Politics as If Women Mattered: A Political Analysis of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women

Lin Good, formerly an associate librarian at Queen’s University, is
currently a consultant.

“To the women of NAC who have made women matter in Canadian
politics” reads the dedication in this book, suggesting a lively
account of such vital NAC personalities as Laura Sabia, Kay Macpherson,
Grace Hartman, and Chaviva Hosek. The subtitle gives a more accurate
description; as a political analysis of the organization’s
achievements, this book is a useful contribution to Canadian history and
political studies, but it is not likely to attract the general reader.

NAC celebrated its 20th anniversary in 1992, but the authors
concentrate on the first 17 years, providing only a brief afterword on
the last three. Like most organizations, the NAC had to endure
ideological differences and changes in strategy and tactics. Its
survival owes much to its first chair, Laura Sabia, who “possessed
formidable skills of coalition, building and mediation,” and her
successor, Grace Hartman, secretary-treasurer of the Canadian Union of
Public Employees, who bridged the gap between working-class and
middle-class women.

From the “Strategy for Change” founding meeting to the present, the
NAC has reflected a multiplicity of beliefs and opinions. Anglophones,
with their traditional values of individual liberties, worked side by
side with francophones, who placed emphasis on collective rights. Lorna
Marsden, another early leader, held that structure and process for
decision-making by vote were needed to obtain agreement among such
diverse sectors, and she established workable ground rules. But many
radical feminists argued, and still do, that a decentralized,
unstructured organization, offering access to women anywhere in Canada,
is more appropriate to a women’s movement.

With no clear electoral system to give it a mandate, the NAC is not
universally regarded as the Parliament of Women (as the authors name
it). Nor is it easy to assess how representative it is of the majority
of women. The impact it has had on public policy could substantiate that
claim, however. The question now is whether it can sustain its role
given the regional pressures and reduction in government funding that
currently threaten its effectiveness. Recently it has concentrated
primarily on issues of race, disability, and sexual orientation,
operating as part of the women’s movement. Despite this book, the
survival of NAC remains an open question.