The U.S. Women's Movement in Global Perspective. Edited
by Lee Ann Banaszak. Rowman & Littlefield. 2006. 272 pp. $72.00 cloth,
$27.95 paper.
Despite its considerable successes, the U.S. women's movement has
frequently been seen as a disappointment from a global perspective. For
instance, in their analysis of global women's movements'
influence on the major multinationals, Robert O'Brien and colleagues
state that “in the case of the US women's movement, even though
it is the largest and most powerful women's movement in the world,
its focus is squarely domestic, not international” (Contesting
Global Governance, 2000, p. 53). Similarly, in a chapter in the
current volume, Joyce Gelb points out that, although the United States has
been a standard-bearer in regard to gender equity policy, a
“politics of insularity” has sometimes prevented the movement
from achieving new gains (p. 177).