The National Council of Women鈥檚 Organizations and Coalition Advocacy
By Laura R. Woliver (PolSci鈥�75; MS鈥�77)
(Temple University Press, 234 pages; 2018)
The coalition known as the National Council of Women鈥檚 Organizations no longer exists today, but the history and the lessons learned from the NCWO鈥檚 activism remain as important as ever鈥攑erhaps even more so in this age of Trump. Laura Woliver spent 15 years doing fieldwork and conducting research and interviews to understand how the NCWO coalition group functioned. The result is her impressive study, Push Back, Move Forward.
Woliver explores the foundational work of the NCWO and member groups to promote women鈥檚 economic security, citizen status, and political rights. She investigates women鈥檚 access to previously 鈥渕ale only鈥� organizations, such as private clubs; the increase in voter participation generated by measures such as early voting; advocacy campaigns for such benefit programs as Social Security and the Affordable Care Act; and global human and women鈥檚 rights activism. In addition, she examines the accomplishments of women of color, both alongside and within the NCWO, who orient their politics toward achieving justice and attaining rights. 听
Push Back, Move Forward artfully documents this important group鈥檚 activities while also gleaning larger lessons about coalition organizations. Woliver is a Professor of Political Science and Gender & Women鈥檚 Studies at the University of South Carolina. She is the author of From Outrage to Action: The Politics of Grass-Roots Dissent and The Political Geographies of Pregnancy.