What Is Feminism

Since 1976, when Juliet Mitchell and Ann Oakley published their path–breaking book The Rights and Wrongs of Women, the search for a coherent identity for ‘woman’ has called that identity into question in the most fundamental way. If ‘woman’ cannot be defined beyond the biological female, how can feminism have a single definition?
The contributors to this collection ask as many questions as they answer. Nancy Cott explores the paradox at the heart of feminism; that while requiring gender consciousness as its very basis, its political end is the elimination of gender roles. Deborah Rhode examines the tensions between feminist theory and the liberal, legalist traditions that have shaped the development. Juliet Mitchell’s discussion of social change and feminism points out how feminism may succeed in bringing about social change but in doing so become involved in constructing a future it never wanted.

Developments in theory are not allowed to obscure discussion of the practical situation of women. Essays cover health, motherhood, child abuse, social welfare, science and law. Perhaps, as Rosalind Delmar contends, we can no longer usefully talk of one monolithic feminism but should think in terms of a plurality of related feminisms. Feminists have combated the stereotypes of woman; now they must look at themselves with equal rigour.