'The downright torture of women': moral lobby women, feminists and pornography

Apparent alliances between moral campaigners and certain feminists in opposition to pornography have been the subject of discussion both in the United States and in Britain. Drawing on a wider study of the views of women in British moral and pro-family organisations, this article examines the attitudes of such women to pornography. It then compares these views with those of anti-pornography feminists, commenting in particular on the moral reasoning underlining different perspectives. Attention to moral reasoning, it is argued, helps to further explicate the charges of 'alliance' between the moral lobby and anti-pornography feminists, even where such alliance is neither sought or desired. The potential difficulties and uses of an assessment of pornography as 'moral' concern for the development of feminist ethics are then considered. Finally, the apparent willingness of moral lobby women to express support for anti-pornography feminists is examined. The article concludes by suggesting that this support reflects both complexities of gender identification amongst moral lobby women, and, crucially, power imbalances between anti-pornography feminists and the moral lobby rooted in the institutionalisation of heterosexuality. The implications of these findings for sociologists and for feminist theory and activism are outlined.     

Religious Freedoms versus Gender Equality: Faith-Based Organizations, Muslim Minorities, and Islamic Headscarves in the New Europe

The intersections of gender and civil society in the formersocialist countries of Eastern Europe have been examined primarilythrough the lens of Western Aid to support feminist nongovernmentalorganizations (NGOs). What has received less scholarly attentionis the growing number of NGOs advocating for a return to moreconservative gender roles and more restricted public roles forwomen. Many of these organizations are so-called "faith-based"organizations (FBOs), and are bound to particular religiousdenominations. In this article, I will examine the presenceof Islamic FBOs in Bulgaria and how they mobilize a liberal"rights" discourse to justify practices that could be locallyinterpreted as being oppressive to women. Their insistence onguaranteeing women's "right to choose" certain religious practicesputs feminists and women's NGOs in an increasingly difficultposition.     

An Ethics of Postcolonial Citizenship: Lessons from Reading Women Writing in India

This essay addresses the question of how the ethical values of the postcolonial subject are classed and gendered. A certain kind of postcolonial citizen, enjoying the privileges of birth and position, expresses an attitude that is best described (if somewhat anachronistically) as noblesse oblige . I focus on the writings of a handful of post-Independence Indian women writers, in particular Shama Futehally's novel Tara Lane (1993), as exemplifying this attitude. My essay will draw upon discussions by Indian feminists which, in different genres and informed by different politics, have set the stage for this historical, autobiographical and conceptual inquiry. Reading Indian women's fiction and Indian feminist theory and politics together, I trace their disjunctures and overlaps, merging these into an ethico-political inquiry about women and citizenship.     

The Making of Entrepreneurial Islam and the Islamic Spirit of Capitalism 1

This essay examines the relationship between Islam and economy through a case study of Islamic entrepreneurs in Turkey. It analyzes the cultural politics of Islamic entrepreneurs and examines the Islamization of capitalism and the construction of entrepreneurial Islam by probing the interpretative activities of Islamic actors who deconstruct and reconstruct the relationship between Islam, economy and entrepreneurship. The construction of Islam as incompatible with and antagonistic to capitalism has a long history. Vestiges of such thinking still continue to be reflected in contemporary accounts that depict the encounter between Islamic societies and forces of global capital as a hostile battle, each trying to outdo the other. It can be argued that this confrontational scenario is not limited to Islamic world, but also displayed in other accounts that study the meeting of forces of capital with those of local cultures at a global scale. This essay attempts to challenge such dualist accounts that oppose “global capital” and “local culture”, and shows how such dualisms fail to see how capitalism and culture interpenetrate and transform each other. The essay attempts to show that a new synthesis between religion and capitalism is unfolding where culture has not been outdone but is creatively transformed and integrated to capitalism, while capitalism is made a part of “one’s culture”.     

Unpopularising Feminism: 'Blaming Feminism' in the Generation Debate and the Mother Wars

Over the last three decades, 'blaming feminism' has been a strong thread in two popular debates concerning the women's movement. The first is the generation debate, between second-wave baby-boomer feminists and the third wave or generation × feminists. Third-wave feminists blame second-wave feminists for sabotaging women's potential by taking on the mantle of 'victim' feminism; second-wave feminists retort that third wavers embrace an individualistic and consumerist approach. In the second debate, the mother wars (mommy wars in the United States), second-wave feminists are blamed for denigrating full-time mothers and telling young women they can 'have it all': they can readily combine career and motherhood. This article reviews the debates, with attention to the media's role and the larger social context in Australia, Great Britain and the United States.     

Gender boundaries and sexual categories in the Arab world

This essay considers the construction of gender and sexual images in the Arab world and how Western responses to Islam have affected the way Islam is perceived and interpreted. After a brief introduction, the essay discusses the problems of using Islam as a standard methodological yardstick in the face of the diversity of Muslim lifestyles and interpretations. The next section describes gender boundaries and social barriers in Islam that involve rigid segregation of the sexes. While Islam is shown not to favor full gender equality, the dynamic interaction between a Middle Eastern culture and the Islamic religion, each of which promote the ostensible inferiority of women, makes it difficult to determine whether culture or religion has had more influence on gender relations. The essay continues with a look at controversies about homosexuality, the condition that defined the difference between Christianity and Islam. Characteristics of present-day sexism and sexuality among the Arabs are highlighted in a look at the persistence of male dominance, the restriction of women from the public sphere, theories about the toleration of homosexuality, and the taboo extended towards lesbians and others practicing free sex. It is concluded that the study of gender and sexuality in the Middle East remains incomplete and preliminary, although gender studies have progressed in the past two decades. Social and sexual tensions have been exacerbated by the rise of fundamentalism, and homosexuality remains a forbidden topic for Muslim scholars.     

All the rage: decolonizing the history of the British women's suffrage movement

ABSTRACT

The intervention of British feminists in the South African War is a chapter of feminist history that is rarely included either in the memorialization of the suffrage movement or the genealogies of global counterinsurgency. The careers of pacifist Emily Hobhouse and suffragist Millicent Fawcett provide rich opportunities to examine the gendered and racialised politics of British imperial militarism. By exploring the confrontation between these two white women within the wider context of aggressive colonial expansion, this essay will draw out the implications of their differing stances towards the conduct and practice of war, particularly as it impacted on female civilians in the war zone. In doing so, it will contribute to our analysis of the interconnected histories of racism, imperialism, feminism and militarism that have undeniably shaped the politics of global security today.     

Legitimation,Consent, and Antifeminism

Antifeminists have developed a legitimation theory that justifies, informs, and enhances their politics. Whereas early American conservatives opposed consent theory because it justified political equality, contemporary antifeminists have adopted and adapted consent theory to articulate and promote different rights and responsibilities for women and men. This article traces the history of consent theory in sexual politics. It suggests that the social contract philosophers and the Founding Fathers systematically excluded women from consent. Early American feminists adopted consent theory to legitimate political equality between the sexes only to discover that political equality stopped far short of gender equality. The innovation of the antifeminists today lies in their use of consent theory to justify the political inclusion of women in politics in order to legitimate their subordination in the social realm.     

Index of Volume 4, 2002

This article links a theoretical debate within poststructural feminisms – whether feminist politics can be pursued without hegemonic representations of women and gender – to the practice of transnational feminist organizing in the World Conference against Racism (WCAR) in Durban in 2001. It goes beyond the traditional analysis of ‘adding’ gender to a mega world conference and asks the critical question of what

gender signifies in this instance of UN politics. The article argues that feminists’ strategic use of the concept of ‘gender as intersectionality’ marks a paradigm shift from the predominant monolithic representation of gender as women, being equal to or different from men, in international human rights frameworks. It puts the issue of diversity among women at the forefront of the intergovernmental WCAR. Far from entailing an abandonment of feminist politics, as some poststructuralist feminists have suggested, it is argued that opening up ‘gender’ for unlimited signification in

the case of WCAR marks the beginning of a new phase of transnational feminist mobilization.     

EAT,DWELL, ORIENT

Through a comparative analysis of Julie and Julia and Ginger and Ganesh, this paper examines a pair of culinary texts, similarly organized, that turn to digital media in order to build a narrative about a year-long experiment with food. Through this juxtaposition of two very similar texts, the essay sets in motion a debate about how Asian Americanist critique can open an important window into understanding this sub-genre of Internet-based writing. Though my analysis remains critical of the latent racial implications of each text, I am not denigrating the value of either text or dismissing the potential that either text has to articulate female subjectivity through the lens of the culinary. Rather, my interest in these particular texts derives from wanting to make sense of how texts by avowed feminists who make use of the Internet in order to construct a form of gendered solidarity that ostensibly crosses lines of age, race and class, might also produce familiar Orientalist orthodoxies that continue to marginalize communities of colour, particularly women of colour, in ways that mark a deep anxiety about the position of the middle-class white feminist in the contemporary racial moment.     

Theorizing equal opportunity in Muslim majority countries

This article offers an interdisciplinary and transnational review of feminist, management and Islamic literatures to develop an understanding of philosophical theorization and institutional framing of equal opportunity in employment in Muslim majority countries (MMCs). The review suggests that ‘the mainstream’ western literature on gender and equal opportunity, along with its secular orientation, may not capture the complexity of gender and equal opportunity in MMCs. Through integrating Islamic writings and gender scholarship, the article examines how equal opportunity theorizing may be advanced by Islamic philosophies and interpretations. In particular, it presents two concurrent principles of gender relations in Islam, for instance, equality and difference of women and men. While Islamic scholars generally agree that women and men are equal because both are created by one God, there are two competing interpretations with respect to the principle of difference between women and men. The first is an egalitarian interpretation which advocates affirmative action in women's favour, and the second is a patriarchal interpretation which supports women's subordination to men. We present this discussion and use it to develop our understanding of equal opportunity or lack thereof in MMCs.     

Disabled Women and Reproductive Rights

Both the women's and disability rights movements have paid scant attention to the concerns of disabled women, especially involving sexuality, reproductive freedom and mothering. Although their concerns may seem opposite of the women's movement's primary agenda, they are based on the same position: women must not be defined solely by biological characteristics and have the right to make decisions about their bodies and lives. Disabled feminists often support 'reproductive rights', but also have different perspectives on abortion and reproductive technologies than non-disabled feminists. The literature indicates that the reproductive rights of disabled women are constrained by: the assumption that disabled women are asexual; lack of reproductive health care, contraception, and sexuality information; and, social resistance to reproduction and mothering among disabled women. Disabled women are at risk for a range of undesirable outcomes, including coercive sterilization, abortion or loss of child custody.     

Empowered Women,Failed Patriarchs: Neoliberalism and Global Gender Anxieties

Notions of “empowered women,” promoted by NGOs, economists, and feminists beginning in the 1970s, do not necessitate a countervailing notion of “failed patriarchs.” However, our review of the feminist literatures on globalization, development, and migration in the United States, the former Soviet Union, and South Asia suggests that discourses of empowered women and failed patriarchs are fused in the specter of the “reverse gender order.” A presumption of this new order is that global capitalism has liberated women to such an extent that they have surpassed men who are now the truly “disadvantaged.” Drawing on these literatures as evidence, we argue that the large‐scale incorporation of poor and working‐class women into global capitalism relies upon an ideology of the family that keeps women's labor “cheap” and draws support from the feminist idea that work is empowering for women. Diverse nationalisms uphold the ideology of the family as central to capitalist expansion, providing culturally resonant justifications for women's unpaid reproductive work, while men are breadwinners. Thus, poor and working‐class men experience a painful dissonance between breadwinning expectations and economic opportunities. We show that these tensions between ideologies and material conditions make women's responsibility for reproductive work a structural feature of neoliberalism.     

Getting the message out: Feminists,the press and violence against women

Dans cette communication l'auteur présente une étude de cas sur les relations entre les féministes, qui s'inquiètent de la violence faite aux femmes, et la presse torontoise pendant les six premiers mois de 1988. L'auteur emploie les données d'une analyse de contenu de la couverture de presse accordée à la violence faite aux femmes, ainsi que les entrevues avec les journalistes et les féministes. Globalement, l'auteur trouve que les vues des féministes ont été absentes de la couverture faite par la presse an sujet de la violence faite aux femmes. Mais, malgré cette absence, les féministes ont eu plusieurs occasions d'exprimer leurs vues sur le sujet. Ces données indiquent qu'il y a lieu d'ětre optimiste quant aux chances de succès qu'ont les mouvements sociaux lorsqu'ils utilisent la presse pour faire connaǐtre un point de vue opposé au point de vue dominant. This paper presents a case study of relations between feminists concerned about violence against women and the Toronto press during the first six months of 1988. Drawing upon a content analysis of press coverage of violence against women and interviews with both journalists and feminists, the study finds that on the whole, feminist views were absent from press coverage of violence against women, but there were also openings where feminists could achieve a significant amount of access to the press to express their views on the issue. This gives cause for optimism regarding the possibility of social movements using the press to disseminate knowledge of oppositional views of reality.     

The Way we Were — and Will Be

When extremists, both feminists and anti-feminists, perpetrate the myth that equality means death to the family, women such as myself have a hard time working out what our real options are — and indeed what our real feelings are. Some choose to opt out of families; some choose to make a lot of money pursuing their own careers; some choose to travel the country lecturing women that they don't need equal rights, just husbands to support them. But the underlying reality is no different for the most committed feminists and the most vocal defenders of the traditional family.     

#MeToo: Before and After

ABSTRACT

This essay asks, why now? What contributed to the rapid public success of #MeToo in this contemporary moment? It situates the explosion of #MeToo within both a longer history of feminist debates and activism around sexual violence, in which feminists of color have played a leading role, and the rage and bewilderment so many women have experienced in the wake of Donald Trump’s election. The author proposes the term “facilitative displacement” as a way to understand how Trump’s election, despite and perhaps because of his known record of misogynist statements and assaultive behavior, may have fueled #MeToo.     

Interacting with the State: Feminist Strategies and Political Opportunities

In recent years feminists have been engaged in new debates about gender and the state. Instead of adopting either a purely structural or agential approach, the emphasis in these debates is on the interactive relationship between the two. Feminists in political science have not been immune to this trend. Work is emerging in this field which dissaggregates the state to consider the way different political institutions shape and are shaped by engagement with feminist actors. This article contributes to these efforts by providing a detailed comparative analysis of feminist strategies and political opportunities in two similar political systems - Australia and Canada. A number of key points emerge from this study. First, similar institutions in different countries provide varying opportunities for feminists. As a result, it is not possible to make emphatic claims about certain institutions being more or less beneficial for feminists. Second, feminists respond to these opportunities by adopting certain strategies over others. Through these strategies, feminists can have a direct bearing on the opportunity structure open to them. What the experiences of Canadian and Australian feminists tell us is that the relationship between feminists and political institutions changes over both time and place; that it is interactive and dynamic, rather than predictable and permanent.     

Toward a reconceptualization of "choice": challenges by women at the margins

It has been suggested that recent first world and third world feminist movements have gained impetus from a shared emphasis on "body politics" (abortion, rape, and domestic violence). It has been made clear by other writers, however, that first and third world women (including women of color in the first world) have very different conceptions of which policies and practices should be pursued to change their reproduction experiences (because the overriding experiences of their entire lives are so very different). Likewise, the concept of "the right to choose" has been challenged on the grounds that it ignores the external conditions (such as economics) which, in fact, dictate "choice." Eugenics also influences which "choices" are promoted among populations considered "undesirable." The dilemmas associated with reproductive choices are further highlighted by debate about the use of amniocentesis in India for sex determination and female feticide. At the center of this debate is whether calling for a ban on this practice would support or violate a woman's choice. The rhetoric of choice arose in the first place because women who wanted to end a pregnancy had "no choice" but to seek illegal abortions. However, working class women and Black women in the US object to the narrowness in the abortion rights agenda dictated by the use of this term. To assert women's "choice" absolves all others of the responsibility for a pregnancy. The "choice" concept is also vulnerable to political manipulation. "Choice" also evades ethical problems such as sex selection. Disabled feminists have also pointed out that it is as important to create conditions which include "the choice to have a disabled child" as it is to choose not to be a mother. Can feminists oppose the selective abortion of female fetuses while leaving the choice to abort a defective or unwanted fetus of either sex up to the mother? Objection to sex determination can be categorized as consequentialist (based on various predicted social and psychological consequences, such as more men would lead to more violence in the world) or nonconsequentialist (based on the inherent immorality of selective abortion). The benefits of sex selection would possibly include a reduction in sex-linked diseases and a reduction in the overall birth rate. Most US feminists support the moral, but not the legal, condemnation of sex selection. In India, where sex selection is openly practiced, feminists have tried to achieve legal prohibition of the use of tests for this purpose. This difference from the US position may be due to the difference in the abortion context in the 2 countries. Whether feminists support legal and/or moral prohibition of sex selection, however, almost all call for the longterm structural changes which must be made in the context of imperialism, racism, and poverty which would allow true "choices" to prevail.     

Presidential Address: Heroes,Warriors, and Burqas: A Feminist Sociologist's Reflections on September 11

My presidential address looked back at the gendered imagery of American heroes and warriors, Muslim terrorists, and oppressed Islamic women as they appeared in comparatively sophisticated media sources in the first 6 months after September 11. The imagery was conventionally gendered, but the actions of women and men reported in the same sources showed multiple gendering—heterogeneity within homogeneity. Making this multiplicity of gendering visible blurs and undermines gender lines and the inequities built on them. The social constructions of heroism, masculinity, and Islamic womanhood are core parts of the gender politics of September 11, a politics deeply embedded in the current debates over the causes and consequences of terrorism and war.