In times of current crisis, the voices of women are needed more than ever. The accumulation of war and environmental catastrophes teaches us that exploitation of people and nature through violent appropriation and enrichment for the sake of short-term self-interest exacts its price. This book presents contributions on the currently most relevant and most urgent issues: reshaping the economy, environmental problems, technology and the re-reading of history from the non-western and western tradition. With an outlook into the problems of class, (...) race and gender in its intersectional framing, the collection offers a unique overview of current research in these fields and contributes to the renewal and contemporary presentation of feminist thought from partly concrete perspectives with regard to factual issues. (shrink)

Despite a profound concern for the epistemological, ontological and ethical conditions for being-at-home-in-the-world, G.W.F. Hegel published very little on a particularly serious threat to being-at-home: mental illness and disorder. The chief exception is found in Hegel's Encyclopaedia of the Philosophical Sciences (1830). In this work, Hegel briefly provides an ontology of madness (Verrücktheit), wherein madness consists in the inward collapsing of subjectivity and objectivity into the individual's unconscious and primordial feeling soul. While there has been an increasing number of studies (...) on Hegel's conception of madness, I propose that there is another overlooked way to understand madness in Hegel's system: as social pathology. I argue in this article that Hegel offers a compelling social account of madness in the Phenomenology of Spirit (1807), which arises at the elevated, self-reflective and community level of spirit. This sociality of madness, as I call it, occurs when spirit is unable to reconcile two contradictory yet equally essential aspects of its reality, resulting in spirit's structural homelessness. I argue that by examining this overlooked sociality of madness, we may read Hegel's political-philosophical project in a new light: on the one hand, the ethical life (Sittlichkeit) presented in the Philosophy of Right (1821) becomes understood as a political therapeutic. On the other hand, if the ethical life fails to live up to the demand of being an adequate spiritual therapeutic, then the traditional reading of the Philosophy of Right as a reconciliatory hermeneutic becomes problematized, opening up new avenues for the proliferation of social pathology. (shrink)

Contemporary political philosophers often take for granted that for political purposes all humans are to be considered of equal worth. The difficulty, as Bernard Williams observed, is to find an interpretation of this claim that does not collapse into absurdity or triviality. I show that the principal attempts to solve this problem all beg the question against an Aristotelian proponent of natural hierarchy. I then explore existing proposals for dissolving the problem of basic equality, whether by denying the need for (...) justification altogether or by reframing justification in either ostensive or coherentist fashion, showing that each fails to account for our sense that basic equality is objectively true. In response, I outline a Hegelian approach that treats the commitment to basic equality as a social fact that constrains philosophical reasoning in contemporary liberal democracies. By itself that might suggest complacent conservatism or cultural relativism, but I argue that practices and institutions that reflect and foster a commitment to basic equality have a distinct value in permitting reciprocal recognition and thereby enabling us to make a distinct class of normative claims on one another. This Hegelian resolution of the problem is dialectically superior to its rivals and therefore warrants further development. (shrink)

The frontispiece of Hobbes's Leviathan is justly renowned as a powerful visual advertisement for his political philosophy. Consequently, its rich imagery has been the subject of extensive scholarly commentary. Surprisingly, then, its gendered dimensions have received relatively limited attention. This essay explores this neglected facet of the frontispiece. I argue that the image initially appears to present a hypermasculine sovereign. However, upon closer inspection, and considered alongside Hobbes's economic theory, it yields to a reading of the sovereign as an ambiguously (...) gendered figure. Reading the frontispiece through the prism of gender and the economy reveals not a static image of unwavering male power but rather one of an equivocally-sexed creature teeming with life, contradictions, and complexities worthy of continued examination. (shrink)

What is the point of ideology critique? Prominent Anglo-American philosophers recently proposed novel arguments for the view that ideology critique is moral critique, and ideologies are flawed insofar as they contribute to injustice or oppression. We criticize that view and make the case for an alternative and more empirically-oriented approach, grounded in epistemic rather than moral commitments. We make two related claims: (i) ideology critique can debunk beliefs and practices by uncovering how, empirically, they are produced by self-justifying power, and (...) (ii) the self-justification of power should be understood as an epistemic rather than moral flaw. Drawing on the recent realist revival in political theory, we argue that this genealogical approach has more radical potential, despite being more parsimonious than morality-based approaches. We demonstrate the relative advantages of our view by discussing the results of empirical studies on the contemporary phenomenon of neopatriarchy in the Middle East and North Africa. (shrink)

Drawing on the work of Charles W. Mills and considering the case of reparations to Black Americans, this article defends the “structural turn” in the philosophical reparations scholarship. In the Black American context, the structural turn highlights the structural and institutional operations of a White supremacist political system and a long chronology of state-sponsored injustice, as opposed to enslavement as a standalone historical episode. Here, the question whether distributive justice is more appropriate than reparative justice is particularly pressing, since structural (...) racial inequalities form part of the basis for reparations. Derrick Darby’s pragmatic argument for non-race-specific redistributive policies and Tommie Shelby’s principled defense of distributive justice are both considered, as well as the challenge to the structural turn that comes from Carlton Waterhouse’s argument for reparations for enslavement rather than “legacy of slavery” reparations. (shrink)

This article proposes the comparison of two methods of analysis, semiotics, and hermeneutics, to address contemporary issues in ethical and political philosophy, through the study of the phenomenon of epistemic injustice. Conceptualized by Fricker (2007), epistemic injustice is synonymous with the denial of the value of knowledge that an individual possesses because of prejudices about the social group to which he or she belongs or is affiliated. When epistemic injustice is studied in the empirical world, it poses some crucial issues (...) in terms of interpreting the meaning that the individual gives to the experience of injustice that he or she experiences. Although the interpretation of injustice is central to the understanding of the phenomenon itself, little research in ethical and political philosophy addresses these aspects, because of the failure to sufficiently mobilize analytical methods such as semiotics and hermeneutics. However, these two methods, usually used in other fields to deal with these aspects, allow us to question the treatment and the interpretative scope of the epistemic injustice by the different interlocutors involved in the interaction in which it is reconducted. The comparison of these two methods in the analysis of epistemic injustice finally allows us to argue in favor of the hermeneutic method, as defined by Gadamer and rethought by Code (2003), to enhance Gadamer's legacy through the analysis of ethical and political issues in human sciences research. (shrink)

This article reviews an epochal change in international thinking about physical punishment of children from being a reasonable method of chastisement to one that is harmful to children and troubling to families. In addition, the article suggests shifts in thinking about physical punishment were originally pioneered as part and parcel of the dismantling of national laws granting fathers’ specific rights to admonish children under conventions of patria potestas. A comparative historical framework of analysis involving two case studies of Ireland and (...) Ghana illustrates non-unilinear pathways of international convergence towards the prohibition of physical punishment. The comparative historical analysis highlights the 1930s and 1940s as an era when Ireland began to reject patria potestas and religious or judicial rulings which allowed for children to be given ‘a good beating’ in family and school settings. However, from the same period, Ghana is seen to experience Christian remonstrations not to ‘spare the rod’ leading to the ‘conventional’ tradition of ‘this is how we do it here’. Two case studies serve to illustrate that banning physical punishment was less controversial in Ireland where allied traditions of patria potestas and disciplinarian Christian beliefs had lost their moral hegemony than in Ghana where such beliefs still held influence. The article concludes overall that normative campaigns against physical punishment of children emanate from a coherent paradigm of family policy where childcare, education, and well-being of children are embedded as everyday societal responsibilities rather than privatised or patriarchal familial obligations. The coherent model offers an alternative moral hegemony to neo-liberal and Janus-faced conceptualisations of good or ‘intact’ families versus ‘broken’ or ‘troubled’ families. (shrink)

RESUMEN Este artículo trata de la marginación de la mujer de los espacios públicos y políticos en Europa y en el mundo indígena de Ecuador. Esta situación de exclusión y marginación se origina en pensadores como Locke, Rousseau, Kant y Hegel, quienes se encargaron de justificar epistemológicamente la exclusión de la mujer de los asuntos públicos en todos los ámbitos; es decir, redujeron el actuar de la mujer al espacio de lo privado, a lo doméstico, a los asuntos de la (...) familia. Sin embargo, es interesante constatar que algunos filósofos fueron sensibles al tema de lo femenino, es el caso de Condorcet y Stuart Mill, aunque su gran aporte no logró cambiar la mentalidad de la época. ABSTRACT This article deals with the marginalization of women from public and political spaces in Europe and in the indigenous world of Ecuador. This situation of exclusion and marginalization originates in thinkers such as Locke, Rousseau, Kant, and Hegel, who were responsible for epistemologically justifying the exclusion of women from public affairs in all areas; that is to say, they reduced the act of women to the space of the private, to the domestic, to the affairs of the family. However, it is interesting to note that some philosophers were sensitive to the issue of the feminine, in the case of Condorcet and Stuart Mill, although their great contribution did not change the mentality of the time. (shrink)

Building on recent developments in radical democratic theory, in this article we articulate and explore a fresh perspective for theorists and activists of radical democracy: a ‘living critique of domination’. Characterized by a two-fold analytical effort, a ‘living critique of domination’ calls for a radical critique of contemporary forms of power and control coupled with a reappraisal of emancipatory political experiences created by the political action of the Many. We demonstrate that this project responds to the theoretical and practical challenges (...) faced by a politics of emancipation today. Our article offers a first articulation of this living critique through a discussion of three recent political experiences, namely, the 2016 French uprising, Nuit Debout, as well as the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements. (shrink)

Anarchism is by far the least broadly understood ideology and the least studied academically. Though highly influential, both historically and in terms of recent social movements, anarchism is regularly dismissed. Anarchism: A Conceptual Approach is a welcome addition to this growing field, which is widely debated but poorly understood. Occupying a distinctive position in the study of anarchist ideology, this volume, authored by a handpicked group of established and rising scholars, investigates how anarchists often seek to sharpen their message and (...) struggle to determine what ideas and actions are central to their identity. Moving beyond defining anarchism as simply an ideology or political theory, this book examines the meanings of its key concepts, which have been divided into three categories: Core, Adjacent, and Peripheral concepts. Each chapter focuses on one important concept, shows how anarchists have understood the concept, and highlights its relationships to other concepts. Although anarchism is often thought of as a political topic, the interdisciplinary nature of Anarchism: A Conceptual Approach makes it of interest to students and scholars across the social sciences, liberal arts, and the humanities. (shrink)

BDSM is no longer treated as a manifestation of the darkest twists of the human soul but rather as a sexual activity like many others. Moreover, the philosophy of sex and much of popular culture has come to embrace BDSM for its models of consent, exploration, and freedom. Yet celebrating BDSM without deeper reflection can obscure some serious moral issues. In this chapter, I present an overview of the moral issues raised by BDSM, and I argue that it is reductive (...) to see BDSM as a simple or straightforward model for how to practice egalitarian sex. Yet, BDSM communities grapple with issues of consent, autonomy, and power in important ways, which can help us think through broader issues in sexual ethics. Either way, BDSM must be understood in its full complexity. (shrink)

Sociologists of education often emphasize goods that result from a practice (external goods) rather than goods intrinsic to a practice (internal goods). The authors draw from John Dewey and Alasdair MacIntyre to describe how the same practice can be understood as producing “skills” that center external goods or as producing habits (Dewey) or virtues (MacIntyre), both of which center internal goods. The authors situate these concepts within sociology of education’s stratification paradigm and a renewed interest in the concept of alienation, (...) contrasting the concepts of skills, habits, and virtues to capital, credentials, and habitus. They close by connecting the argument to broader critiques of procedural liberalism and the ideology of meritocracy, then giving suggestions for an expanded sociology of education beyond the stratification paradigm. (shrink)

Social norms regulating carework and social reproduction tend to be inegalitarian. At the same time, such norms often play a crucial role when we plan our lives. How can we criticise objectionable practices while ensuring that people can organise their lives around meaningful and predictable rules? Gerald Gaus argues that only ‘publicly justified’ rules, rules that everyone would prefer over ‘blameless liberty,’ should be followed. In this paper, we uncover the inegalitarian implications of this feature of Gaus's framework. We show (...) that because a society without clear social norms for how social reproduction and care work ought to be organised would be so unattractive, inegalitarian rules would pass Gaus's test. They would pass this test since they would nevertheless be better than ‘blameless liberty.’ Those who are disproportionately burdened by a rule are faced with the daunting task of showing that they would be better off under no rule, instead of merely having to show that they would be better off with a different rule. (shrink)

Is authoritarian power ever legitimate? The contemporary political theory literature—which largely conceptualizes legitimacy in terms of democracy or basic rights—would seem to suggest not. I argue, however, that there exists another, overlooked aspect of legitimacy concerning a government’s ability to ensure safety and security. While, under normal conditions, maintaining democracy and rights is typically compatible with guaranteeing safety, in emergency situations, conflicts between these two aspects of legitimacy can and often do arise. A salient example of this is the COVID-19 (...) pandemic, during which severe limitations on free movement and association have become legitimate techniques of government. Climate change poses an even graver threat to public safety. Consequently, I argue, legitimacy may require a similarly authoritarian approach. While unsettling, this suggests the political importance of climate action. For if we wish to avoid legitimating authoritarian power, we must act to prevent crises from arising that can only be resolved by such means. (shrink)

This article explains how the issue of inclusion is central to Habermas’s theory of democracy and how it is deeply rooted in his conception of a political public sphere. After recalling Habermas’s views on the public sphere, I present and discuss various objections raised by other critical theorists: Oskar Negt and Alexander Kluge, Nancy Fraser, Axel Honneth and Iris Marion Young. These criticisms insist on the paradoxically excluding effects of a conception of democracy that promotes civic participation in the public (...) debate. Negt, Kluge and Fraser develop a Marxist line of analysis that question who can participate in the public sphere. Honneth and Young criticize in various ways the excluding effect of argumentation: are unargumentative speeches excluded from the public debate? I show how Habermas’s model can provide some responses to these various objections by drawing inspiration from his treatment of the gap between religious and post-metaphysical world views. (shrink)

Sex. Die meisten von uns haben ihn. Mal schlecht, mal gut, manchmal phänomenal. Die wenigsten denken lange drüber nach. Oder reden offen drüber. Dabei ist gar nicht so klar, was Sex eigentlich gut macht. Und wann ist Sex schlecht? Oder nicht nur schlecht, sondern sogar moralisch problematisch? Hilkje Hänel zeigt, dass es gar nicht so einfach ist, zwischen (moralisch) problematischem Sex und gutem Sex klar zu unterscheiden und dass es dabei häufig vor allem auf den Kontext und unsere Kommunikation ankommt. (...) Auf der Basis aktueller Wissenschaft und medialer Bewegungen wie #MeToo verteidigt Hänel ihre Ansichten gegen die wichtigsten Einwände und argumentiert für mehr Respekt im Bett. (shrink)

Understanding the ethical concerns of paid and altruistic surrogacy requires a knowledge of reproductive freedom and procreative autonomy. An accurate approach must be sensitive enough of the nature of sexual oppression, specifically in its influence in women’s choices, self-identity and personal relationships. The aim of this essay is to stand up for the prominence of radical feminism in questioning reproductive liberalism, which overfocus the interests of the so-called intended parents. Having in mind what egalitarian philosophers have put forward from a (...) social-relational autonomy view to allow surrogacy contracts under certain circumstances —particularly, they suggest that legalization could be compatible with women’s reproductive autonomy following an altruistic fashion under protective measures and supportive to the surrogate’s revocation of consent—, I uphold that radical feminists properly make clear how oppression remains in the cultural environment that endorses surrogacy contracts. A macroscopic methodology, based on American philosopher’s Marilyn Frye metaphor of the caged bird, is a helpful tool to comprehend why surrogacy contracts do not enhance women’s reproductive autonomy, even if they enable some surrogate mothers to gain an income enough to endure tough economic pressure. (shrink)

Is prostitution immoral? In this book, Rob Lovering argues that it is not. Offering a careful and thorough critique of the many―twenty, to be exact―arguments for prostitution's immorality, Lovering leaves no claim unchallenged. Drawing on the relevant literature along with his own creative thinking, Lovering offers a clear and reasoned moral defense of the world's oldest profession. Lovering demonstrates convincingly, on both consequentialist and nonconsequentialist grounds, that there is nothing immoral about prostitution between consenting adults. The legal implications of this (...) view are also brought to bear on the current discourse surrounding this controversial topic. (shrink)

This article investigates related contexts and connections that both hide and display the coercion and sexual violence manifest in Western cultural and aesthetic artefacts during ancient Greek and Roman eras and the French imperialist epoch. Exploring ‘Pan and Syrinx’ from Ovid’s ‘Book I’ of the Metamorphoses and Claude Debussy’s Syrinx for solo flute, I historicise the meanings of rape and sexual assault that informed Ovid’s epic and then revisit the genesis of Debussy’s Syrinx because of the uneasy elements surrounding its (...) creation. I show how its cultural production is complicit with the imperial in several ways. I consider how sexual violence impacts voice, subjectivity and the body, and finally, I draw on Luce Irigaray’s work to sketch an embodied Syrinx in relation with others and her environment. I suggest the desiring potential of sexual difference, with limitations, as a generative conception of figuring the feminine-maternal body beyond masculine appropriation. In this way I open the myth up to watery material-social relations. (shrink)

The authors identify a pervasive tendency, especially in the world of development and humanitarian response, to hierarchize or prioritize certain types of victims of sexual violence in armed conflict over others. Within this broader context, they focus on what a considered feminist acknowledgement of male victims of conflict-related sexual violence should look like. On the one hand, they emphasize that one and the same patriarchal template is used to humiliate and shame male and female victims of sexual violence alike. On (...) the other, they urge that in light of the pervasiveness of patriarchal ideology and its harmful and wide-reaching social effects, the time is not yet ripe to endorse a gender-blind approach to CRSV. (shrink)

In this paper I develop a systemic discrimination approach to defining a narrowly construed category of ‘hate speech’, as speech that harms to a sufficient degree to warrant government regulation. This is important due to the lack of definitional clarity, and the extraordinarily wide usage, of the term. This article extends current literature on how hate speech can harm by identifying under what circumstances speakers have the capacity to harm, and under what circumstances targets are vulnerable to harm. It also (...) shows how the capacity to harm can be mobile and involve the construction of new targets. Finally, it bridges the gap between conceptual understandings of hate speech and policy designed to regulate it. (shrink)

Building upon recent work on epistemic varieties of liberalism, avant-garde political agency and the theory and practice of activism, I claim that a liberal defence of more open borders does not presuppose either indifference to the problem of the deep structural sources of poverty in poorer countries, or the absence of an account of those structures’ transformation. Rather, it is claimed that in addition to the remittance of money and other economic goods to alleviate the symptoms of poverty, more open (...) borders facilitate the remittance of norms and values in terms of which individuals and activist communities in poorer countries may transform the deep structures and institutions that are poverty’s sources. This liberal account of more open borders and deep structural transformation also makes possible the non-coercive discharge of obligations of global justice on the part of wealthier states to the world’s poor, when poorer nations are either unable or unwilling to discharge them themselves. (shrink)

The notion that rape is an act of violence rather than sex is a central tenet in rape crisis support and education. A therapeutic benefit of this conceptualisation of rape is that it counters shame and guilt by affirming that the victim was not a complicit partner in an act of sex. However, this conceptualisation has recently been criticised for not capturing what makes rape an especially serious kind of wrong. This raises an apparent dilemma for rape crisis support. Recent (...) work in analytic moral philosophy on the nature of rape offers a way to resolve this dilemma. It is argued that rape is not sex, but is nonetheless sexual. This distinction allows for a charitable reformulation of the central tenet in rape crisis support, which can facilitate the dual therapeutic aims of countering the sense of shame and of recognising the especially serious kind of the harm suffered by the victim. (shrink)

Abstract: Kant and Arendt on Barbaric and Totalitarian Evil -/- This paper starts by sketching Kant’s four ideal legal and political conditions—'anarchy,’ ‘despotism,’ ‘republic,’ and ‘barbarism’—before showing their usefulness for analyzing different political forces that may operate in any given society. Contrary to the common tendency in political philosophy to view our societies as either in the so-called ‘state of nature’ (‘anarchy’) or in ‘civil society’ (‘republic’), I propose that we might find ourselves in societies where aspects or ‘pockets’ of (...) our lives are subject to any one of these (anarchic, despotic, republican, and barbaric) political forces. I then combine Kant’s ideas on barbaric evil with Arendt’s ideas on totalitarian evil, which gives us a four-fold conception of political evil. This fourfold distinction is then used to identify some types and patterns of destructive political forces as they occur in actual, historical societies, such as racist, sexist, or heterosexist violence and oppression. (shrink)

Being autonomous depends on the kind of relations we enjoy in the different domains of our lives, but the impact of decision-making and the power exercise that takes place in the political sphere, makes political relations crucial to our development and enjoyment of autonomy. This dissertation develops a novel view of political participation by interrogating its connection to our personal autonomy. According to this view, our political relations are partially constitutive of our personal autonomy, which in other words means there (...) is a political aspect of our autonomy. The kind of political relations we should hold to fully enjoy our autonomy is what I call Relations of Mutual Recognition. It is the mutual recognition of each agent’s autonomous standing—translated into a proper distribution of political power— that will face dominating political relations. The basis for that domination comes from our democracies’ power imbalances that condition influence over political decision-making to each individual’s economic, social or cultural standing. Consequently, there are political conditions for our autonomy to thrive. Relations of Mutual Recognition require two main conditions: non-domination and control. I take these two neo-republican ideals and redefine them to shape what a proper distribution of political power amounts to. Political participation comes in precisely to identify a way to challenge power imbalances. Therefore, my definition of political participation, which I call Collective Self-Government, requires a particular sort of implementation. Accordingly, I suggest a deliberative and inclusive arrangement that involves direct and innovative forms of decision-making, and more importantly, grants relevant shares of authority to all actors, i.e., common citizens, legislators, technocrats, etcetera. This project could rightly belong to both a relational approach to autonomy and be labelled as a version of deliberative democracy. However, relational accounts focus on our social relations, whilst I claim that we cannot be “less” or non-autonomous in the political sphere and still enjoy an autonomous life. Likewise, the participatory focus—in the sense of inclusion of all actors—of this proposal more accurately turn it into either a participatory version of deliberative democracy or a deliberative version of participatory democracy. (shrink)

This paper has two goals. The first is to argue that the field of bioethics in general and the literature on ideal vs. nonideal theory in particular has underemphasized a primary problem for normative theorizing: the role of conditioning principles. I define these as principles that implicitly or explicitly ground, limit, or otherwise determine the construction and function of other principles, and, as a result, profoundly impact concept formation, perception, judgment, and action, et al. The second is to demonstrate that (...) ableism is one such conditioning principle and that it undermines the field of bioethics and the practice of biomedicine from achieving the aim of justice as fairness. After briefly addressing the history and critiques of principlism in bioethics, I lay out and defend my account of conditioning principles. I then argue that ableism is one such principle and demonstrate it at work through an analysis of a storied debate between Eva Kittay, Peter Singer, and Jeff McMahan. In conclusion, I contend that the ethical and philosophical dangers of conditioning principles are too easily exacerbated by ideal theory frameworks, and I do so by demonstrating how they are especially liable to generate epistemic injustice, especially contributory and hermeneutical injustice. (shrink)

In this chapter, the author articulates two Hobbesian models of interpersonal power relations that can be used to understand gender relations: what he will call the dominion model and the deference model. Hobbes himself analyses the relation between men and women through the dominion model. The author lays out Hobbes's model of interpersonal power relations as dominion, including his application of the model to the case of gender relations. The centerpiece of Hobbes's method is his “state of nature” thought experiment. (...) Hobbes's analysis is radical insofar as he understands familial relations according to the general model of interpersonal relations just outlined, without any reference to sui generis principles. The author indicates some shortcomings of the dominion model for grasping contemporary social life. The much‐celebrated social contract between equal male citizens is quietly underpinned by the sexual contract, a contract of domination between men and women. (shrink)

In spite of feminist recognition that hierarchical organizations are an important location of male dominance, most feminists writing about organizations assume that organizational structure is gender neutral. This article argues that organizational structure is not gender neutral; on the contrary, assumptions about gender underlie the documents and contracts used to construct organizations and to provide the commonsense ground for theorizing about them. Their gendered nature is partly masked through obscuring the embodied nature of work.jobs and hierarchies, common concepts in organizational (...) thinking, assume a disembodies and universal worker. This worker is actually a man; men's bodies, sexuality, and relationships to procreation and paid work are subsumed in the image of the worker. Images of men's bodies and masculinity pervade organizational processes, marginalizing women and contributing to the maintenance of gender segregation in organizations. The positing of gender-neutral and disembodied organizational structures and work relations is part of the larger strategy of control in industrial capitalist societies, which, at least partly, are built upon a deeply embedded substructure of gender difference. (shrink)

One of the explicit goals of the 1996 welfare reform in the United States was to create conditions that would encourage marriage as a means of reducing poverty and welfare “dependency.” With the exception of a few notable studies that examine reliance on abusive partners and former partners, relatively little scholarly attention has been given to the contours of partnering after welfare reform. Using a feminist lens on data from two qualitative studies, the author examines the partnership experiences of a (...) sample of mostly white women three to four years after they had left welfare. An exploration of women’s views of their transitions into and their experiences with partnering reveals that women align with a logic of heterosexual partnering that holds the potential to complicate their lives. The analysis sounds a precautionary note and provides empirical evidence that partnering in the context of the reduced options of welfare reform can diminish women’s long-term stability and that encouraging partnering is, ultimately, an unsustainable policy direction for the support of lone mothers. (shrink)

The article focuses on the complex positioning of people from disempowered backgrounds with respect to liberalism and liberal dividends. The author offers the term liberal bargain, paraphrasing Deniz Kandiyoti’s “patriarchal bargain” and Cynthia Cockburn’s “ethnic bargain,” and dwells on the interconnections between the three. The liberal bargain indicates the particular consciousness and symbolic whitening that “colorized” people tend to adopt when they attempt to cash in on the liberal promise. Within the discourse of postcolonial feminism, the concept is intended to (...) promote the discussion of power differentials among women, through refining the analytically dissatisfactory color metaphors habitually used to address issues of hegemony and ethnocentrism. (shrink)

The article examines national news reports on prostitution of Russian women in northern Norway between 1990 and 2001. Applying critical discourse analysis, the author shows how this particular type of cross-border, rural prostitution is represented as sexual transaction, as a sociopolitical problem, and as a symbolic issue used to legitimize stricter border controls. Images of prostitutes, pimps and customers are also discussed. The different thematizations are in turn connected to various historical practices of state regulation of sexuality, to constructions of (...) group identities based on moral categories, and to social definitions of what is normal and what is deviant. (shrink)

In 2000, the Netherlands became the first European country to legalize prostitution, a policy supported by Dutch feminists. It distinguishes forced from voluntary prostitution, defining the latter as ‘sex work’, in contrast to feminist positions viewing it as ‘sexual domination’. This article examines the discourses used by parliamentarians in the debates since the 1980s and charts the shift from a traditional moral view to the sex-work frame, creating new meanings of ‘ prostitutes’, ‘clients’ and ‘brothel keepers’ in the process. The (...) new discourse allows for an active female sex worker but desexualizes the nature of the prostitution exchange. Neither does it offer an account of why it is mainly men buying sex from women. The analysis also highlights the contradictions created by the forced/voluntary distinction when speaking of the trafficking of women from poor countries and current anti-migration discourse, as well as the near obliteration of the racial differences between ‘clients’ and ‘workers’ in parliamentary discourse. (shrink)

In this article, I examine the seemingly incompatible epistemologies of sex offered by dominance (‘governance’) feminism and queer theory. While these bodies of work, especially when applied to US legal and political activity on prostitution, are commonly viewed as divergent sparring partners, I propose a ‘convergence’ of the two in the form of a revived and enhanced sex-positive feminism. If dominance feminism is the ‘theory of no’ to heterosexuality’s male gender power, and if queer theory is the ‘theory of yes’ (...) to the defiant possibilities of sex, sex-positive feminism is a ‘theory of maybe’: it examines practices of gender and sexuality in multiple contexts to find the ways in which heterosexuality can sometimes reify, and other times resist, the transfer of eroticised dominance and submission to political practices of patriarchy. After tracing the split between feminism and queer theory and arguing for a ‘sex-positive queer feminism’, I use the example of prostitution to consider some theoretical and practical implications of this shift in feminist lenses. (shrink)

This article considers whether there is room in the work of Goldenberg, which is characterized as materialist, for spirituality. The author shows how Freudian psychoanalysis gives the opportunity for the body to be resurrected from the place of signifier of death and dissolution. However, it is also argued that it is possible to bring body and spirit together in such a way as to allow the body to flourish. The author argues for a 'thinking through the body' that is best (...) accomplished when grounded in goddess spirituality. (shrink)

This essay analyses how Australian postcolonial discourses, influenced by both Republicanism and Reconciliation, deploy the trope of woman to signify political change in both feminist and cultural debates about belonging, national legitimacy and sovereignty. I point out that white feminist rejection of the Queen in favour of embracing indigeneity is itself complicit with a history of ‘incorporating’ and assimilating indigeneity – a complicity that is sublimated in favour of a triumphant rejection of Imperial white womanhood. The essay looks at a (...) contemporary Australian novel, media depictions of Paul Keating's ‘embrace’ of Queen Elizabeth II (as a kind of captivity narrative), critical whiteness studies’ ‘rejection’ of the Queen and the misrecognition of Australia's distinct characteristics as a ‘settler culture’ (that incorporates indigeneity) within Australian feminist debates and claims of ‘transgression’ that are made for interracial relationships in Australia. (shrink)

Feminist debates on sex trafficking have become entrenched and polarised, with abolitionists producing images of helpless abused victims, while sex worker advocates work hard to achieve some recognition of the agency of migrant sex workers. This article explores constructions of embodiment, subjectivity and agency in the debate, showing how abolitionist views, in spite of their efforts to challenge liberal pro-sex perspectives, rely on a familiar vision of the body as a singular, bounded and sovereign entity whose borders must be secured (...) against invasion. The result is a vision in which victimisation is taken to epistemically compromise the subjectivities of sex workers, forcing them and their advocates to argue for recognition of their agency according to familiar liberal models of consent in order to be able to enter the debate. Drawing on the recent work of Judith Butler on consent and vulnerability, this article argues that what is needed is a rethinking of bodily ontology so that the vulnerability of sex workers is not opposed to their agency, but rather seen as an inevitable aspect of embodied sociality, constituting a call to ethical engagement and a recognition of the inequitable global distributions of precarity that produce sex trafficking as part of contemporary geopolitics. From this perspective, the alignment between radical feminist efforts to secure women's bodily borders and global efforts to secure national borders no longer appears as coincidence. (shrink)

The neo-liberal upsurge of the last twenty years and the neo-liberal case against the welfare state has gained much of its emotional force from a sub-text which is highly gendered. Whereas social liberalism had contained the promise of more autonomy within the private sphere and more caring values in the public sphere, neo-liberalism depicts the results of social liberalism as a loss of self reliance – through ‘over-protection’ by the state in the public sphere and usurpation of male roles in (...) the private sphere. The identification of the welfare state as female (the ‘nanny state’) helps fuel resentment on the part of those already confused by rapidly changing gender roles. This paper tracks the sex change which took place in the image of the liberal state as it evolved out of the night watchman state – the link between the women's suffrage movement and social regulation, maternal principles of distribution and demands for the public organization of caring. It examines the neo-liberal rejection of the breast and neo-liberal claims that the maternal state is incompatible with ‘self-reliance’ and a barrier to competitiveness in the world market. (shrink)

This article examines the precepts of natural law feminism, and in exploring the writings of two Canadian feminists, Maureen McTeer and Louise Vandelac, examines how natural law feminism is deployed in debates about how to theorize reproduction. I contend that the natural law perspective obscures many issues worthy of feminist inquiry, and, perhaps more critically, eschews a discourse that emphasizes reproductive freedom in favour of one which has at its centre a largely unproblematized view of reproduction that follows a biologically (...) driven script of conception, gestation, childbirth and mothering as inherently and necessarily connected. I argue that this stance is particularly evident in natural law feminist analyses of ecology and the regulation of new reproductive and genetic technologies. In both these areas, natural law feminism poses the central problem as one in which feminists must zealously protect the natural association between women and reproduction; in so doing, natural law feminists gloss over the nature of this association. I suggest a reframing of the focus of debates on reproduction from what is natural and what is socially constructed to how we demarcate the two. (shrink)

Choice feminism is a popular form of contemporary feminism, encouraging women to embrace the opportunities they have in life and to see the choices they make as justified and always politically acceptable. Though this kind of feminism appears at first glance to be tolerant and inspiring, its narratives also bring about a political stagnation as discussion, debate and critical judgement of the actions of others are discouraged in the face of being deemed unsupportive and a ‘bad’ feminist. Choice feminism also (...) encourages neoliberal values of individualism and consumerism, while downplaying the need for political and collective action against systematic inequalities. Yet in order to succeed in creating change for women, debate needs to occur, and not all decisions can be supported if they act to further inequality and a patriarchal status quo. In this article, I would like to argue for the continued need to engage politically with other feminists and with the status of the movement as a whole, by critiquing choice feminism and looking empirically at how discussion and dissent can be silenced by the choice narrative. The empirical data in this article will focus on online discussions of naming on marriage to illustrate the wider theoretical argument. (shrink)

This first part of a two-part series exploring implications of the natural differences between the sexes for the cultural evolution of marriage assesses whether Kant should be condemned as a sexist due to his various offensive claims about women. Being antithetical to modern-day assumptions regarding the equality of the sexes, Kant’s views seem to contradict his own egalitarian ethics. A philosophical framework for making cross-cultural ethical assessments requires one to assess those in other cultures by their own ethical standards. Sexism (...) is inappropriate if it exhibits or reinforces a tendency to dominate the opposite sex. Kant’s theory of marriage, by contrast, illustrates how sexism can be egalitarian: given the natural differences between the sexes, different roles and cultural norms help to ensure that females and males are equal. Judged by the standards of his own day and in the context of his philosophical system, Kant’s sexism is not ethically inappropriate. (shrink)

This second part of a two-part series exploring implications of the natural differences between the sexes for the cultural evolution of marriage considers how the institution of marriage might evolve, if Kant’s reasons for defending monogamy are extended and applied to a future culture. After summarizing the philosophical framework for making cross-cultural ethical assessments that was introduced in Part I and then explaining Kant’s portrayal of marriage as an antidote to the objectifying tendencies of sex, I summarize Kant’s reasons for (...) rejecting polygamy and for viewing monogamy as the only ethically acceptable form of marriage. Finally, I argue that if we apply Kantian principles to the real situation of marriage in many modern cultures, and if we wish to maintain a legitimate place for marriage in the future evolution of human culture, then the future evolution of marriage laws must recognize polyfidelity (i.e., plural marriages for both men and women) as being just as legitimate as monogamy. (shrink)

This dissertation addresses the question of how to reconceptualize “women” in order to do a more intersectional feminism. Intersectionality—the idea that gender, race, class, sexuality, and so on operate not as separate entities but as mutually constructing phenomena—has become a gold standard in contemporary feminist scholarship. In particular, intersectionality has achieved success in showing that the old conception of women as a single, uniform concept marginalizes women and others who exist at the intersecting axes of multiple oppressions (e.g., women of (...) color, women in the global South, working-class women, and/or queer and trans people), and thus, demonstrating the need to develop a new way of conceptualizing women. However, the question of what such a new conception would be remains unanswered. Specifically, if feminist theory today is to destabilize the old notion of “women” that relegates multiply oppressed women to the margin of feminism, and yet still needs to use some notion of “women” to critically analyze how the social structure of sexist oppression operates to subordinate women and to dismantle this oppression, how should the concept “women” be reformulated? In this dissertation, I argue that we need to understand women as a concept that is open to constant redefinition, which is socio-historically situated in the actualities of oppression. This is what I refer to as the “situated redefinition” model of women, which is formulated in more detail as follows: -/- The Situated Redefinition Model of Women (SR) – The concept “women” should be always open to being redefined in a way that it could better serve political goals grounded in the actual, daily lives of the marginalized. That is, “women” should be always open to new meanings and provisional definitions that the marginalized would find more useful to achieve political goals, which grow out of their concrete experiences in the current intersecting structures of oppression. -/- My central argument is that we need to understand the concept “women” according to the situated redefinition model, in order to employ this concept for doing intersectional feminism. To support this thesis, the dissertation is divided into two main parts. By engaging with the intersectionality literature, critical race feminisms, Asian/American feminisms, and recent critiques of intersectionality, the first part of the dissertation elucidates what exactly it means for feminism to be more “intersectional.” The second part develops the situated redefinition model and articulates why this model is needed to do intersectional feminism, drawing on the social/political philosophy literature on non-ideal theory, postmodern discussions of universality, and feminist discussions of identity politics. Broadly, this dissertation seeks to shed new light on how we understand and use the concept women for feminist ends. My conceptual model offers a way for feminist scholar-activists to subvert the essentialist/exclusionary notion of “women” without abandoning altogether feminist-political deployments of the concept “women” for the purpose of ending sexist and intersecting oppressions. (shrink)

In her recent book Private Government, Elizabeth Anderson makes a powerful but pragmatic case against the abuses experienced by employees in conventional corporations. The purpose of this review-essay is to contrast Anderson’s pragmatic critique of many abuses in the employment relation with a principled critique of the employment relationship itself. This principled critique is based on the theory of inalienable rights that descends from the Reformation doctrine of the inalienability of conscience down through the Enlightenment in the abolitionist, democratic, and (...) feminist movements. That theory was the basis for the abolition of the voluntary slavery or self-sale contract, the voluntary non-democratic constitution (pactum subjectionis), and the voluntary coverture marriage contract in today’s democratic countries. When understood in modern terms, that same theory applies as well against the voluntary self-rental or employment contract that is the basis for our current economic system. (shrink)

This is the Introduction to a collected volume.

This article argues that access to meaningful sexual experience should be included within the set of the goods that are subject to principles of distributive justice. It argues that some people are currently unjustly excluded from meaningful sexual experience and it is not implausible to suggest that they might thereby have certain claim rights to sexual inclusion. This does not entail that anyone has a right to sex with another person, but it does entail that duties may be imposed on (...) society to foster greater sexual inclusion. This is a controversial thesis and this article addresses this controversy by engaging with four major objections to it: the misogyny objection; the impossibility objection; the stigmatisation objection; and the unjust social engineering objection. (shrink)

In this paper, I outline the cumulative network model of the self. This model articulates the self as relational, recognizing social relations as constitutive of the self. The theory arises out of concerns about the individualistic paradigms of two main frameworks in the analytic philosophical literature on personal identity, namely, the psychological and the animalist approaches to personhood and is explicitly inspired by feminist theories on relational autonomy and self. I argue that “relationality” is not only social, but that the (...) self is relational throughout, psychologically, physically, biologically, culturally, semantically, as well as socially. Hence, the self is a network of relations. The model also aims to recognize that temporality or historicity is constitutive of the self, that the self is a process, not a static three-dimensional thing. Hence, the self is a cumulative network. (shrink)