‘Housewives Build a New World’: Emmy Freundlich, Pacifism and Women Co‐operators’ International Economic Thinking at the League of Nations, 1927–37

Abstract This article examines the contribution of women co‐operators to international economic thinking between the two world wars through the figure of Emmy Freundlich, founder and president of the International Co‐operative Women's Guild (ICWG). Moving beyond the marginalization of women in the history of international thought and the tendency to privilege formal theorists over practitioners, it argues that Freundlich drew on the everyday experiences of housewives to articulate a distinctive vision that combined consumer representation, maternal feminism and pacifism. Leveraging gendered hierarchies within society and the family, she presented housewives’ agency as a means of democratizing international economic governance, both within and beyond the League of Nations. Beginning with Freundlich's participation in the International Economic Conference of 1927, the article traces how the ICWG pursued its unfulfilled resolutions through informal co‐operative bodies while continuing to lobby within the League framework. In 1937, this trajectory culminated in an ambitious programme for the reform of the League, encompassing trade, disarmament and colonial administration. By recovering this overlooked history, the article shows how women co‐operators brought the perspectives of housewives – among the least visible constituencies of interwar society – into international economic debate, thereby broadening the boundaries of recognized expertise through a bottom‐up approach.