When we come to think about nineteenth-century feminism, we can’t celebrate its achievements without recognising what it was achieved on the back of. In so many cases, women’s greater contribution to the public sphere [was] through social action, through social work, through philanthropy […], so often those things were achieved on the basis of middle-class women framing working-class women or women of colour in the Empire, as somehow a problem that needed their intervention. […] There is a strong argument that many campaigns achieved something primarily for middle-class women, but on the basis of saying they had to act for, or speak for, the others who could not.
– Prof. Ruth Livesey, in the Beyond the Ballot course
Although Livesey was discussing the nineteenth century, the above quote still resonates today. Social justice movements continue to struggle to make room for diversity, and particularly for those who experience the harshest oppression.
Mary Rabagliati (1942-92), who dedicated her life to fighting poverty, was one woman who attempted to open up the movement to include more diverse voices. Social justice was part of Rabagliati’s family heritage. Her mother was a strong woman who spent eight years as a lone parent after her husband’s death. Her father was the great-grandson of the prominent Scottish suffragist, Priscilla Bright McLaren (1815-1906). McLaren was the president of the Edinburgh Women’s Suffrage Society, which campaigned for women’s right to vote and to own property, and she also fought against slavery and poverty.
Like her nineteenth-century ancestor, Rabagliati threw herself passionately into the cause of social justice. In addition to working against poverty, she was also active in the feminist movement, particularly ensuring that the voices of women living in extreme poverty would be heard, in addition to those of the middle class.
In 1962, when Rabagliati was 20 years old, she helped to co-found ATD Fourth World (All Together in Dignity). ATD is a non-profit organisation which seeks to eradicate poverty. It has grown into an international movement, led by people in extreme poverty and drawing on their courage and intelligence in order to promote peace and human rights wherever they are. To honour Rabagliati’s role as a co-founder, this year, ATD is creating a series of nine videos to retrace her career. The videos can be seen here.
The sixth video focuses on Rabagliati’s work with women and girls. In 1962, she worked in Birmingham, supporting a woman who was pregnant with her eighth child. The woman lived in so much chaos that she could not hope to follow natural methods of birth control. This converted Rabagliati into a staunch advocate for family planning. At this time, the birth control pill had only just been legalised in the UK for married women, and was not yet available to single women.
Yet, as important as access to family planning was, Rabagliati also saw that in the following decades, it was beginning to be used in a coercive way to curb population growth amongst the UK poor. She told governments:
Some couples in poverty have sterilisation proposed to them when they are very young and do not want to take such an irreversible step. Some doctors, when they have just delivered a baby, then sterilise the mother without her consent. Many poor women think that doctors are inclined to decide for them. They resent being pushed into an abortion because others think they already have enough children. Coercive sterilisation or abortions are most likely to occur among the poorest families. […] Addressing parental rights and responsibility, as well as free choice in family planning, requires the utmost sensitivity. We must consider the actual experiences of very disadvantaged families through several generations.
Rabagliati hoped to help women around the world. In 1975, she attended the United Nations’ first-ever World Conference on Women. Before travelling to the conference in Mexico City, she interviewed many women living in extreme poverty. One of them told her:
When I heard about Women’s Liberation, at first I thought it was a good idea. But then after hearing two or three of them talking on the television, I came to the conclusion that there was only a certain class of women speaking out for women as a whole. […] I don’t agree with what they say on my behalf.
Rabagliati was determined that the voices of women in poverty be heard at the conference. When it became clear that it would be impossible for ATD to give a speech, she recruited the housekeeping staff of the hotels where diplomats were staying and slipped ATD Fourth World’s message onto dining tables and pillows.
At subsequent World Conferences on Women – in 1980 in Copenhagen, and in 1985 in Nairobi – Rabagliati took the floor, chaired a workshop, and was able influence the governments’ decisions. However, despite these conferences, she remained concerned that, “gains made have not benefited all women equally, and that women in the lowest socio-economic groups have benefited least of all”.
Rabagliati’s work with ATD inspired people and governments around the world to listen to the voices of those living in poverty and, in particular, to take into account the needs of the poorest women. Although she died in 1992, at the age of only 51, her legacy lives on through the continuing work of ATD.
