Women in the Early Labor Movement

The integration of women into French labor movements faced enormous obstacles but produced remarkable leaders and innovations. Women workers confronted not only employer exploitation but also exclusion from male-dominated unions and societal expectations that their primary role was domestic. Yet their struggles expanded the labor movement's vision and challenged its limitations.

In the textile regions of the North, women constituted the majority of workers but were systematically excluded from union leadership. They earned half of male wages for identical work, justified by the assumption that men were breadwinners while women merely supplemented family income. This fiction ignored the reality of widows, single women, and families dependent on female wages.

The 1905 strike at the Limoges porcelain factories, led primarily by women, demonstrated their capacity for militant action. When male union leaders counseled moderation, women workers invaded the factories, smashing the precious porcelain that they spent their lives creating but could never afford to own. The violence shocked respectable opinion but forced recognition of women's rage at their dual exploitation as workers and as women.

Louise Michel, the "Red Virgin of the Commune," became an icon of revolutionary feminism. Deported to New Caledonia after the Commune's fall, she continued organizing among the indigenous Kanak people, connecting struggles against class, gender, and colonial oppression. Her 1880 return to France was greeted by massive crowds, and she spent her remaining years advocating for anarchism and women's rights.

The question of women's suffrage divided the labor movement. While most socialists officially supported it, many male workers feared that women, influenced by priests, would vote for conservative parties. This tension between progressive ideals and traditional prejudices would persist throughout the 20th century, with French women not gaining the vote until 1944—decades after their British and American counterparts.