How did the return to peacetime affect women's roles in European society?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Answers will vary. Despite measures of wartime necessity that mobilized women into the workforce, the majority of women were expected to return to their homes, and in many cases, European nations embraced policies of pro-natalism in order to regenerate their lost populations. However, the reality meant that with significant depopulation, many men would not be able to return to their former occupations, and women remained in some positions, albeit at lower wages with less security. Women's positions as consumers were a new trend in the 1920s, particularly marketing to the needs of the "working girls" and young, independent women. Marketing campaigns and magazines promoted images of a modern young woman, the Flapper, which suggested that this "new woman" was the accepted standard, while conflicting messages of women in traditional spheres, as nurturers, mothers, and homemakers, was also broadcast. Challenging this notion was the new place of women in artistic communities, as well as in the Soviet world, which argued for women as social equals, able to provide and interpret the world around them with equal success.