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9 Feminist Interpretations of Social and Political Thought Virginia Held Obviously, traditional social and political thought needs to be examined for gender bias and needs to be revised. But it was not until feminists demanded that it be examined and revised that its gender bias became apparent to us, because, sadly, established thought throughout the Academy had succeeded in causing earlier feminist thinking to become invisible and forgotten. By the early 1970s, women began to be aware of the degree to which we had been excluded from the liberal principles of freedom and equality that were said to guide the systems we lived in. There had been almost no explicit discussion of how all women were left out of the picture drawn by the principles of democracy and no discussion ofwhy such omissions had not been corrected.1 As women began to look at all the ways we did not enjoy equality, glaring inequities leapt into view, and feminists addressed them. By now, some 20 years later, feminist theorists often suggest that instead of seeing the world and society and everything in it from the point of view of men, and then correcting that view for bias, we ought to try seeing the world and society and everything in it from the point of view of women. Perhaps this view will only be a temporary stage to go through, a period in which we can all gain a correction across the board of the misleading views of the past. But we cannot know whether it will be temporary. Perhaps the point of view of women will turn out to be genuinely better for gaining moral insight and social knowledge, and everyone will be able to recognize this.2 The perspectives ofwomen 89 90 VIRGINIA HELD should be considered not only as a corrective but as offering the possibility of an alternative world view that may be better and truer. Here as elsewhere, feminist transformations are suggesting new avenues for moral and social inquiry. Traditional moral theory is thought to be oriented around an ethic ofjustice. Formal principles or abstract rules ofjustice, autonomy, liberty, and equality are adopted, and moral problems are dealt with in terms of reasoning from such abstract principles ; notions of social contract and individual rights are prominent. In the alternative approach being developed by a number of feminists, caring relationships among actual human persons are the basis for interpreting what a particular situation calls for in the way of responsible moral behavior; the reasoning involved is more apt to be narrative and contextual. An "ethic of care" is the phrase which is gathering most support as a way of designating an alternative feminist moral outlook. Although no label seems adequate yet, "care" seems to come closest, and to contrast well with traditional approaches based on rationality, rules, and the conceptualization of morality in terms ofsuch public or political concerns as justice, or liberty, or equality. In the domain of "particular others" central to the approach of many feminists, relationships are salient, whereas the "self" and "all others" of traditional moral and political theories seem artificial and problematic. Feminists are also questioning the contractualview ofsociety so central to the liberal tradition, and underlying that still growing and imperially expanding field of endeavor known as rational choice theory. From a feminist perspective, society as it exists, and certainly as it ought to exist, can be seen as noncontractual if it includes, as a reasonable view of it would, relationships within the family and between friends. At best, society may contain contractual enclaves, but they should probably be embedded in noncontractual relationships of trust and concern. Most of those trying to clarify the alternative ethic of care question the individualistic assumptions of much moral theory. A relationship of care or trust between a mother and a child, for instance, cannot be understood in terms of the individual states ofeach taken in isolation.3 And the values of relationships cannot be broken down into individual benefits and burdens; we need to assess the worth of relationships themselves. As Carol Gilligan sees it, "Care is grounded in the assumption that self and other are interdependent.... The self is by definition connected to others."4 Further, most of those pursuing the nonindividualistic aspects offeminist theory think that persons are not only deeply affected by their relations with others but are also at least partly or largely constituted by these relations, though we may seek to change them. [18.221.165.246] Project MUSE...

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