Nuova DWF. Donna Woman Femme
Quaderni di studi internazionali sulla donna
Roma, Coines Edizioni, then Editrice coop. UTOPIA, 1976-1985

Feminism/Socialism - Political Parties/Political Movements, 1980, n. 14

BUTTAFUOCO Annarita, Re-thinking Politics, pp. 3-5

Taking Rowbotham's essay as a starting point, this issue aims at investigating the meaning of politics and the relationship between feminism and socialism. Judging from the few answers our questions received, in comparison with the many women to whom they were asked, "it seems that in the Italian feminist movement (or for many Italian feminists) the focus of interest has shifted to other issues, with a refusal of politics which could be signal a feeling of saturation".
Notice: The editorial board has resigned, and from now on the journal will be edited by another editorial board, in collaboration with a larger advisory board.

ROWBOTHAM Sheila, The Women's Movement and the Construction of Socialism, [passages from "Beyond the Fragment" (London, Merlin Press, 1980), selected and translated by A. Buttafuoco, D. Lodi and M.G. Rossilli], pp. 6-74

The author examines the conception and the role of the party in all those socialist organisations grounded in marxist ideology: formation of the leaders, theories of organisation, relationship avant-garde/masses, internal democracy etc. The issue is whether and how the women's movement, and especially the feminist movement, challenges such conceptions, as it does not make recourse to the idea of exploitation but to the wider one of oppression; thus, it defines itself as a political subject in its own right, not just as a possible occasional ally. This challenge implies the necessity of re-thinking the very idea of socialism, questioning the modes of its political organisation.

REPETTO Margherita, Our History Has Just Begun. A Comment of Sheila Rowbotham's Essay, pp. 75-86

The author reads Rowbotham's essay in the light of her own experience in the emancipatory women's movement in Italy, as it developed in connection with the presence of an Italian Communist Party which after World War II posed itself as a 'new party', an original political formation with new features. She is not convinced by Rowbotham's attempt to redefine the very concept of socialism: "The task we have to face is that of creating the conditions for change; the problem, therefore, is not questioning and upsetting the modes of organisation which have historically come into being in the fight for socialism; rather, we should strive to create - criticising the present - an historically situated tool in the fight for liberation. […] Let's try and do it: our history has just begun".

ROSSILLI Maria Grazia, The Feminist Movement and the Marxist-Leninist Groups in Italy, pp. 87-102

On the basis of the experience of Marxist-Leninist feminists, Rossilli analyzes the mistakes made by New Left groups (as well as by the "revisionist" Italian Communist Party) in accepting ideas which are a betrayal of true Leninism. A new theoretical-political conception of the revolutionary process is needed, one which sees it as the convergence of liberation movements in a coherent aim towards revolution; it is necessary to overcome the partiality of seeing the contradiction of sex as separated from the contradiction of class.

FIUME Giovanna, Sheila Rowbotham and Leninism, pp. 103-112

The author disagrees with Rowbotham's historical analysis, underling the fact that since the end of the 19th century the development of the industrial revolution had brought about such changes of social and family roles to make a relationship between bourgeois feminism and the proletarian masses impossible. The identification and examination of the different forms of socialist organizations should also be further analyzed. Rowbotham's proposal of a "democracy of participation" is not convincing; much else is needed for the individual changes positively wrought by feminism to become politically significant.

GRAMAGLIA Mariella, Politics: "nec tecum nec sine te vivere possum". A Comment of Sheila Robotham's Essay, pp. 113-116

According to the author, Rowbotham fully partakes of the Marxist critical tradition which existed well before feminism, and investigates ideas already well known in the Italian left. She still accepts a conception of history as having an ultimate purpose, waiting for something radically different from the world we live in. Feminism is outside this framework, because women have privileged an inquiry focused on their sense of themselves, on how they could find it together. They have investigated the borders of the territory of politics (and therefore of an unproblematic consciousness aimed at efficiency), reaching the darkest questions on one's existence and meaning.

DE ROMANIS Roberto, The Bible and the pen: pamphlets by and on women during the English Revolution, pp. 117-162

In the second half of the 17th century, the debate on the Modern State in England was accompanied by a debate on the definition of women's role. As well as satires written by men (and diplomatic and other sources), the author analyses women-authored pamphlets and petitions, introducing them with a brief discussion of women's conditions in pre-revolutionary England. The role of religious sects is underlined, because in that context everybody's right to free speech and to the participation in public debates was possible due to a more democratic conception of power and to the emphasis on individual freedom in reading the Bible.