In a series of interviews with Louise Toupin, groundbreaking feminist thinkers Silvia Federici and Mariarosa Dalla Costa return to the movement they co-founded in 1972—the International Feminist Collective. The feminist collective originated the radical and controversial demand for wages for housework. From these powerful roots, they continue to explain how their political thinking developed over time, formulating an intersectional critique of neoliberal capitalism with a crisis of social reproduction at its heart.

Silvia Federici is a feminist activist and scholar whose writing and political activities have contributed enormously to the broad Autonomist tradition. Known for her intellectual generosity, sharp, nonconformist thought, and searing critiques of capitalist society, Federici’s work has inspired the generation of social activists associated with the rise of the alter-globalization movement.

Silvia Federici's profile page

Mariarosa Dalla Costa was born in Treviso, Italy, in 1943. She studied at the University of Padua, received her doctorate in law in 1967, and was a professor at the Istituto di Scienze Politiche e Sociali. She is the author of the founding document of the Wages for Housework perspective, “Donne e sovversione sociale,” published in 1972 with an essay by Selma James, “Il posto della donna,” as Potere femminile e sovversione sociale. The book was
translated into several languages, including into English as The Power of Women and the Subversion of the Community, and into French, as Le pouvoir des femmes et la subversion sociale. She lives in Padua, Italy.

Mariarosa Dalla Costa's profile page

Louise Toupin lives in Montréal, Québec. She has taught political science at Université du Québec à Montréal. She was a member of the Québec Women’s Liberation Front (1969-71) and co-authored numerous anthologies of activist and feminist writings. She is notably the author of Wages for Housework: A History of an International Feminist Movement, 1972-77 (Remue-ménage 2014). The book has been translated into English (UBC/Pluto Press, 2018), Spanish (Tiempo Robado, 2022), German (Unrast, 2022), Italian (Ombre Corte, 2023), and Korean, (Nanjang, 2024).

Louise Toupin's profile page