Archives West Finding Aid

Radical Women (RW) is an all women organization dedicated to "exposing, resisting and eliminating the inequities of women's existence by providing women the leadership skills, social history, and working-class consciousness that they were denied in the male-dominated antiwar, antipoverty and civil-rights movements." RW was founded in Seattle in 1967 when the Freedom Socialist Party co-founder Clara Fraser and her close colleague, Gloria Martin, joined with young women from Students for a Democratic Society to build women’s leadership in the left and anti-war movements. RW also sought to become the socialist wing of the feminist movement. In 1973, it formally affiliated with the Freedom Socialist Party, and the party gained a sister organization. Other founding members include Melba Windoffer and Susan Stern.

RW was active in anti-Vietnam War protests, labor issues, gay rights, women’s rights in the workplace, divorce reform, and other issues that affect oppressed peoples. They are an organization that does intersectional organizing against racism, sexism, homophobia, and labor exploitation. RW's political analysis sees women's leadership and political action as decisive to social change and trains women to lead in these campaigns.