40,000 people. Contrary to most feminist groups that strongly supported the anti-veiling law in
2003, Ni Putes- ni soumises supported the rights of women to wear a veil in school and, hence,
became the object of much feminist criticism. This disagreement appeared to be more healthy
than destructive to a diverse feminist movement supportive of different paths to gender equality.
Feminist mobilization in academia and research has also been an important part of the
recent revitalization. Feminist scholarly and movement oriented journals have served as crucial
public platforms for the development and dissemination of women’s movement positions and
policy recommendations in the issue-specific campaigns, such as Travail Genre et Société and
Cahier du Genre, both created in the late 1990s. The National Association of Feminist Studies
(ANEF) brings together gender experts and is also an important venue for women’s movement
activities inside and outside of academia. In 2002, ANEF held a two day forum on feminism
that was attended by 700 people (ANEF 2003).
Women’s commissions in the left-wing trade unions and political parties, important and
often effective linkages between feminist actors and ideas and party and union leadership in the
late 1970s and 1980s, have had less of a presence in this feminist renewal. Representatives tend
to make public appearances and lend formal support only when asked to by women’s groups.
The commissions do not try to convince often reluctant leaders to support feminist issues either.
Once an important conduit between the feminist movement and government, through the
women’ policy agencies, the women’s commission in the Socialist party has been strikingly
absent from recent feminist activities. The fading Communist party and the Greens take vocal
positions on women’s rights issues, but have few direct links to specific feminist groups. The
increasing weakness of the trade unions also undermines the influence of even of the one active
women’s commission, the new feminist collective- mixité in the CGT. Given this apathy,
feminist activists from outside have turned less-and-less to women’s commissions.
9
Convention