Clara Zetkin

Pioneering feminist and socialist who revolutionized women's rights in labor movements

Clara Zetkin (1857-1933) stands as a transformative figure in global social reform through her groundbreaking work merging feminism with socialist theory. As principal architect of International Women's Day, she created the first coordinated platform addressing gender equality in workplace conditions across political borders.

Born in Saxony, Zetkin defied Bismarck's Anti-Socialist Laws by organizing clandestine workers' education circles. Her 1889 speech at the Second International's Paris Congress demanded equal pay and maternity protections - radical concepts predating most labor laws. She later edited Die Gleichheit (Equality), a socialist women's journal reaching 125,000 subscribers by 1914.

Zetkin's most enduring legacy emerged in 1910 when she proposed an annual International Working Women's Day at the Copenhagen Socialist Conference. This evolved into the UN-recognized International Women's Day celebrated globally on March 8. During Weimar Germany, she became the oldest Reichstag member, using her 1932 presidential address to warn against Nazism while fascists heckled her speech.