Is there a feminist ideological undertone when women choose to organise separately, or are their motivations purely instrumental? While this question has been addressed by numerous researchers, most studies are mono-national; most extrapolate meaning from different types of networks/groups, and most do not carry out close examination of network members’ orientations. This article explores varieties of orientations to feminism among members of four networks for business and professional women in the UK and Germany. The findings suggest that even within a (...) single network, members’ feminist orientations can vary, and can be different from the publicly/officially declared organisational position. (shrink)

Since the start of the new millennium in the UK, a range of new feminist activities – national networks, issue-specific campaigns, local groups, festivals, magazines and blogs – have been formed by a new constituency of mostly younger women and men. These new feminist activities, which we term ‘third-wave’ feminism, have emerged in a ‘post-feminist’ context, in which feminism is considered dead or unnecessary, and where younger feminists, if represented at all, are often dismissed as insufficiently political. Representations of North (...) American third-wave feminism are brought into play in these criticisms of the UK third wave, and insufficient attention has been paid to the distinctiveness of the UK contexts. Drawing on data from a survey of 1265 people involved in post-2000 forms of feminism and semi-structured interviews with thirty feminist activists, the article sketches out the contours of the contemporary feminist movement and its activists, activism and priorities. It attends to differences and similarities between second and third waves, and situates contemporary UK feminism in its distinctive UK context. Arguing that feminism is both alive and relevant for significant numbers of people in the UK today, the article interrogates younger feminists’ reluctance to use the term ‘third-wave feminism’ to describe themselves, attributing this reluctance to ambivalent and cynical representations of the third wave in academic literature and the popular media. (shrink)

This essay examines the contradictions often found in third wave feminist texts that function as strategic choices that may shape, foster, and enhance an individual's sense of agency. Many third wave feminists utilize contradiction as a way to understand emergent identities, to develop new ways of thinking, and to imagine new forms of social action. Agency, then, stems from the use of contradiction as a means of self-determination and identity, of transcendence of seemingly forced or dichotomous choices, and counter-imaginations of (...) a better future. (shrink)