Beatrice Webb

Martha Beatrice Webb, Baroness Passfield, born Potter (1858 to 1943), was an English sociologist, economist, feminist, socialist thinker and social reformer. She was among the founders of the London School of Economics and played a crucial role in forming the Fabian Society. She wrote several popular books, the most notable being The Co-operative Movement in Great Britain and Industrial Democracy, the latter co-authored with her husband Sidney Webb, in which she coined the term collective bargaining to describe negotiation between an employer and a labor union. As a feminist and social reformer she criticised the exclusion of women from various occupations and campaigned for the unionisation of female workers and for legislation allowing better hours and conditions.