The Women's Electoral Lobby : a study of political activism

Abstract

A major concern of the survey undertaken was to explore and describe first the characteristics and motivations of a group of women who were political activists and second to examine the effectiveness of the strategies they used, As the findings were discussed, comparisons were made with other studies of a similar nature. The findings were that women in the sample, taken from members of the Women's Electoral Lobby, were characteristically highly educated, urban women of European descent. They were likely to be working in occupations outside the home. This involved many of them in a double workload as a majority of women were married with children. Despite this heavy conunitment on the part of many, an 'average' WEL member spent the equivalent of one working day per week in activities not connected with work or household duties, This involvement in organisations cast doubt on the situational model of political behaviour. WEL members joined organisations for a number of reasons but joined WEL itself mainly because it was a political group directed at influencing society on behalf of women. They did not join WEL for reasons of social gratification. Evidence pointed to the women in the sample being relatively deprived in objective terms so far as occupational standing and income were concerned when they were compared with a sample of WEL partners. However, their responses indicated that they did not feel personally deprived in the main, but that they possibly felt 'altruistic relative deprivation' on behalf of all women. Members were likely to vote for the Labour or the Values Parties rather than for National or Social Credit. The voting patterns of members over the last three elections indicated a loss of votes from National and Labour to Values. The strong support for the Values Party indicated that the women in the sample could feel the policies of the major parties were not particularly relevant to them as women nor were relevant for the future. However, the evidence suggested that they changed their votes to Values as an encouragement to this new party rather than as a protest against the others. The WEL campaign received a good deal of publicity from the media.Although it was not possible to gauge accurately its overall effect, members themselves felt the campaign was most effective in influencing politicians and in publicising discrimination against women. While women in WEL show that there may be emergent elites among women, it is not likely that they will influence the decision­ making centre of society to any marked degree as long as the present public/private dichotomy persists. However, WEL may demonstrate and encourage increasing individualism among women. WEL should concentrate on the political content of their approach as this is the one most likely to be effective in an organisation which is small in numbers and short of resources. This emphasis on politics will also help to make them a legitimate occupation for women in the future.