Abstract
By 1975, all the major legal hurdles to women’s equal citizenship with men had been overcome. They had equal political rights. They had gained major revisions to the Civil Code. Access to contraception and the legalisation of abortion made it possible to control childbearing, ending prohibitions that had seriously impeded women’s participation in public life. Women were free to assume their full rights as citizens alongside men. Yet the proportion of women in the National Assembly remained one of the lowest in Europe, and the numbers of women in government ministries and the upper echelons of the bureaucracy also remained small: theoretical equality did not translate readily into ‘real’ equality of power between the sexes.
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Suggestions for Further Reading
Gregory, A. and U. Tidd (eds) Women in Contemporary France (Oxford and New York: Berg, 2000).
Haase-Dubosc, D. ‘Sexual Difference and Politics in France Today’, Feminist Studies (Spring, 1999), available at http://www.findarticles.com, accessed 8 January 2004.
Mayer, N. and M. Sineau, ‘III: France: The Front National,’ in H. Amsberger and B. Halbmayre (eds), Rechtsextreme Parteien (forthcoming Leverkusen: Leske & Budrich, 2002), pp. 42–103; http://elections2002.sciences-po.fr/Enjeux/enjeux.html, from link ‘Women and the National Front/Le Front National et les femmes’, accessed Sunday, 2 March 2003.
Ramsey, R. L. French Women in Politics: Writing Power, Paternal Legitimization, and Maternal Legacies (New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2003).
Reynolds, S. ‘The French Ministry of Women’s Rights 1981–86: Modernisation or Marginalisation?’, in J. Gaffney (ed.) France and Modernisation (Aldershot: Avebury, 1988).
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Todd, E. The Making of Modern France: Politics, Ideology and Culture, trans. A. and B. Forster (London: Basil Blackwell, 1991).
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© 2004 Susan K. Foley
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Foley, S.K. (2004). The Politics of ‘Women’s Place’ since 1975. In: Women in France since 1789. European Studies Series. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-230-80214-8_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-230-80214-8_11
Publisher Name: Palgrave, London
Print ISBN: 978-0-333-61993-3
Online ISBN: 978-0-230-80214-8
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