ABSTRACT
The idea that the issue of women 's emancipation was once and for all taken care of by the safe hands of the revolutionary government and administration, after its consolidation of power in 1945, is a commonplace in any mainstream reflection on the position of women in post-revolutionary Yugoslavia. The repudiation of the women's movement' s complex history in the inter-war period, which has been pushed into oblivion and become inaccessible to new generations, only encouraged the idea that the socialist devel opment era was the starting point for the liberation of Yugoslav women . 1 It was only the development of feminist perspectives dur ing the mid-1970s2 that has prompted its questioning. The consid erable lack of women's historical consciousness was a natural con sequence of the absence of historiographic tradition to draw upon when researching past activities of women in general , let alone when dealing with their struggle for emancipation.3 Anyone who wants to study the organised activities of women in the post-revolu tionary social context, whether to explore these activities from the point of view of their emancipatory goals and potentials, or merely to analyse the profound changes in the role of women in various dimensions of social life , is in danger of missing the point by ignor ing its history.
