Radical sex role ideology and the Finnish gender role movement in the late 1960s

This is a self-archived version of an original article. This version may differ from the original in pagination and typographic details. Author(s): Title: Year: Version: Copyright: Rights: Rights url: Please cite the original version: CC BY 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Radical sex role ideology and the Finnish gender role movement in the late 1960s © 2022 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group Published version Kurvinen, Heidi; Turunen, Arja Kurvinen, H., & Turunen, A. (2023). Radical sex role ideology and the Finnish gender role movement in the late 1960s. Women's History Review, 32(1), 62-81. https://doi.org/10.1080/09612025.2022.2092270 2023 Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=rwhr20 Women's History Review ISSN: (Print) (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rwhr20 Radical sex role ideology and the Finnish gender role movement in the late 1960s Heidi Kurvinen & Arja Turunen To cite this article: Heidi Kurvinen & Arja Turunen (2022): Radical sex role ideology and the Finnish gender role movement in the late 1960s, Women's History Review, DOI: 10.1080/09612025.2022.2092270 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/09612025.2022.2092270 © 2022 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group Published online: 11 Jul 2022. Submit your article to this journal View related articles View Crossmark data Radical sex role ideology and the Finnish gender role movement in the late 1960s Heidi Kurvinen a and Arja Turunen b a Turku Institute for Advanced Studies, University of Turku, Turku, Finland; b Department of History and Ethnology, University of Jyväskylä, Jyväskylä, Finland ABSTRACT An active discussion of gender roles and the need to renegotiate them took place in the late 1960s in Finland. While previous studies have associated this ‘sex role debate’with the independent civic organisation Association 9, this article focuses on the wider gender role movement. The article analyses the interplay and differences among the Finnish Women’s Democratic League, the Committee for Women’s Status, and Association 9’s grassroots activism between 1965 and 1970. It demonstrates that similar ideas about sex roles were presented simultaneously in two public spheres: the dominant public, where the ideas were promoted by Association 9, and the people’s democratic counterpublic, which presented the goals of the Finnish Women’s Democratic League. Both discussions also influenced the work of the Committee for Women’s Status in Finland. These organisations had divergent modes of action, ranging from a civic association to party political organisation and parliamentary committee, but the theoretical premises of their conceptualisations of gendered societal structures had clear similarities. We show this by drawing on the archives of Association 9 and the Finnish Women’s Democratic League, including original documents such as minutes of meetings and newspaper and magazine clippings, and the Committee for Women’s Status’s White Paper. KEYWORDS radical sex role ideology; gender role movement; public sphere; 1960s; Finland Introduction Nordic countries have been pioneers in gender equality and changes that are seen as distinctive accomplishments of the second-wave feminist movement were being implemented also in Finland in the early 1970s. These included the liberalisation of abortion that was an important goal for both the American and West-European feminist movement and the provision of affordable day care for small children that was a central aim especially in the Nordic countries. However, these accomplishments did not arise in the first instance from feminist ideology, but rather from the so-called sex role ideology and debate typical for the Nordic countries at this time. A change in © 2022 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. CONTACT Heidi Kurvinen heidi.kurvinen@utu.fi WOMEN’S HISTORY REVIEW https://doi.org/10.1080/09612025.2022.2092270 attitudes was promoted by the participants in this debate, who used the term ‘sex role’ instead of ‘woman question’or ‘feminism’in order to stress that women’s and men’s roles were social constructions, and that men’s roles, too, needed to be problematised. 1 They specifically criticised the idea that women and men had two distinct roles, with man as breadwinner and woman as mother. They argued that this separation of roles was a result of socialisation, not based on biological or psychological facts, and therefore women’s and men’s roles should be changed so that they both would be equally responsible for supporting the family and taking care of the children. 2 In Sweden and Finland in particular, several actors including academics, journalists, political parties, and other organisations adopted and promoted the new gender ideology at different levels of society, making important contributions to the institutionalisation of gender equality policy. 3 The debate also led to the establishment of the distinctive sex role associations Group 222 (Grupp 222) in Sweden and Association 9 (Yhdistys 9) in Finland. Previous studies of the Finnish sex role discussion have focused on Association 9, a non-governmental organisation that was active between 1966 and 1971. Scholars have viewed it as the main proponent of the radical sex role ideology, although it has been noted that the wider sex role movement included the radical left Finnish Women’s Democratic League (Suomen Naisten Demokraattinen Liitto, SNDL), the women’s and youth associations of other political parties, and the Finnish Committee for Women’s Status, which was active during 1966–70. 4 This article offers a fresh analysis of the interplay and differences between parliamentary and extra-parliamentary activism within the SNDL, the Committee for Women’s Status, and the grassroots activism of Association 9 in the promotion of gender equality in Finland between 1965 and 1970. While we acknowledge Association 9’s centrality to the Finnish sex role discussion, we complicate existing understandings of that discussion by analysing how the SNDL, a party-political women’s organisation of the radical left, adopted contemporaneously a radical sex role ideology into its political agenda, and how that ideology was also present in the White Paper published by the Committee for Women’s Status in 1970. In parallel with female labour activists in the US, participants in the Finnish sex role movement did not call themselves feminists. Nevertheless, in this article we treat the 1960s sex role ideology as a part of feminist history. This is because we understand feminism as activism that recognises the existence of gender-specific subordination or discrimination against women, which questions the legitimacy of the present gender order. 5 This article thus follows recent studies that have argued for more inclusive conceptualisations of feminist agendas and participation, and which have demonstrated that the women’s rights movement of the 1960s and 1970s included working women and had links to party political activism. 6 Although politically active women in left-wing parties in particular avoided calling themselves feminists –they regarded feminism as a right-wing ideology –they shared many ideas about women’s oppression and liberation. Furthermore, feminist ideology and practices were developed through contact with politically active women in the New Left. 7 Read within this context, we argue that the SNDL did not simply adopt the sex role ideology developed by Association 9, but also debated it with the radical left and formulated its own version of sex role ideology, which corresponded with party political lines. Additionally, we critically review the relationships among Association 9, the SNDL, and the Committee for Women’s Status. Previous literature has claimed that SNDL members were critical of Association 9’s ideas, which 2H. KURVINEN AND A. TURUNEN they viewed as too conceptual and distant from working women’s everyday lives, and that the SNDL therefore had more practical goals. 8 Contrary to this interpretation, our article demonstrates that alongside this practical emphasis, the SNDL’s adaptation of sex role ideology was rooted in a sociological understanding of sex roles combined with a socialist understanding of class struggle. Both strands of thought were also present in the Committee for Women’s Status’s White Paper, which can be seen as a compromise among the viewpoints of all the parties involved in the committee. Our interest here is in observing the late 1960s discussion of women’s status and gender as a multi-sited process in which the ideas behind the radical sex role ideology were presented, elaborated, and negotiated in different public spheres. The three actors considered in this article offer slightly different viewpoints onto this process, but when analysed alongside each other they provide a sophisticated understanding. We also take account of the dialogue among the three organisations. 9 Our multi-sited approach is complemented by insights from previous research on Swedish sex role activism. While we do not make direct comparisons between the Finnish and Swedish sex role movements, scholarship on the Swedish movement has encouraged us to look beyond the hegemonic narrative regarding sex role activism in Finland. 10 This article does not focus on the sex role debate that took place in the mainstream Finnish media. 11 Instead, we focus on internal discussions within the SNDL and Association 9, and on those organisations’contributions to the public debate, in order to analyse their understanding of sex roles. Using archival sources from Association 9 and the SNDL as well as the White Paper of the Committee for Women’s Status, we ask how and to what extent radical sex role ideology was adopted by the SNDL. What were the similarities and differences among the aims and proposals presented by Association 9, the SNDL, and the committee? How were the ideas of Association 9 and the SNDL actualised in the White Paper? In answering these questions, we draw on the insights of media scholar Kaarina Nikunen into the public sphere as ‘a constructed societal space in which citizens have the opportunity to discuss questions in which they share a common interest’. 12 According to this definition, the media plays a central role in maintaining the public sphere, but public discussions also take place in other arenas. 13 Additionally, our analysis is connected to feminist critiques of Jürgen Habermas’s theory of the public sphere, which introduced the idea of counterpublics. For instance, political scientist Nancy Fraser has argued that alongside the dominant public, there also exist several counterpublics. 14 In late 1960s Finland, the foundations for the new gender equality policies were laid through parliamentary committee work; but as we will show, the sex role ideology was formulated through a public discussion comprising a dominant public and a people’s democratic counterpublic, 15 the latter serving as an arena for internal discussion within the radical left (the SNDL included). 16 Entanglements between Association 9 and the SNDL Finland’s geographical location –between the Soviet Union and liberal Sweden –represents an important context for the development of gender equality and feminism in the country during the Cold War period. Although Finland’s cultural radicalisation produced a number of ‘single-issue movements’, including Association 9, the political parties and official state apparatus remained central to the mental landscape of Finnish society. Unlike in many WOMEN’S HISTORY REVIEW 3 other countries, radicalisation in Finland channelled itself first and foremost through a politicisation that polarised society, giving the extreme end of communism increasing momentum from the early 1970s onwards. Nevertheless, for a brief period during the late 1960s, the culturally radical groups that represented the New Left contributed to societal discussions side by side with party political organisations, especially left-wing organisations. 17 The Finnish sex role debate, specifically, was initiated by articles by Margaretha Mickwitz and Ritva Turunen. These articles were published in the Finnish-Swedish newspaper Nya Pressen (Mickwitz) and the Finnish-language newspaper Uusi Suomi (Turunen) in autumn 1965. 18 Inspired by theories emanating from Sweden and America, they launched a lively discussion of the topic in the Finnish media. In November 1965, Mickwitz and Turunen joined Group 9 (Ryhmä 9), an informal group whose purpose was to set up an official association to promote radical sex role ideology in Finland. Established in February 1966, Association 9 was formed as a civic organisation with a relatively loose structure. 19 In the association’sfirst year, members totalled around 250 in Helsinki; membership had risen to nearly 800 by 1970, when the decision was taken to wind up the association. 20 Association 9 aimed to transform society so that gender-based divisions would cease to exist in all the spheres where they were unnecessary. 21 One of the main aims of Association 9 was to attract publicity in order to gain a larger audience for its agenda, educate people about radical sex role ideology, and influence political parties and political decision-making. 22 To achieve this aim, various members of Association 9 actively participated in public discussions of sex roles, both in print media and on radio and television. Alongside its media appearances, the association promoted its ideas through seminars and demonstrations, as well as issuing statements and publishing research reports and other publications. 23 Thus, the question of sex roles was in the air in general, and as a result, 60–80 per cent of Finnish people followed the public debate about the association’s goals and actions. 24 This public debate was matched by a political process in 1966, when the Finnish government appointed a specific organ, the Committee for Women’s Status, to discuss and find solutions to improve women’s position in society. The committee consisted of representatives from all the political parties, including the SNDL, and civic organisations such as Association 9; it published its White Paper in 1970. The White Paper was a result of negotiations between all the participating actors, and it encouraged active policies with regard to gender equality. 25 By ‘sex role’, Association 9 meant all expectations, norms, and values regarding a person as either a man or a woman. 26 Association 9 criticised the strict division of men’s and women’s roles into two separate spheres. They demanded that both women and men should play two roles –breadwinner and parent –which in turn also meant that both sexes should have equal rights, opportunities, and responsibilities at work, at home, in the family, and in sexuality. 27 In this respect, the concerns of Association 9’s members resembled those of women on the British radical left during the late 1960s. The radical left intellectuals of the day, and later activists in the UK feminist movement such as Sheila Rowbotham, argued that there was a need not just for the new woman, but also for the new man. 28 For them, the women’s liberation movement offered a channel for this. In contrast Association 9 combined grassroots activism with parliamentary methods, and provided a platform for women and men to collaborate. The SNDL was a party political women’s organisation, and large by comparison with Association 9. Established in 1944, it was a successor to the working women’s organising 4H. KURVINEN AND A. TURUNEN of the late nineteenth century and unlike Association 9 the SNDL represented the Old Left. 29 It supported the Finnish People’s Democratic League (Suomen Kansan Demokraattinen Liitto, SKDL), a coalition of left-wing parties established in 1944. 30 In the late 1960s, the SNDL had between 16,000 and 17,000 individual women members; if we also include its organisational members, the SNDL’s activities reached approximately 35,000 Finnish women. 31 The majority of these women had communist sympathies, and this influenced the SNDL’s activities, the central aim of which was to enhance the political power of the SKDL. 32 However, the SNDL also sought to reach women beyond its own political circle, which it did by publishing the women’s magazine Uusi Nainen.In 1966 the organisation also launched an internal magazine, Pippuri, which aimed to offer guidance to SNDL members. 33 Since the late 1940s the SNDL had striven to improve women’s status by focusing on issues such as equal pay and paid maternity leave. 34 However, by the mid-1960s, SNDL members had realised that their party’s everyday politics did not promote equal treatment of the genders in practice, even though the Finnish radical left had embraced the socialist gender system, which in theory included gender equality in party politics. 35 At the same time, the growing debate on sex roles in the Finnish mainstream media prompted the organisation to problematise women’s status with the help of the concept of sex roles. 36 As a result, the SNDL’s general assembly agreed on the need to take a stance on the woman question at its eighth meeting in November 1965, which was supported by the SNDL’s national commission composed of representatives of regional committees (from now on we refer to this organisational body as the commission). Consequently, a committee was set up at the beginning of 1966 to prepare a programme entitled For Women’s Liberation (Naisen vapauttamiseksi), a name later changed to Woman, Man, Democracy (Nainen, mies, demokratia). The purpose of the programme was to map out women’s status in the society and to present the SNDL’s solutions to the prevailing problems. 37 During the spring of 1966, the discussion of sex roles appeared in various forums in the Finnish public sphere, and local chapters of the SNDL also made their own contributions. 38 For instance, a discussion event on women’s roles was organised at the People’s House in Lahti in March 1966. Based around Kansan Uutiset, Finland’s leading radical left newspaper, the event attracted approximately 200 participants. 39 At the same time, the SNDL’s committee for women’s liberation held internal discussions of the sex role ideology; these discussions resulted in a draft programme, which was widely discussed at various local events and in people’s democratic newspapers after its release on 8 March 1967. 40 A year later, a seminar concerning the programme was organised in connection with the general assembly of June 1968, leading to the programme’s approval 41 and the publication of its material manifestation, i.e. a printed leaflet entitled Woman, Man, Democracy, in October 1968. According to a press release, the leaflet was based on feedback from over 1,000 local discussion events with a total of 35,000 participants. 42 Thus, the question of sex roles was widely problematised within the people’s democratic counterpublic between 1966 and 1968. The discussion was initiated by the official organs of the SNDL, but from spring 1966 onwards the understanding of sex roles was also negotiated in gatherings and seminars throughout the country, and in media texts. WOMEN’S HISTORY REVIEW 5 The two-year process towards the Woman, Man, Democracy programme coincided with the public debate promoted by Association 9. The informal Group 9 was established at the same time as the SNDL’s general assembly of 1965. Furthermore, the main publications of both organisations –Association 9’s pamphlet Harmful Laws of Men’s World (Miesten mailman nurjat lait) and the SNDL’s leaflet Women, Man, Democracy –were released in autumn 1968. A key person connecting the Association 9-led sex role debate and the SNDL’s process towards the Woman, Man, Democracy programme was Kati Peltola: a founding member of Association 9, Peltola was also a serving local politician with the SKDL, i.e. the political party behind the SNDL. 43 Association 9’s core group also included Brita Polttila, a writer who had previously worked on Vapaa Sana, a newspaper owned by the SKDL. More formal ties existed between the organisations too. Association 9 seems to have invited members of the SNDL to join its constitutive meeting in early 1966. 44 The establishment of the association was also reported prominently in Kansan Uutiset. 45 Later that year, the SNDL’s committee for women’s liberation decided to invite Peltola to a meeting to describe the work done by Association 9. 46 The governmental Committee for Women’s Status was another point of contact between the SNDL and Association 9: Irma Rosnell (SNDL), Inkeri Anttila (Association 9), and Jutta Zilliacus (Association 9) participated in its work, Anttila as a professor of criminology and Zilliacus as a journalist. The association’sinfluence was particularly significant because the committee drew on the expertise of sociologist Klaus Mäkelä, journalist Ritva-Liisa Sumu, and architect Kirsti Nordin, all of whom were active members of Association 9 and made an impact on its working groups that focused on juridical questions, childrearing and housing. The committee’s secretaries, Anneli Kuusi and Leila Räsänen, were also association members. 47 A similar connection between political women’s organisations and extra-parliamentary groups is observed by Ulrika Thomsson, who has studied the public discussion of sexual abuse in 1970s Sweden. She argues that political women’s organisations need external impetus for their campaigns on gender equality because it is easier for them to react to issues that are already on the public agenda. 48 In this case, however, the impetus also operated in the opposite direction: particularly after the official publication of the Woman, Man, Democracy programme in March 1967, the SNDL and Association 9 reciprocally shared their ideas. 49 For instance, Association 9 and some of its individual members were informed about the Woman, Man, Democracy programme, 50 and the association had a representative at the International Congress for Women organised by the SNDL in Helsinki in 1969. 51 Furthermore, in publications and statements issued by Association 9 during its final years, the problems of modern society were framed as problems of capitalist society, and the solutions were framed by Marxist argumentation. 52 Certainly, during the final years of the association’s campaigning, members used presentational strategies that directly connected the central causes with left-wing political perspectives. Arguably, this was partly the result of the flow of influence between the SNDL and the grassroots organising of Association 9, which was more multidirectional than was the case in Sweden, where Group 222 focused on spreading information it had gathered from others’political programmes and academic research. 53 We might also argue that the active role taken by the SNDL in problematising sex roles widened interest in the SNDL’s ideas among other organisations, especially Association 9, which in turn strengthened the connections between their respective discussions. This 6H. KURVINEN AND A. TURUNEN is also observed by Katainen, who concludes that Association 9 was influenced by the SNDL in its discussion of childcare issues. Instead of the ‘mother’s wage’–an idea being debated in Finland at the time –the association began to support a strategy promoted by the SNDL, according to which child support would be paid to both stay-athome mothers and working mothers. 54 Striving for a modern or democratic society The radical sex role ideology promoted by Association 9 represented modern scientific thinking and was based on recent sociological studies demonstrating that people’s behaviour differed from existing gender norms and expectations. For example, contrary to the traditional gender roles that prevailed in Finnish society, over 50 per cent of Finnish mothers with young children (under school age) were in paid work. 55 Turunen interpreted this finding in 1966: In the 1960s, Finland is facing the fact that the gender-based division of labour has changed […] but the role expectations have mostly remained the same. There is a cultural lag, a gap between attitudes and reality, which is harmful to society as a whole and particularly to the group that has faced the most rapid change –women. 56 Rather than helping people to adjust to outdated norms and quasi-biological role expectations, Association 9 called for a transformation of the social roles of men and women. The goal was to create a modern society based on justice. The main difference between the theorisation of sex roles and feminist ideology was that the former encompassed men’s roles. 57 In particular, Association 9 consciously dissociated itself from women’s organisations and ‘the woman question’. This was marked in the mixed gender composition of sex role organisations in contrast to feminist organisations. In the case of Association 9, three of the nine founding members were men and during its active years 28 per cent of all the association’s members and 38 per cent of board members were male. 58 The association not only included men at an organisational level, but also argued that a change in women’s role required a change in men’s role, as the sex roles were interrelated. Sociologist and member of the Association 9’s research group, Risto Jaakkola explained this as follows in 1968: ‘The sex role debate is not primarily about changing women’s social status, it is about dividing tasks appropriately and fairly, regardless of gender. Achieving this goal will not only mean changes in women’s status, but it will also create new possibilities of choice for men.’ 59 The basic idea that both genders should be able to express themselves in all areas of life was presented in several texts written to explain the idea of sex roles and the aims of the Association 9. In 1968, Holger Rotkirch, the association’s board member, formulated this as follows: The main goal is not to help women integrate into men’s society and promote their possibilities to act in it, but to truly try to transform the structure of the whole society so that both men and women will have the possibility to fulfil themselves according to their skills and to combine a close family relationship with participation in paid work. 60 The influence of Association 9’s ideological premises can also be observed in the documents produced by the SNDL committee for women’s liberation. That is to say that the WOMEN’S HISTORY REVIEW 7 affected the cultural feedback loop in Finnish society, creating potential for further change. We end this article by urging future research to be more sensitive to entanglements between parliamentary and non-parliamentary actors that make feminist claims. Notes 1. The theoretical field of sex role research was established by Anglo-American social scientists in the years after World War II. However, this theorisation did not assume the same practical dimensions or political impact as it did in the Nordic countries in the 1960s. Christina Florin and Bengt Nilsson, ‘Något som liknar en oblodig revolution …’: Jämställdhetens politisering under 1960och 70-talen (Umeå: Umeå University, 2000); Solveig Bergman, The Politics of Feminism: Autonomous Feminist Movements in Finland and West Germany from the 1960s to the 1980s (Åbo: Åbo Akademi, 2002), 134–7; Jenny-Leontine Olsson, Kön i förändring: Den svenska könsrollsforskningen 1959–1979 (Lund: Sekel, 2011). 2. See e.g. Edmund Dahlström, ‘Analys av könsrolldebatten’,inKvinnors liv och arbete, ed. Edmund Dahlström (Stockholm: Studieförbundet Näringsliv och Samhälle, 1962), 22–30; Rita Liljeström, ‘Om könsroller’,inKönsroller, ed. Ingrid Fredriksson (Stockholm: Prisma, 1965), 9–23; Margaretha Mickwitz, ‘Kvinnor –hjärntvättas till tro på lyckan genom mannen’,Nya Pressen, 2 September 1965, 6. 3. On Finland and Sweden, see Florin and Nilsson, ‘Något som liknar’; Olsson, Kön i förändring; Bergman, Politics of Feminism, 138; Raija Julkunen, ‘Suomalainen sukupuolimalli: 1960luku käänteenä’,inNaisten hyvinvointivaltio, ed. Anneli Anttonen, Lea Henriksson, and Ritva Nätkin (Tampere: Vastapaino, 1994), 189. Although discussions of sex roles took place in other Nordic countries too, less is known about those discussions. 4. Bergman, Politics of Feminism, 138; Julkunen, ‘Suomalainen sukupuolimalli’, 179–201; Tuija Parvikko, ‘Conceptions of Gender Equality: Similarity and Difference’,inFinnish ‘Undemocracy’: Essays on Gender and Politics, ed. Marja Keränen (Helsinki: Finnish Political Science Association, 1990), 89–111; Anne Maria Holli, ‘Yhdistys 9:n politiikan ja politiikkakäsityksen suhteen merkityksestä tasa-arvopolitiikan syntyhistoriassa’,Politiikka 29, no. 4 (1988): 321–32. The Finnish Committee for Women’sStatus is comparable to the national commissions on the status of women established in the US and Canada during the 1960s. See e.g. Patricia Bradley, Mass Media and the Shaping of American Feminism, 1963–1975 (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2004), 29–30. 5. Bergman, Politics of Feminism, 19; Elisabeth Elgán, Att ge sig själv makt: Grupp 8 och 1970talets feminism (Göteborg: Makadam, 2015), 13–14; Dorothy Sue Cobble, The Other Women’s Movement: Workplace Justice and Social Rights in Modern America (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004), 3; Nancy A. Hewitt, ‘Introduction’,inNo Permanent Waves: Recasting Histories of US Feminism, ed. Nancy A. Hewitt (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2010), 1, 7. 6. See e.g. Kate Weigand, Red Feminism: American Communism and the Making of Women’s Liberation (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001); Kathleen A. Laughling and Jaqueline Castledine, Breaking the Wave: Women, Their Organizations, and Feminism, 1945–1985 (New York: Taylor & Francis, 2011); Cobble, Other Women’s Movement; Hewitt, No Permanent Waves; Francisca de Haan, ‘Continuing Cold War Paradigms in Western Historiography of Transnational Women’s Organisations: The Case of the Women’s International Democratic Federation (WIDF)’,Women’s History Review 19, no. 4 (2010): 547–73; Monica Threlfall, ‘State Feminism or Party Feminism? Feminist Politics and the Spanish Institute of Women’,European Journal of Women’s Studies 5, no. 1 (1998): 69–94; Joan Sangster, ‘Radical Ruptures: Feminism, Labor, and the Left in the Long Sixties in Canada’,American Review of Canadian Studies 40, no. 1 (2010): 1–21. 7. Ibid. 8. Elina Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi: Suomen Naisten Demokraattinen Liitto 1944–1990 (Helsinki: Kansan Sivistystyön Liitto, 1994), 343, 372; Laura Saarenmaa, Intiimin 14 H. KURVINEN AND A. TURUNEN äänet: Julkisuuskulttuurin muutos suomalaisissa ajanvietelehdissä 1961–1975 (Tampere: Tampere University Press, 2010), 278–9. 9. George E. Marcus, ‘Contemporary Problems of Ethnography in the Modern World System’, in Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography, ed. Clifford James and George E. Marcus (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986), 165–93; Arjun Appadurai, ‘Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy’,Theory Culture Society 7, no. 2–3 (1990), 295–310; Paula Saukko, Doing Research in Cultural Studies: An Introduction to Classical and New Methodological Approaches (London: Sage, 2003), 176–97. 10. On contrasting as a research method, see Heidi Kurvinen and Hannah Yoken, ‘Ylirajaiset tutkimusmenetelmät feminismin historian tutkimuksessa’,inKulttuurihistorian tutkimus: Lähteistä menetelmiin ja tulkintaan, ed. Rami Mähkä et al. (Turku: Kulttuurihistorian seura, 2022), forthcoming. 11. This debate consisted of expert articles by members of Association 9, as well as readers’ letters in which those articles were either supported or opposed. 12. Kaarina Nikunen, ‘Yksityisyyden murros –julkisuuden haaste: Feministisen kritiikin näkökulmia julkisuuden tutkimukseen’,Tiedotustutkimus 2 (2003): 79. 13. Nikunen, ‘Yksityisyyden murros’. 14. Nancy Fraser, ‘Rethinking the Public Sphere: A Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy’,Social Text, nos 25–26 (1990): 56–80. 15. The people’s democrats comprised people with various radical left political backgrounds, including Marxist-Leninists, communists, socialists and the radical wing of social democrats. Their party political representative was the left-wing coalition party the Finnish People’s Democratic Party (SKDL) which women’s organisation the SNDL was. 16. Heidi Kurvinen, ‘Adopting Public Relations-like Strategies to Promote Labour Feminism in Finland During the Long 1960s’(unpublished manuscript). 17. E.g. Juho Saksholm, Reform, Revolution, Riot? Transnational Nordic Sixties in the Radical Press, c. 1958–1968 (Jyväskylä: University of Jyväskylä, 2020), 19–26, 67–9; Bergman, Politics of Feminism, 138–44. 18. Margaretha Mickwitz, ‘Könsrollerna –inte frontdelning utan primärrelationer’,Nya Pressen, 24 August 1965, 6; Ritva Turunen, ‘Nainen ja hänen roolinsa I’,Uusi Suomi,31 August 1965, 18; Ritva Turunen, ‘Nainen ja hänen roolinsa II’,Uusi Suomi, 6 November 1965, 21; Ritva Turunen, ‘Nainen ja hänen roolinsa III’,Uusi Suomi, 14 November 1965, 19. 19. Bergman, Politics of Feminism, 134–5; Saksholm, Reform, Revolution, Riot?. 20. Annual reports of Association 9, 1966–70, Archive of Association 9, 1D, Db, People’s Archive (from now on PA). The association had aimed to establish local chapters in different parts of the country, but only two chapters (in Tampere and Jyväskylä) were set up. Margaretha Mickwitz, ‘Yhdistys 9 ja sukupuoliroolikeskustelu’,inRoolien murtajat: Tasa-arvokeskustelua 1960-luvulta 2000-luvulle, ed. Margaretha Mickwitz, Agneta von Essen, and Elisabeth Nordgren (Helsinki: Gaudeamus, 2008), 52. 21. Constitution of Association 9, Archive of Association 9, 1C, Ca, PA; see also Mickwitz, ‘Yhdistys 9 ja sukupuoliroolikeskustelu’, 30. 22. Holger Rotkirch, ‘Yhdistys 9 uudistusten jouduttajana’,inMiesten maailman nurjat lait, ed. Katarina Eskola (Helsinki: Tammi, 1968), 66; Mickwitz, ‘Yhdistys 9 ja sukupuoliroolikeskustelu’, 37. 23. The Association published statements in which they demanded inexpensive communal day care for all children, criticised plans of introducing a special wage for stay-at-home mothers, noted problems included in the legislative proposal on legalising abortion. In the statements published on the Father’s Day in 1968 and on the Mother’s Day in 1969 the Association 9 demanded restructuring of the roles of the parents (Statements, Archive of the Association 9, 1D, Dc, PA). The working groups published reports based on recent research on their area, and the Association 9 published the pamphlet Harmful Laws of Men’s World in 1968. 24. The interest in the sex role debate varied between urban and rural areas. Elina HaavioMannila, Suomalainen nainen ja mies: Asema ja muuttuvat roolit (Helsinki: WSOY, 1968). WOMEN’SHISTORYREVIEW 15 25. Naisten asemaa tutkivan komitean mietintö: A 8 (Helsinki: Valtion painatuskeskus, 1970), 3–4; Mickwitz, ‘Yhdistys 9 ja sukupuoliroolikeskustelu’,44–5. 26. Association 9 used a formulation introduced by Swedish sociologist Rita Liljeström in her book Könsroller (see e.g. Mickwitz, ‘Kvinnor’). 27. Invitation to constitutive meeting (1966), Archive of Association 9, 1C, Ca, PA; Constitution of Association 9, Archive of Association 9, 1C, Ca, PA; Turunen, ‘Nainen ja hänen roolinsa II’, 21; Brita Polttila, ‘Roolidebatista’,Tilanne, no. 2 (1966): 116–7; Marina Sundström, ‘Varför det inte är bra som det är’,FBT, no. 3 (1966): 4–5; Ritva Turunen, ‘Rooleista’,in Vastalause 66, ed. Sauli Salmi (Helsinki: Kirjamaailma, 1966), 89. 28. According to Margaretta Jolly, Rowbotham elaborated this vision in her text ‘Women’s Liberation and the New Politics’, published in The Black Dwarf in 1969. Margaretta Jolly, Sisterhood and After: An Oral History of the UK Women’s Liberation Movement, 1968 –Present (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), 13–14. 29. Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi. 30. Established in 1944, the SKDL had strong ties with the Finnish Communist Party. However, not all its members were communists, and the party programme became tied to socialism only in 1967. The SKDL was replaced by the Left Alliance in 1990. Sirpa Puhakka, Vasemmistoliiton synty (Helsinki: Into, 2015). 31. E.g. reports of activities in 1965–68 and 1968–71 published in Pippuri in 1968 (no. 3) and 1971 (no. 2). See also Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi, 115–20. 32. Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi,59–70, 85–9, 130–1; Melanie Ilic, ‘Soviet Women, Cultural Exchange and the Women’s International Democratic Federation’,i n Reassessing Cold War Europe, ed. Sari Autio-Sarasmo and Katalin Miklóssy (London: Routledge, 2010), 157–74; Pirkko Kotila, ‘Hertta Kuusinen: The “Red Lady of Finland”’,Science & Society 70, no. 1 (2006): 70. 33. Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi, 91, 148–9, 201, 352–4. 34. Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi, 173–315. 35. Speech by Irma Torvi to eighth general assembly, Woman, Man, Democracy seminar, 1968, 1D Ca16, SNDLA, PA. On gender in the Finnish radical left, see Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi, 330–1, 355. 36. Similarly, other women’s organisations in Finland adopted the sex role terminology around the same time: Margaretha Mickwitz, ‘Tasa-arvotilanne 1960-luvulla’, in Mickwitz, von Essen, and Nordgren, Roolien murtajat, 19. See also ‘Sinikka Luja: Yhteiskunnallisessa uudistustyössä on naisilla tärkeä osuus’,Suomen Sosialidemokraatti, 4 May 1966, 7. 37. Letter by Hellä Meltti to members of SNDL commission, 27 November 1965, 1D Cc4, SNDLA, PA; minutes of meeting of SNDL commission, 12 December 1965, 1D Cc4, SNDLA, PA; minutes of meeting of SNDL commission, 9 January 1966, 1D Cc4, SNDLA, PA. On the new-found interest in gender role discussions, see e.g. ‘Naisliiton tehtäväkenttää arvioitiin uudella tavalla: Esitys uudesta kokonaisohjelmasta’,Kansan Uutiset, 23 May 1966, 3. See also Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi, 344–8. 38. E.g. an advertisement for the event ‘Mikä on naisen rooli’,Kansan Uutiset, 8 March 1966, 2; ‘Muistio’,Kansan Uutiset, 26 April 1966, 6. 39. ‘Naisen rooli kiinnosti lahtelaisiakin’,Kansan Uutiset, 14 March 1966, 3. 40. E.g. Tyyne Tuominen, ‘Nainen –mies –demokratia: Jäykistyneestä roolijaosta tasa-arvoon’, Pippuri, no. 1 (1967): 3–4; ‘Nainen –mies –demokratia: Ohjelman käytöstä’,Pippuri, no. 2 (1967): 4; R.M., ‘Nainen –mies –demokratia: Ohjelman käsittely jatkuu’,Pippuri, no. 3 (1967): 5; advertisement for discussion event organised by local SNDL chapter, EteläSuomen Sanomat, 3 March 1967, 1. 41. Minutes of general assembly, 1968, 1D Ca15, SNDLA, PA; speech by Irma Torvi to Woman, Man, Democracy seminar, 1968, 1D Ca16, SNDLA, PA. 42. Press release, 28 October 1968, 1D J2, SNDLA, PA. 43. For instance, she was asked to write an article on home economics for Pippuri, which was published in 1966: Kati Peltola, ‘Nainen –talouskone’,Pippuri, no. 4 (1966): 8–9, 12, 14. The SNDL encouraged local chapters to use this article as a basis for discussion events. As a 16 H. KURVINEN AND A. TURUNEN member of Association 9, she contributed to the pamphlet Miesten maailman nurjat lait by writing an article on women’s status in working life: Kati Peltola, ‘Naiset työssä’,inMiesten mailman nurjat lait, ed. Katarina Eskola (Helsinki: Tammi 1968), 129–38. 44. The invitation is preserved in the SNDL archive. Invitation to constitutive meeting of Association 9, H102, SNDLA, PA. 45. ‘Sukupuolten välisestä roolijaosta päästävä: “Yhdistys 9”esitteli päämääriään’,Kansan Uutiset, 15 February 1966, 5. 46. Minutes of meeting of SNDL commission, 14 October, H102, SNDLA, PA. The year is not given in the minutes, but based on the timeline, the meeting took place in October 1966. 47. Mickwitz, ‘Yhdistys 9 ja sukupuoliroolikeskustelu’,44–5. 48. Ulrika Thomsson, ‘Rätten till våra kroppar: Kvinnorörelsen och våldtäktsdebatten’,Tidskrift för Genusforskning 21, no. 4 (2000): 58–9. See also Bergman, Politics of Feminism, 165. 49. Report on activities in 1965–1968, published in Pippuri, no. 3 (1968). 50. List of organisations that had received a copy of the first draft of the Woman, Man, Democracy programme, 1 April 1967, H102, SNDLA, PA; list of individuals invited to participate in general assembly, Woman, Man, Democracy seminar, 1968, 1D Ca16, SNDLA, PA. 51. Annual report of Association 9, 1969, 5, Archive of Association 9, 1D, Db, PA. 52. See ‘Naisen asema materialistisen historiakäsityksen mukaan’, 1969, Archive of Association 9, 4H, Hb, PA; ‘Tasa-arvoa toteuttava talousjärjestelmä’, 1969, Archive of Association 9, 1D, Dd, PA. See also Anne Maria Holli, ‘Why the State: Reflections on the Politics of the Finnish Equality Movement Association 9’, in Keränen, Finnish “Undemocracy”, 77, 84. 53. On the activism of Grupp 222, see Florin and Nilsson, ‘Något som liknar’,50–6. 54. Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi, 338. On the discussion of the mother’s wage, see also Antero Peräläinen and Jarl Lindgren, ‘Äidinpalkka’,Finnish Yearbook of Population Research 10, no. 1 (1968): 165. 55. Margaretha Mickwitz, ‘Slutreplik i debatten om könsroller’,Nya Pressen, 13 September 1965, 6; Turunen, ‘Nainen ja hänen roolinsa I’, 18; Ritva Majuri, ‘Lasten päivähoito on unohdettu ongelma’,FBT, no. 3 (1966): 10; Turunen, ‘Rooleista’, 90. 56. Turunen, ‘Rooleista’, 89. 57. E.g. Shira Tarrant, ‘When Sex Became Gender: Mirra Komarovsky’s Feminism of the 1950s’, Women’s Studies Quarterly 33, nos 3–4 (2005): 338, 343; Michael A. Messner, ‘The Limits of “the Male Sex Role”: An Analysis of the Men’s Liberation and Men’s Rights Movements’ Discourse’,Gender & Society 12, no. 3 (1998): 257–8. 58. Riitta Jallinoja, Suomalaisen naisasialiikkeen taistelukaudet: Naisasialiike naisten elämäntilanteen muutoksen ja yhteiskunnallis-aatteellisen murroksen heijastajana (Helsinki: WSOY, 1983), 163. 59. Risto Jaakkola, ‘Miesten vaihtoehto’,inMiesten maailman nurjat lait, ed. Katarina Eskola (Helsinki: Tammi, 1968), 183. See also Mickwitz, ‘Könsrollerna’, 6; Turunen, ‘Nainen ja hänen roolinsa I’, 18. 60. Rotkirch, ‘Yhdistys 9 uudistusten jouduttajana’, 66; see also Sundström, ‘Varför det inte är bra’,4. 61. E.g. speech by Tyyne Tuominen to commission, 21 May 1966, 1D Cc4, SNDLA, PA; minutes of meeting of commission, 21 and 22 May 1966, 1D Cc4, SNDLA, PA; comments by Maija Savutie, Aili Backlund, and Liisa Aura to commission, 22 May 1966, annexes 30, 31 and 34, 1D Cc4, SNDLA, PA. 62. Tyyne Tuominen, ‘Naisen rooli ja SNDLn tehtävät’,Kansan Uutiset, 10 June 1966, 4. 63. Comments by Liisa Aura on sex role discussion, 8 June 1966, H102, SNDLA, PA; undated speech by Irma Torvi, H102, SNDLA, PA. 64. Ellen C. DuBois, ‘Eleanor Flexner and the History of American Feminism’,Gender & History 3, no. 1 (1991): 81–90; see also de Haan, ‘Continuing Cold War Paradigms’, 557. 65. Thomsson, ‘Rätten till våra kroppar’, 58. See also Maud Eduards, ‘Against the Rules of the Game: On the Importance of Women’s Collective Actions’,inRethinking Change: Current Swedish Feminist Research, ed. Maud L. Eduards et al. (Stockholm: HSFR, 1992), 83–104. 66. Speech by Irma Torvi to Woman, Man, Democracy seminar, 1968, 1D Ca16, SNDLA, PA. WOMEN’SHISTORYREVIEW 17 67. Aili Backlund, ‘Naisella tulee olla oikeus kasvaa ja kehittyä myös kansalaisena ja työntekijänä’,Kansan Uutiset, 6 November 1965, 14; Christina Nordgren, ‘Naisen roolista 1: Sukupuoliroolista’,Kansan Uutiset, 22 June 1966, 7; Kristiina Nordgren, ‘Naisen roolista 2: Kasvatus sukupuolirooliin’,Kansan Uutiset, 3 July 1966, 10–11; Kristiina Nordgren, ‘Naisen roolista 4: Kaksoisroolin haitat’,Kansan Uutiset, 25 July 1966, 7; minutes of meeting of SNDL committee for women’s liberation, 19 September 1966, H102, SNDLA, PA; minutes of meeting of SNDL commission, 23 September 1966, H102, SNDLA, PA; speech by Kristiina Nordgren to SNDL study day for commission and district secretaries, 20 May 1966, 1D HS297; gender role discussion, SNDLA, PA. 68. Minutes of meeting of SNDL committee for women’s liberation, 5 April 1966, 1D J2; minutes of meetings of local chapters, Finnish-Swedish chapter, SNDLA, PA. 69. Minutes of meeting of SNDL committee for women’s liberation, 23 September 1966, H102, SNDLA, PA. 70. E.g. Weigand, Red Feminism; Sangster, ‘Radical Ruptures’. 71. E.g. comments by Maija Savutie and Liisa Aura to commission, 22 May 1966, annexes 30 and 34, 1D Cc4, SNDLA, PA; comments by Raili Ruusala on draft of Woman, Man, Democracy programme, 7 February 1967, H102, SNDLA, PA. See also Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi, 344. 72. E.g. Nilsson and Florin, ‘Något som liknar’,44–50; Weigand, Red Feminism; Sangster, ‘Radical Ruptures’. 73. Speech by Kristiina Nordgren, 20 May 1966, 1D HS297, SNDLA, PA. 74. E.g. comments by Liisa Aura on sex role discussion, 8 June 1966, H102, SNDLA, PA; minutes of meeting of committee for women’s liberation, 19 September 1966, H102, SNDLA, PA. 75. R.M., ‘Nainen –mies –demokratia’. 76. E.g. minutes of meeting of committee for women’s liberation, 19 September 1966, H102, SNDLA, PA. 77. Naisten asemaa tutkivan komitean mietintö,7–8. 78. Heidi Kurvinen and Arja Turunen, ‘Toinen aalto uudelleen tarkasteltuna: Yhdistys 9:n rooli suomalaisen feminismin historiassa’,Sukupuolentutkimus 31, no. 3 (2018): 21–34; Saarenmaa, Intiimin äänet,277. 79. Mickwitz, ‘Yhdistys 9 ja sukupuoliroolikeskustelu’, 51; Margaretha Mickwitz, ‘Tutkijat ja Yhdistys 9’, in Mickwitz, von Essen, and Nordgren, Roolien murtajat, 212. 80. Saksholm, Reform, Revolution, Riot?,19–20. 81. Pauli Kettunen, ‘The Nordic Welfare State in Finland’,Scandinavian Journal of History 26, no.3 (2001): 225–47. 82. Holli, ‘Yhdistys 9:n politiikan’, 327–28; Holli, ‘Why the State?’,80–3. 83. Heidi Kurvinen, ‘Äitienpäivän mielenosoitus vuoden 1968 uutisvirrassa’,inToivon ja raivon vuosi 1968, ed. Maarit Leskelä-Kärki, Marika Ahonen, and Niko Heikkilä (Helsinki: Työväen ja perinteen tutkimuksen seura, 2019), 67–86; Mickwitz, ‘Yhdistys 9 ja sukupuoliroolikeskustelu’, 41. 84. Reports and suggestions by education groups, Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA; annual reports, 1966–70, Archive of Association 9, 1D, Db, PA. 85. ‘Woman, Man, Democracy’(leaflet), Birgitta Boucht Archive, Archive of the FinnishSwedish Literature Society. See also short untitled news item, Etelä-Suomen Sanomat,23 December 1966, 2; comments by Liisa Aura on sex role discussion, 8 June 1966, H102, SNDLA, PA. See also Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi, 312–5. 86. Reijo Virtanen, ‘Suosiiko koululaitoksen organisaation sukupuoliroolien eriytymistä’, Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA. 87. ‘Woman, Man, Democracy’(leaflet), Birgitta Boucht Archive, Archive of the FinnishSwedish Literature Society; Leila Mélart, ‘Yhdistys 9:n taistelu lasten päivähoidon puolesta’, in Mickwitz, von Essen, and Nordgren, Roolien murtajat,99–109; Lasten päivähoidon raportti,2, Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA. 88. Bergman, Politics of Feminism, 177–8; Mickwitz, ‘Tasa-arvotilanne 1960-luvulla’, 14. 18 H. KURVINEN AND A. TURUNEN 89. ‘Mieskin on ihminen’, Archive of Association 9, 1D, Dc, PA; Lasten päivähoidon raportti,9, Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA. 90. ‘Woman, Man, Democracy’(leaflet), Birgitta Boucht Archive, Archive of the FinnishSwedish Literature Society. 91. Association 9 and Sexpo, Seksuaaliraportti, Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA; ‘Woman, Man, Democracy’(leaflet), Birgitta Boucht Archive, Archive of the Finnish-Swedish Literature Society. 92. ‘Woman, Man, Democracy’(leaflet), Birgitta Boucht Archive, Archive of the FinnishSwedish Literature Society; ‘Naisten työttömyyslähetystö Paasion luona’,Länsi-Savo,23 February 1968, 5. 93. Report of juridical group, Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA; Ammatillisille keskusjärjestöille, Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA; Peltola, ‘Naiset työssä’, 137–8; Gunnel Wrede, Naisten koulutus, työn motivointi ja työehdot (1969), Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA. 94. See e.g. Dick Urban Vestbro, ‘Kollektivhus för kvinnofrigörelse’,Kvinnovetenskaplig tidskrift 3, no. 1 (1982): 23–5. 95. ‘Woman, Man, Democracy’(leaflet), Birgitta Boucht Archive, Archive of the FinnishSwedish Literature Society. See also comments by Liisa Aura on sex role discussion, 8 June 1966, H102, SNDLA, PA. 96. Reports of housing group, Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA. 97. Report of juridical group, Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA; Kristina Herzberg, Perheverotuksen uudistaminen, Archive of Association 9, 3H, Hd, PA; ‘Woman, Man, Democracy’ (leaflet), Birgitta Boucht Archive, Archive of the Finnish-Swedish Literature Society. 98. Speech by Irma Torvi, Woman, Man, Democracy seminar, 1968, 1D Ca16, SNDLA, PA. 99. Naisten asemaa tutkivan komitean mietintö, 88, 126. 100. E.g. Bergman, Politics of Feminism, 143–91; Hannah Yoken, ‘Nordic Transnational Feminist Activism: The New Women’s Movements in Finland, Sweden and Denmark, 1960s–1990s’ (PhD thesis, University of Glasgow, 2020). 101. Lynn Abrams, ‘Talking about Feelings: Women, Mental Health and Self Care in Postwar Britain’(presentation, Modern Cultural History seminar, Cambridge University, 21 October 2020). 102. E.g. Holli, ‘Why the State?’; Katainen, Akkain aherrusta aatteen hyväksi, 329–31. 103. E.g. Laura Kolbe, ‘From Memory to History: Year 1968 in Finland’,Scandinavian Journal of History 33, no. 4 (2008): 366–8; Jukka Relander, ‘From Flowers to Steel’,Scandinavian Journal of History 33, no. 4 (2008): 464–7. 104. Sangster, ‘Radical Ruptures’, 11. 105. Florin and Nilsson, ‘Något som liknar’,50–6. 106. Leila Räsänen, ‘Katsaus tasa-arvolainsäädännön kehitykseen vuosina 1970–1982’,inMiesnainen-ihminen: Tieteen näkemyksiä sukupuolten eroista ja tasa-arvosta, ed. Marita Savola et al. (Helsinki: Opetusministeriö, 1984), 147–68; Bergman, Politics of Feminism, 139; Julkunen, ‘Suomalainen sukupuolimalli’, 194. Acknowledgements The authors offer warm thanks to the peer reviewers and the Women’s History Review’s editor for their insightful comments. Additionally, they thank the Academy of Finland and the Kone Foundation for financing the research projects, ‘The Travelling Image of Bra Burners: Negotiating Meanings of Feminism inFinnish Mainstream Media from the 1960s to 2007’(Kurvinen, decision number 316287) and ‘For Women, Men, and Children! Association 9 and the Struggle for Gender Equality in the 1960s’(Turunen, grant number 201805372). This article was written as part of both projects. Disclosure statement No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s). WOMEN’SHISTORYREVIEW 19 Funding This work was supported by the Academy of Finland (Kurvinen) and the Kone Foundation (Turunen). Notes on contributors Heidi Kurvinen, PhD, is a Collegium Researcher at the Turku Institute for Advanced Studies at the University of Turku, Finland. She has published several articles on the gendered history of professional journalism and the history of feminism in Finland. Correspondence to: Dr Heidi Kurvinen, Arcanum, School of History, Culture, and Arts Studies, FIN-20014 University of Turku, Finland. Email: heidi.kurvinen@utu.fi Arja Turunen, PhD, is a Senior Research Fellow in ethnology and anthropology at the Department of History and Ethnology, University of Jyväskylä, Finland. She has published several articles on the history of women’s dress and second-wave feminist activism in Finland. Correspondence to: Dr Arja Turunen, Department of History and Ethnology, PO Box 35, FI-40014 University of Jyväskylä, Finland. Email: arja.h.turunen@jyu.fi ORCID Heidi Kurvinen http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1056-0701 Arja Turunen http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3589-5380 20 H. KURVINEN AND A. TURUNEN