Steven Buechler presents a comprehensive analysis of the role of organizations in advancing the cause of the woman suffrage movement (1866 - 1920) and the modern women's movement. While the early movement was primarily a struggle to gain the right to vote, the contemporary movement has focused on equal rights in every sphere of life. Although large and prominent women's national organizations such as the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) in the suffrage movement and the National Organization for Women (NOW) in the contemporary women's movement possessed the resources and the organization skills to lobby the government, they were often estranged from the daily needs of women from minority races and working class. In both cases, the women's movements were boosted by the efforts of other smaller grassroots organizations that addressed the concerns of the people. Furthermore, these smaller organizations often adopted aggressive strategies that encouraged women to take a proactive stance in advancing their cause. In this paper, the effectiveness of these small grassroots organizations in mobilizing the women will be discussed based on Buechler's Women's Movements in the United States.
For the women's suffrage movement, the formation of new organizational groupings provided a powerful impetus at the turn of the century when the movement met with a series of defeats. Social reformers from the settlement house movement helped to spread the demand for the ballot in the immigrant neighborhoods in order to improve the living and working conditions of the immigrants and the poor whose lives were adversely affected by rapid industrialization. Through these organizations, NASWA was able to expand its base of support from a middle-class community to a diversified grouping (Buechler 55). Furthermore, the diversification of the group gave an important boost to the movement at a time when the suffrage movement was floundering in t...