ACTA SCIENTIARUM POLONORUM - SGGW

164 M. Żakled. Many members of these organizations are also active in the local government authorities,mainly at commune (gmina) level. However, this cooperation is not always theway the non-governmental organizations wished for [Śpiewak 2008]. Anna Wójcicka,the president of the Women’s Association “Victoria” from Górki in Podkarpackie Regioncomplained about the issue of cooperation with local government authorities: “Therewere no greater difficulties [as regards the establishment of the association] but as usual,everything depended on people, precisely on these people who decided on the existenceof our association. At the beginning of our way to register the association, the communehead gave us to understand that our ideas probably resulted from the lack of much seriousthings to do. (…) It was the district authorities, precisely the department of regional promotionwhich functions by the district authorities, that helped us the most. The employeesof this department willingly provide all the non-governmental organizations with information,organize workshops and trips for us, inform of competitions” [Interview 1].As a result of the Diagnosis of the Social and Professional Situation of Rural Womenin Poland conducted in 2008, it was determined that the village women’s clubs are theorganizations that commune authorities cooperate with the most often (67% of indications).This cooperation is formal as well as informal. The communes cooperate also withthe district authorities and they in turn implement, within the scope of their powers, theactivities based on partnership with non-governmental organizations (NGOs). The partnershipbetween the NGOs and the district authorities is stronger than the partnership atcommune level. The cooperation between local government authorities and organizationsmentioned above is of a great importance with a view to organizational help, material andfinancial support from commune and district authorities. It must be emphasized that thiscooperation is not permanent. The local government authorities usually cooperate withinthe scope defined by the provisions of law [Marks 2008]. The recipients of the cooperationfor rural women described above were asked for the opinion. It turned out that only17% of women researched, investigated were satisfied with such a cooperation.They listed also the most important aims for women’s organizations nowadays: counteractionto violence in rural family (70%), counteraction to discrimination on the jobmarket (42%), support for professional activity of rural women (35%), support for accessto education for rural women (30%), counteraction to sexual harassment of rural women(27%), support for rural women’s entrepreneurship (26%), promoting the pattern of ruralfamily based on partnership (16%), support for social and civic activity of rural women(14%) [Walczak-Duraj 2008].The representatives of the local government authorities and local organizations indicatedthe following problems of rural women: access to education and information,health protection, material conditions, job, family, infrastructure, rural women’s personalfeatures, social relations in the villages and small towns [Lisek-Michalska 2008].Discussing the activity of rural women which brings them closer to solving the problemsmentioned above, I will compare it to the activities undertaken by such organizationsas village women’s clubs and women’s associations. The issue of activity of ruralwomen cooperating with the Polish Women League will not be discussed. The descriptionof rural women’s activity was based on the comparison of their organizations’ wayof acting presented in Table 1 and supported by additional examples from the interviewsconducted with the representatives of rural women’s organizations.Acta Sci. Pol.