“And you call that equality?” (Kallarðu þetta jafnrétti?) The slogan of the “women’s strike” is chanted throughout Iceland this Tuesday, October 24, for the 48th consecutive year. From teachers to doctors to industrial fishing workers, they are all called upon not to work and to stop all domestic activities. To set the tone, Prime Minister Katrín Jakobsdóttir – known for making women’s rights one of the main axes of her policy – herself went on strike this Tuesday.
The goal: to draw attention to the country’s gender pay gap and gender-based and sexual violence. Although Iceland tops the World Economic Forum’s 2023 global gender gap rankings for the 14th year in a row, according to Statistics Iceland, women still earn on average 9% less than men. men.
According to the World Economic Forum 2023, “Icelandic women earn 21% less than men in certain professions”, and “more than 40% of them” experience gender inequalities based on sexual violence. In certain sectors, such as finance and insurance, the salary gap rises to 26%. Women also remain over-represented in poorly paid professions, such as housekeeping or personal care and assistance.
This even though Iceland has committed by law to making equal pay between women and men compulsory. In this country of more than 330,000 inhabitants, it has been illegal since January 2018 to pay a man more than a woman for an equivalent position and function. Since then, companies and government agencies that employ at least 25 employees have been required to obtain an official certificate that proves their equal pay policy.
Even if the gap has already been narrowing in recent years, this law has “clearly had an effect”, Prime Minister Katrín Jakobsdóttir told AFP in 2021. But its implementation is taking longer than expected and the efforts are not are not sufficient, given the mobilization this Tuesday, October 24, 2023.
This strike movement brings together 40 associations such as the regional association of the Green Left Movement, whose president wrote an article in the tabloid Visir. According to her, “today, a lot has certainly changed for the better, but there are still too many things that activists thought we would have accomplished today.” If nothing is done to change things “gender equality will not happen for 285 years and we must act!”
The strikers are demanding that the gender pay gap be closed by publishing the salaries of workers in predominantly female professions such as cleaning or care professions, and that measures be taken to combat sexist and sexual violence.
This year, at least 25,000 demonstrators (or 6% of the Icelandic population) are expected in downtown Reykjavík to defend equal pay according to the Guardian, and many more will participate in 10 demonstrations across the country. This is probably, according to the British newspaper, the largest women’s strike ever organized in Iceland…since it was first organized 48 years ago!
According to the Icelandic newspaper RÚV, this strike has a real impact on society. Hospitals and schools, mainly occupied by women, must organize themselves. The newspaper cites Landspitala Hospital in Reykjavík, where 5,493 of the 6,856 employees (80%) are women. Runólfur Pálsson, director of the hospital center, tells RÚV that the day is organized in such a way that as many people as possible can participate in the strike. Thus, the service is greatly reduced at the hospital.
This particular day comes from a historic women’s strike which took place on October 24, 1975. That year was declared the “international year of women” by the United Nations. The International Organization then organized the first world conference for women in Mexico City (Mexico), in order to highlight the persistence of discrimination targeting them and to work to stem it.
In Iceland, where women receive a salary almost 40% lower than that of men, anger is growing. For October 24, Icelandic Women’s Day, the radical feminist group Redstockings is launching the idea of a women’s strike. They want to show that without women, society cannot function and that their work deserves to be more recognized. Gerdur Steinthorsdottir, the spokesperson for the strikers, said: “The strike is intended to prove how indispensable we are to the economy and national life of the country. We are not demanding any special salary increase. We just want to show that it is very unfair that women receive lower salaries.” 90% of women in the country would have decided to follow the movement which paralyzed the country that day. Events of this type have been held every year since.
Since then, the movement had been celebrated during anniversaries in 1985, 2005, 2010 and 2016 according to Le Parisien. However, during these days, the women did not strike all day but stopped working at a specific time. In 1985 for example, they took leave at 2:05 p.m. in 2016 at 2:38 p.m. in order to represent the slow progression of equal pay between men and women.
An idea that is on the rise in feminist groups, including in France: March 8, International Women’s Rights Day, has for several years become the strike day for feminist demonstrations. This year, 48 associations such as Attac, NousToutes or Femmes égalité joined forces with numerous unions to protest. In the capital, 13,500 participants marched between Place de la République and Place de la Nation according to the police headquarters. 150 demonstrations were organized throughout France.
