| Sumario: | This article examines the Türk-İş Women's Bureau's creation within Cold War labour initiatives led by the AFL-CIO and its affiliate, the Asian American Free Labor Institute (AAFLI). In 1976, African American organiser Maida Springer was appointed to strengthen women's representation in Turkish unions. Adopting a multi-scalar approach, the article traces the interplay between Cold War rivalries, national union politics, and local women's organising. It argues that despite a favourable international climate for women's labour participation, efforts to institutionalise women's representation failed due to intra-union tensions, anti-Americanism, and weak national-local coordination. Drawing on untapped archival material and oral histories, this is the first study to examine Springer's overlooked role in Cold War Turkey. By centering the transnational constraints on women's organising, it pioneers an intersectional analysis of how anti-Americanism, gendered union politics, and Cold War geopolitics converged to limit women's labour reforms – a dynamic largely neglected in existing studies of AFL-CIO internationalism.
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