Feminist Theory Links the Operation of the Family to Patriarchy

Introduction – The Basics

• Inequality between men and women is universal and the well-nigh significant class of inequality

• Gender norms are socially constructed not determined past biological science and tin can thus exist changed.

• Patriarchy is the main crusade of gender inequality – women are subordinate considering men have more power.

• Feminism is a political motility; it exists to rectify sexual inequalities, although strategies for social change vary enormously.

• There are four types of Feminism – Radical, Marxist, Liberal, and Difference.

Radical Feminism

• Blames the exploitation of women on men. It is primarily men who have benefitted from the subordination of women. Women are 'an oppressed group.

• Society is patriarchal – it is dominated and ruled past men – men are the ruling class, and women the discipline class.

• Rape, violence and pornography are methods through which men have secured and maintained their power over women. Andrea Dworkin (1981)

• Radical feminists accept often been actively involved in setting up and running refuges for women who are the victims of male violence.

• Rosemarie Tong (1998) distinguishes betwixt 2 groups of radical feminist:

• Radical-libertarian feminists believe that it is both possible and desirable for gender differences to be eradicated, or at least greatly reduced, and aim for a country of androgyny in which men and women are not significantly dissimilar.

• Radical-cultural feminists believe in the superiority of the feminine. Co-ordinate to Tong radical cultural feminists celebrate characteristics associated with femininity such as emotion, and are hostile to those characteristics associated with masculinity such equally bureaucracy.

• The various alternatives suggested by Radical Feminists include separatism – women but communes, and Matrifocal households. Some likewise practise political Lesbianism and political celibacy every bit they view heterosexual relationships as "sleeping with the enemy."

Marxist Feminism

• Commercialism rather than patriarchy is the principal source of women's oppression, and capitalists every bit the master beneficiaries.

• Women'due south subordination plays a number of important functions for commercialism:

• Women reproduce the labour force for free (socialisation is washed for free)

• Women absorb acrimony – women continue the husbands going.

• Because the hubby has to support his married woman and children, he is more dependent on his chore and less likely to demand wage increases.

• The traditional nuclear also performs the function of 'ideological conditioning' – it teaches the ideas that the Capitalist class require for their future workers to be passive.

• The disadvantaged position of women is seen to be a event of the emergence of individual property and their lack of ownership of the means of production

• They are more sensitive to differences between women who belong to the ruling course and proletarian families. Marxist Feminists believe that there is considerable scope for co-functioning between working class women and men and that both can work together

• In Communist society, Marxist feminists believe that gender inequalities will disappear.

Liberal Feminism

• Nobody benefits from existing inequalities: both men and women are harmed

• The explanation for gender inequality lies non so much in structures and institutions of social club but in its civilisation and values.

• Socialisation into gender roles has the outcome of producing rigid, inflexible expectations of men and women

• Discrimination prevents women from having equal opportunities

• Liberal Feminists do not seek revolutionary changes: they want changes to take identify within the existing structure.

• The creation of equal opportunities is the main aim of liberal feminists – e.thousand. the Sex Discrimination Act and the Equal Pay Human action.

• Liberal feminists attempt to eradicate sexism from the children's books and the media.

• Liberal Feminist ideas have probably had the most affect on women'due south lives – e.one thousand. mainstreaming has taken place.

Departure Feminism/ Postmodern Feminism

• Do not see women as a single homogenous group. MC/WC ,

• Criticised preceding feminist theory for claiming a 'false universality' (white, western heterosexual, middle class)

• Criticised preceding Feminists theory of being essentialist

• Critiqued preceding Feminist theory every bit being office of the masculinist Enlightenment Project

• Postmodern Feminism – concerned with language (discourses) and the human relationship between power and knowledge rather than 'politics and opportunities'

• Helene Cixoux – An instance of a postmodern/ destabilising theorist

Criticisms of Feminist Theories

Marxist	1. Radical Feminists – ignores other sources of inequality such as sexual violence. 2. Patriarchal systems existed before capitalism, in tribal societies for example. 3. The experience of women has not been especially happy under communism.
Liberal	1. Based upon male assumptions and norms such as individualism and contest, and encourages women to be more similar men and therefor deny the 'value of qualities traditionally associated with women such as empathy. 2. Liberalism is accused of emphasising public life at the expense of private life. 3. Radical and Marxist Feminists – it fails to take account of deeper structural inequalities 4. Difference Feminists argue it is an ethnocentric perspective – based by and large on the experiences of middle course, educated women.
Radical	1. The concept of patriarchy has been criticised for ignoring variations in the experience of oppression. 2. Some critics debate that it focuses too much on the negative experiences of women, failing to recognise that some women can take happy marriages for example. three. It tends to portray women every bit universally adept and men equally universally bad, It has been accused of human being hating, not trusting all men.
Difference	Walby, women are still oppressed by objective social structures – namely Patriarchy Dividing women sub-groups weakens the movement for change.

Related Posts

Feminist Perspectives on the Family unit

Sources Used to Write this Mail

• Haralambos and Holborn (2013) – Folklore Themes and Perspectives, Eighth Edition, Collins. ISBN-ten: 0007597479
• Chapman et al (2016) – A Level Sociology Student Book Two [4th Edition] Collins. ISBN-10: 0007597495
• Robb Webb et al (2016) AQA A Level Folklore Book 2, Napier Press. ISBN-10: 0954007921

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Source: https://revisesociology.com/2017/02/03/feminist-theory-summary-sociology/

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