Autonomy, diversity, and integration: Union women's separate organizing inNorth America and western Europe in the context of restructuring and globalization

For over two decades, union women's committees and educational programs and conferences organized by and for women have played a key role in politiciz ing women and producing them as a vocal constituency. The project of this a rticle is to provide a conceptual framework to help assess the viability of separate organizing in the face of national and global economic and politi cal restructuring. This article opens with a discussion of analytic tools for exploring separa te organizing, outlining distinctions, for example, between separate and au tonomous organizing, and between separate organizing and separatism. The se cond section presents a brief overview of some of the changes wrought by re structuring and globalization. The final sections consider the conditions u nder which such organizing avoids marginalization, addresses diversity prom otes both autonomy and integration, and facilitates coalition building-all of which will be critical to the continued relevance of separate organizing . (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.