How did the events of the early modern period affect the way gender and the self were represented? This collection of essays attempts to respond to this question by analysing a wide spectrum of cultural concerns - humanism, technology, science, law, anatomy, literacy, domesticity, colonialism, erotic practices, and the theatre - in order to delineate the history of subjectivity and its relationship with the postmodern fragmented subject. The scope of this analysis expands the terrain explored by feminist theory, while its (...) feminist focus reveals that the subject is always gendered - although the terms in which gender is conceived and represented change across history. Feminist Readings of Early Modern Culture not only explores the representation of gendered subjects, but in its commitment to balancing the productive tensions of methodological diversity, also speaks to contemporary challenges facing feminism. (shrink)

Margaret Brazier has argued that, in the literature on reproductive technology, women's “right” to reproduce is privileged, pushed, and subordinated to patriarchal values in such a way that it amounts to women's old “duty” to reproduce, dressed up in modern guise. I agree that there are patriarchal assumptions made in discussions of whether women have a right to select which embryos to implant or which fetuses to carry to term. Forcing ourselves to see women as active, rational (...) decisionmakers tends to counteract any lingering patriarchal assumptions. But rational decisionmaking requires information. Voting wisely requires information about the candidates. Taking women's reproductive rights seriously means taking seriously women's need for relevant information to make rational decisions, including decisions about which embryos to implant or alter. I argue that preimplantation genetic profiles and prenatal test information should be made available to prospective parents, especially prospective mothers, unless doing so threatens to harm the resulting child or the larger society in specifiable and important ways. (shrink)

This article addresses the complex reflections regarding gender relations expressed by women active in the contemporary Islamic revival movements in Europe (especially France and Germany). Much recent research conducted among these groups aims to counter the rather negative accounts prevailing in public discourses on gender and Islam. This literature notably argues that women's conscious turn to Islam is not necessarily a reaffirmation of male domination, but that it constitutes a possibility for agency and empowerment. However, when faced with (...) certain ‘traditionalist’ positions defended by these women, even this well-meaning literature seems precarious, left in a state of uncertainty. Taking this puzzlement as a point of departure, this contribution aims to think about the dilemmas involved in articulating a language for women's dignity and self-realization, which competes with dominant languages of equality, individual rights and autonomy. This project is rendered even more intricate by the fact that these pious Muslim women socialized in Europe have also been partly fashioned by the liberal discourses against which they want to position themselves. (shrink)

In this article I put forward three lines of argument. Firstly, the current debate on trafficking in human beings focuses narrowly on exploitation in the sex industry. This has produced a stand-off between moralists and liberals which is detrimental to developing strategies to combat trafficking. Moreover, this narrow focus leads to missing out the large numbers of women who are trafficked into other industries. It also masks some of the root causes of trafficking. In this article I therefore compare the (...) practice of trafficking for prostitution with forced labour in other industries in order to show that the sole focus on trafficking for prostitution is detrimental to the efforts to combat trafficking. This analysis is based on recent research and reports on its methodology as well as its outcomes. Secondly, I relate these findings in the article to the agenda for the women's rights debate. The women's rights literature has looked separately at the sex industry and labour migration. In the light of our research outcomes, it makes sense to have a much more intimate exchange between these areas, in order to discern the central role of root causes like globalization, patriarchy and other forms of discrimination. Thirdly, whereas a dichotomy between universalism and particularism has produced its own trenches in this field, I propose a balanced approach which addresses all forms of violence against women, including the central area of exploitation of migrant women in any sector or domestic context. (shrink)

In this article I put forward three lines of argument. Firstly, the current debate on trafficking in human beings focuses narrowly on exploitation in the sex industry. This has produced a stand-off between moralists and liberals which is detrimental to developing strategies to combat trafficking. Moreover, this narrow focus leads to missing out the large numbers of women who are trafficked into other industries. It also masks some of the root causes of trafficking. In this article I therefore compare the (...) practice of trafficking for prostitution with forced labour in other industries in order to show that the sole focus on trafficking for prostitution is detrimental to the efforts to combat trafficking. This analysis is based on recent research and reports on its methodology as well as its outcomes. Secondly, I relate these findings in the article to the agenda for the women's rights debate. The women's rights literature has looked separately at the sex industry and labour migration. In the light of our research outcomes, it makes sense to have a much more intimate exchange between these areas, in order to discern the central role of root causes like globalization, patriarchy and other forms of discrimination. Thirdly, whereas a dichotomy between universalism and particularism has produced its own trenches in this field, I propose a balanced approach which addresses all forms of violence against women, including the central area of exploitation of migrant women in any sector or domestic context. (shrink)

This comprehensive and important volume includes contributions by activists, journalists, lawyers and scholars from twenty-one countries. The essays map the directions the movement for women's rights is taking--and will take in the coming decades--and the concomittant transformation of prevailing notions of rights and issues. They address topics such as the rapes in former Yugoslavia and efforts to see that a War Crimes Tribunal responds; domestic violence; trafficking of women into the sex trade; the persecution of lesbians; female (...) genital mutilation; and reproductive rights. (shrink)

Feminist scholars argue that women generally gain political rights followed by civil and social rights. However, this argument is based on data from North America and Western Europe, and few scholars, if any, have examined the progression of these rights within countries currently undergoing transitions to democracy in different parts of the world. Through in-depth interviews with members of women's organizations in Ghana, the author extends this literature. The findings both contradict and support the prior (...) feminist argument. They indicate that prior to democratization, women focused primarily on social rights to improve their economic well-being. However, new opportunities emerged with the transition, which allowed women to use their political rights to secure more civil and social rights. (shrink)

Major changes have taken place in Muslim societies in general during the last decades. Traditional family and social organizational structures have come into conflict with the perceptions and needs of development and modern state-building. Moreover, the international context of globalization, as well as changes in intercommunity relations through immigration, have also deeply affected social and cultural mutations by facilitating contact between different cultures and civilizations. Of the dilemmas arising from these changes, those concerning women’s and men’s roles were the most (...) conflictive issues because of different interpretations and evaluations of historical, religious and/or cultural heritages. In the case of Morocco, for over 30 years, women’s and human rights NGOs have acted and advocated to promote women’s rights. The main disputes have concerned the distinction between what is within the requirements of Islam and what is the consequence of traditional social beliefs and practices. This ended nevertheless with the adoption by the Parliament of a new Family Law proclaimed in February 2004. This law was the result of a process of consultation and national debate, which made possible substantial progress in terms of proclaimed values of equality of rights between men and women, with the support of most national political and social leaders. Several lessons can be learned from the Moroccan experience. The crucial role of civil society, the political support of the state at its highest level, the working methodology of the Royal Advisory Commission and the final process for the adoption of the new code were from the most determinant parameters. In light of recent developments in some majority-Muslim countries, the future of women’s rights is a key issue of the so-called Arab spring. Muslim women’s challenges and struggles are not only ideological and legal battles, but they are also social and political struggles for which one of the major conditions is to prevent and prohibit the use of Islam as a political instrument. Muslim societies need to educate people properly and change their traditional representations and patterns of thought. To promote justice, equity and equality in general, as well as to protect women’s economic rights, they need appropriate economic and social policies. Then women can really promote, protect and benefit from the advances of their legal status. (shrink)

This article analyses existing biases – whether due to misinterpretation, culture or politics – in the application of women’s rights under Islamic Shari’a law. The paper argues that though in its inception, one purpose of Islamic law may have aimed at elevating the status of women in pre-Islamic Arabia, biases in interpreting such teachings have failed to free women from discrimination and have even added “divinity” to their persistent subjugation. By examining two case studies – Saudi Arabia and Egypt (...) – the article shows that interpretative biases that differ in application from one country to the other further subject women to the selective application of rights. Dictated by norms, culture and tradition rather than a unified Islamic law, the paper shows how culture and politics have contributed to such biases under the pre-text of Islamic dictate. As such, it proposes a re-examination of “personal status” laws across the region in light of international human rights norms. (shrink)

This book celebrates the work of Patricia Werhane, an iconic figure in business ethics. This festschrift is a collection of articles that build on Werhane’s contributions to business ethics in such areas as Employee Rights, the Legacy of Adam Smith, Moral Imagination, Women in Business, the development of the field of business ethics, and her contributions to such fields as Health Care, Education, Teaching, and Philosophy. All papers are new contributions to the management literature written by well-known business (...) ethicists, such as Norman Bowie, Richard De George, Ronald Duska, Edwin Hartman, Michael Hoffman, Mollie Painter-Morland, Mark Schwartz, Andrew Wicks, and others. The volume is comprised of articles that reflect on Werhane’s work as well as build on it as a way to advance further research. At the end of the festschrift, Pat Werhane provides responses to each chapter. The first chapter of the book also includes the overview of Patricia Werhane’s work and her academic career. The book is written to appeal to management scholars and graduate students interested in the areas of Business Ethics, Modern Capitalism, and Human Rights. Patricia Werhane is one of the most distinguished figures in the field of business ethics. She was a founder of the field, she is one of its leading scholars, and she has had a profound impact on the world of business practice. Among her many accomplishments, Pat is known for her original work on moral imagination, she is an acclaimed authority on employee rights in the workplace, and she is one of the leading scholars on Adam Smith. Having been active in Academia for over 50 years, Werhane is a prolific author of over a hundred articles and book chapters, and the author or editor of twenty-seven books, including Adam Smith and his Legacy for Modern Capitalism, Moral Imagination and Management Decision-Making, and co-authored books Organization Ethics in Health Care, Alleviating Poverty Through Profitable Partnerships, Obstacles to Ethical Decision-Making, Corporate Responsibility: The American Experience, and Research Approaches to Business Ethics and Corporate Responsibility. (shrink)

Le Code civil français, premier code libéral et bourgeois d’Europe, passe, en raison de sa clarté systématique et de sa langue, pour un modèle de législation moderne. En outre, il eut une influence durable parce qu’il est resté en vigueur dans de nombreux pays d’Europe après la fin des conquêtes napoléoniennes. Pourtant, en comparaison avec d’autres codifications européennes et avec le droit coutumier de son temps, le Code français se caractérise, dans le droit conjugal et familial, par des règles particulièrement (...) rigides consolidant la domination masculine. L’article propose une analyse comparée de certains aspects du droit civil qui ont eu et ont encore un impact considérable sur la vie des femmes et sur l’histoire des mouvements féministes. Il se demande pourquoi les Françaises, qui se sont fait entendre plus tôt que d’autres dans leur lutte pour les droits des femmes qu’elles revendiquaient comme des droits humains, ont paradoxalement obtenu la reconnaissance de leur égale citoyenneté relativement tard (en 1944 seulement) par rapport aux autres pays européens. (shrink)

Women's Power To Be Loud: The Authority of the Discourse and Authority of the Text in Mary Dorcey's Irish Lesbian Poetic Manifesto "Come Quietly or the Neighbours Will Hear" The following article aims to examine Mary Dorcey's poem "Come Quietly or the Neighbours Will Hear," included in the 1991 volume Moving into the Space Cleared by Our Mothers. Apart from being a well-known and critically acclaimed Irish poet and fiction writer, the author of the poem has been, from its (...) beginnings, actively involved in lesbian rights movement. Dorcey's poem "Come Quietly or the Neighbours Will Hear" is to be construed from a perspective of lesbian and feminist discourse, as well as a cultural, sociological and political context in which it was created. While analyzing the poem, the emphasis is being paid to the intertwining of various ideological and subversive assumptions, their competing for importance and asserting authority over one another, in line with, and sometimes, against the grain of the textual framework. In other words, Dorcey's poem introduces a multilayered framework that draws heavily on various sources: the popular culture idiom, religious discourse, the text even employs, in some parts, crime and legal jargon, but, above all, it relies upon sensuous lesbian experience where desire and respect for the other woman opens the emancipating space allowing for redefining of one's personal and textual location. As a result of such a multifarious interaction, unrepresented and unacknowledged Irish women's standpoints may come to the surface and become articulated, disrupting their enforced muteness that the controlling heteronormative discourse has attempted to ensure. In Dorcey's poem, the operating metaphor of women's silence, conceived of, at first, as the need to conceal one's sexual identity in fear of social ostracism and contempt of the "neighbours," is further equated with the noiseless, solitary and violent death of the anonymous woman, the finding of whose body was reported on the news. In both cases, the unwanted Irish women's voices of either agony, during the unregistered by anybody misogynist bloodshed that took place inside the flat, or the forbidden sounds of lesbian sexual excitement, need to be censored and stifled, not to disrupt an idealized image of the well-established family and heteronormative patterns. In the light of the aforementioned parallel, empowered by the shared bodily and emotional closeness with her female lover, and already bitterly aware that silence in discourse is synonymous with textual, or even, actual death, the speaker in "Come Quietly or the Neighbours Will Hear" comes to claim her own agency and makes her voice heard by others and taken into account. (shrink)

The article discusses the problems of development of women’s political rights in Lithuania in the legal historical aspect starting from the 16th century, when some property and individual rights were enshrined in the first codifications of the laws of the Great Duchy of Lithuania. The aim of the article is to show that women’s struggle for political equality and suffrage at the end of the 19th and at the turn of the 20th century correlates with the movement for (...) re-establishment of the independent State of Lithuania. As a result in Lithuania equal suffrage and political rights were ensured from the very beginning of independence. In 1905 the Great Seimas of Vilnius recognized the principles of equality of women and men and declared the principles of equal general election to the Seimas (parliament); women’s suffrage, as one of the elements of legal equality, became constitutionally entrenched already in the first temporary Constitution of the State of Lithuania in 1918. At the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century women’s rights have been further developed, moreover, the first woman was elected as President of the Republic in the national elections in May 2009. (shrink)

Many caricaturists get the idea for their caricature from current issues of society. The philosophy of the caricature lies in the opinion it presents, which discusses society’s goals, culture, and crises, and it is represented in an ironic way to deliver its visual message. The fight for women’s rights, inequality, and discrimination are examples of issues concerning Saudi women that have been represented by several caricaturists. Hence, the aim of this paper is to investigate female and male caricaturists’ linguistic (...) and semiotic representation of Saudi women’s challenging issues. Following (Kress and Van Leeuwen. 2006. Reading images: The grammar of visual design, 2nd edn. London: Routledge), a social semiotic multimodal approach to the analysis is adopted in this study, which is drawn from Halliday’s social semiotic theory. Twenty caricatures were carefully selected based on the content and the issues that are being discussed in the caricatures with a consideration of their relation to the aim of the study. The present study contributes to enriching Saudi women’s rights in relation to Saudi Vision 2030. The research is significant in that, in examining women/male caricaturists’ representations of the challenges and opportunities of Saudi women empowerment prior/after Saudi Vision 2030 in the workplace, social life, it contributes to understanding the supportive caricature discourse, basic social values for Saudi women, the pressures they undergo, and the success they have achieved so far in attaining their rights. The study findings show that both the semiotic and verbal elements of the caricatures were significant in delivering the messages for women’s rights in the new Saudi. (shrink)

Since the Taliban resumed political power in Afghanistan in August 2021, their total application of strict Sharia Law has demanded global attention. This paper theorizes that, in pursuit of social order, the Taliban has enacted a civil religion to justify their complete reversion of women’s rights as a public good. I examine Afghanistan's social contact through the political philosophies of Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau and suggest why the intended social order has not materialized. In conclusion, I depict the (...) erosion of women's rights as a matter of structural injustice and incite critical reflexivity towards our responsibility for global justice. (shrink)

Identity politics and citizenship are often envisaged in dichotomous terms, but cosmopolitan theorists believe commitments to “thin” universal values can be generated from divergent “thick” positions. Yet, they often gloss over the ways in which the nexus of thick and thin is negotiated in practice—a weak link in the cosmopolitan argument. To understand this nexus better, we turn to women’s rights organizations (WROs) in polarized Turkey to show that women affiliated with rival camps (e.g., pro-religious/pro-secular, Turkish/Kurdish, liberal/leftist) can mobilize (...) over issues like empowerment, violence against women, and education. However, thick readings of these issues inflect upon collaboration. This has spurred pro-religious and Kurdish women to develop strategies that flag their specific concerns. As such, mutual recognition along cosmopolitan lines appears possible—and is reinforced through iterative encounters—but is not necessarily negotiated between equally empowered agents and entails complex processes of contestation and concession-making. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Books ReceivedAt the Eleventh Hour: The Biography of Swami Rama. By Pandit Rajmani Tigunait, Ph.D. Honesdale, Pennsylvania: Himalayan Institute Press, 2002. Pp. 427. Hardcover $18.95.Awakening and Insight: Zen Buddhism and Psychotherapy. Edited by Polly Young Eisendrath and Shoji Muramoto. Hove, England: Brunner-Routledge, 2002. Pp. xii + 275. Paper $24.95.Beyond Metaphysics Revisited: Krishnamurti and Western Philosophy. By J. Richard Wingerter. Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America, 2002. Pp. vii + (...) 391. Hardcover $71.00.Bhāmatī and Vivaraṇa Schools of Advaita Vedānta: A Critical Approach. By Pulasth Soobah Roodurmun, foreword by V. N. Jha, and edited by Kanshi Ram. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, 2002. Pp. xv + 297. Price not given.A Bibliography of Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy. By James S. Crouch. New Delhi: Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts and Manohar Publishers and Distributors, 2002. Pp. 430. Price not given.Crisis Theory and World Order: Heideggerian Reflections. By Norman K. Swazo. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002. Pp. x + 289. Hardcover $78.50. Paper $26.95.Devotional Literature in South Asia: Current Research 1997-2000: Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on Early Literature in New Indo-Aryan Languages, Leuven, 23-26 August 2000. Edited by Winand M. Callewaert and Dieter Taillieu. New Delhi: Manohar Publishers and Distributors, 2002. Pp. xxii + 324. Price not given.Dharma Bell and Dhāraṇī Pillar: Li Po's Buddhist Inscriptions. By Paul W. Kroll. Kyoto: Italian School of East Asian Studies, 2001. Pp. viii + 95. Price not given.Essays on the Moral Philosophy of Mengzi. Edited, with introduction, by Xiusheng Liu and Philip J. Ivanhoe. Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 2002. Pp. xiv + 249. Hardcover $39.95. Paper $16.95. Professional price $12.95.Ethical Questions: East and West. Edited by Bina Gupta. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2002. Pp. vi + 279. Hardcover $70.00. Paper $26.95.Ethical Relativism and Universalism. By Saral Jhingran. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, 2001. Pp. xiv + 385. Price not given.Genius-In Their Own Words: The Intellectual Journeys of Seven Great 20th Century [End Page 431] Thinkers. Edited and with introduction by David Ramsay Steele, foreword by Arthur C. Danto. Chicago and La Salle: Open Court, 2002. Pp. xxii + 366. Paper $24.95.The Hatha Yoga Pradipika. The original Sanskrit by Svatmarama, an English translation by Brian Dana Akers. Woodstock, New York: YogaVidya.com, 2002. Pp. xii + 115. Hardcover $19.95. Paper $11.95.Human Rights and Chinese Thought: A Cross-Cultural Inquiry. By Stephen C. Angle. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Pp. xviii + 285. Hardcover $65.00. Paper $23.00.Indestructible Truth: The Living Spirituality of Tibetan Buddhism. By Reginald A. Ray. Boston and London: Shambhala Publications, 2002. Pp. x + 495. Paper $17.95.Introduction to Eastern Thought. By Marietta Stepaniants. Edited by James Behuniak and translated by Rommela Kohanovskaya. Lanham, Maryland: AltaMira Press, a division of Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2002. Pp. xiv + 293. Hardcover $69.00. Paper $24.95.Jainism and Ecology: Nonviolence in the Web of Life. Edited by Christopher Key Chapple. Cambridge: Harvard University Press for the Center for the Study of World Religions, 2002. Pp. xliv + 252. Hardcover $32.95. Paper $22.95.Mediating the Power of Buddhas: Ritual in the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa. By Glenn Wallis. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002. Pp. xiii + 263. Hardcover $86.50. Paper $29.95.Methodology in Religious Studies: The Interface with Women's Studies. Edited by Arvind Sharma. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002. Pp. xi + 253. Hardcover $78.50. Paper $26.95.Persons and Valuable Worlds: A Global Philosophy. By Eliot Deutsch. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2002. Pp. x + 309. Hardcover $80.00. Paper $34.95.Philosophy and Art in Gurdjieff's Beelzebub: A Modern Sufi Odyssey. By Anna T. Challenger. Amsterdam and New York: Editions Rodopi B.V., 2002. Pp. xi + 145. Paper EUR 27,00, U.S. $25.00.The Pratyabhijñā Philosophy. By G. V. Tagare. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, 2002. Pp. xii + 165. Price not given.Reflections on Reality: The Three Natures and Non-Natures in the Mind-Only School: Dynamic Responses to ong-ka-a's The... (shrink)

Establishing women's rights became part of the moral justification given for waging `war on terror' by ensuring regime change in Afghanistan. Yet by December 2002, Human Rights Watch was reporting ongoing violations of women's rights. Western presumptions that women's lives would be transformed simply by removing the Taliban were false. This `interchange' explains this gap between expectation and reality by examining the contentious history of Afghan gender politics and the current political and economic situation. (...) Acknowledging such factors reveals that Western intervention will not easily subvert the existing gender order. Rather, any real change will result, not from prescribing Western models, but by enabling Afghan women to be autonomous agents with the right to determine their own life plans. (shrink)

Across the African continent, women's rights have become integral to international declarations, regional treaties, national legislation, and grassroots activism. Yet there is little research on how African men have understood these shifts and how African masculinities are implicated in such changes. Drawing on a year of ethnographic research in the Ugandan capital Kampala, this article investigates how ordinary men and women in Uganda understand women's rights and how their attitudes are tied to local conceptions of masculinity. (...) The author argues that a new configuration of gender relations is evident in urban Uganda—one that accommodates some aspects of women's rights while retaining previous notions of innate male authority. This article therefore illustrates the complex and often contradictory engagements with human rights that occur in local contexts and how such engagements are shaped by—and are shaping—gender relations, including conceptions of masculinity. (shrink)

The proclamation Banbiantian, which was proposed during the Mao era, is a vivid and straightforward appellation of women in new China that has gained popularity in national and folk discourses over the past seven decades. This article disassembles this term into three elements — quotation marks, Banbian, and tian — to conduct a political phenomenological analysis. By exploring and sorting reports related to Banbiantian in Renmin ribao, this article reflects on changes in relation to status and role of women in (...) the Mao era on the basis of three findings. Firstly, the quotation marks make Banbiantian a symbol of women’s actual experience and ideal image while playing a role in enhancement and guidance. Secondly, Banbian indicates the equal ratio of men and women and symbolizes the dynamic adjustment in determining equal rights, demonstrating equal capabilities, and improving equal status. Thirdly, tian is the scope of women’s liberation. Through women’s participation in public labor and political activities, coupled with balanced national and regional coordination, its scope continues to expand, extending from the family to society and the country. (shrink)

This paper foregrounds how women’s public testimony as part of a formal transitional justice initiative is shaped by the particular context in which a commission operate, including the political and security environment. While the literature has engaged with the gendered predicaments of truth commissions after peace agreements and during transitions away from non-democratic rule, the function of such initiatives in more authoritarian and in immediate post-war contexts is generally overlooked. I examine women’s testimonies from Sri Lanka’s Lessons Learned and (...) Reconciliation Commission, and contend that pervasive militarization and insecurity, and the conduct of the Commission, influenced the stories that came forth. Women’s testimonies in the war-torn areas primarily represent pleas for information about missing family members and reflect important silences about the women’s own experiences of abuse, including ongoing post-war insecurities. The analysis raises questions about what may be expected from transitional justice efforts in difficult post-war contexts. (shrink)

When Betty Friedan published The Feminine Mystique in 1963, the book exploded into women's consciousness. Before the decade was out, what had begun as a campaign for women's civil rights transformed into a diverse and revolutionary movement for freedom and social justice that challenged many aspects of everyday life long accepted as fixed: work, birth control and abortion, childcare and housework, gender, class, and race, art and literature, sexuality and identity, rape and domestic violence, sexual harassment, (...) pornography, and more. This was the women's liberation movement, and writing--powerful, personal, and prophetic--was its beating heart. Fifty years on, in the age of #MeToo and Black Lives Matter, this visionary and radical writing is as relevant and urgently needed as ever, ready to inspire a new generation of feminists. Activists and writers Alix Kates Shulman and Honor Moore have gathered an unprecedented collection of works--many long out-of-print and hard to find--that catalyzed and propelled the women's liberation movement. Ranging from Friedan's Feminine Mystique to Backlash, Susan Faludi's Reagan-era requiem, and framed by Shulman and Moore with an introduction and headnotes that provide historical and personal context, the anthology reveals the crucial role of Black feminists and other women of color in a decades long mass movement that not only brought about fundamental changes in American life--changes too often taken for granted today--but envisioned a thoroughgoing revolution in society and consciousness still to be achieved"--Back cover. (shrink)

The overall oppressive effect on women's rights of religious fundamentalism has been well documented in the literature. When looking at women's resistance to fundamentalism, it is important to examine not only organized efforts but individual women's agency in subverting or co-opting these movements toward their own ends. Using a series of narratives, the authors discuss four strategies used by Iranian women to negotiate the patriarchal practices of Islamic fundamentalism. These women crafted agency by responding to (...) the demands of family and state through collaboration, acquiescence, co-optation, and subversion. Their narratives of agency show how some women negotiated the economic hardship and gender oppression brought on by the Iranian revolution and how these negotiations affected women's options when filtered through the rhetoric of Islamic fundamentalism. The purpose of the article is to contribute further to the feminist discourse that has moved beyond victimization narratives. (shrink)

Criticisms have been made against international laws and conventions on asylum and refugees, arguing that these have been based on a male model of definition, which have ignored women’s persecutions. This article will argue that recent developments in European asylum policy have the potential to deepen this discrimination and to further reduce the rights of female asylum seekers. Although there have been some positive developments in jurisprudence that have recognised that gender-specific persecution may be the basis for granting asylum, (...) these advances remain relatively sporadic and are undermined by the operation of random and discretionary exercises of power by bureaucrats and decision makers in many cases. Further, although new developments in asylum policy are in theory “gender neutral,” differences in the material circumstances of men and women who arrive to seek asylum may mean in effect that the implications of these policies are deeply gendered. (shrink)

Development literature on global gender empowerment devotes much attention to employment, a code word for the inclusion of women’s labor in the global market. Recent work in transnational feminisms shows that the emphasis on employment over assets may not prevent exploitation of labor and perpetuity of poverty. This paper first highlights research on how women are increasingly taking on too much responsibility, working in a confluence of survival-oriented activities that undermine their own well-being. I also address how women are (...) increasingly able to get out of poverty: when they can labor in such a way that they are not merely working to survive but also working for accumulation of their own material assets, foremost of which is basic housing. Finally, I consider these transnational feminist insights about the importance of housing for women in light of philosophical concerns about property ownership, specifically Locke’s theory of property. In justifying property rights through labor, and arguing against the state’s right to usurp property, a Lockean can give a defense against forced evictions that still occur in some contexts and give support for a normative connection between women’s labor and assets. (shrink)

There has been much recent debate about women's rights and their relation to human rights. Debates about domestic violence in Vanuatu are situated in this global frame but also in a regional and historical context dominated by the relation between kastom (tradition) and Christianity. This article depicts the dynamics of a conference on Violence and the Family in Vanuatu held in Port Vila in 1994, in terms of the competing claims of universal human rights and cultural (...) relativism. The allegedly western character of human rights which focus on the individual and civil and political rights is often contrasted with the non-western stress on collectivities and the rights to economic development and self-determination. These sorts of ideological oppositions in international politics reverberate in domestic politics as well, and especially in those which situate women and men as subjects in conflict, as they are in many domestic disputes. (shrink)

Women’s legal rights are one of the most significant determinants of their status. In Bangladesh, a series of laws ensuring women’s rights have proven largely ineffective in promoting their positions. The prime reasons for this are: dirtier politics, the ineffective implementation of women rights laws, the traditional and cultural negative views about women’s rights, the absence of an accountable and transparent government, the expensive and time consuming judicial process, the lack of an efficient judiciary, and other (...) socio-economic reasons. The core theme of this essay concentrates on the ineffective enforcement of laws with the objective to promote protection of women’s rights by recommending remedies to flaws in prevailing laws in Bangladesh. Recommendations are made by reference to comparative and international practices. The primary arguments developed throughout this essay are: the protection of women’s rights is imperative to improve their status the legislative, administrative and judicial efforts dealing with women’s rights; and improvements in those effortsto better protect women’s rights. This study examines laws regarding women’s employment and political participation and the laws on dowry. It also explores the ways laws have been structured and enforced in Bangladesh, and how law can be an effective means of women’s pursuit of rights. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Philologus Jahrgang: 160 Heft: 2 Seiten: 197-216.

The concept of ‘accounts’ (Scott and Lyman, 1968) – or linguistic strategies for neutralizing the negative social meanings of norm violation – has a long history in sociology. This work examines British and American women's accounts of cosmetic surgery. In the medical literature, feminist writings and the popular press, aesthetic plastic surgery has been associated with narcissism, psychological instability and self-hatred. Given these negative connotations, cosmetic surgery remains a practice requiring justification even as its popularity increases. Drawing on (...) interview data, I argue that respondents' efforts to account for cosmetic surgery vary according to the ‘repertoires of evaluation’ (Lamont and Thévenot, 2000) made available by their own nation and, particularly, by its healthcare culture. In the market-based US healthcare system, women justify cosmetic surgery by referring to their personal and financial ‘investments’ in physical attractiveness and well-being. Such explanations are less legitimate in Britain, where healthcare is considered a social right rather than a consumer good. In the latter context, women employ narratives that medicalize the pre-surgical body by stressing the physical pain and emotional distress that it caused. (shrink)

Freedom of religious expression is to many a fundamental element of their identity. Yet the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights on the Islamic headscarf issue does not refer to autonomy and identity rights of the individual women claimants. The case law focuses on Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which provides a legal human right to freedom of religious expression. The way that provision is interpreted is critically contrasted here with the (...) right to personal autonomy and identity now developed by that court in interpreting Article 8 which contains a right to respect one’s private life. (shrink)

S. Matthew Liao argues here that children have a right to be loved. To do so he investigates questions such as whether children are rightholders; what grounds a child's right to beloved; whether love is an appropriate object of a right; and other philosophical and practical issues. His proposal is that all human beings have rights to the fundamental conditions for pursuing a good life; therefore, as human beings, children have human rights to the fundamental conditions for pursuing (...) a good life. Since being loved is one of those fundamental conditions, children thus have a right to be loved. Liao shows that this claim need not be merely empty rhetoric, and that the arguments for this right can hang together as a coherent whole. This is the first book to make a sustained philosophical case for the right of children to be loved. It makes a unique contribution to the fast-growing literature on family ethics, in particular, on children's rights and parental rights and responsibilities, and to the emerging field of the philosophy of human rights. (shrink)

In the name of safeguarding public interests and ethical principles, China’s National Health Commission bans unmarried women from using assisted reproductive technology (ART), including egg freezing. Supported by local governments, the ban has restricted single women’s reproductive rights nationwide. Although some courts bypassed the ban to allow widowed single women to use ART, they have not adopted a position in favour of single women’s reproductive autonomy, but quite the contrary. Faced with calls to relax the ban and allow single (...) women to freeze eggs electively, the National Health Commission refused to amend their policy, partly to protect women’s well-being paternalistically and partly to implement the central government’s policies to boost the birthrate and maintain traditional family structures. While the government’s concerns about elective egg freezing are not entirely unfounded, they have failed to demonstrate that banning single women’s egg freezing is a suitable, necessary and proportionate means to safeguard societal interests and ethical principles. The authority’s assumptions that women cannot make rational decisions for their health even with adequate informed consent procedures, that banning egg freezing by single women promotes a culture of having children ‘at a proper age’, and that egg freezing by single women offends China’s public moralities have not been substantiated. (shrink)

These papers were presented at a panel, organized by us and chaired by Liz Wilson, on ‘Women’s Leadership and Monastic Organizations in Therav?da Buddhist Traditions’, at the 2008 American Academy of Religion meeting, Chicago. Here, we bring together articles that examine the roots of the teachings on nuns in P?li literature with others which investigate issues relating to contemporary Therav?da nuns, as well as an analysis of relevant debates in ancient China. The objective of these papers is to contribute (...) to discussion of the multiple ways in which professionally celibate women are represented, organized and empowered in the textual and contemporary traditions of P?li and Therav?da Buddhism, to study how representations of female monasticism are related to organizational structures of leadership and agency, and explore how debates over the need for ‘dual ordination’ have occurred in traditions other than the Therav?da. (shrink)

This article examines women’s rights to property in marriage, upon divorce, and upon the death of a spouse in Uganda, highlighting the problematic aspects in both the state-made (statutory) and non-state-made (customary and religious) laws. It argues that, with the exception of the 1995 Constitution, the subordinate laws that regulate the distribution, management, and ownership of property during marriage, upon divorce, and death of a spouse are discriminatory of women. It is shown that even where the relevant statutory laws (...) are protective of women’s rights to property, their implementation is hindered by customary law practices, socialization, and the generally weak economic capacity of many women in the country. The article delves into the even weaker position of women’s rights to matrimonial property at customary and religious laws. In many homes, wives provide labor to support their husbands without having a stake in the use or monetary benefit from it. Under Islamic law regulating intestate succession to property, the entitlements for widows fall short of the constitutional standards on equality and non-discrimination. Polygyny is widely practiced by Muslims implying that the widows share the one eighth whenever there are children or one fourth in cases when there are no children. Radical reforms such as adopting an immediate community property regime instead of the present separate property regime are inevitable if women’s rights to property are to advance. (shrink)

This article examines the responses of Parisian noble women to campaigns for women's rights in France of the early Third Republic. The methodology of the article is based on the works of Pierre Bourdieu. His concept of the habitus is used to analyse the effects of class and gender in noble women's attitudes to French feminisms before the First World War. The conditioning of Parisian noble women explains their resistance, indeed often outspoken opposition, to feminists' demands. These (...) female aristocrats supported their own oppression within a social order governed by the state, the scientific and medical establishments, the expectations of family, and the Catholic Church of the time. (shrink)

Despite being neighbouring countries, Bolivia and Argentina appear to be a world apart in terms of economics, international relations, and women’s rights. Historically, women’s rights have been fairly similar in both countries, but while one country seemingly made “progress,” the other country appeared to be stagnating. By exploring violence against women, and the current state of contraception and abortion laws it becomes apparent that “progress” does not necessarily bring about social change.