Battling for Equality: Sexual Integration in the U.S. Military, 1945-1978

This dissertation argues that the U.S. military\u27s postwar sexual integration efforts initiated a process of redefining women\u27s equality. As a new workplace for women, the U.S. military became a central site for reconsidering women\u27s postwar social and economic roles, well before the rise of second wave feminism in the 1960s and 1970s. As servicewomen, civilians, and military leaders debated women\u27s place in national defense, they simultaneously challenged existing beliefs about women\u27s social roles and slowly helped expand women\u27s equality. The dissertation arcs from the debates over the Women\u27s Armed Services Integration Act of 1948 to the Equal Rights Amendment and changes in servicewomen\u27s status during the 1970s. The evolution of women\u27s military roles in those years directly influenced the development of the current military environment, where servicewomen continue to encounter career limitations, discrimination, and sexual harassment and abuse. Women\u27s integration into the U.S. military remains, in many ways, incomplete