Women In and Out of Power

Session Submission Type: In-Person Full Paper Panel

Session Description

Feminist theory has exposed women's exclusion from politics since its inception. Liberal feminist efforts have long focused on breaking the so-called glass ceiling, and working towards women's inclusion in fields that historically excluded them, especially political office. Thus, the "pink wave" of the 2018 midterm elections, along with the election of Kamala Harris as the first woman, and woman of color, to the office of Vice President were rightly acclaimed as historic wins for women and feminism. Nevertheless, many have pointed out that there should be more to feminism than the simple inclusion of women in institutions that are structurally and intrinsically oppressive. Our panel will discuss the tension around feminist challenges to our current system, focusing especially on issues around women’s inclusion in, exclusion from, and transformation of politics. What mechanisms have been used to exclude women from politics in the past? Can women participate in politics without fundamentally transforming our institutions? How could we think anew about the necessary societal changes that would allow women to fully engage in political action?

We propose papers that both expose the violence of women’s exclusion from the realms of politics, and offer ways to reimagine what politics might look like once women are not just allowed to participate in it, but invited to rethink and transform our political realm. Rose Owen historicizes Carole Pateman’s The Sexual Contract with older debates around violence against women to ask whether women must commit violence to become equal signatories and political actors. By both calling attention to broken contractual promises and articulating the need for repair, Elena Gambino argues, lesbian feminists in the 1970s and 80s appropriated the language of social contract theory to engage in prefigurative politics. Turning to the ancients, Silvia Fedi reads Aristophane’s Ecclesiazusae to consider how gynaikokratia (rule by women) fundamentally alters our concept of rule. Tessy Schlosser puts Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz in conversation with Hortense Spillers to show that practices of imitation might help women escape enclosure in the private sphere.

Sub Unit

• Division 2: Foundations of Political Theory

Cosponsor

• Division 31: Women, Gender, and Politics Research

Individual Presentations

• Violence Against Women in Carole Pateman’s "The Sexual Contract" - Rose Owen

• Prefiguration and Promise-Making: Lesbian Feminism and Social Contract Theory - Elena Gambino, Rutgers University, New Brunswick

• Gynaikokratia and the Problem of Politics as Rule in Aristophane’s Ecclesiazusae - Silvia Fedi, University of Chicago

• Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz and Hortense Spillers on the Circulation of Power - Tessy Schlosser, Cornell University

Chair

• Elizabeth R. Wingrove University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

Discussant

• Lida E. Maxwell Boston University