POLI 417 Quiz 1 Feminist Political Theory Flashcards
Frazer and Waves
- feminism as challenging the public private divide
- tension between degendering v.s revaluing traditional women’s work
- Emphasis on the private sphere entering the political domain. 2nd wave slogan the personal is political
- 1st wave: Right to vote, education, right to enter professions/uni, participation in political life, right to divorce. does not problematize the public private divide
- 2nd wave: late 60’s, Betty Friedan. associated more with radical feminism. brings in personal issues such as sexuality, marriage relations and diversity. significant widening of what is considered political, has resulted in disputes within feminism and debates about the nature of equality
Conventional v.s Feminist Political Theory
Conventional
-politics: governing politically through public institutions
-competition for power in a variety of power centers
-the feminist view is that politics inherently concerned with public world as seen in both classical and modern political theory as separate from the private or domestic
Feminist
-conventional is distorted by gender subtext, politics is defined as a masculine business because in public sphere
-not just of the time, gendering systemic and anti-woman
-mainstream models assume that parties are rational individuals and public actors, exclude women and femininity as noncontractual participants
-reconstruction of the public private distinction
-examination of institutional arrangements as allowing marginalization
Theory//Oppression//Duality
Liberal,sexism,M/f
Radical,patriarchy,M/F androgyny
Cultural, patriarchy, m/F
Marxist, capitalism, m/f dialectical
Socialist,capitalism and patriarchy, m/f dialectical
Postmodern/colonial, phallogocentrism, deconstructing m/f
Liberal Feminism
-push liberalism further to include women
individual discrimination and equality of individuals
-sexism, not systemic
-make women like men, not questioning the system itself
-reform, gender neutrality with a bias against women
Radical Feminism
- 60’s, rise of new left
- treated as second class activists so started meeting as just women
- arguing for social change and identify the leftist oppression
- patriarchy as structural inequality, critique of liberal male bias so change masculinity and femininity itself
Cultural Feminism
-70’s, out of radical
-system of structures called the patriarchy
-about power systems that grant men power and marginalize women
-reevaluation of what it means to be feminine, devalue traditional masculinity
nverted the dualism
-NOT THE SAME AS RADICAL
- Problematic
- Anti-intellectual
Socialist Feminism
○ Antiracist, anti-colonial and anti-homophobic
○ Started as just against capitalism
○ Capitalist patriarchy is the cause of women’s oppression
○ Dialectical- reconcile dualism in contemporary thinking. Beyond male female dualism
Dialectic that favours one side, so male side gets favoured
Marxist Feminism
-capitalist patriarchy, like liberal feminism cleaning up marxism for its biases
Post Modernism
- 80’s, initially leading edge was radical in late 70’s
- challenges enlightment and modernity
- phallogocentrism: critiquing liberalism and marxism and emphasis on universality. challenges universal categories and critiques logic and reasoning the modernity paradigm because it is too universalistic. problem with capital T truth
- blur and fragment male female dualism. more genders
- lots of pop culture
Bryson and Key Moments in 2nd Wave
- Betty Friedan, Feminine Mystique and NOW
- Women manipulated by pervasive cultural ideology, advertising, magazines, whole life devoted to attracting and keeping a husband and domestic life.
- no independence and self development
- live for themselves, educated and reach full potential, careers outside home, aided by maternity leave, daycare and sharing of responsibilities, doesn’t question structures and institutions
- Establishment of NOW (National Organization of Women) as a pressure group use the law and existing political processes to end discrimination and achieve formal equality of opportunity
Faludi and Backlash Against 2nd Wave Liberal Fem
- women haven’t really achieved equality
- poorly paid and insecure jobs
- still have to do all of the domestic work
- attacked as cause of wide range of social ills
Naomi Wolf Fire with Fire and Power Feminism
- Rather than bemoaning their status as victims, women should celebrate their achievements and overcome their fear of success to compete on equal terms with men in the new neoliberal economy
- Against victim feminism: hostility against men, obsession with sexual violence and pursuit of separatism rather than economic success
- Early work: Critical of movie industry and pressure to conform to physical appearances
Rawls Theory of Justice and Feminism + Okin
y placing knowledge of one’s sex behind Rawls’ ‘veil of ignorance’, individuals would agree to changes in gender divisions
-Okin: equal sharing of child rearing and domestic work would lead to gender equality in all other areas, justice means abolishing gender
‘Equal Rights Feminism’
- Equal rights as STARTING point, don’t want to lose rights
-Demand for full legal equality contradictory because denies relevance of gender differences.
-Enable women to be treated and valued equally but only to the extent that they behave like men.
-Differences confirm domestic responsibilities.
-Reconceptualization of equality
-Affirmative Action
Today liberal feminism is more welfare state liberal than neoliberal
-Tensions in liberalism between being given rights as individuals, and the recognition of their shared subordination as a group. - claim affirmative action and quotas can be defended on the grounds that unless members of politically excluded group are actually present, adequate representation is unlikely
-Narrow focus on formal legal and political rights for women ignores economic, cultural and sexual exploitation and oppression, thus largely reflecting the concerns of middle class white women.
-state provision of services push the state in a social democratic direction which is contrary
-State is not neutral, power relations distort the practice of justice
-Liberal separation of public and private is heavily gendered,
-Liberalism individualistic ontology has been critiques by feminists as representing a partial and incomplete view of human nature
Okin and Lib Fem
Worried about: feminization of poverty: pay equity, unequal sharing of family responsibilities after divorce, family justice: unequal division of family roles not conducive to rearing of citizens with strong sense of justice
Thinks solution is: welfare provisions: public education, social services, securing of child support payments, subsidized high quality day care, parental leave, flexible work hours, elimination of gender
-Family as earliest training ground for justice
-Limitations: analysis of family justice only looks at inequality of roles, but gendered violence in the violence is ignored in her article
-How adequate will a justice based on the elimination of gender be for poor women and women of colour?
-Reluctance of delving in to the private
