violence against women must turn towards the working class and raise the call: time’s up for Sisi!

Across the world, an epidemic of violence against women, femicide, and domestic abuse plagues society. This is yet another symptom of a sick system. Capitalism is the disease. To end sexism and oppression, we must fight for revolution.

In a historic and unanimous vote by ten ministers, the Supreme Court of Mexico has declared the penalisation of women who decide to get an abortion unconstitutional. That this vote has taken place now is clearly the result of our struggle in the streets, which has made it impossible for women’s rights to be ignored any longer. Without this struggle, the vote simply never would have happened.

The US Supreme Court has voted to uphold a new Texas state law that drastically limits access to legal abortions. This scandalous attack on reproductive rights must be met with working-class resistance in defence of fundamental democratic freedoms, which are under threat from the rotten US capitalist system.

Protests erupted across Turkey on Saturday 20 March after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan issued a decree withdrawing Turkey from the Istanbul convention, an international treaty to prevent and combat violence against women. The withdrawal has sparked anger, thousands have taken to the streets at protests throughout the country. 

In the wake of the murder of Sarah Everard, and the subsequent police suppression of a vigil in her memory, protestors have taken to the streets across Britain. We must mobilise to overthrow this entire oppressive, violent, and repressive system. Speakers from Socialist Appeal (British section of the IMT) will address these events at a free public rally today at 7PM GMT, register here.

Over the past week, Britain has experienced an outpouring of anger and indignation after the body of 33-year-old Sarah Everard was discovered in Kent. She had been abducted and murdered while walking home from a friend's house in South London. An off-duty policeman has been arrested and charged with this heinous crime. On the weekend, a peaceful vigil in Clapham Common was brutally broken up by police, using COVID-19 restrictions as an excuse.

Despite the ongoing pandemic, comrades of the IMT participated in and held events to commemorate International Working Women’s Day all over the world.

Marxism has always been at the forefront of the cause of women's emancipation. The 8th of March (International Women's Day) is a red letter day for us as it symbolises the struggle of working class women against capitalism, oppression and discrimination throughout the world. In this article, we outline the first steps given by Marxism to fight for women's rights, what the first successful revolution meant for the emancipation of women, conditions of women under capitalism both in advanced and Third World countries and pose the question of how to eliminate inequality between men and women for good. Originally published 8 March 2000.

To mark this year’s International Working Women’s Day, the International Marxist Tendency is organising events across the world over the next two weeks (starting today), to discuss the history of women’s oppression and the need for a revolutionary solution based on class struggle!

With the rise of the feminist movement and the struggle against women’s oppression, sections of both the left and the very same feminist movement have revived the idea of “wages for housewives”. They classify housework carried out by women as “unpaid” work, claiming that capitalists cut costs by relying on this unpaid labour. Where does Marxism stand on this issue?

In the evening of Friday 7 November, 20-year-old Bianca Alejandrina, known to friends as Alexis, did not return home after she had gone out to sell electronic cigarettes in the suburbs of Cancún, in Quintana Roo, southeast Mexico. On Sunday, her dead body was found. She had been quartered. Her remains had been put in plastic bags. Thousands of youths took to their streets of Cancún and other cities to protest against this brutal murder.