Ethics in the Women's Movement

Abstract

Feminism without ethics is inconceivable. Each feminist position makes contact with previous politico-ethical systems, sometimes extending, sometimes repudiating features of those systems. In this article, the author elaborates the relationship between feminism in its radical, liberal, Marxist or socialist, and ecological varieties and various political and ethical positions on some of the most highly charged issues of the day. Her aim is to show that feminism cannot escape exuding ethical assumptions and implications and that feminists can and should be held accountable for the stances their own positions either underwrite or repudiate. In this matter, at least, Jean-Jacques Rousseau was right when he insisted that “those who would separate politics from morals must fail to understand both.”

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References

1. I draw upon my book Public Man, Private Woman: Women in Social and Political Thought (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1981) as well as several previous essays for this discussion.

2. For one of the liveliest examples of this genre by one of its best-known spokeswomen, see Mary Daly , Pure Lust (Boston: Beacon Press, 1984).

3. Spacks's essay appears in E. Langland and W. Gove , eds., A Feminist Perspective in the Academy: The Difference It Makes (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981), pp. 7-24.

4. Charles Taylor , “Atomism,” in Power, Possessions and Freedom: Essays in Honor of C. B. McPherson, ed. Alkis Kontos (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1979), p. 48.

5. See, for example, Gayle Rubin , “The Traffic in Women: Notes on a `Political Economy' of Sex,” in Toward an Anthropology of Women, ed. Rayna R. Reiter (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1975), p. 165.

6. See, for example, Ann Ferguson , “Androgyny as an Ideal for Human Development,” in Feminism and Philosophy, ed. M. Vetterling-Braggin , F. Elliston , and J. English (Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Allanheld, 1977), pp. 62-63.

7. I draw freely upon my book Women and War (New York: Basic Books, 1987) for these reflections on feminism and war.

8. The brief is available from the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund, 132 West 42nd Street, New York, NY 10036.

9. See Anne Donchin , “The Future of Mothering: Reproductive Technology and Feminist Theory,” Hypatia, 2(2):121-137 (Fall 1986). Donchin divides feminist positions into noninter-ventionist, moderate interventionist, and radical interventionist.

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10. Alison M. Jagger , Feminist Politics and Human Nature (Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Allanheld, 1983), p. 132.

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11. Cited in Genoveffa Corea , “How the New Reproductive Technologies Could Be Used to Apply the Brothel Model of Social Control over Women,” Women's Studies International Forum, 8(4):299 (1985).

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12. Cited in James Barron , “Views on Surrogacy Harden after Baby M. Ruling,” New York Times, 2 Apr. 1987.

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13. Eva Feder Kittay and Diana T. Meyers , eds., Women and Moral Theory (Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Littlefield, 1987).

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14. Natalie Zemon Davis , “Men, Women and Violence: Some Reflections on Equality,” Smith Alumnae Quarterly, Apr. 1972, pp. 12-15.

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15. For those readers not familiar with the political events that gave birth to the Mothers, suffice it to say that between 1976 and 1979 at least 10,000 Argentine citizens were abducted and murdered by their government. Many of them were young people, the sons and daughters of the Mothers of the Plaza.