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medical and legal advisory clinics, create commissions on preventive child medical care, and set up special scholarships for young women. Women link the welfare of the family closely to the effective functioning of the state, and have argued for tighter laws against prostitu tion and narcotics. They generally demand welfare sup port for the needy and the establishment of more schools to meet the ever-present demand. Women activists make a point of commenting that the discussion of specifi cally feminist agenda will have to be deferred until basic social ills are addressed. Paying lip serve to the need for an institutional base for effective action, women periodically talk of creating an umbrella organization, a genuine Council of Women of Ukraine that would promote the concerns and causes of women and represent Ukrainian women in the inter national arena. But, given the recent experience with the single party, women remain wary of any monolithic organization and have not yet taken definitive steps in this respect. Women’s conferences, nevertheless, often result in specific recommendations. Especially significant was the work of the First International Conference on Women in State Building, held May 28 through 30, 1993, organ ized by the Women’s Community. Much of its agenda served as the basis for preparations for the Parliamen tary hearings. Conference resolutions drew on Ukraine’s commitment to enforce provisions of the United Nations Document to End Discrimination of Women that Soviet Ukraine signed after the Nairobi Conference in 1985 to vouchsafe equality of women. The women also moved into the language of modernity, asking for the drafting of gender-related legislation, demanding that measures be taken to combat covert discrimination, create condi tions that would make sexual harassment difficult and eventually illegal, and support the creation of Women’s Studies centers at institutions of higher learning. The largest and most popular of the Ukrainian women’s journals, the monthly magazine formerly pub lished as S o v ie t W om an (Radians’ka Zhinka) has be come, under the able editorship of Lidia Mazur, simply W om an (Zhinka).5 Most women’s organizations publish more modest newspapers, and there have been interest ing ventures into glossy magazines aimed mainly at women. Of these, Eve (leva), edited by Irena Danilevska, is the most interesting. There is also a very small moderate feminist move ment and some public discussion of women’s issues.6 Especially significant are practical attempts to address the educational needs of girls, including the introduc tion of boarding schools with a demanding curriculum. Religion and tradition, as rallying cries for women, draw their contemporary popularity from the persecution of religion and the attempt of the Soviet government to extirpate local culture. Some women find solace in reli gion and ethnography, especially in rediscovering old songs, rituals, food, clothing. Others cluster in religiously oriented societies. Organized religions draw the women into public activity for faith and good works. Obviously, sometimes such organizations view woman’s role in the family limited to raising children while being supported by a husband who will care for her. We also should mention that in 1992, an International Women’s Club of Kiev, composed of non-Ukrainian women working and living in Kiev, has been serving as a monthly meeting ground for professional women and those in the diplo matic community. This is the first time a club of this nature has existed in Ukraine and Ukrainian women are showing interest in this novelty. (T o be c o n tin u e d ) NOTES 1. There are some analysts who suggest that it was a women’s organization, the Ukrainian Committee of Mothers of Soldiers, that cracked apart the Soviet Army, and that as a result, the unified state structure of the Soviet Union crumbled. See Bohdan Pyskir, “Materi dlia Bat’kivshchyna: Ukrainska derzhavnist’, maternytstvo ta natsional’na bezpeka,” Suchas- nist’, June, 1994, pp. 70-82. The Committee of Mothers of Sold iers in Ukraine, headed by Liudmyla D. Trukhmanova, a Bulgarian-Ukrainian, held a series of mass meetings to public ize the plight of soldiers. The rally held in the city of Zapo- rizhzhia in August 1990 was particularly significant. It was not an area known for its expressions of Ukrainian nationalism, so that a facile dismissal of the activities of women as being expressions of nationalism was not applicable in this case. At the rally, women demanded shortened army service, increased leave time, and the creation of permanent medical commis sions that would be responsible to the local elected councils and work closely with the Committee of the Mothers of Soldi ers to ensure the safety of the draftees. They also demanded that the Minister of Defense of Ukraine be a civilian; there was even a suggestion that Trukhmanova head that post. 2. In addition to its own work, The Women’s Hromada serves as an umbrella organization for Ukrainian women’s organizations of women of Jewish origin, those of Tartar des cent, and of an organization that seeks to provide support for women of the less numerous ethnic groups. Volodymyr Skania, “Povernemo im sviato,” Holos Ukrainy, March 12, 1991; also Stanislav Yartsenko, “Zovsim ne sviatkovy mytinh,” Molod Ukrainy, March 12, 1991. To underscore its political character, the meeting was held at the October Square, renamed Inde pendence Square, which since the hunger strike of the stu dents in October, 1990, that resulted in the resignation of Vitaly Masol, the Prime Minister of Ukraine (the only such case in the history of the whole USSR) became the venue for major politi cal demonstrations. 3. Valentyna S. Shevchenko, who served as the president of Ukraine and V.A. Ivashko, the secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine and Gorbachev Party stalwart, helped organize the Council. Later, charges were made that the Women’s Councils were used to launder party coffers. See Samostiina Ukraina, no. 13, September, 1991, p. 3. 4. Most parties include assurances for rights of all religions and all nationalities on the territories of Ukraine. Some of the parties, as for instance the Green Party, included a reference to ’’НАШЕ ЖИТТЯ”, ЛИСТОПАД 1995 23
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