Women will celebrate International Women’s Day on Wednesday March 8, continuing a nearly 100-year tradition started by working women in the U.S. in 1908. The international character of the day was sealed in 1917, when Russian women took to the streets to protest food shortages and the hardships of war and touched off a general strike that led to the abdication of Czar Nicholas II. Despite political victories for women in the last century, poverty, war, violence and discrimination continue to plague the lives of women around the world. Look out for events in your city or community.