At a 1902 meeting in Washington, D.C., delegates from ten countries, believing that a new international organization devoted to women's suffrage was needed, planned to meet in Berlin to form a permanent organization. Delegates from eight nations founded the International Woman Suffrage Alliance (IWSA) in 1904 as an unconditionally pro-suffrage and explicitly feminist alternative to the International Council of Women, which had failed to take a clear pro-suffrage position. The Alliance established suffrage as its primary goal from the beginning and maintained votes for women as its sole concern until just before World War I. Beginning in 1913 the group began to address wider issues including prostitution, peace, equal pay, women's right to employment, the nationality of married women, and slavery. In 1915, individual members of IWSA from warring countries had met in the Hague and were instrumental in setting up what has become another highly regarded sister organization, the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.

By the 1920s the Alliance was divided into groups of enfranchised and disenfranchised women and, although it continued to press for woman suffrage in countries without it, the organization also adopted peace and equality as major goals. Changing its name to the International Alliance of Women for Suffrage and Equal Citizenship in the late 1920s, the group, headed by Margery Corbett Ashby, maintained its commitment to peace throughout the inter-war period. Although it became increasingly similar to the International Council of Women after the 1910s it stubbornly maintained its separate structure and identity. Emerging intact out of the chaos of World War II the organization adopted a program of peace, democracy, women's rights, and support for the United Nations. In 1946 the name International Alliance of Women was adopted with the sub-title Equal Rights - Equal Responsibilities.

In its present-day work the IAW "affirms that full and equal enjoyment of human rights is due to all women and girls. The IAW maintains that a prerequisite to securing these rights is the universal ratification and implementation without reservation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). The importance and value of women's contributions as equal partners has been acknowledged in numerous United Nations World Conferences held during the past decades." [Source: IAW Web site http://www.womenalliance.org/history.html]

Approximately half of the collection consists of programs and other material related to biennial conferences, in particular the 12th Congress held in Istanbul, 1935. Material from this Congress includes committee reports and resolutions, correspondence, programs, publicity, speeches, and memorabilia. Documentation for other congresses is more sparse, consisting mainly of programs. There are also official conference reports (1906-61) and general documents such as agendas, publicity, position papers, newsletters, and printed material. Major topics addressed include women's rights, women's suffrage, the international women's movement, peace, and the United Nations.