Respectable Radicals: A History of the National Council of Women of Australia 1896–2006

For much of the twentieth century, the National Council of Women of Australia was the peak body representing women to government in Australia and, through the International Council of Women, to the world. This history of the NCWA tells the story of mainstream feminism in Australia, of the long struggle for equality at home and at work, which is still far from achieved. These days, when women can no longer be imagined as speaking with one voice and women as a group have no ready access to government, something of the optimistic vision of the leaders of the NCWA is still needed. Respectable in hat and gloves to the 1970s and beyond, the women of the NCWA politely persisted with the truly radical idea that women around the world should be equal with men.