Dian Septi Trisnanti, General Chairwoman of Indonesia's Federation of Independent Workers' Unions (FSBPI) argues that the workplace norm is male, and that any menstrual leave policy which treats menstrual pain as a medical deviation from that norm — rather than as a condition produced by it — will reproduce the stigma it claims to address. The demand for menstrual leave, she writes, is a demand to transform the work system itself, extending from leave entitlement through the elimination of (…)

Une pétition tchèque réclamant l'instauration législative du congé menstruel a recueilli près de 25 000 signatures en quatre jours. Des décennies de débats féministes asiatiques de gauche ouvrent des pistes que les pays européens qui débattent du congé menstruel — dont l'Espagne, la France et désormais la République tchèque — n'ont pas encore sérieusement explorées. Ce que le bilan asiatique révèle L'Indonésie est le point de départ. Le droit à deux jours de congé menstruel payé par mois (…)

A Czech petition calling for legislative menstrual leave has collected nearly 25,000 signatures in its first four days. Decades of Asian left feminist debates point toward answers that European countries debating menstrual leave, including Spain, France, and now the Czech Republic, have not yet seriously engaged with. What the Asian record shows Indonesia is the place to start. The right to two days' paid menstrual leave per month has been in national law since 1948, restated in Law No. (…)