Rigsdagstidende

Prostitutionen og grundloven

Protecting Women

Enacted in almost every industrial country a century ago, protective legislation directed toward women provoked bitter controversy, pitting men against women, women against women, and elected officials against political parties. Strong conflicts arose over what constituted 'protection.' Does this kind of legislation help preserve women's capacities to mother, or is it intended to preserve men's jobs? Does protective legislation help achieve workplace equality? Does it give the state the right to intrude into private family life and, if so, how far? In this international collection, thirteen historians explore the origin and array of protective labor legislation directed at women. The authors analyze ideologies, attitudes, and effects of legislation across women's classes, among employers and workers' organizations, and in both bourgeois and socialist feminist groups. Their essays raise profoundly disturbing questions and provide startling insights as to why the debates that originated more than a hundred years ago are still unresolved. The contributors are from Australia, Austria, Denmark, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States.

Caught in the Middle

The essays in this collection cover not only multiple countries, but also multiple aspects of the concept of neutrality: political, economic, cultural and legal. These case studies have led to a re-evaluation of the notion of neutrality, and the role of neutrals, during the First World War, making this collection of great value to all scholars of neutrality, the history of individual neutral countries, and of the war itself.