Description
Amidst a flurry of interest in both Third World internationalism and the history of development, the role of Asian and African women is strangely absent. This paper engages with this history through two Afro-Asian women’s conferences: the 1958 Asian-African Conference on Women in Colombo, and the Afro-Asian Women’s Conference in Cairo in 1961. The first conference included only countries that had achieved independence and aimed to be non-political, focusing on development priorities including education, health, and social welfare. While it encompassed largely women from Asia, who sought to reach out to their ‘African sisters’, the second included far more African women campaigning for an end to colonialism throughout the continent. Composed largely of women affiliated with the international left, it prioritised a bold vision of anti-colonial solidarity, including a rejection of Western aid, while celebrating the achievements of the communist world. Through a comparative examination of the two, this paper shows that Asian women’s ideas of development changed depending on who was included, shaped by both ideological politics and the geographies of decolonisation.
