How to Liberate a Female Proletarian: Women’s Emancipation and (Un)paid Work in the Czech Socialist and Communist Women’s Movements in the Early Twentieth Century

This article analyses the Czech socialist and communist women’s movements and their approaches to paid work, housework, and care. I argue that, despite diverse opinions and changes in the labour discourse over time, socialist and communist activists always understood class inequality as intersecting with gender inequality. This article also demonstrates that the women’s socialist movement did not consider socialism merely as a solution to economic inequality. The aim of the movement was broader in that it sought to ensure a balance between public and private life by means of co-parenting or the collectivisation of care and housework. The socialist avant-garde called for gender-neutral socialisation and the involvement of men in raising children and housework. In contrast to socialists, female communists of the late 1920s viewed care and housework through a gendered lens as women’s work. They also advocated for collectivised care and housework and argued that women should be paid for this labour as a means of recognition and liberation.