BY ELIZABETH STONE
HAVANA, Cuba - Three thousand delegates from 79 countries came here for an "International Meeting of Solidarity Between Women." The conference, which took place April 13-16 was sponsored by the Federation of Cuban Women, the Continental Front of Women, and the International Democratic Federation of Women.

The largest delegations hailed from Latin America and the Caribbean, including 500 women from Brazil and 300 from Mexico. Substantial delegations also participated from Vietnam, Angola, Mozambique, Russia, and South Africa. More than 100 people attended who came from the United States.

The official Cuban delegation was 150, with more Cubans attending specific events.

A large number of those present were professional women, professors, and social service workers. Many were members of political parties, women's organizations, and trade unions.

The central focus of discussion was how to confront the growing attacks on the standard of living and conditions of working people that the employers and the governments that represent them are demanding worldwide as the crisis of the world market system worsens.

A document on economic development prepared for the conference by the Federation of Cuban Women listed statistics illustrating the devastating effect of these attacks on the majority of the world's women, particularly in the semicolonial countries.

One out of three people in the Third World live in conditions of the most extreme poverty, the document points out. And women make up two-thirds of those who are poor.

Struggles against austerity, colonialism
One delegate after another explained how these conditions, which are not new in the semicolonial world, are being made worse by austerity policies that are pushed by the capitalist rulers of the United States and other imperialist countries - often in the form of pressure from the International Monetary Fund or World Bank - and implemented by the national bourgeoisie.

Susana Martínez, the secretary general of a trade union representing workers in the advertising industry in Argentina, explained how these attacks affect working people in her home town of Córdoba. She said Fiat, which has a large plant in Córdoba, is laying off workers. Two banks are being merged, leading to a 50 percent cut in the total number of employees, something the workers are fighting against. Budgets for hospitals and public education are also being cut.

Martínez said that throughout Argentina state-owned enterprises in telecommunications, water, postal services, and industries such as sugar are being sold off to private capitalists, who often impose further layoffs.

As more men have become unemployed, women have come into the workforce to help make ends meet, many of them forced into low-paid work as street vendors or domestic servants. At the same time, she said, women are becoming more active in protests and political life in general.

In the workshop on Health, Education, Culture, and Social Security, delegates described how health care, public education, and social security programs are being undermined in many countries by the privatization of schools and hospitals and cutbacks in social spending.

Women also spoke of struggles against these conditions. María Angélica Ribeiro, who is a teacher and an official of a teacher's union from Sao Paulo, Brazil, told Militant reporters about the growing role of women in the fight for land being organized by the Movement of Landless Rural Workers (MST).

She has participated in land occupations carried out by peasants and unemployed workers in which women formed the front lines when the land was occupied and surrounded. Women also stood in front of the tractors brought in by the landlords and cops to try to remove the occupiers. Women are among the first to set up tents, turn over the soil, and begin the planting at a new encampment.

A delegate from Bolivia spoke of a general strike being carried out by workers in Bolivia.

In the workshop on Independence, Sovereignty and Peace, Palestinian and Puerto Rican women spoke of their continuing fights against occupation of their lands.

Camille Dieudonne came to the conference from Reunion, a French-controlled island off the coast of Africa near Madagascar. She said her organization, the Union of Women of Reunion, was fighting for the right of students to study in their own language, as opposed to French.

In a number of countries in South America, women have organized to fight for legalized abortion and access to birth control in an organization called "Catholics for the Right to Choose." Marta Alanis of Córdoba, Argentina participates in demonstrations and other activities sponsored by that group. She said that abortion carried out in unsafe conditions was the principle cause of death of young women in Argentina.

The example of Cuba
The clearest perspective for how to advance the struggles of working people and women was presented by the delegates from Cuba. In the opening session, the president of the Federation of Cuban Women, Vilma Espín, explained that in the Cuban revolution, "Women decided we would not stay behind. Women became the constructors of society, as well as men."

Cuban women today have a strong presence in the workforce, making up 42.5 percent of it. They are 65.5 percent of the technical and professional workforce and 58 percent of university graduates.

Women are not as strongly represented in industry and agriculture, but special efforts have been mounted to encourage participation in nontraditional jobs, which continue to today. Militant reporters spoke with delegates from Sancti Spiritus province, Yamilet Fernández, a locomotive engineer, and Irialis Hernández, who works on an agricultural cooperative. They both reported having attended a conference sponsored by the FMC a year ago dedicated to increasing the number of women industrial workers.

Dolores Alvarez, the secretary general of the FMC in Ciego de Avila, was another Cuban delegate who had an interest in getting women into nontraditional jobs. Her head was full of statistics on women and work. Alvarez said there are plans to expand tobacco in the province, and already they are discussing how to increase the participation of women in this industry. She said three women are now running the big combines used in agriculture. They are also six macheteras - women who cut sugar cane with a machete - in the province.

Reflecting the gains made by the revolution in areas such as nutrition, potable water, health, and education, the life expectancy of Cuban women is 77.6 years, while in the rest of the Third World the average for women is 63.5 years.

"What we have won was through the revolution," Espín told the congress.

To make gains for women, "You have to fight for a government that defends the interests of the people," Giselo Loso of the Cuban Ministry of Science and Technology told the workshop on development. "This is the Cuban experience."

Another Cuban delegate, Tania García, pointed out that sovereignty and independence is key. "The Cuban model is focused on men, women, and children, not on capital," she added.

Solidarity with Cuba
Delegates at the conference took a strong stand in opposition to Washington's attacks against Cuba. A whole conference session was devoted to speeches by leaders of the Cuban revolution taking up this question.

Carlos Lage, vice president of the Cuban Council of State, described a century of attempts by the U.S. rulers to dominate Cuba, asserting that what Cuba faces "is not an embargo, it's not even a blockade, it is economic warfare against the revolution." He called the recent offer of the U.S. government to give "humanitarian" aid to nongovernmental bodies in Cuba unacceptable. It is "something undignified and cynical to blockade a country, to try to bring it to its knees by hunger, and then on the other hand to offer alms," he said.

Ricardo Alarcón, president of the National Assembly of People's Power, described how Cuban democracy includes a broad process of discussion and decision making at the workplace and in the communities. Rosa Elena Simeón Negrín, the minister of science, technology and the environment, documented a long history of biological warfare against Cuba and the contribution of Cuban women to fighting this.

At the final session María Adelia Cornejo of the Executive Committee of the International Democratic Federation of Women read a resolution calling for an end to the U.S. embargo, a cease of the bacteriological war against Cuba, and respect for Cuba's sovereignty.

In a speech closing the conference, Cuban president Fidel Castro discussed the devastating impact of the policies of the exploiting classes on millions of human beings around the world. A discussion of women's issues must start with the main issues of today's world, he asserted, such as underdevelopment, poverty, and the debts to the imperialist banks that are economically strangling the Third World.

Castro pointed out that the gap in economic conditions between countries is widening today, and within each country, the rich are richer and the poor increasingly poor. He argued that this will continue until the present capitalist economic order is replaced.

The Cuban president also discussed the negative impact of the growing domination of "U.S. culture" in other countries, including how the media presents women. He pointed to the fashion industry, which presents a prototype of "female beauty" that has nothing to do with the diversity of women in the world. "It is an insult, a humiliation," he said.

He detailed how Washington tries to dictate to other countries and intervening in their affairs. "They tell Indonesia what to do. They tell Thailand what it has to do. They tell South Korea what to do. They decide whether there is a loan or not. "We are the only ones who escape!" he added. "There are a lot of difficulties because of the blockade, but we are the only country they can't tell to do something."

Elizabeth Stone is a member of the International Association of Machinists (IAM) in Chicago. Virginia Garza of Los Angeles and Rebecca Arenson of Philadelphia, also a member of the IAM, contributed to this article.  
 
 
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