Women in Western Political Thought

by Susan Moller Okin, Debra Satz (Introduction)

Overview

In this pathbreaking study of the works of Plato, Aristotle, Rousseau, and Mill, Susan Moller Okin turns to the tradition of political philosophy that pervades Western culture and its institutions to understand why the gap between formal and real gender equality persists. Our philosophical heritage, Okin argues, largely rests on the assumption of the natural inequality of the sexes. Women cannot be included as equals within political theory unless its deep-rooted assumptions about the traditional family, its sex roles, and its relation to the wider world of political society are challenged. So long as this attitude pervades our institutions and behavior, the formal equality women have won has no chance of becoming substantive.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691158341
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	04/21/2013
Edition description:	With a New introduction by Debra Satz
Pages:	440
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.40(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Susan Moller Okin (1946-2004) was a prominent feminist philosopher and the Marta Sutton Weeks Professor of Ethics in Society at Stanford University. Her books include Justice, Gender, and the Family and Is Multiculturalism Bad for Women?

Table of Contents

Introduction to the 2013 Edition ix

Acknowledgements xix

Introduction 3

PART I. PLATO

1. Plato and the Greek Tradition of Misogyny 15

2. Philosopher Queens and Private Wives 28

3. Female Nature and Social Structure 51

PART II. ARISTOTLE

4. Woman's Place and Nature in a Functionalist World 73

PART III. ROUSSEAU

5. Rosseau and the Modern Patriarchal Tradition 99

6. The Natural Woman and Her Role 106

7. Equality and Freedom - for Men 140

8. The Fate of Rosseau's Heroines 167

PART IV. MILL

9. John Stuart Mill, Liberal Feminist 197

PART V. FUNCTIONALISM, FEMINISM AND THE FAMILY

10. Women and Functionalism, Past and Present 233

11. Persons, Women, and the Law 247

12. Conclusions 274

Appendix to Chapter 2 305

Afterword to the 1992 edition 309

Notes 341

Bibliography 387

Index 399

Editorial Reviews

"Okin has written an engaging, serious, careful, and important work that raises the issues of women and politics in their most elemental and pertinent form. . . . A pioneering book."—-Benjamin R. Barber, New Republic

"A brilliant, clear, sustained drive through the murky history of men's ideas about what they wished women to do into the terra incognita of what women can be. . . . [A] major contribution to political thought."—-Christina Robb, Boston Globe

"Excellent. . . . Given the generations of scholars who have ignored the obvious, Okin's contribution is tantamount to the child declaring the emperor to be without clothes. Her language is calm, clear, simple, and strong."—-Vivian Gornick, Washington Post

"Okin's impressive book makes clear that whatever we may have been taught, we cannot read the great political theorists as though 'mankind' means all of us."—-Nannerl Keohane, Ethics

From the Publisher

Okin's impressive book makes clear that whatever we may have been taught, we cannot read the great political theorists as though 'mankind' means all of us.

Ethics - Nannerl Keohane

Excellent. . . . Given the generations of scholars who have ignored the obvious, Okin's contribution is tantamount to the child declaring the emperor to be without clothes. Her language is calm, clear, simple, and strong.

Washington Post - Vivian Gornick

A brilliant, clear, sustained drive through the murky history of men's ideas about what they wished women to do into the terra incognita of what women can be. . . . [A] major contribution to political thought.

Boston Globe - Christina Robb

Okin has written an engaging, serious, careful, and important work that raises the issues of women and politics in their most elemental and pertinent form. . . . A pioneering book.

New Republic - Benjamin R. Barber

Okin's impressive book makes clear that whatever we may have been taught, we cannot read the great political theorists as though 'mankind' means all of us.
— Nannerl Keohane

Ethics

Excellent. . . . Given the generations of scholars who have ignored the obvious, Okin's contribution is tantamount to the child declaring the emperor to be without clothes. Her language is calm, clear, simple, and strong.
— Vivian Gornick

Washington Post

A brilliant, clear, sustained drive through the murky history of men's ideas about what they wished women to do into the terra incognita of what women can be. . . . [A] major contribution to political thought.
— Christina Robb

Boston Globe

Okin has written an engaging, serious, careful, and important work that raises the issues of women and politics in their most elemental and pertinent form. . . . A pioneering book.
— Benjamin R. Barber

New Republic

"Okin has written an engaging, serious, careful, and important work that raises the issues of women and politics in their most elemental and pertinent form. . . . A pioneering book."

The New Republic