PARTITION: A WOMAN'S ISSUE 
 
     The present phase of the struggle for national liberation
has gone on for twenty years. It is the longest phase in the
struggle for self determination for the Irish people. In the Six
Counties Irish women experience oppression both as women and as 
members of a colonized people. Nationalist working class women in
the Six Counties have lived, in the last 20 years, with the
constant armed patrolling of their areas by the British Army and
the RUC. 
 
     Years of neglect have ensured overcrowding in dilapidated
estates (housing projects.) with up to 70% unemployment. Women
from 17 to 70 years of age are arrested, interrogated, physically
abused thrown in jail. They are maimed and killed by plastic
bullets and live bullets on the street and in their own homes.
Many of them spend their lives  in endless rounds of prison
visits, including travelling to England, to arrive at prisons
only  to find that the person they have come to visit 
has been secretly transferred to a prison at the other end of the
country. 
 
     Today 20 years on, working class nationalist women continue
to fight the British occupation of their country. Their strength,
courage and determination has been crucial in the last 20 years. 
Mairead Farrell, a volunteer in the Irish Republican who was a
victim of the shoot to kill policy operated by the British
government, is an example of the courage and commitment of the 
nationalist women in the Six Counties. Mairead spent 10 1/2 years
in Armagh and Maghaberry jails. She endured the dirty protest, a
hunger strike and strip searching. She is a symbol of the spirit
and strength of the women political prisoners in Maghaberry and
English jails. 
 
     British interference in Ireland has brought about the
existence of two conservative states whose continued existence
demands the oppression of certain sectors of society and women in
particular. 
 
     The vast majority of women in the labour force are low paid,
lacking in promotion prospects, discriminated against as part
time workers and deprived of the machinery which would make equal
pay legislation effective.  Where women are in trade unions they
have little or no economic strength. Where they are not unionized
they have no one to protect their rights. 
 
PARTITION 
 
     Partition has hindered the development of a strong trade
union movement and the development of class politics. It has
weakened the forces of the left leaving working class people
vulnerable to right wing attacks. 
 
     Cutbacks in the health and social services effect all
working class people but it is women who bear the brunt of right
wing policies. 
 
     It is women who are expected to care for the sick children
when there are no hospital beds for them, to care for the patient
who has been discharged early and to look after the old person in
the family who has no where else to go. 
 
     We in Sinn Fein see the struggle of Irish women for
recognition as equal citizens with equal opportunities 
as being interlinked with the struggle for national liberation.
The victory of the struggle to end partition and reunite the
national territory is the absolute condition for any change in
the social status for women as a whole. There can be no real 
liberation for women in a society  which, North and South, is
still controlled in every aspect of life by extremely reactionary
forces. 
 
     Partition has led to the continued dominance of the Catholic
Church in the 26 counties. Its domination in the area of
education has led to the perpetuation of sexism and stereotyping
of women in single sex schools, traditional values, perceptions  
of women's place being at home as wife and mother. The domination
of the Catholic Church in the area of education has meant that
basic civil liberties such as divorce are not available in the 26
County state. 
 
     In the last 17 years a lot of energy of the women's movement
in Ireland has been spent in the area of reproductive rights.
While the struggle for contraception was largely due to the
women's  movement in the 26 counties very little other 
gains have been made in that area. The attack on non-directive
pregnancy counselling in the last few years has shown the
strength of the right wing ethos of the state. 
 
     While battles have been fought on equal pay and welfare very
few gains have been made that have changed the lives of working
class women. The majority are still trapped at home with little 
money because of unemployment, inadequate social welfare payments
and a lack of child care facilities.    
 
SERVICES 
 
     In the latter half of the `70's energy from the women's
movement was spent on the provision of services for women;
refugees, family planning centers, rape crisis centers, health
groups, and women's centers. Services the state should provide as
a right. 
 
     At the moment each women's group has to compete for the
little money that the state makes available for these essential
services. Each women's group has to lobby for it's own particular
field. This process leads to fragmentation. The old divide and
conquer trick. Just recently the Dublin Government announced in
the budget 100,000 pounds (pounds or "punts' is the currency 
in the South) for the Dublin Rape Crisis Centre. While this is to
be welcomed, no money was given to any other crisis agency
outside Dublin. 
 
     The mobilization of the new right has put the women's 
movement on the defensive in the 80's. Although new women's
groups have sprung up in towns and across the country and in
local city communities women have not managed to assemble an
effective opposition to the new right. The failure of the women's
movement to develop is directly related to its emphasis on equal 
rights and equal opportunities. It has failed to address the
central issue of partition. Partition sets the political face of
both states, the North based on sectarian privilege, the 26
counties deeply conservative social terms with the strong
influence of the church. 

REAL CHANGE 
     We believe women will not experience any real change until
they address this issue. Social and economic deprivation, the
influence of the church, the repression that women suffer in the
Six Counties are inter related issues. 
     For as long as Britain remains in Ireland its presence 
distorts the political landscape. We believe the only solution is
the ending of partition, a British disengagement from Ireland and
the restoration of the Irish people of their right to
sovereignty, independence and national self-determination. 
     There can be no real freedom for women in Ireland in a
partitioned country. Neither can we have socialism without
national liberation. Socialism can only be won by the working
class developing the political power necessary to develop an
economic democracy which would return the ownership of 
Ireland to its rightful owners, the people of Ireland. 
 
     The success of the struggle for national liberation is 
the pre condition for socialism and the liberation of 
Irish women. 
 
 
SINN FEIN'S WOMEN' DEPT. 
 
     However, we in Sinn Fein believe women must highlight their
oppression and put their demands on the agenda. In this regard,
women in Sinn Fein pushed for a women's department in 1980.   
 
     The women's department came out of a  realization that women
had to have an organized political voice within the party. Women
came together from all over Ireland to discuss their work within
Sinn Fein, the problems they faced in fulfilling their roles  
as political activists and the need for Sinn Fein to have strong,
progressive policies on  issues important not just for women but
to society as a whole. A women's policy document was passed at
the 1980 Ard Fheis, the annual national meeting of Sinn Fein.
Included in that policy is a policy of positive discrimination 
(affirmative action) for women in the party. At least one quarter
of the positions on the national executive are reserved for
women. 
 
     Today 20 years on in the struggle we believe that the
maximum number of people must be mobilized to achieve Irish
unity. There is a broad  anti imperialist movement to mobilize on
the issue of self-determination  for the Irish people. There 
is a need for women to link women's self) determination with the
core demand of self)determination for the nation. 
 
     In order to do this we must make this demand relevant to
working class women. We must be involved in the struggles which
affect a broad section of women. We must show them through
involvement in their struggles  on social and economic issues,
which are our struggles, that their freedom is intertwined 
with the reunification of our country. 
 
     The ending of partition will see the dismantling of right
wing power on both sides of the border and the establishment of
democracy in Ireland. 
 
     In the words of Mairead Farrell: "I'm oppressed as a woman,
but I am also oppressed because I'm Irish. Everyone in this
country is oppressed and we can't successfully end our  
oppression as women until we first end the oppression of our
country. But I don't think that's the end of it. It happened
before where women took the back seat. But women today have gone
through too much, no way will they allow that to happen. 
  
Published in A Women's Voice 
April May 1989. 
Sinn Fein Women's Department 
 
 
 
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