better kind of corporate leadership, such as Ritchey’s surely
was. “Movement leadership requires persuasion, not giving
orders. There is no position to lead from. It doesn’t exist. What
makes you successful is that you can phrase things in a way that
is inspirational, that makes coalitions possible. The movement
has to be owned by a variety of people, not one group. For ex-
ample, before we popularized the phrase ‘reproductive free-
dom,’ people talked about ‘population control.’ And that was
divisive, because some poor people and some racial groups felt
that this was directed at them. The problem was the phrase,
which said that someone else was going to make the decision,
not you. ‘Reproductive freedom’ tells you that the center of
authority is in the individual. And that made coalitions possi-
ble.... There is no human being who’s going to do what I say.
None. Not even my assistant, who is too smart. The only
power I have is the power of persuasion, or inspiration.”
Betty Friedan also discussed the idea of leading through
voice rather than position. “I have never fought for organiza-
tional power. I can have a great deal of influence just by my
voice. I don’t have to be president. I recently gave a speech at
a university where only 2 percent of the faculty is women. I
had a big crowd. I said, ‘I must be in a place that is for some
reason an anachronism.’ I read the figures to them. I said,
‘I’m surprised that you have not had a major class action suit.’
You could see the tension in the room. I said, ‘Of course, we
have had eight years of Reagan, and the laws that affect dis-
crimination haven’t been enforced, but now we’ve got the
Civil Rights Restoration Act. And you are really in a vulnera-
ble position, since over 50 percent of your financing is federal
funding. Just as a warning. Watch it.’ Then I went on with the
rest of my lecture. And something happened in that room. So
Getting People on Your Side