Women workers’ education at the Confederation of Turkish Trade Unions: excavating histories of transnational collaboration with the ICFTU

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article explores the relationship between the Confederation of Turkish Trade Unions (Türk-İş) and the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) from the 1960s until the 1990s with a focus on the transnational collaboration of activists who organised educational activities for women workers and trade unionists to empower them as rights-seeking political subjects and strengthen their position within the trade union movement. Demonstrating how women’s trade union education evolved within the framework of local politics as well as global processes such as the Cold War and the emergence of a UN-led gender equality regime, it argues that global inequalities, geopolitical differences, and Türk-İş leaders’ ambivalent attitude towards women’s status in the trade union movement led to a loose, sporadic relationship between local activists and those from the west. At the same time, it was often these activists’ sustained efforts towards collaboration and the circulation of their agendas that pressured Türk-İş to invest in women’s empowerment in trade unions. Utilising archival and trade union sources as well as oral history interviews, the article integrates the work of women labour activists in feminist labour historiography, offering a more comprehensive understanding of trade unions’ gender politics in Turkey and globally.KEYWORDS: Feminist labour historyICFTUtrade union educationtransnational collaborationTurkeyTürk-işwomen’s labour activism AcknowledgmentsThe author thanks Sylvia Hahn, Silke Neunsinger, Mahua Sarkar, and the ZARAH research team, and the two anonymous reviewers for their constructive criticism and valuable comments on the earlier versions of the article.Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Additional informationFundingThis article is part of the ERC-funded project ‘ZARAH: Women’s labour activism in Eastern Europe and transnationally, from the age of empires to the late 20th century’ (Advanced grant no. 833691).Notes on contributorsSelin ÇağataySelin Çağatay is a postdoctoral researcher in History and Gender Studies at the Central European University, Austria. Her recent publications have appeared in Women’s History Review, International Feminist Journal of Politics, and the Palgrave Macmillan Thinking Gender in Transnational Times series. Currently she investigates educational activities targeting urban and rural women in the world of gainful work in Turkey and transnationally.