Feminism

What is feminism?

• Gender equality
• Originated in the 18th & 19th centuries with m/c women seeking the vote
• Has since diversified

• Classical liberals consistently asserted the rights of man 
• This led to the develpment of 1st wave feminism, with Mary Wollstonecraft, J.S. Mill & Harriet Taylor advocating the reduction of sexual discrimination primarily through equal suffrage
• Liberal type of feminism
• Wollstonecraft: women were essentially rational beings & therefore capable of self-determination & deserving of liberty, rights & education

Achievements of first wave liberal feminism

• Married Women's Property Act 1870, giving married women the right to own property
• 1928: Women had the vote on equal terms with men

Liberal Feminism

• By the 1960s, it was perceived that little had been done to reduce ongoing inequalities between men & women
• After WW2, liberal feminists such as Betty Frieden (The Feminine Mystique, 1963) sought equal legal & political rights
• Underpinned by liberal values e.g. individualism & rationalism

Achievements of second wave liberal feminism

• Abortion Act 1967, Equal Pay Act 1970, Sex Discrimination Act 1976
• liberalisation of divorce, taxation & property laws
• State provision of free & legal contraception
• Women's lifestyles & health improved & the fertility rate declined

Socialist Feminism

• Largely based on Marxist theories
• Close link between capitalism & women's oppression
• Gender equality wll come with economic revolution
• The nuclear family is an economic unit, where marriage is a contract between the male breadwinner 7 female housewife of economic maintenance in returen for sexual services
• Women are a reserve army of cheap labour, socialised to accept low wages & status
• Domestic work is essential to the conomy, releasing men for paid work & keeping them fit & healthy for work

• Patriarchy is the most important power realtionship in the social system - "the personal is the political"
• Women excluded from work, politics & economics as they are confined to the private sphere by domestic work & childcare
• Diatinguish between sex & gender
• Reject the "public-private split" - public man & private woman

The concept of patriarchy

• Liberal feminists - legal & political oppression; public sphere
• Socialist feminists - capitalism = patriarchy
• Radical feminists - sexual revolution in the public & private spheres

The public-private split

• Liberal feminists - personal freedom of choice
• Socialist feminists - patriarchy originates in the public sphere & spreads to the private sphere
• Radical feminists - patriarchy originates in the private sphere & spreads to the public sphere

The concept of patriarchy

• Liberal feminists - legal & political oppression; public sphere
• Socialist feminists - capitalism = patriarchy
• Radical feminists - sexual revolution in the public & private spheres

The public-private split

• Liberal feminists - personal freedom of choice
• Socialist feminists - patriarchy originates in the public sphere & spreads to the private sphere
• Radical feminists - patriarchy originates in the private sphere & spreads to the public sphere

• Do not subscribe to androgyny - argue that men & women are biologically different, making men naturally more competitive & aggressive & women more caring & empathetic
• Women should not seek full equality with men, but should insead celebrate the distinctive traits of the female sex
• Some essentialists choose to practice "political lesbianism", implying female superiority
• Rejected by other strands of feminism as another form of sexism

Anti-feminism

• Traditional conservatives: gender hierarchy is natural, functional, inevitable & desireable
• Some feminists have rejected androyny & instead celebrate the unique nature of womanhood & the superior roles of motherhood & domesticity

Post-feminism

• Some argue that feminism has done its job & is now obsolete
• Victim of its own success
• Feminism has succeeded to the extent that women now have to search desparately for "trivial definitions of victimhood" e.g. being complimented on appearance / having doors opened for them by men