For a long time, the Federal Republic of Germany was a republic of men. Men wrote the history and occupied its offices. Men set the tone. And women? This book tells the political history of the Federal Republic of Germany from female points of view.
For many years, women politicians were barely visible in Germany. The first woman minister was appointed in 1961. And Chancellor Konrad Adenauer only included Elisabeth Schwarzhaupt in his fourth cabinet when a sit-in by the women of his party outside the cabinet room forced him to. Which, however, did not stop him from continuing to greet the members of his government with the words “Good morning, gentlemen” …
At the heart of this book are charismatic women whose political work and private fates provide insight into an aspect of German history that remains untold to this day. The protagonists are female politicians from all parties who asserted themselves in the male bastion of the Bundestag during the Bonn Republic. Their lives are characterized by political and private drama because they often had to pay a high personal price for their commitment. In this book, many of them speak for the first time about how politics changed their life, how their enduring commitment resulted in painful separations and estrangements, how they became addicted to politics and about the various ways men from all parties fought against them.
The result is a gripping chronicle of the fight for political equal rights that continues to this day.
