‘The Business is Political’: Des femmes Publishing House and the Question of Power in the French Women’s Liberation Movement (1972–1979)

Abstract

In 1972 a new publishing house was created by an activist group of the Women’s Liberation Movement in Paris: ‘Psychoanalysis and Politics’ (Psychanalyse et politique). Following an anti-capitalist and anti-sexist agenda, the aim was to publish all that was ‘repressed by the bourgeois publishing houses’ with a specific focus on women. Funded by the support of a wealthy activist, the group had the opportunity to invent an original business model inspired by a political vision and without any pressure to sell. The publishing house had an important role in providing ‘feminine literature’ and women’s struggles to a large audience with the publication of 150 books between 1974 and 1979, as well as a newspaper and a magazine. However, it was also at the heart of various conflicts within the Women’s Liberation Movement, resulting in trials, tensions deriving from conflicting political views, difficult working relations and competition between publishing houses. More deeply, it revealed the power generated by the possibility of printing. The creation of a trademark and an association in 1979 by the women at the head of the Éditions des femmes, was the climax of the entanglements between activism, business and power. Drawing from archives of ‘Les Éditions des femmes’ and the wider French feminist movement, this article will highlight the many ways in which the feminist publishing business in 1970s France was profoundly political.