International Encyclopedia of Revolution and Protest

Extract

Anna Walentynowicz is widely understood to be the catalyst for the Gdansk shipyard strikes and was the face of the anti-communist propaganda posters of the Solidarność (Solidarity) movement in the 1980s. A member of the free trade unions of Gdansk, Walentynowicz was fired in August 1980 from her job as a crane operator at the Lenin shipyards in Gdansk (preceding Lech Walesa , who worked in the same shipyard) for distributing the journal Robotnik Wybrzeza (Coastal Worker). She was editor of the illegal newspaper, which advocated workers' rights to unionize and a 1,000-zloty pay raise. Walentynowicz and Walesa organized labor union strikes demanding their reinstatement and a 2,000-zloty pay raise in the Lenin shipyards. Once the government allowed Walentynowicz to return to work, she became one of only two female members of the Interfactory Strike Committee Presidium and one of the signatories of the Gdańsk Agreements of August 1981 that legalized the Solidarity trade union. As the Solidarity movement gained momentum, Walentynowicz's prominence waned when her local chapter elected a male delegate to the National Solidarity Congress in Gdańsk in the fall of 1981. The new local, regional, and national boards systemically excluded women who were involved in the Solidarity movement. Nevertheless, Walentynowicz's activism, in conjunction with the many shipyard strikes that led to ... log in or subscribe to read full text