International Women’s Day, observed annually on March 8, celebrates women’s accomplishments across various fields. It serves as a platform to advocate for gender equality and highlight challenges faced by women worldwide. This day recognises progress while emphasising the need for continuous efforts to create an inclusive, fair, and empowering society for women.
How International Women’s Day Came To Be Celebrated On March 8
Why In News
- International Women’s Day, observed annually on March 8, celebrates women’s accomplishments across various fields. It serves as a platform to advocate for gender equality and highlight challenges faced by women worldwide. This day recognises progress while emphasising the need for continuous efforts to create an inclusive, fair, and empowering society for women.
Theme
- The 2025 theme, ‘Accelerate Action,’ calls for rapid advancements in gender equality. It focuses on recognising strategies and tools that drive women’s progress in education, employment, and leadership. This theme encourages collective efforts from governments, organisations, and individuals to remove barriers and foster an environment of equal opportunities for women.
History Behind International Women’s Day
- The seeds of such a day have grown out of the labour movement. In 1908, 15,000 women marched through New York City demanding shorter hours, better pay and voting rights. A year later, the Socialist Party of America declared the first National Woman’s Day. The holiday soon caught the attention of the Europeans and a woman named Clara Zetkin (leader of the ‘Women’s Office’ for the Social Democratic Party in Germany) proposed an International Women’s Day.
- Her efforts culminated in the establishment of the first International Women’s Day celebrated in 1911 in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland on March 19. However, it was later decided that March 8 would be celebrated as International Women’s Day thanks to the ‘Bread and Peace’ protest in Russia’s Petrograd in 1917.
- On this day — February 23 in the old Russian calendar — tens of thousands of women congregated on the Nevsky Prospekt in the centre of the Russian capital, carrying banners demanding the Tsarist government “feed the children of the defenders of the motherland”. The protests emerged as a result of the tiring World War I and the resulting shortage of bread.
- The situation worsened when female factory workers, who were forced to stand in long queues for the staple, heard rumours about a planned rationing. Furious that they wouldn’t have enough to feed their children, the women, on March 8, gathered demanding food and peace.
- By the end of the day, 100,000 workers went on strike, holding banners that said “Bread” and “Down with the Czar.” The number of demonstrators increased to 150,000 by the next day. As the crowds grew bigger, Russian police forces were called in to repel them, resulting in clashes. But the demonstrators didn’t back down and as days progressed, even the Russian army joined the marchers, withdrawing their support from Tsar Nicholas.
- The protests that went on for a week ended with the collapse of the Russian monarchy and paved the way for socialism and the formation of the Soviet Union in 1922.
- As historian and activist Rochelle Ruthchild of Harvard’s Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies told TIME, “One could argue that these demonstrations sparked the abdication of Tsar Nicholas and the end of the Romanov dynasty. This was probably the most consequential of any International Women’s Day demonstrations of any time.”
International Women’s Day in other countries
- In modern times, International Women’s Day is marked by marches, talks, concerts, exhibitions and debates. It’s also a day when bouquets of flowers are given by men to women or from woman to woman. In fact, before the start of the Russia-Ukraine war, flower sales in Russia typically doubled around International Women’s Day.
- Many experts note that a day like International Women’s Day is now more required than ever. Russian leader Vladimir Putin has asked women to forego education and careers to prioritise having children. In the US, women believe their bodily autonomy has slipped away after Roe v Wade was overturned by the US Supreme Court.
International Women’s Day
