by Phil Parvin
‘Liberal individualism seems to be a good view for feminists to embrace. For it is clear that women have too rarely been treated as ends in themselves, and too frequently treated as means to the ends of others. Women’s individual well-being has far too rarely been taken into account in political and economic planning and measurement. Women have very often been treated as parts of a larger unit, especially the family, and valued primarily for their contribution as reproducers and caregivers rather than as sources of agency and worth in their own right.’
Martha Nussbaum, Sex and Social Justice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 63.
‘[Liberalism has] yet to face either the facts or the implications of women’s material inequality as a group, has not controlled male violence societywide, and has not equalized the statues of women relative to men… [I]f liberalism ‘inherently’ can meet feminism’s challenges, having had the chance for some time, why hasn’t it?’
Catharine MacKinnon, ‘“The Case” Responds’, American Political Science Review 95/3 (2001), p. 709.
The personal is political
Finally, feminists are critical of the traditional liberal distinction between the public and the private. They argue that this distinction undermines equality. Historically women have primarily occupied the ‘private’ or domestic sphere: while men went out to work, women stayed at home as wives and mothers. Consequently, if the private sphere is beyond the scope of the state then women’s lives are beyond the scope of the state. And yet, feminists point out, a great deal of power, including oppressive and abusive power, operates in the private sphere. The principal focus of liberal political thought has been to determine the appropriate limits of state power and confine it to the public sphere. But feminists argue that power cannot be contained within a circumscribed public sphere. It is everywhere, including those parts of our lives which are often considered to be private in the sense that they are beyond the scope of politics and the state: the family, for example, or religion.
Power pervades every area of our lives. Consequently, feminist politics is more holistic than traditional liberal politics: it asks us to examine our settled convictions, and to seek reform, across the full range of human experience, and to broaden our understanding of ‘the political’ into areas like the family which many think should be considered apolitical or non-political.
Conclusion
Feminism asks us to broaden our understanding of the political into all those areas in which power, in all its different forms, resides. It is therefore a critique of many approaches to political philosophy and political science. Most importantly, it urges us to re-examine the many ways in which society is characterized by deeply entrenched attitudes about men and women, handed down through generations.
It is sometimes said that feminism is redundant now that women have achieved equality. However, women have not achieved equality, even in the most enlightened and progressive of societies. Once the scale of gender inequality is grasped, once the negative stereotypes associated with feminists are dispensed, and once the subtlety and importance of feminist insights into society, politics, power and equality are more fully grasped by more people, perhaps more men and women will identify as ‘feminist’.
Key ideas
Patriarchy: Literally translated as ‘the rule of the father’, more generally used by feminists to describe the overarching attitudes and norms which serve to encourage and perpetuate the inequality of women.
Gender: The socially constructed (as opposed to biologically determined) identities held by men and women, shaped by social norms, widespread attitudes, etc.
Social construction of preferences: The idea that our choices are at least partly shaped by overarching social norms and that, in sexist societies, women will be encouraged to make choices which are against their wider interests.
Public/private distinction: Central to liberalism, the idea that it is possible to distinguish a ‘political’ from a ‘non-political’ realm. Generally viewed with scepticism by feminists, who argue that our whole lives are ‘political’.
Sex: The biological categories of male and female, determined by physical features such as chromosomes, genitals and reproductive organs.
Dig deeper
Clare Chambers, Sex, Culture, and Justice: The Limits of Choice (University Park: Pennsylvania State Press, 2008).
Andrea Dworkin, Pornography: Men Possessing Women (London: Women’s Press, 1981).
Germaine Greer, The Female Eunuch [1970] (London: Harper, 2006).
G.W.F. Hegel, The Philosophy of Right [1820], trans. T.M. Knox (New York, Oxford University Press, 1973).
Catharine A. MacKinnon, Towards a Feminist Theory of the State (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989).
Martha Nussbaum, Sex and Social Justice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000).
Susan Moller Okin, Justice, Gender, and the Family (New York: Basic Books, 1989).
Natasha Walter, Living Dolls: The Return of Sexism (London: Virago, 2010).
Fact-check
1 Which of the following is the best definition of patriarchy, as the term is used in contemporary feminism?
A A society in which men are in charge
B A society in which men hate women
C A society in which men are feminists
D A society in which men are advantaged
2 According to feminism, how does patriarchy manifest itself?
A Through social norms
B Through patterns of wealth
C Through patterns of violence
D All of the above
3 What is the difference between sex and gender?
A Sex is biological, gender is cultural
B Sex is cultural, gender is social
C Sex is genetic, gender is political
D Sex is personal, gender is political
4 What is implied by the sex / gender distinction?
A That some differences between men and women can be changed
B That some differences between men and women cannot be changed
C That some differences between men and women should be changed
D All of the above
5 Why does power matter to feminism?
A Because feminists want to have power over men
B Because feminists argue that there is power in gendered norms
C Because feminists argue that power is not important
D Because feminists think that power is the most important thing
6 Which of the following is not usually part of the feminist claim ‘the personal is political’?
A The private sphere is a sphere of power
B The private sphere is traditionally identified with women
C Politics should pay more attention to the private lives of politicians
D Politics should pay more attention to the family
7 Which of the following claims best encapsulates liberal feminism?
A Men and women should be free to do as they please
B Men and women should be given equal freedoms
C Men and women are exactly the same
D Equality requires a profound shift in gender norms and behaviour
8 Which of the following claims best encapsulates radical feminism?
A Men and women should be free to do as they please
B Men and women should be given equal freedoms
C Men and women are exactly the same
D Equality requires a profound shift in gender norms and behaviour
9 Feminists might endorse any or all of the following, but which of the following reforms would best meet the demands of liberal feminists?
A Having more female leaders than male leaders
B Ending male violence against women
C Equal rights for women and men in the workplace
D Women working in the home, men working outside the home
10 And which would best meet the demands of radical feminists?
A Having more f
emale leaders than male leaders
B Ending male violence against women
C Equal rights for women and men in the workplace
D Women working in the home, men working outside the home
18
Global justice
Consider the following facts:
• 25 per cent of the world’s total financial assets are currently controlled by the wealthiest 0.2 per cent of the world’s population.
• The gross domestic product (i.e. the total of everyone’s income) in the poorest 48 nations is less than the combined wealth of the world’s three richest people.
• 50 per cent of the world’s population (3 billion people) live on less than £1.60 a day.
• Of the 2.2 billion children in the world, 600 million live in extreme poverty.
• One-third of all deaths (18 million people a year) are caused by poverty.
What should we think about facts such as these? Why should political philosophers care about the fact that the vast majority of the world’s wealth is concentrated not merely in a few very rich nation-states, but in the hands of very few very wealthy individuals living in certain wealthy nation-states, while millions of people living in poorer nations suffer under conditions of devastating poverty? And what, if anything, should we think about the fact that around the world numerous states routinely imprison, torture, and murder their citizens for crimes such as peacefully protesting against the government, campaigning for democracy, or having the wrong religious beliefs?
Questions such as these have come to assume a central place in contemporary political philosophy. If Anglo-American political philosophy was dominated in the 1970s by debates about the distribution of wealth, in the 1980s by debates about communitarianism, and in the 1990s by debates about multiculturalism, then the 2000s might arguably be seen as the decade in which political philosophers chose to reflect upon the international implications of their normative theories. The increased interest in international issues among political philosophers has been partly driven by the growing sense among political theorists and political scientists that politics can only really be understood in an international or global context. With the rise of supranational institutions like the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, political structures like the European Union (EU), multinational corporations, and the increased global influence of non-governmental organizations, pressure groups, lobby organizations, and other bodies, as well as the globalization of liberal markets and the rise of other global issues such as the war in Iraq, the war on terror, 9/11, and climate change, normative debates about social justice have been increasingly framed in international terms.
The key question for political philosophers is whether principles of justice can be universal. Universal principles of justice would allow us to criticize and perhaps punish unjust regimes, using sanctions, trade embargoes, or even military force. But if justice is relative rather than universal then other regimes may be immune from outside criticism. If justice can be different in different societies then any attempt to interfere in the affairs of other states may simply be unjust.
Questions of global justice are fundamental, then. From where do we derive our ideas about good and bad, right and wrong? Particularists claim that we derive them from the shared values of our particular cultural or national community. On the other hand, cosmopolitans argue that principles of justice and morality apply to all people in all circumstances.
In the second half of this chapter we examine the distinction between particularism and cosmopolitanism in more detail. But first we introduce the concepts of statism and state sovereignty.
Statism
The assumption underlying the conduct of global politics in the modern era, originating in the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, is that states are sovereign. According to this view, known as statism, the world is divided into nation-states which are sovereign in the sense that they should be free to manage their own internal affairs without external interference from other bodies, including supranational institutions, corporations, and other states.
The idea of sovereignty occupies an important place in international law. It protects nation-states from interference by other states or institutions, and ensures that nation-states are self-determining or self-governing. Statism is therefore a basic assumption of real-world global politics. And yet as an ideal it is problematic. Consider four problems with the idea of sovereignty that underpins statism.
SOVEREIGNTY PERMITS INJUSTICE
Illiberal states can appeal to state sovereignty as a defence for doing things which violate liberal principles, such as oppressing their citizens, denying them basic rights, treating them unfairly, or even killing them in the name of some greater good. This is the wrong way around. We should not be protecting the right of groups (e.g. nations or states) to oppress their members. We should instead be protecting the rights of individuals not to be oppressed by their states, by recognizing basic standards of justice which apply to all people regardless of where they live.
SOVEREIGNTY PROTECTS UNDEMOCRATIC REGIMES
A democratic state, one that acts in accordance with the will of the people, has moral grounds for its domestic policies: it has been given a mandate by the people who will be affected by those policies. So the idea that a democratic state should be left alone has widespread appeal. But it is less appealing to suggest that undemocratic states should enjoy the same protection. It is not clear why the international community should extend the privileges associated with state sovereignty to regimes which maintain power through corrupt or undemocratic means. Liberal and other critics of the idea of state sovereignty argue that international law gives too much scope for undemocratic states to claim the same protections against external interference in their affairs as democratic ones.
SOVEREIGNTY ENTRENCHES INEQUALITY
According to current international law, if a nation-state discovers that it has desirable resources within its territory (such as diamonds or oil) then, following state sovereignty, it can claim ownership of those resources. But is it fair that a particular nation-state and its members should automatically be the owner of the natural resources within its territory? Is it fair, for example, that the 12 countries which make up OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) control 79 per cent of the world’s oil reserves, effectively allowing the heads of those states to set the price of oil for the whole world, simply because they happen to have been lucky enough to live on pieces of the Earth’s surface which contain oil? Similarly, does the fact that the USA has discovered vast new oil reserves in Alaska give it the right to extract that oil even though doing so would devastate the environment, landscape, and wildlife in that area? They currently have the legal right to do so, as their rights in international law are grounded in the idea of sovereignty. However, is it morally right that they have the legal ability to act in such a way, or is there an argument for constraining national sovereignty in this case in the interests of preserving the Alaskan ecosystem?
‘In the case of natural resources, the parties to the international original position would know that resources are unevenly distributed with respect to population, that adequate access to resources is a prerequisite for successful operation of (domestic) cooperative schemes, and that resources are scarce. They would view the natural distribution of resources as arbitrary in the sense that no one has a natural prima facie claim to the resources that happen to be under one’s feet. The appropriation of scarce resources by some requires a justification against the competing claims of others and the needs of future generations. Not knowing the resource endowments of their own societies, the parties would agree on a resource redistribution principle that would give each society a fair chance to develop just political institutions and an economy capable of satisfying its members’ basic needs.’
Charles R. Beitz, Political Theory and International Relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1979), p. 141.
/> SOVEREIGNTY CONFLICTS WITH GLOBALIZATION
The fourth objection to statism is that its premise, that global politics is conducted among self-interested, sovereign nation-states, can no longer be coherently defended. This is partly because the world now faces problems like climate change which cannot be solved unless states put aside their self-interest and work for the good of the collective good of the world’s population as a whole. But it is also because (as a result of globalization) national governments are increasingly incapable of exercising sovereign control over important areas of public policy. The most obvious example is economic policy. Liberal markets transcend national boundaries; trade is genuinely global, with deals being made electronically among people all over the world. Consequently, as the recent global financial crisis has shown, whole national economies can be plunged into recession as a result of decisions made by people on the other side of the world, who are not elected, and who are not subject to political scrutiny. It is therefore a simple fact that in the world today states cannot be said to have sovereign control over their own economies.
Cosmopolitanism and particularism
These criticisms of statism raise the more fundamental question of the origin and status of moral principles. We can distinguish two approaches to this question: particularism and cosmopolitanism.
PARTICULARISM
Particularists believe that morality and justice originate in the shared values of a community, be it a religion, culture or nation. Particularists argue that people are situated in communities which shape their understanding of themselves and determine the context in which they act. Hence, these communities shape the way we think, the way in which we understand the world, and the way we think we should and should not act.
Furthermore, particularists argue, we have moral obligations to people in our community that we do not have to outsiders. Just as we have moral obligations to our own families that we do not have to other people’s families, so we have moral obligations to members of our own nation that we do not have to members of other nations (Miller 1995). Particularists differ in their attitude toward the possibility of international standards of justice. Some, like David Miller, argue that national values provide the basis for our morality but that certain ‘minimal’ standards of morality exist between nations (Miller 1995). Others, like Michael Walzer, believe that no such international standards can exist (Walzer 1983). Nevertheless, particularists tend to be sympathetic to the idea of sovereignty, arguing that it is each nation’s sovereign right to live according to its own moral values and manage its own affairs.