Forgotten feminists: the Federation of British Professional and Business Women, 1933-1969

Using archive documents of the British Federation of Business and Professional Women (BFBPW) this article explores the role of this early business organisation in campaigning for feminist issues in the post-war period. It argues that the BFBPW is indicative of the complexities of the women's movement in the post-suffrage era when it fragmented into interconnecting campaigning organisations around a multitude of women's issues. The article suggests that businesswomen in this period acted in ways that anticipated modern 'femocratic' practice in the way they sought to use business networks to gain access to parliamentary policy networks.