Spanky assiter leaves barrett jackson

FEMINIST THOUGHT

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FEMINIST T

A MORE COMPREHENSIVE INTRODUCTION

Rosemarie Tong University of North Carolina, Charlotte

A Member of the Perseus Books Group

THIRD EDITION

HOUGHT

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Copyright © 2009 by Westview Press Published by Westview Press, A Member of the Perseus Books Group

All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, address Westview Press, 2465 Central Avenue, Boulder, Colorado 80301-2877. Find us on the World Wide Web at www.westviewpress.com.

Westview Press books are available at special discounts for bulk purchases in the United States by corporations, institutions, and other organizations. For more information, please contact the Special Markets Department at the Perseus Books Group, 2300 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA, or call (800) 810-4145, extension 5000, or e-mail special.markets@perseusbooks.com.

A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress

ISBN: 978-0-8133-4375-4 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

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Contents Preface ix Acknowledgments xi

Introduction: The Diversity of Feminist Thinking 1

1 Liberal Feminism 11

Conceptual Roots of Liberal Feminist Thought and Action 11 Eighteenth-Century Thought: Equal Education 13 Nineteenth-Century Thought: Equal Liberty 16 Nineteenth-Century Action: The Suffrage 21 Twentieth-Century Action: Equal Rights 23 Twentieth-Century Thought: Sameness Versus Difference 27 Contemporary Directions in Liberal Feminism 34 Critiques of Liberal Feminism 37 Conclusion 45

2 Radical Feminism: Libertarian and Cultural Perspectives 48

Libertarian and Cultural Views on the Sex/Gender System 51 Some Libertarian Views on Gender 52 Some Cultural Views on Gender 56 Sexuality, Male Domination, and Female Subordination 65 The Pornography Debate 68 The Lesbianism Controversy 71 Reproduction, Men, and Women 73 Libertarian and Cultural Views on Mothering 82 Critiques of Radical-Libertarian and Radical-Cultural Feminism 90

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3 Marxist and Socialist Feminism: Classical and Contemporary 96

Some Marxist Concepts and Theories 97 Classical Marxist Feminism: General Reflections 106 Contemporary Socialist Feminism: General Reflections 110 Women’s Labor Issues 118 Critiques of Marxist and Socialist Feminism 125 Conclusion 126

4 Psychoanalytic Feminism 128

Sigmund Freud 129 Feminist Critiques of Freud 133 Early Feminist Appropriations of Freud 135 Later Feminist Appropriations of Freud 138 Psychoanalytic Feminism: General Reflections 152 Conclusion 160

5 Care-Focused Feminism 163

The Roots of Care-Focused Feminism 164 Maternal Ethics and the Ethics of Care 181 Conclusion 195

6 Multicultural, Global, and Postcolonial Feminism 200

Multicultural Feminism: General Reflections 201 Roots of Multicultural Feminism in the United States 202 Interlocking Sources of Women’s Oppression 204 Conceptual Challenges for Multicultural Feminism 207 Global and Postcolonial Feminism: General Reflections 215 Diversity and Commonality 217 Sexual/Reproductive Issues Versus Economic Issues 218 Knowing When to Respect Women’s Culture 228 Conclusion 233

7 Ecofeminism 237

Some Roots of Ecofeminism 238 Ecofeminism: New Philosophy or Ancient Wisdom? 242 Tensions in Nature: Ecofeminist Thought 243

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Spiritual Ecofeminism 252 Transformative Ecofeminism 256 Global Ecofeminism 261 Critiques of Ecofeminism 265 Conclusion 268

8 Postmodern and Third-Wave Feminism 270

Postmodernism/Postmodern Feminism: Keynotes 272 Critique of Postmodern Feminism 283 Third-Wave Feminism 284 Critique of Third-Wave Feminism 289 Conclusion 290

Notes 293 Bibliography 333 Index 401

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Preface

Oftentimes, a new edition of a book, particularly a third edition, amounts to lit- tle more than some added references and updates. But I can assure readers that this new edition of Feminist Thought: A More Comprehensive Introduction, con- stitutes a major overhaul: eighteen months of drafting and redrafting. Chapters that remain substantially the same are the chapters on liberal feminism, radical feminism, and ecofeminism, though even these have significant revisions. Sub- stantially reformulated chapters are the ones on psychoanalytic feminism and Marxist/socialist feminism. I have reassigned some feminist thinkers I previ- ously classified as postmodern feminists to the psychoanalytic feminist fold, and I have amplified my discussion of socialist feminism in ways that better clarify the differences between it and Marxist feminism. In addition, although Chapter 6, “Multicultural, Global, and Postcolonial Feminism,” includes ideas from the second edition, I have thoroughly revised the section on multicultural femi- nism, offering new interpretations of this mode of feminist thinking. Further enhancing this chapter, which is now one of my favorite chapters, is a serious effort to address the differences between multicultural, global, and postcolonial feminism. New or expanded discussions of Susan Okin, Martha Nussbaum, Chila Bulbeck, Linda Martin Alcoff, and Adrian Piper are featured. Another chapter that blends a bit of old material with much new material is Chapter 8, “Postmodern and Third-Wave Feminism.” Among the feminist thinkers now showcased are Hélène Cixous, Judith Butler, Leslie Heywood, Jennifer Drake, and Rebecca Walker. Finally, a new chapter makes its debut in this third edition. Although Chapter 5, “Care-Focused Feminism,” includes previous discussions of Carol Gilligan and Nel Noddings, equally long discussions of Virginia Held and Eva Feder Kittay have been added.

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As I reflect on this third edition of Feminist Thought, I realize how quickly and richly feminist thinking has developed. I applaud the creative and schol- arly abilities of the feminists whose work I try to summarize, interpret, and share with as wide and diverse an audience as possible. Feminist thinking has energized the academy and challenged it to reject the limits that had been previously imposed on it by a “white/male/exclusionary” modality of thought. Just as importantly—indeed more importantly—feminist thinking has motivated feminist action. The world is more fair, just, and caring thanks to the ideas not only of the feminist thinkers featured in this book but also the many feminist thinkers who, for lack of pen perhaps, have not been able to write down, let alone widely publicize their ideas. It is to this group of feminist thinkers I dedicate this book.

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Acknowledgments

As anyone who has ever written a book knows, it is not a solo project. Rather, it is a collaborative effort. My only fear is that I will fail to say a public thank-you to one of the persons who helped me bring this book to completion.

First, I want to thank Lisa Singleton for the long hours she spent research- ing for me and the even longer hours she spent typing draft after draft of a book that seemed without end. Without Lisa’s cheerful commitment to this project, it would not have seen the light of day. There is no way that I can thank this gifted woman enough.

Second, I want to thank Karl Yambert, my editor. His patience is that of Job. Due to life’s unpredictable and sometimes sad detours, it took me far longer to complete this book than I hoped. Rather than chastising me, Karl made things easy for me. Had I had a less understanding editor, I would have probably abandoned this third edition.

Third, I want to thank my diligent copyeditor, Patty Boyd, for perfecting my manuscript and the anonymous reviewers who motivated me to improve it. Their behind-the-scenes work is most appreciated.

I also want to thank Laura Stine, my project editor, for getting this edition of Feminist Thought to press.

Finally, I thank all feminist thinkers for building a body of thought that is moving us closer to being a more just and compassionate world. I am grateful to be a part of this effort and hope to remain a part of it until the day I die.

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1

Introduction: The Diversity of Feminist Thinking

Since writing my first introduction to feminist thought nearly two decades ago, I have become increasingly convinced that feminist thought resists categoriza- tion into tidy schools of thought. Interdisciplinary, intersectional, and interlock- ing are the kind of adjectives that best describe the way we feminists think. There is a certain breathlessness in the way we move from one topic to the next, revising our thoughts in midstream. Yet despite the very real problems that come with trying to categorize the thought of an incredibly diverse and large array of feminist thinkers as “x” or “y” or “z,” feminist thought is old enough to have a history complete with a set of labels: liberal, radical, Marxist/socialist, psychoanalytic, care-focused, multicultural/global/colonial, ecofeminist, and postmodern/third wave. To be sure, this list of labels is incomplete and highly contestable. Indeed, it may ultimately prove to be entirely unreflective of femi- nism’s intellectual and political commitments to women. For now, however, feminist thought’s old labels still remain serviceable. They signal to the public that feminism is not a monolithic ideology and that all feminists do not think alike. The labels also help mark the range of different approaches, perspectives, and frameworks a variety of feminists have used to shape both their explana- tions for women’s oppression and their proposed solutions for its elimination.

Because so much of contemporary feminist theory defines itself in reaction against traditional liberal feminism, liberalism is as good a place as any to begin a survey of feminist thought. This perspective received its classic formulation in Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Women,1 in John Stuart Mill’s “The Subjection of Women,”2 and in the nineteenth-century women’s suffrage movement. Its main thrust, an emphasis still felt in contemporary

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groups such as the National Organization of Women (NOW), is that female subordination is rooted in a set of customary and legal constraints that blocks women’s entrance to and success in the so-called public world. To the extent that society holds the false belief that women are, by nature, less intellectually and physically capable than men, it tends to discriminate against women in the academy, the forum, and the marketplace. As liberal feminists see it, this dis- crimination against women is unfair. Women should have as much chance to succeed in the public realm as men do. Gender justice, insist liberal feminists, requires us, first, to make the rules of the game fair and, second, to make certain that none of the runners in the race for society’s goods and services is systemati- cally disadvantaged.

But is the liberal feminist program drastic and dramatic enough to com- pletely undo women’s oppression? Radical feminists think not. They claim the patriarchal system is characterized by power, dominance, hierarchy, and competition. It cannot be reformed but only ripped out root and branch. It is not just patriarchy’s legal and political structures that must be overturned on the way to women’s liberation. Its social and cultural institutions (espe- cially the family and organized religion) must also be uprooted.

As in the past, I remain impressed by the diverse modalities of thinking that count as “radical feminist thought.” Although all radical feminists focus on sex, gender, and reproduction as the locus for the development of femi- nist thought,3 some of them favor so-called androgyny, stress the pleasures of sex (be it heterosexual, lesbian, or autoerotic), and view as unalloyed bless- ings for women not only the old reproduction-controlling technologies but also the new reproduction-assisting technologies. In contrast, other radical feminists reject androgyny; emphasize the dangers of sex, especially hetero- sexual sex; and regard as harmful to women the new reproduction-assisting technologies and, for the most part, the old reproduction-controlling tech- nologies. As in the second edition of my book, I sort this varied array of rad- ical feminist thinkers into two groups: “radical-libertarian feminists” and “radical-cultural feminists.”4

With respect to gender-related issues, radical-libertarian feminists usually reason that if, to their own detriment, men are required to exhibit mascu- line characteristics only, and if, to their own detriment, women are required to exhibit feminine characteristics only, then the solution to this harmful state of affairs is to permit all human beings to be androgynous—to exhibit a full range of masculine and feminine qualities. Men should be permitted to explore their feminine dimensions, and women their masculine ones. No human being should be forbidden the sense of wholeness that comes from combining his or her masculine and feminine sides.

2 Introduction

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Disagreeing with radical-libertarian feminists that a turn to androgyny is a liberation strategy for women, radical-cultural feminists argue against this move in one of three ways. Some anti-androgynists maintain the problem is not femininity in and of itself, but rather the low value that patriarchy assigns to feminine qualities such as “gentleness, modesty, humility, supportiveness, empathy, compassionateness, tenderness, nurturance, intuitiveness, sensitiv- ity, unselfishness,” and the high value it assigns to masculine qualities such as “assertiveness, aggressiveness, hardiness, rationality or the ability to think log- ically, abstractly and analytically, ability to control emotion.”5 They claim that if society can learn to value “feminine” traits as much as “masculine” traits, women’s oppression will be a bad memory. Other anti-androgynists object, insisting femininity is the problem because it has been constructed by men for patriarchal purposes. In order to be liberated, women must reject femininity as it has been constructed for them and give it an entirely new meaning. Fem- ininity should no longer be understood as those traits that deviate from mas- culinity. On the contrary, femininity should be understood as a way of being that needs no reference point external to it. Still other anti-androgynists, reverting to a “nature theory,” argue that despite patriarchy’s imposition of a false, or inauthentic, feminine nature upon women, many women have nonetheless rebelled against it, unearthing their true, or authentic, female nature instead. Full personal freedom for a woman consists, then, in her abil- ity to renounce her false feminine self in favor of her true female self.

As difficult as it is to fully reflect the range of radical feminist thought on gender, it is even more difficult to do so with respect to sexuality. Radical- libertarian feminists argue that no specific kind of sexual experience should be prescribed as the best kind for women.6 Every woman should be encour- aged to experiment sexually with herself, with other women, and with men. Although heterosexuality can be dangerous for women within a patriarchal society, women must nonetheless feel free to follow the lead of their own desires, embracing men if that is their choice.

Radical-cultural feminists disagree. They stress that through pornography, prostitution, sexual harassment, rape, and woman battering,7 through foot binding, suttee, purdah, clitoridectormy, witch burning, and gynecology,8 men have controlled women’s sexuality for male pleasure. Thus, in order to be liber- ated, women must escape the confines of heterosexuality and create an exclu- sively female sexuality through celibacy, autoeroticism, or lesbianism.9 Only alone, or with other women, can women discover the true pleasure of sex.

Radical feminist thought is as diverse on issues related to reproduction as it is on matters related to sexuality. Radical-libertarian feminists claim bio- logical motherhood drains women physically and psychologically.10 Women

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should be free, they say, to use the old reproduction-controlling technolo- gies and the new reproduction-assisting technologies on their own terms— to prevent or terminate unwanted pregnancies or, alternatively, so that women can have children when they want them (premenopausally or post- menopausally), how they want them (in their own womb or that of another woman), and with whom they want them (a man, a woman, or alone). Some radical-libertarian feminists go farther than this, however. They look forward to the day when ectogenesis (extracorporeal gestation in an artificial placenta) entirely replaces the natural process of pregnancy. In contrast to radical-libertarian feminists, radical-cultural feminists claim biological mother-hood is the ultimate source of woman’s power.11 It is women who determine whether the human species continues—whether there is life or no life. Women must guard and celebrate this life-giving power, for without it, men will have even less respect and use for women than they have now.12

Somewhat unconvinced by the liberal and radical feminist agendas for women’s liberation, Marxist and socialist feminists claim it is impossible for anyone, especially women, to achieve true freedom in a class-based society, where the wealth produced by the powerless many ends up in the hands of the powerful few. With Friedrich Engels,13 Marxist and socialist feminists insist women’s oppression originated in the introduction of private property, an institution that obliterated whatever equality of community humans had previously enjoyed. Private ownership of the means of production by rela- tively few persons, originally all male, inaugurated a class system whose con- temporary manifestations are corporate capitalism and imperialism. Reflection on this state of affairs suggests that capitalism itself, not just the larger social rules that privilege men over women, is the cause of women’s oppression. If all women—rather than just the “exceptional” ones—are ever to be liberated, the capitalist system must be replaced by a socialist system in which the means of production belong to everyone. No longer economically dependent on men, women will be just as free as men.

Socialist feminists agree with Marxist feminists that capitalism is the source of women’s oppression, and with radical feminists that patriarchy is the source of women’s oppression. Therefore, the way to end women’s oppression, in socialist feminists’ estimation, is to kill the two-headed beast of capitalist patriarchy or patriarchal capitalism (take your pick). Motivated by this goal, socialist feminists seek to develop theories that explain the rela- tionship between capitalism and patriarchy.

During the first stage of theory development, socialist feminists offered several “two-system” explanations of women’s oppression. Among these two- system theories were those forwarded by Juliet Mitchell and Alison Jaggar. In

4 Introduction

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Women’s Estate, Mitchell claimed that women’s condition is determined not only by the structures of production (as Marxist feminists think), but also by the structures of reproduction and sexuality (as radical feminists believe), and the socialization of children (as liberal feminists argue).14 She stressed that women’s status and function in all of these structures must change if women are to achieve full liberation. Still, in the final analysis, Mitchell gave the edge to capitalism over patriarchy as women’s worst enemy.

Like Mitchell, Alison Jaggar attempted to achieve a synthesis between Marxist and radical feminist thought. Acknowledging that all feminist per- spectives recognize the conflicting demands made on women as wives, moth- ers, daughters, lovers, and workers,15 Jaggar insisted that socialist feminism is unique because of its concerted effort to interrelate the myriad forms of women’s oppression. She used the unifying concept of alienation to explain how, under capitalism, everything (work, sex, play) and everyone (family members and friends) that could be a source of women’s integration as per- sons becomes instead a cause of their disintegration. Together with Mitchell, Jaggar insisted there are only complex explanations for women’s subordina- tion. Yet, in contrast to Mitchell, she named patriarchy rather than capital- ism as the worst evil visited on women.

After Mitchell and Jaggar, another group of socialist feminists aimed to develop new explanations of women’s oppression that did not in any way pinpoint capitalism or patriarchy as the primary source of women’s limited well-being and freedom. Iris Marion Young, Heidi Hartmann, and Sylvia Walby constructed explanations for women’s oppression that viewed capital- ism and patriarchy as interactive to the point of full symbiosis. To a greater or lesser extent, these thinkers addressed the question of whether capitalism could survive the death of patriarchy, or vice versa. Although the nuances of their theories were difficult to grasp, Young, Hartmann, and Walby—like their predecessors Mitchell and Jaggar—pushed feminists to address issues related to women’s unpaid, underpaid, or disvalued work.

To the degree that liberal, radical, and Marxist-socialist feminists focus on the macrocosm (patriarchy or capitalism) in their respective explana- tions of women’s oppression, psychoanalytic feminists are most at home in the microcosm of the individual. They claim the roots of women’s oppres- sion are embedded deep in the female psyche. Initially, psychoanalytic feminists focused on Sigmund Freud’s work, looking within it for a better understanding of sexuality’s role in the oppression of women. According to Freud, in the so-called pre-Oedipal stage, all infants are symbiotically attached to their mothers, whom they perceive as omnipotent. The mother-infant relationship is an ambivalent one, however: sometimes

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mothers give too much—their presence is overwhelming—but other times mothers give too little—their absence disappoints.

The pre-Oedipal stage ends with the so-called Oedipal complex, the pro- cess by which the boy gives up his first love object, the mother, in order to escape castration at the hands of the father. As a result of submitting his id (desires) to the superego (collective social conscience), the boy is fully inte- grated into culture. Together with his father, he will rule over nature and woman, both of whom supposedly contain a similarly irrational power. In contrast to the boy, the girl, who has no penis to lose, separates slowly from her first love object, the mother. As a result, the girl’s integration into culture is incomplete. She exists at the periphery, or margin, of culture as the one who does not rule but is ruled, largely because, as Dorothy Dinnerstein sug- gested, she fears her own power.16

Because the Oedipus complex is the root of male rule, or patriarchy, some psychoanalytic feminists speculate that the complex is nothing more than the product of men’s imagination—a psychic trap that everyone, especially women, should try to escape. Others object that unless we are prepared for reentry into a chaotic state of nature, we must accept some version of the Oedipus complex as the experience that integrates the individual into society. In accepting some ver- sion of the Oedipus complex, Sherry Ortner noted, we need not accept the Freudian version, according to which the qualities of authority, autonomy, and universalism are labeled male, whereas love, dependence, and particularism are labeled female.17 These labels, meant to privilege that which is male over that which is female, are not essential to the Oedipus complex. Rather, they are sim- ply the consequences of a child’s actual experience with men and women. As Ortner saw it, dual parenting (as recommended also by Dorothy Dinnerstein and Nancy Chodorow) and dual participation in the workforce would change the gender valences of the Oedipus complex.18 Authority, autonomy, and uni- versalism would no longer be the exclusive property of men; love, dependence, and particularism would no longer be the exclusive property of women.

Not sure that dual parenting and dual participation in the workforce were up to changing the gender valences of the Oedipal complex, a new generation of psychoanalytic feminists turned to theorists like Jacques Lacan for more insights into the psychosexual dramas that produce “man” and “woman,” the “feminine” and the “masculine,” the “heterosexual” and the “lesbian,” and so forth. Formidable theorists like Luce Irigaray and Julia Kristeva claimed that feminists had spent too much time focusing on the Oedipal realm and not nearly enough time on the prelinguistic, pre-Oedipal domain. This domain, often referred to as the Imaginary, is the domain infants are supposed to leave behind so they can enter the Symbolic order, the realm of language, rules, and

6 Introduction

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regimes: civilization. But, asked Irigaray and Kristeva, why should women abandon the Imaginary so they can be oppressed, suppressed, and repressed in patriarchy’s Symbolic order? Why not instead stay in the Imaginary, and relish the joy of being different from men? Why not remain identified with one’s first love, the mother, and develop with her new ways of speaking and writing, of constituting one’s subjectivity, that do not lead to women’s oppression? Why lead life on men’s terms at all?

In earlier editions of this book, I had included theorists like Carol Gilligan and Nel Noddings with psychoanalytic feminists because of their interest in women’s psychology. But I now realize that Gilligan and Noddings are not the same kind of thinkers as those I currently classify as psychoanalytic feminists. What distinguishes Gilligan and Noddings from psychoanalytic feminists, and what links them to feminists thinkers like Sara Ruddick, Virginia Held, and Eva Feder Kittay, is their focus on the nature and practice of care. More than any other group of feminist thinkers, care-focused feminists are interested in understanding why, to a greater or lesser degree, women are usually associated with the emotions and the body, and men with reason and the mind. On a related note, care-focused feminists seek to understand why women as a group are usually linked with interdependence, community, and connection, whereas men as a group are usually linked with independence, selfhood, and autonomy. These thinkers offer a variety of explanations for why societies divide realities into things “feminine” and things “masculine.” But whatever their explanation for men’s and women’s differing gender identities and behaviors, care-focused feminists regard women’s hypothetically greater capacities for care as a human strength, so much so that they tend to privilege feminist approaches to an ethics of care over the reigning ethics of justice in the Western world. In addi- tion, care-focused feminists provide excellent explanations for why women as a group disproportionately shoulder the burden of care in virtually all societies, and why men as a group do not routinely engage in caring practices. Finally, care-focused feminists provide plans and policies for reducing women’s burden of care so that women have as much time and energy as men have to develop themselves as full persons.

Like all the feminists who preceded them and now overlap with them, multicultural, global, and postcolonial feminists focus on the causes of and explanations for women’s subordination to men worldwide. However, these groups’ main contribution to feminist thought is their strong commitment to highlighting the differences that exist among women and identifying ways that diverse kinds of women can work together. Unafraid of the challenges that women’s differences sometimes present to women’s alleged solidarity, multicultural, global, and postcolonial feminists courageously address the

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ways in which race, ethnicity, sexual identity, gender identity, age, religion, level of education, occupation/profession, marital status, health condition, and so on, may separate one group of women from another. They aim to reveal how contextual factors shape women’s self-understanding as being oppressed or not oppressed. They also seek to help feminists reject both female essentialism (the view that all women are, down deep, exactly alike) and female chauvinism (the view that privileged women should take it upon themselves to speak on behalf of all women).

Although the terms “multicultural,” “global,” and “postcolonial” are often used interchangeably to describe feminists who focus on women’s varying social, cultural, economic, and political contexts, I reserve the term “multicultural” to denote feminists who focus on the differences that exist among women who live within the boundaries of one nation-state or geographical area. In turn, I use the terms “global” or “postcolonial” to denote feminists who focus on the ways in which most women’s lives in most developing nations are generally worse off than most women’s lives in most developed nations. These feminists challenge women in developed nations to acknowledge that many of their privileges are bought at the expense of the well-being of women in developing nations. Regrettably, the harmful effects of nineteenth- and twentieth-century coloniza- tion campaigns are still felt in the so-called Third World.

As attentive as multicultural, global, and postcolonial feminists are to the complexities of human beings’ relationships to each other, they do not focus, as ecofeminists do, on human beings’ relationships to the nonhuman world—that is, to nature itself. In many ways, ecofeminists offer the broadest and also the most demanding conception of the self ’s relationship to the other. According to ecofeminists, we are connected not only to each other but also to the non- human world: animal and even vegetative. Unfortunately, we do not always acknowledge our responsibilities to each other, let alone to the nonhuman world. As a result, we deplete the world’s natural resources with our machines, pollute the environment with our toxic fumes, and stockpile arms centers with tools of total destruction. In so doing, we delude ourselves that we are control- ling nature and enhancing ourselves. In point of fact, said ecofeminist Ynestra King, nature is already rebelling, and each day the human self is impoverished as yet another forest is “detreed” and yet another animal species is extinguished.19 The only way not to destroy ourselves, insist ecofeminists, is to strengthen our relationships not only with each other but also with the nonhuman world.

Challenging all the versions of feminism that have preceded them, post- modern and third-wave feminists push feminist thought to new limits. Although postmodern feminists’ insistence that women are in no way “one” poses problems for feminist theory and action (if women do not exist as a class

8 Introduction

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or group or collectivity, it is difficult to fight against women’s oppression), this insistence also adds needed fuel to the feminist fires of plurality, multiplicity, and difference. Moreover, postmodern feminists’ rejection of in-the-box thinking helps feminists speak and write in ways that overcome the binary oppositions of traditional patriarchal thought. Postmodern feminists erase the lines between masculine and feminine, sex and gender, male and female. They seek to break down the conceptual grids that have prevented women from defining themselves in their own terms rather than through men’s terms.

Third-wave feminists, eager to shape a new-millennium feminism, push just as hard as postmodern feminists do to rethink the category “woman/women.” For third-wave feminists, difference is the way the world is. Conflict and even self-contradiction are the name of the game as women seek new identities for themselves and stir up what Judith Butler termed “gender trouble.”20 Yet for all their differences from first-wave and second-wave feminists, third-wave femi- nists have no intentions of thinking, speaking, or writing themselves and other women out of existence. Instead, they aim to answer the “woman question”— Who is she and what does she want?—in ways that it has never been answered before.

Clearly, it is a major challenge to contemporary feminism to reconcile the pressures for diversity and difference with those for integration and com- monality. Fortunately, contemporary feminists do not shrink from this chal- lenge. It seems that each year, we better understand the reasons why women worldwide are the “second sex” and how to change this state of affairs. In this third edition of my book, I have tried to discuss the weaknesses as well as the strengths of each of the feminist perspectives presented here. In so doing, I have aimed not so much at neutrality as I have at respect, since each feminist perspective has made a rich and lasting contribution to feminist thought. At the end of this book, readers looking for one winning view, a champion left standing after an intellectual free-for-all, will be disappointed. Although all feminist perspectives cannot be equally correct, there is no need here for a definitive final say. Instead there is always room for growth, improvement, reconsideration, and expansion for true feminist thinkers. And this breathing space helps keep us free from the authoritarian trap of having to know it all.

As I revised each chapter of this book and decided to delete some old chapters and add some new ones, I became increasingly convinced that I write out of a specific background of experience, as do we all. Thus, I have tried very hard to avoid either accepting or rejecting an analysis simply be- cause it resonates or fails to resonate with my own ideas and experiences. Whether I have largely succeeded or mostly failed in this attempt is some- thing I must leave up to you, my thoughtful readers.

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1 Liberal Feminism

Liberalism, the school of political thought from which liberal feminism has evolved, is in the process of reconceptualizing, reconsidering, and restruc- turing itself.1 Because this transformation is well under way, it is difficult to determine the precise status of liberal feminist thought. Therefore, if we wish to gauge the accuracy of Susan Wendell’s provocative claim that liberal feminism has largely outgrown its original base,2 we must first understand the assumptions of both classical and welfare liberalism. It may turn out that liberal feminists are “liberal” only in some ways.

Conceptual Roots of Liberal Feminist Thought and Action In Feminist Politics and Human Nature,3 Alison Jaggar observed that liberal po- litical thought generally locates our uniqueness as human persons in our capac- ity for rationality. The belief that reason distinguishes us from other animals is, however, relatively uninformative, so liberals have attempted to define reason in various ways, stressing either its moral aspects or its prudential aspects. When reason is defined as the ability to comprehend the rational principles of moral- ity, then the value of individual autonomy is stressed. In contrast, when reason is defined as the ability to determine the best means to achieve some desired end, then the value of self-fulfillment is stressed.4

Whether liberals define reason largely in moral or prudential terms, they nevertheless concur that a just society allows individuals to exercise their autonomy and to fulfill themselves. Liberals claim that the “right” must be given priority over the “good.”5 In other words, our entire system of individ- ual rights is justified because these rights constitute a framework within which we can all choose our own separate goods, provided we do not deprive others

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of theirs. Such a priority defends religious freedom, for example, neither on the grounds that it will increase the general welfare nor on the grounds that a godly life is inherently worthier than a godless one, but simply on the grounds that people have a right to practice their own brand of spirituality. The same holds for all those rights we generally identify as fundamental.

The proviso that the right takes priority over the good complicates the con- struction of a just society. For if it is true, as most liberals claim, that resources are limited and each individual, even when restrained by altruism,6 has an interest in securing as many available resources as possible, then it will be a challenge to create political, economic, and social institutions that maximize the individual’s freedom without jeopardizing the community’s welfare.