International Women’s Day: Celebrating 110 years of female empowerment

This year marks the 110th anniversary of the first International Women’s Day. Celebrated each year on 8 March, it was born out of the suffragette movement in the US in 1909 during which women were campaigning for shorter hours, better pay and the right to vote.

The movement was picked up in Europe and the first International Women’s Day was celebrated across Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland in 1910. The power of women banding together to create lasting change was cemented on 8 March 1917, when Russian women launched a strike which ended in the forced abdication of Czar Nicholas II and led to the establishment of a new government which granted women voting rights.

In 1918, women in Ireland were given the right to vote. Not every woman was eligible, however – it only applied to women over 30, those with property or a university education. It would take another four years for the full parliamentary franchise to be granted to women under the provision of the State’s new constitution. Women in Britain would have to wait until 1928, while French women were only granted the right to vote in 1945. International Women’s Day was recognised by the United Nations and proclaimed as the United Nations Day for Women’s Rights and International Peace in December of 1977.