By Frauke R-H

FAWCO is an umbrella organization for almost 80 women's clubs, representing some 17,000 women in 35 countries from Norway to Nairobi and from Vienna to Venezuela. It was founded in 1931 by Caroline Curtis Brown, then President of the American Women's Club of London, who believed that enlightened women, working cooperatively throughout the world, could do much to help achieve international peace. Its objectives, were to "work towards international goodwill and the preservation of world peace, to help one another solve problems common to them all and to aid women whose citizenship rights were being ignored or restricted."

Today it serves not only as a support network for American women residing abroad but also as a major force in promoting better conditions for all Americans overseas. It has, for example, been instrumental in obtaining the vote for overseas U.S. citizens and in making progressive changes in U.S. citizenship law (up to the most recent, which provides for expeditious naturalization of children born to or adopted by Americans residing abroad). It organizes voter registration drives; it disseminates information on primary and secondary education abroad and on American university education. For more information, see the FAWCO website at http://www.fawco.org.