For the portal tačno.net, Professor Dr. Sci. Zilka Spahić Šiljak, the program director of the TPO Foundation, discussed the significance and manner of celebrating International Women’s Day.
“Working women are not the only ones who suffer due to difficult working conditions and low wages. Nor are male workers faring any better.” (Clara Zetkin)
When March 8 is recognized as International Women’s Day, public responses generally fall into three categories. The first and most common is to celebrate the day by giving flowers and gifts to women without critically addressing the broader issues of women’s roles in family and society. The second type involves activism by various women who use street marches, performances, and educational events to raise awareness about the origins of March 8 and the ongoing threats to women’s rights and the plight of workers worldwide who remain impoverished and underpaid. The third reaction is opposition to the celebration of March 8, often voiced by certain Muslim women and men who argue that Islam guaranteed women equal rights 14 centuries ago, and thus, Muslim women need not commemorate this day. Many are unaware of what March 8 truly represents, viewing it instead as a remnant of socialism and therefore inherently negative. Furthermore, there is a tendency to ignore the fact that many Muslim women live in societies that, while identifying as Islamic, violate Islamic principles and undermine women’s dignity by denying them education, employment, and the opportunity to realize their intellectual and other capacities.
What is March 8?
On this day, we commemorate the achievements in civil, political, and economic rights for women, rights that were arduously fought for and won in America and Western Europe, such as the right to vote, education, work, and equality in marriage and society. The first celebration of this holiday occurred in America in 1908. At the International Conference of Socialist Women in Copenhagen in 1910, German Marxist theorist and activist Clara Zetkin proposed March 8 as the international day for all women demanding their rights and freedoms. Representatives from 17 countries at that conference unanimously adopted the proposal, and by 1911, the day was being celebrated in Germany, Denmark, Austria, and Switzerland. It was also observed in Russia in 1913, and in 1917, thousands of women protested in the streets of St. Petersburg against the famine ravaging the empire. By the end of World War II, women in most Western European countries, including Yugoslavia in 1946, had secured the right to vote.
The United Nations officially recognized March 8 as International Women’s Day in 1975, emphasizing that ensuring peace, prosperity, and the enjoyment of human rights and freedoms requires the active participation of women in all processes, as well as the acknowledgment of their contributions to global peace and security. At the UN, the importance of an inclusive approach and the participation of women in all aspects of civil and political life is recognized. On this day, there is a focus on raising awareness about the extent to which women’s rights, particularly for women workers who perform the most arduous and underpaid jobs, are under threat and how economic violence against women persists.
International Women’s Day is a testament to the struggle for equality and a just society. Socialist women particularly emphasized the rights of workers who labored under inhumane conditions for 14 or more hours with meager wages. Women working as laundresses, midwives, cleaners, cooks, and factory workers faced the harshest conditions and received lower pay than men for similar work.
Following the French Revolution in 1798, women were marginalized, deprived of political assembly, property rights, divorce rights, and child custody. Education was reserved for the privileged few, leaving most women to work on farms and in factories where they were exploited by the emerging industrial capitalist elite. This exploitation galvanized conscious women to push for workers’ rights.
Socialist Flora Tristan, in her work The Workers’ Union (1844), called for class struggle to secure education, an eight-hour workday, and political representation. She advocated for union membership as a means to realize these rights and care for the elderly and sick, demonstrating an ethic of caring for the most vulnerable. Tristan highlighted the exploitation of workers by capitalists, noting that women were hired at lower wages because they could perform tasks faster than men. She warned that capitalists might employ children instead of women and pay them even less, further degrading and impoverishing the working class.
Patriarchy in the family reduced women to mere servants, their role defined by fulfilling men’s needs. Torn between domestic patriarchy and capitalist exploitation, women were often treated as objects rather than individuals with their own destinies. Educated women thus called for solidarity and action against injustice and economic exploitation.
Clara Zetkin and fellow socialist Rosa Luxemburg, a Polish-German Marxist theorist, continued to develop the ideas of class struggle intertwined with gender equality. Their activism underscored the necessity of fighting for women’s equality alongside workers’ rights. They argued that just as men exploit women’s domestic labor, capitalists exploit workers in factories, highlighting the importance of combining these struggles.
March 8 is not just a celebration for women, but for all workers who demand equal labor rights, equal wages for the same jobs, and a fairer society. Reducing March 8 to merely buying flowers distorts its purpose and significance. While flowers are a pleasant gesture, they should not overshadow the ongoing economic exploitation of women in both factories and households, where they perform a large share of unpaid work that remains undervalued.
The Values of March 8
In response to some Muslim women and men who claim their own values within Islamic tradition and dismiss the significance of Western holidays that promote women’s autonomy, it is crucial to reflect on the universal values represented by March 8: dignity, justice, equality, and solidarity. Most people assert the importance of preserving their own dignity and expect respect and fairness from others. However, they often neglect to extend this respect and fairness to others, particularly women, whom they may not see as equal partners in society.
Dignity means recognizing every person’s intrinsic value as a human being, deserving of fundamental rights and freedoms, and respect regardless of identity differences. International human rights documents emphasize that all people are born free and deserving of respect. Thus, dignity is not something earned but inherent from birth. In monotheistic religions, personal dignity is considered a paramount value, as every human is seen as a divine creation deserving respect. Yet, people often misuse this principle to violate others’ dignity in the name of religion, committing injustice, excluding others, and exploiting them. Women frequently face denial of their rights under the guise of religious protection, with restrictions placed on their freedom of movement and action.
Justice is a vital principle in the struggle for women’s and workers’ rights. In Islamic tradition, justice is regarded as a fundamental principle that must be upheld, even at personal cost. The question arises whether social justice can be achieved without gender justice, and whether fairness is possible if women, workers, and other marginalized groups are treated unfairly. Are there different standards of justice for men and women, the rich and the poor? Observing many societies that claim religious foundations, it is evident that women’s voices are often silenced, and those who dare to speak out face sanctions, imprisonment, or even death.
Women who fought for civil and political rights sought respect as human beings, including the right to education, work, fair wages, and the freedom to make decisions about their lives and participate in societal affairs. During the suffragette movement, the idea of women voting was considered contrary to women’s dignity, as it was believed that a woman’s nature and purpose, according to religious doctrine, were limited to being a wife and mother. However, when the industrial revolution demanded more labor, it was overlooked that it was unjust and undignified for women to work 16-hour days in factories for less pay than men.
Economic Exploitation of Women Today
Despite advancements in women’s rights, many still face severe economic hardship. Women own only 1 percent of the world’s wealth and inherit property less equitably than men. Only 5 percent lead major global companies, and they earn 19 percent less than men for the same work.
In Bosnia and Herzegovina and other countries, workers often earn minimum wages, lack job security and pensions, and lose jobs due to privatization abuses. Many service industry workers, including cashiers, are economically marginalized. Women frequently face low wages, unpaid overtime, mobbing, and gender-based violence. They may hide pregnancies or marriage plans to avoid job discrimination and often face dismissal if they take legal parental leave. Maternity benefits are not universally available or equal across cantons.
Despite these pressures, women are expected to bear children without adequate state or spousal support, often receiving moralistic advice rather than practical help. Some are told they should stay home and raise children, without consideration for their financial need or the domestic abuse they might face. When they speak out, they are stigmatized, while perpetrators remain respected figures in society.
Today, in many countries across Asia, Africa, and Latin America, there is severe exploitation of women and children. Children work in factories for large corporations for just one dollar a day, as their small hands are suited for assembling tiny parts in various devices. Women are often subjected to the most grueling jobs and are frequently forced into prostitution. When women from Bangladesh and other impoverished Asian countries migrate to wealthier Middle Eastern countries for work, their documents are frequently confiscated, and they are coerced into providing sexual favors in addition to performing domestic duties. They are trapped, unable to escape due to their lack of documentation and the knowledge that their impoverished families rely on every penny they send home.
Women find themselves ensnared in a trap: on one side is corporate capitalism, which extracts surplus value by exploiting the most vulnerable—namely, women and children—and on the other side is patriarchy, where a significant number of women are objectified and reduced to commodities controlled by men and families.
Moreover, it is deeply dishonest to praise how Islam has addressed the issue of women or to moralize about what a “true woman” should be—confined to the home and focused solely on raising children while shunning the celebration of March 8. Although Islam offers guidance and ethical norms of justice, mercy, and concern for others, many Muslims have neglected these principles. Instead of fostering gender justice, they marginalize women; instead of promoting economic well-being and ethical behavior, they exploit workers like any other capitalist, and then contribute part of their earnings to charity to soothe their consciences and earn spiritual merit. However, without fair treatment—such as appropriate wages and respectful working conditions—no amount of charity or donations can substitute for the fundamental respect and rights that every worker deserves. The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) instructed employers to pay workers before their sweat dried, yet many workers face exploitation until their very lives are drained, while March 8 is wrongly blamed for the failings of greedy capitalists and hypocritical believers who are more concerned with outward displays of faith than with addressing the real suffering of the impoverished and exploited.
Resistance to March 8th stems from societal structures that cannot accept the deconstruction of gender stereotypes that deny women their full humanity. To truly recognize women as people in the fullest sense, it is crucial to dismantle patriarchal and androcentric power structures and to act emancipatorily for the benefit of both women and men, and all workers.
Happy March 8th—the day dedicated to the fight for women’s and workers’ rights!
