Sex and Social Justice (review)

Sex and Social Justice. By Martha C. Nussbaum. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Martha C. Nussbaum's book Sex and Social Justice is in many ways a breath of fresh air—not so much because she introduces amazing new ideas that sweep away old ways of thinking, but rather because she re-introduces us to perfectly good, stable, useful, and life-affirming ways of thinking that have fallen into faddish academic disrepute. Essentially, Nussbaum wants to defend the thesis that liberalism is sufficient for the goals of feminism (albeit a liberalism that is informed by, but not radically altered by, international perspectives, humanism, sympathy, and a moral psychology that accounts for deformed desires).

Sex and Social Justice is not a sustained-argument single narrative, but a collection of various articles written and rewritten in the past decade. Though the book is divided into two large sections, entitled "Justice" and "Sex," there is actually a more useful way of understanding what the text offers. Basically, there are four types of articles:

a. A defense of feminist liberalism (mostly against postmodern relativists and certain vacuous types of multiculturalism, but also against quasi-conservative liberals' anemic pared-down "equity" feminism)

b. Some practical feminist ethics articles on prostitution, pornography, and female genital mutilation (including some excellent analytical work on the concept of objectification and a pointed critique of Andrea Dworkin's retributivism)

c. A liberal defense of gay and lesbian rights (including valuable material on what ancient Greek philosophers actually had to say about homosexuality and work on the concept of the social construction of sexual desire)

d. Some book reviews and literary analysis

As a whole, then, the book offers different things to different people. The last three articles of the book (all of the "d" type) feel in some ways a diversion from the social justice issues that weigh so heavily in the rest of the text: a tribute to ancient Greek scholar Sir Kenneth Dover, replete with biographical insights both touching and salacious; a multiple book review and intellectual roadmap of Judge Richard Posner's legal and social criticism; an essay on Virginia Woolf's solution to the other minds problem in To The Lighthouse.

The type "c" articles on lesbian and gay rights are solid, but not particularly ground breaking. Most will be familiar with the general arguments, although some of the legal reasoning (and lack thereof) on various specific cases is very interesting and exposes the complicated and depressingly uncritical way court decisions are often made. There is also an engaging story about Nussbaum's participation as an expert witness in the trial challenging the constitutionality of Colorado's Amendment 2 (which nullified and prohibited any municipal gay rights ordinances), in which she was called upon to clarify what the ancient Greeks had to say about the morality of homosexuality. Nussbaum reproduces her arguments here in a thorough and readable summary of what Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle have to say about homosexuality and how to interpret their sometimes vague comments.

The type "b" articles are probably of greater interest to those interested in feminist ethics. Of particular note is the article on "Objectification" (1999, 213-39). Nussbaum does a masterful job of dissecting the concept of objectification that figures so prominently in the moral critiques of Andrea Dworkin and Catharine MacKinnon. Identifying seven ways in which it is possible to treat something as an object, she surveys a variety of activities (raising children, slavery, wage labor, sex) and argues that objectification is not always problematic, but depends on context. Nussbaum also addresses Andrea Dworkin's work in the next essay. Linking Dworkin's positions to those of Immanuel Kant and John Stuart Mill points out how Dworkin does not diverge from classical moral analysis nearly as radically as some people read her. Unfortunately, she is also linked to old-time retributivism; Nussbaum criticizes her "fire-and-brimstone" rhetoric (1999, 251) for possibly leading women out of something bad, but failing to lead them to anything good. Dworkin...