About Us
We are an international grassroots network campaigning for recognition and payment for all caring work, in the home and on the land.
As part of a dynamic change of direction we demand a guaranteed income for all – of all genders and identities, beginning with mothers, Indigenous peoples and natural farmers – who do the work of:
- caring for people of every age and condition;
- protecting and regenerating the land and the water from poisonous chemicals which ruin the soil, the health of those who work it, the nutritional value of the food, and the climate;
- defending human rights and the natural world, risking their lives;
- surviving and resisting the climate change we did not cause which, following centuries of imperialist plunder, is endangering lives and livelihoods in the Global South, forcing millions to leave their home and all they hold dear.
For more information about us click here.
Contact details
Email: gws@globalwomenstrike.net
Address: Crossroads Women‘s Centre, 25 Wolsey Mews, London NW5 2DX.
Phone: +44 20 7482 2496
Our History
In March 1972, at the Women’s Liberation conference in Manchester, England, Selma James put forward Wages for Housework for the first time. It was one of six demands in the pamphlet Women, the Unions and Work…or What Is Not to Be Done, written for the conference.
It is now 50 years that WFH has been campaigning for financial recognition for the biological and societal work of reproducing the whole human race – whatever else women do.
This caring work goes on almost unnoticed everywhere, in every country and culture. It is rarely prioritised economically, politically or socially, and women are discriminated against and impoverished for doing it.
The WFH Campaign has been shaped by the autonomous organisations that formed within it – women of colour, queer women, sex workers, women with disabilities, single mothers, and a men’s network which shares its perspective on caring and autonomy. It confronts poverty, sexism, racism, deportation, criminalisation, rape, militarism, the theft and destruction of land and the natural world, and other forms of violence and discrimination against any gender. It defends the relationships we choose, and especially the bond between mother and child.
In 2000, the WFH Campaign launched the Global Women’s Strike (GWS). Since 2021 its Care Income Now campaign brings together the care and protection of people and the planet. Its international network over the years has included Canada, France, Germany, Guyana, India, Ireland, Italy, Peru, Spain, Switzerland, Thailand, Trinidad & Tobago, Uganda as well as UK and US, and contacts in many other countries.
Archives: 50 YEARS OF CAMPAIGNING
Latest News
Urgent: Tell Congress, Include Extended CTC in End Of Year Tax Package!
How long will the richest country in the world tolerate millions of our children in poverty? Urgent action needed to bring back extended CTC, which lifted millions of children out of poverty! The time is NOW to contact Congress because the reinstatement of the expanded Child Tax Credit is being debated as part of negotiations…
Press release: Wages for Housework film All Work and No Pay at Tate Exhibition Women in Revolt.
The Wages for Housework film All Work and No Pay is part of the major Tate Britain exhibition Women in Revolt which opens tomorrow 8 November 2022 and runs until April 2024. The film was made by the Wages for Housework Campaign (WFH) with the BBC community access unit Open Door in 1975. It provided…
Press Release: Mothers and Other Family Caregivers From Across The US Tell Congress to Value Our Work
Congressional Briefing featuring Rep. Gwen Moore (WI-4), directly impacted family caregivers from across the country and policy experts, followed by Press Conference. October 24, 2023 9-10am Briefing, 10:30am Press Conference. Briefing: Rayburn House Office Building, Rm 2060, Washington DC. Breakfast served. Press conference: House Triangle, United States Capitol
Caregiving is Work Congressional Briefing in DC, Tues 24 October
Congressional Briefing and Press Conference, Caregiving is Work: Supporting mothers and other family caregivers through the Worker Relief and Credit Reform Act (WRCR) and beyond
Please join us Tuesday in Washington DC! Also being live-streamed on Center for the Study of Social Policy Facebook page
Workshop: How Nature Regulates the Climate & How Natural Farming Can Help
FRIDAY JUNE 9, 10am-4pm (EDT) Crossroads Women’s Center, 5011 Wayne Ave Philadelphia, PA 19144 and by Zoom With: Didi Pershouse, educator, author and soil sponge strategist committed to building healthy communities both above and below ground. Ms Pershouse’s publications include The Ecology of Care: Medicine, Agriculture, Money, and the Quiet Power of Human and Microbial Communities…
Press Announcement: International and Community Gathering in Philadelphia, June 9-11
End Women’s Poverty: A Care Income, A Movement Whose Time Has Come What: International and Community Gathering: End Women’s Poverty – A Guaranteed Care Income for All Caregivers of People & PlanetWhen: June 9-11, 2023Where: Crossroads Women’s Center, 5011 Wayne Ave, Philadelphia PA 19144, and online The Global Women’s Strike and the new Crossroads Women’s…
Taking Agroecology to scale: Learning from the experiences of Natural Farming in India
Learning from the experiences of Natural Farming in India, this new publication has been compiled by the Alliance for food sovereignty in Africa. Download a copy of it for free here below.
Event this Friday – Join the Women’s Speak Out at XR’s The Big One
Friday 21 April, 1pm, Downing Street, London SW1A 2AA. XR’s The Big One – four days of actions 21-24 April to bring together 100,000 people around Parliament to get this government to act on the climate emergency. On Friday – “Unite to Survive” day – diverse networks of mothers, grandmothers, other carers and people with disabilities will…
Selma James speaks at Oxford Real Farming Conference: A Care Income to Protect the Land, the People and the Natural World
Speakers: Selma James, Swati Renduchintala, Pranom Somwong, Dee Woods, Jyoti Fernandez. As mothers, carers, farmers/farm workers, land and human rights’ defenders, women do most of the work of feeding (starting with breastfeeding) and protecting families and communities, the soil and the environment. For doing this fundamental caring work of society, unwaged and low-waged, we are…
Care Income leaflet for 2023 Oxford Real Farming Conference
Campaigning for an income for all who care for people, the soil and the natural world can: • Strengthen the movement against environmental destruction & global warming • Address poverty & other injustice suffered by those, overwhelmingly women, who do this work unwaged or low-waged • Redirect economic & social priorities internationally towards nourishing food (starting with breastfeeding), clean water & air, and the care & protection of all life • Encourage all genders & identities to commit to this lifesaving life-enhancing work.