APA Dictionary of Psychology

women’s liberation movement (WLM)

Updated on 04/19/2018

a social movement, derived from earlier women’s social activism (e.g., the suffragist movement of the 19th and early 20th centuries), that came into existence in the late 1960s and campaigned for a wide range of feminist goals. These included the securing of (a) equal employment and educational opportunities through legislation and government policy; (b) freedom from male domination through social action against pornography and male violence toward women; and (c) the overthrow of racism, homophobia, and capitalism, which was regarded as essential to achieving gender equality. The movement comprised numerous local women’s groups and benefited from an influx of women from the student movement, the anti–Vietnam War movement, and the Civil Rights movement.
more generally, a movement among some women to free themselves from the sexual double standard; from total responsibility for child rearing and homemaking; and from the traditional stereotype of women as fragile, passive, dependent individuals who are governed by emotion rather than reason. See also feminism; radical feminism.

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