Gender, Rhetoric and Regulation : Women's Work in the Civil Service and the London County Council, 1900–55

Investigates women’s employment in the British Civil Service and London County Council during the twentieth century, providing a new perspective on the development of the women’s movement. -- . The Civil Service and the London County Council employed tens of thousands of women in Britain in the early twentieth century. As public employers these institutions influenced both each other and private organisations, thereby serving as a barometer or benchmark for the conditions of women's white-collar employment. Drawing on a wide range of archival sources – including policy documents, trade union records, women's movement campaign literature and employees'personal testimony – this is the first book-length study of women's public service employment in this period. It examines three aspects of their working lives – inequality of pay, the marriage bar and inequality of opportunity – and demonstrates how far wider cultural assumptions about womanhood shaped policies towards women's employment and experiences. Scholars and students with interests in gender, British social and cultural history and labour history will find this an invaluable text. Front matter Dedication Contents List of figures List of tables Acknowledgements List of abbreviations and terms Introduction Work for women? Challenges to the gendering of routine work in the LCC and the Civil Service Trying to get equal opportunities: women in the higher grades of the LCC and the Civil Service in the first half of the twentieth century ‘Endless arguments about sex and salaries’: the First World War, reconstruction and the campaigns for equal pay, 1914–24 ‘As a matter of justice’: the equal pay campaigns from 1924 to 1939 The slow road to victory: the equal pay campaigns from 1939 to 1954 Lark rise to spinsterhood?: Women, the public service and marriage bar policy, 1900–46 Disabled husbands, deserted wives, working widows: the marriage bar in publicservants’ private lives until 1946 Conclusion Bibliography Index The Civil Service and the London County Council employed tens of thousands of women in Britain in the early twentieth century. As public employers these institutions influenced both each other and private organisations, thereby serving as a barometer or benchmark for the conditions of women's white-collar employment. Drawing on a wide range of archival sources including policy documents, trade union records, women's movement campaign literature and employees' personal testimony this is the first book-length study of women's public service employment in this period. It examines three aspects of Helen Glew investigates women's employment in the British Civil Service and London County Council during the 20th century, providing a new perspective on the development of the women's movement