What Is Feminist Ethics?

What Is Feminist Ethics? This is both the title of the essay Hilde Lindemann contributes to Russ Shafer-Landau's The Ethical Life and the question she tries to answer within it. Lindemann starts out by defining feminism as both a social and political movement and as a body of theory from which feminist ethics stems from.


When introducing us to feminism as a theory Lindemann first describes the three most widely accepted definitions and understandings of feminism and then presents to us how she views this body of theory. The first definition of feminism Lindemann presents is one centered on equality. This view on feminism sees it as being that to make women socially equal to men. Lindemann points out that this is perhaps the definition most people associate with feminism because it has been repeatedly reinforced through references to feminism in the mainstream media and popular culture sources such as books, movies, and television. Lindemann then examines two problems she sees with this stance on feminism. The first is that saying women should be equal to men is a very general statement which doesn't consider other economic and racial differences that also lead to social inequality. She uses bell hooks' question: "Which men do women want to be equal to? from her book Feminist Theory from Margin to Center to illustrate this problem with the equality definition (hooks 1984, 152). This boils down to saying that most "socially well off wouldn't get much advantage from being the equals of the men who are poor and lower class, particularly if they aren't white" (Lindemann 2004, 152). The second problem with the equality definition as Lindemann sees it is that it uses men as a point of reference to which women should compare the standing of their social equality. She then talks about Sarah Lucia Hoagland's criticism of the use of men as a reference point because it prevents women from developing values for themselves on their own, which leads to the second definition of feminism being a theory about women. The problem that Lindemann mentions that some feminist theorists and philosophers have with this definition is that they view the term 'woman' as something different from the term 'female' and more importantly something that is created by society. These feminist philosophers, such as Simone de Beauvoir, find the term 'woman' to be defined by society as nothing other than the difference from men, the 'non male'. This criticism is very similar to the criticism pointed out in the equality definition of feminism which uses men as a reference point. This dissatisfaction with the "woman" definition of ethics leads to the "positive difference" definition which looks at qualities that women have that men don't, such as a passionate nature and natural motherly nurturing of their children, "in positive terms, affirming feminine qualities as a source of personal strength and pride" (Lindemann 2004, 153). The problem that Lindemann presents with this view on feminism is that while it may be useful for identifying the differences between men and women it does not explain why men as a group are more socially advantaged or powerful than women. This is why Lindemann says that in her view feminism should be defined as the study of the pattern of asymmetrical social allocation of power between men and women across time and culture. She then defines this asymmetry with the term gender, while she mentions that it has been called a number of things such as sexism, patriarchy, and systematic misogyny by various feminist theorists. She then goes deeper into why she sees gender as a norm, that directs how a person should act, what they should wear, and what type of things they should be interested in, instead of as a scientific fact. Lindemann then gives several examples of this in our society such as the fact that there has never been a female president or that disproportionate amount of government spending allocated to the military, something she identifies as having masculine attributes, as opposed to the arts, something she associates with femininity.

I found Lindemann's essay to be very interesting, especially since I had not studied or read, or even really been exposed to, feminist literature before in an organized classroom setting. This is why before reading this if I had been asked to define feminism I probably would have simply used the first definition she talks about; the aim to give women social equality to men. I'm not sure how I would define it now but I definitely see the problems with such a generalization. However, I do think it has a lot of value, as a concept or definition, that a more complex definition can be constructed on. In many aspects Lindemann's own definition of feminism as the asymmetrical distribution of power between men and women can be seen as built upon a base of the social inequality between men and women. One of the things I liked most about her definition of feminism is that it recognizes that this gap in amount of power between men and women is something that can be observed in most of the world's various cultures as well as historically if we look at it over time. Another very interesting concept in her definition is that she examines gender as a social norm more so than a scientific fact. She also goes on to say that gender is reinforced through many social institutions, such as law and marriage, and practices, such as education and medicine (Lindemann 2004, 155). As far as the current state of the asymmetrical allocation of power between the genders I believe that there is certainly still a ways to go but at the same time it cannot be denied that significant progress has been made. Since Lindemann wrote this essay the percentage of Fortune 500 CEOs that are women has risen up to 4.2% in 2012 from 2.4% in 2008 and in 2008 Hillary Clinton came closer to becoming the first female president than any other female candidate ever had before. And while I do see that there is obvious much more work to be done towards achieving a balanced distribution of power; 4.2% is not a very large percentage and coming close to winning is not the same as winning, I do believe that things are moving in the right direction.