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“НАШЕ ЖИТТЯ”, ЛЮТИЙ 2010 23 In this month’s issue we begin a series based on a lecture delivered by author and historian Martha Bohachevsky - Chomiak at the University of Ma nitoba (1997 J.B. Rudnyckyj Distinguished Lecture ). An Honorary Member of the UNWLA and a member of Our Life’s editorial board, Martha Bohachevsky - Chomiak has served for many years as director of the Fulbright Exchange Program in Ukraine. During her many y ears as a university professor, she taught at Manhattanville College, Johns Hopkins, George Washington, Catholic, Harvard, Seton Hall, and Fairleigh Dickinson. She also headed programs to support scholarly research at the National Endowment for the Humanit ies in Washington. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, she earned her Ph.D. at Columbia University in 1968. She has received numerous fellowships and awards, including Fulbright fellowships to Poland and Ukraine. Her published work s include The Spring of a Nation: Ukrainians in Eastern Galicia in 1848 (1967), S.N. Trubetskoi: An Intellectual Among the Intelligentsia in Pre - Revolutionary Russia (1976), and Feminists Despite Themselves: Women in Ukrainian Community Life 1884 – 1939 (198 8), a work that also appeared in Ukrainian translation in 1998. We encourage readers to respond to the information presented in this series, particularly with articles about new developments in women’s organizations in Ukraine. WOMEN’S ORGANIZATIONS IN IN DEPENDENT UKRAINE: PROSPECT OF POWER Part I The Soviet totalitarian regime ’ s obsession with security with little understanding of women ’ s needs, as well as Eastern European traditions of a patriarchal society vitiated the women ’ s rights won in the first flush of the Revolutions of 1918. Today, in popular view feminism is either identified with communism or with frivolous Westernism; in both cases it is discredited. The peculiarities of Soviet gender policy, lack of familiarity with mode rn sociological dis course on gender, and the attraction of the ostensible golden age of domesticity are some of the factors that influence the behavior of women in contemporary Ukrainian society and hinder the resurgence of their lost tradition of community activism. The not ion of gender as the socially determined role of sex, as contrasted with biolo - gically determined sex roles, is only slowly gaining recognition among the intellectual elite in Ukraine. Women ’ s organizations themselves are equally slow in popularizing the u sage. Nevertheless, although women participate little in the political and economic life of Ukraine, their lives stand to change most dramatically with the rise of a consumer economy . 1 Women constitute more than half of the population of Ukraine and the demographic situation in the country is such that the government is forced to pay attention to the position of women. 2 The population of Ukraine declined, due partly to a high abortion rate and a decline of birth rate. 3 Rise of single - parent families, hig h incidence of illnesses among children and the decline in multi - generational housing place heavy financial burdens on the government. The extra financial pressure on a badly strained budges forces the government to develop social structures better suited to using human resources. The effectiveness of these pro - grams in large measure hinges on the participation of women and their willingness to cooperate with the government in implementing whatever measures are developed. Despite their seeming absence, wome n in Ukraine have demonstrated their potential power. In the last months of the existence of the USSR women ’ s organizations outside the control of the Party mounted mass demonstrations that challenged the Soviet political system. In the six years of Ukrain e ’ s independence, over fifty women ’ s orga - nizations were created, most based upon broad community principles. Gradually, they became visible in the public arena because their traditional interests — welfare, family, health care — had politi - cal repercussions. The public demonstrations of women on behalf of family and domestic issues crossed existing social and ethnic divisions, thus creating another forum fo r the civil society in Ukraine. The disintegration of the USSR coincided with the United Nations D ecade o f Women. The thrust of this UN initiative was to stress the im - portance of establishing nongovernmental organiza - tions of women that would implement development programs. Just as Ukraine, the country, had to
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