feminist

michelle renyé (March 2014)

Women decide, the State guarantees, society respects& the Catholic Church does not intervene!

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Sahar Vardi

On 14th June this year the Norwegian parliament decided to introduce conscription for women. The question was on the agenda of all the political parties’ yearly meetings this spring, spearheaded by women from a young generation. The most surprising thing, bearing in mind the Norwegian context, is that the socialist party’s young women were at the very front in calling for this change.

Edited by Ellen Elster and Majken Jul Sørensen Preface by Cynthia Enloe PUBLISHED BY WAR RESISTERS' INTERNATIONAL April 2010 ISBN 978-0-903517-22-5 Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales.

War Resisters' International (WRI), an international network of pacifist and antimilitarist organisations with more than 90 affiliates in more than 40 countries, condemns the persecution of Turkish antimilitarist and feminist Pinar Selek. For 12 years now, Pinar Selek has been under prosecution for a crime she did not commit and in connection with which there is no evidence against her - the so-called bombing of the Spice Bazaar in Istanbul on 09 July 1998. Pinar Selek was arrested in 1998, tortured during investigation and spent two and a half years in prison.

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By Ferda Ülker

Let us look at the current situation in Turkey before focusing upon the conscientious objector struggle and conscientious objector women.

By Hilal Demir, War Resisters' International

Why did we, Turkish women, declare conscientious objection though we are not subject to compulsory military service in Turkey? Here I record some problems and dynamics of conscientious objection, the contributions of women’s conscientious objection declarations to the movement, and the resulting discussions.

Living in a patriarchal culture, I think that all the opposition movements, including feminism, have the continuous risk of becoming “masculinized”. This is a risk so strong as to cause the fading away of most movements.

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By Idan Halili, New Profile

The story of how I got discharged from army service ended in 2005, when I was 19 years old. In this chapter I try to describe the story of my refusal, the process I went through, and its implications.

Back to table of contents By Tali Lerner, New Profile Citizenship in Israel is judged in terms of the relations between a certain group and the military. Ultra-orthodox Jewish or Arab citizens are perceived as second-rate citizens. This is legitimised because they are exempted from compulsory military service.

Back to table of contents By Jungmin Choi, Solidarity for Peace and Human Rights

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By Ellen Elster and Majken Jul Sørensen, War Resisters' International

At the WRI 4th International Women's Conference, held in Thailand in 1992, the participants called for strengthening links between women around the world by taking up the tradition of organising common women's actions in different countries.