Canadian Voice of Women for Peace

Last updated

Canadian Voice of Women for Peace, also known as the Voice of Women or VOW, is a Canadian anti-nuclear pacifist organization that was formed in 1960. The organization was created in response to an article in which Lotta Dempsey, a journalist for the Toronto Star , called out for action against the threat of nuclear war and asked women to work together for peace. [1] After the article was published, a group of women contacted Dempsey and formed a women's organization called the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace. [1] The organization's work has spanned multiple decades and is Canada's oldest feminist peace group. [2] [3]

Contents

Historical background

Peace activism expanded throughout much of North America during the mid to late twentieth century due to the controversies and violence surrounding the Cold War and Vietnam War. [4] In particular, many Canadian women resisted and opposed these two political wars. [4] [5] To fight against the expansion of nuclear power and weapons during this era, the number of women-led Canadian pacifist organizations increased substantially. [2] [3] Specifically, many Canadian women questioned the potential environmental and health impacts resulting from nuclear warfare. [5]

Membership

The Canadian Voice of Women for Peace grew to six thousand members shortly after its formation in 1960. [1] Originally, women joined the organization to combat the proliferation of nuclear technologies during the Cold War. [2] However, as the membership quickly increased throughout the country, the organization participated in multiple forms of anti-war activism. [2] Many women who joined the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace participated in disarmament efforts, politics and social justice work within their respective communities. [6] Throughout its first few months of activism, the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace quickly became one of the largest Canadian peace movement organizations. [2] [6]

Prominent women associated with the VOW include Beatrice Ferneyhough, [7] Thérèse Casgrain, Ursula Franklin, Grace Hartman, and Kay Macpherson.

Structure

The organizational structure of the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace has historically been based on a feminist approach of building and promoting peaceful cultures. [3] To accommodate the large membership across the country, the VOW has branches in multiple major Canadian cities. [3] Throughout the years, the advocacy work of each branch has been organized by the National Central Committee (NCC). [6] The NCC is the VOW's governing body that maintains the organization's feminist goals and creates different peace-building advocacies throughout the country. [6] The NCC also connects the activism, campaigns, and projects of each VOW branch to one another. [6]

Activism

Campaigns

The Canadian Voice of Women for Peace organized several campaigns throughout the Cold War and Vietnam War. During the Cold War, the organization collected baby teeth in North America and demonstrated that they contained high amounts of strontium-90. [1] [8] Led by member and research physicist Ursula Franklin, the campaign showcased the dangerous effects of nuclear weapons and radioactive materials within the atmosphere. [9] By presenting the reported increased levels of strontium-90 in baby teeth throughout the continent, the VOW pressured the Canadian federal government to promote a Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. [1] [8] [9] During the Vietnam War, the organization developed a knitting campaign to help Vietnamese children living in conflict zones. [2]   Ontario VOW branch member Lil Greene led over 500 women to knit camouflaged clothing pieces for Vietnamese children. [2] This campaign addressed the dangerous living conditions and survival tactics of Vietnamese children during the Vietnam War. [2]

The Canadian Voice of Women for Peace's campaigns have influenced other women to form their own peace organizations in countries such as New Zealand, Scotland, the United Kingdom and the United States. [2] The VOW's activism has most commonly been associated with the United States grassroots organization Women Strike for Peace (WSP). [2] Although the WSP was a larger organization that focused more on demonstrative activism in comparison to the VOW, the two feminist organizations shared similar goals and collaborated at national and international peace conferences. [2] Specifically, several WSP members were inspired to join the VOW's knitting campaign as they also opposed the Vietnam War. [2] Until the WSP's disbandment in 1975, the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace maintained a close relationship with the United States anti-war feminist organization. [2]

United Nations

Since its formation in 1960, the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace has worked with the United Nations. [9] The organization held an International Conference of Women in 1962 where members came up with ways to fight against the threat of nuclear war. [10] [11] From this peace conference, the VOW requested that the United Nations create an International Year of Peace. [11] Throughout the mid to late twentieth century, the VOW attended and participated in several United Nations conferences aimed at peace and conflict resolution. [11] Most recently, the United Nations 2000 adoption of the Security Council Resolution 1325 on women, peace, and security was successfully approved due to the work of VOW and other international peace groups. [9] [11] This resolution acknowledged the protection of women and girls in conflict areas and also called for a gendered perspective on peace and security issues. [9]

The Canadian Voice of Women for Peace is a recognized non-governmental organization within the United Nations and is associated with the Department of Public Information and the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). [3] The VOW also currently holds consultative status within ECOSOC. [9]

Current activism

The Canadian Voice of Women for Peace's activism currently focuses on issues relating to climate change, fighter jets and sustainability. [3] The organization argues against military-industrial government spending and advocates for the dissolution of NATO. [3]

The VOW is a group representative on the Canadian federal government's Consultative Group on Disarmament and Arms Control and the National Action Committee on the Status of Women. [9]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nuclear disarmament</span> Act of eliminating nuclear weapons

Nuclear disarmament is the act of reducing or eliminating nuclear weapons. Its end state can also be a nuclear-weapons-free world, in which nuclear weapons are completely eliminated. The term denuclearization is also used to describe the process leading to complete nuclear disarmament.

The War Resisters League (WRL) is the oldest secular pacifist organization in the United States. The organization is celebrating its centennial from the founding date of October 19 into 2024.

Peace Action is a peace organization whose focus is on preventing the deployment of nuclear weapons in space, thwarting weapons sales to countries with human rights violations, and promoting a new United States foreign policy based on common security and peaceful resolution to international conflicts.

The International Fellowship of Reconciliation (IFOR) is a non-governmental organization founded in 1914 in response to the horrors of war in Europe. Today IFOR counts 71 branches, groups and affiliates in 48 countries on all continents. IFOR members promote nonviolence, human rights and reconciliation through public education efforts, training programs and campaigns. The IFOR International Secretariat in Utrecht, Netherlands facilitates communication among IFOR members, links branches to capacity building resources, provides training in gender-sensitive nonviolence through the Women Peacemakers Program, and helps coordinate international campaigns, delegations and urgent actions. IFOR has ECOSOC status at the United Nations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War</span> 1965–1973 anti-war movement

Opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War began with demonstrations in 1965 against the escalating role of the United States in the Vietnam War and grew into a broad social movement over the ensuing several years. This movement informed and helped shape the vigorous and polarizing debate, primarily in the United States, during the second half of the 1960s and early 1970s on how to end the Vietnam War.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Women's International League for Peace and Freedom</span> Civil society organization

The Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) is a non-profit non-governmental organization working "to bring together women of different political views and philosophical and religious backgrounds determined to study and make known the causes of war and work for a permanent peace" and to unite women worldwide who oppose oppression and exploitation. WILPF has national sections in 37 countries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Veterans for Peace</span>

Veterans for Peace is an organization founded in 1985. Initially made up of US military veterans of World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, the War in Afghanistan and the Iraq War, and as well as peacetime veterans and non-veterans, it has since spread overseas and has an active offshoot in the United Kingdom. The group works to promote alternatives to war.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cold War (1962–1979)</span> Phase of the Cold War

The Cold War (1962–1979) refers to the phase within the Cold War that spanned the period between the aftermath of the Cuban Missile Crisis in late October 1962, through the détente period beginning in 1969, to the end of détente in the late 1970s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Women Strike for Peace</span>

Women Strike for Peace was a women's peace activist group in the United States. In 1961, nearing the height of the Cold War, around 50,000 women marched in 60 cities around the United States to demonstrate against the testing of nuclear weapons. It was the largest national women's peace protest during the 20th century. Another group action was led by Dagmar Wilson, with about 1,500 women gathering at the foot of the Washington Monument while President John F. Kennedy watched from the White House. The protest helped "push the United States and the Soviet Union into signing a nuclear test-ban treaty two years later". Reflecting the era in which the group's leaders had been raised, between the First-wave feminism and the Second-wave feminism movements, their actions and pleas leaned towards female self-sacrifice rather than towards their own self-interests. However, they pushed the power of a concerned mother to the forefront of American politics, transforming the mother from a "passive victim of war to active fighter for peace".

Anti-nuclear organizations may oppose uranium mining, nuclear power, and/or nuclear weapons. Anti-nuclear groups have undertaken public protests and acts of civil disobedience which have included occupations of nuclear plant sites. Some of the most influential groups in the anti-nuclear movement have had members who were elite scientists, including several Nobel Laureates and many nuclear physicists.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peace movement</span> Social movement against a particular war or wars

A peace movement is a social movement which seeks to achieve ideals such as the ending of a particular war or minimizing inter-human violence in a particular place or situation. They are often linked to the goal of achieving world peace. Some of the methods used to achieve these goals include advocacy of pacifism, nonviolent resistance, diplomacy, boycotts, peace camps, ethical consumerism, supporting anti-war political candidates, supporting legislation to remove profits from government contracts to the military–industrial complex, banning guns, creating tools for open government and transparency, direct democracy, supporting whistleblowers who expose war crimes or conspiracies to create wars, demonstrations, and political lobbying. The political cooperative is an example of an organization which seeks to merge all peace-movement and green organizations; they may have diverse goals, but have the common ideal of peace and humane sustainability. A concern of some peace activists is the challenge of attaining peace when those against peace often use violence as their means of communication and empowerment.

The Nova Scotia Voice of Women for Peace (NSVOW) is an active branch of the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace (VOW). Established in 1960, VOW is a local, national and international feminist Non Governmental Organization (NGO) composed of diverse women with consultative status at the United Nations Economic & Social Council (ECOSOC). For almost 50 years, VOW has advocated a world without war. The organization's mandate is to "provide a means for women to promote world peace and justice, through education of themselves and others to take an equal part in the democratic process of decision making; and to cooperate with women throughout the world to create the mutual respect and understanding necessary for the peaceful resolution of international conflict."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of the anti-nuclear movement</span>

The application of nuclear technology, both as a source of energy and as an instrument of war, has been controversial.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Women's International Democratic Federation</span> International womens rights organization

The Women's International Democratic Federation (WIDF) is an international women's rights organization. Established in 1945, it was most active during the Cold War when, according to historian Francisca de Haan, it was "the largest and probably most influential international women's organization of the post-1945 era". Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, its headquarters were moved from Berlin to Paris. In 2002, with the election of Márcia Campos as president, the office relocated to Brasília. Subsequently, in 2007 the WIDF secretariat was located in São Paulo. Since 2016, the president has been Lorena Peña of El Salvador. The WIDF's magazine, Women of the Whole World, was published in six languages: Arabic, English, French, German, Russian, and Spanish.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anti-war movement</span> Social movement opposed to a nations status of armed conflict

An anti-war movement is a social movement, usually in opposition to a particular nation's decision to start or carry on an armed conflict. The term anti-war can also refer to pacifism, which is the opposition to all use of military force during conflicts, or to anti-war books, paintings, and other works of art. Some activists distinguish between anti-war movements and peace movements. Anti-war activists work through protest and other grassroots means to attempt to pressure a government to put an end to a particular war or conflict or to prevent it in advance.

The Vancouver Indochinese Women's Conference (VICWC) took place in April 1971, where close to a thousand women from Canada and the United States met with Indochinese women in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada in a protest of the Vietnam War organized by the Voice of Women. There was also a sister conference in Toronto, held from April 9 to 11, 1971. These women came from various backgrounds and cultures; black Chicana/Latina, white, and Indochinese women all participated. This conference was a spinoff from an earlier and smaller Indochinese feminist conference which was held in 1967 to give voice to marginalized women.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament</span> British organisation advocating unilateral nuclear disarmament

The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) is an organisation that advocates unilateral nuclear disarmament by the United Kingdom, international nuclear disarmament and tighter international arms regulation through agreements such as the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It opposes military action that may result in the use of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons, and the building of nuclear power stations in the UK.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nuclear Weapons Free Zones in Canada</span>

In international law, Nuclear Weapons Free Zones are areas in which a group of states has prohibited the presence of nuclear weapons, according to criteria set and recognized by the United Nations. On the international level, Canada is not a part of any Nuclear Weapon Free Zone as defined by the United Nations. Canada is a signatory of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation on Nuclear Weapons, a statute that has similar aims to those of NWFZs and even encourages the establishment of multinational NWFZs, but is not directly comparable. However, certain areas within Canada have voluntarily designated themselves as Nuclear Free Zones (NFZs) or Nuclear Weapons Free Zones (NWFZs). Generally, these nuclear weapons free zones and nuclear free zones are codified within Municipal and Provincial jurisdictions.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 "About Us – Canadian Voice of Women for Peace" . Retrieved April 12, 2012.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Early, Frances (2009). "Re-imaging War: The Voice of Women, the Canadian Aid for Vietnamese Children, 1966–1976". Peace and Change: A Journal of Peace Research . 34 (2): 148–163.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Vow Herstory". vowpeace.org. Archived from the original on November 21, 2021. Retrieved November 19, 2021.
  4. 1 2 Hagan, John (2001). "Cause and Country: The Politics of Ambivalence and the American Vietnam War Resistance in Canada". Social Problems . 48 (2): 168–184.
  5. 1 2 Brookfield, Tarah (2012). Cold War Comforts: Canadian Women, Child Safety, and Global Insecurity, 1945–1975. Wilfrid Laurier University Press. pp. 1–20.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 Grady, Sylvia. "Voice of Women (VOW) – Rise Up! Feminist Digital Archive". riseupfeministarchive.ca. Archived from the original on April 11, 2018. Retrieved November 21, 2021.
  7. ↑ "Women's Education Des Femmes – Spring −1994 -Vol. 11 – No.1 – Page – 57". en.copian.ca. Retrieved March 23, 2022.
  8. 1 2 Prentice, Alison (1998). Canadian Women: A History. Toronto: Harcourt Brace.
  9. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Macpherson, Kay, and Tabitha Marshall. "Canadian Voice of Women for Peace | The Canadian Encyclopedia". www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca. Archived from the original on March 19, 2015. Retrieved November 21, 2021.
  10. ↑ "Peace Magazine Archive – Voice of Women for Peace" . Retrieved April 12, 2012.
  11. 1 2 3 4 Alton, Janis (2002). "We've Come a Long Way: Engendering Peace-building and the New Diplomacy (Voice of Women for Peace)". Canadian Women Studies . 22 (22): 72.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.