Susan Moller Okin, Justice, Gender, and the Family

Bibliographic Data

ID23616232
AuthorsMichaele Ferguson (Political Science and Women and Gender Studies, University of Colorado at Boulder), Michaele L Ferguson (0000-0001-7809-229X, corresponding author)
Year2019
Publication date2019-03-14
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeCHAPTER
VenueThe Oxford Handbook of Classics in Contemporary Political Theory (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/oxfordhb/9780198717133.013.49
OpenAlexW2925850996
ISBN9780198717133
LanguageEN
References cited14

Susan Okin’s radical thesis in Justice, Gender, and the Family is that the ideal of the gender-structured family is source of persistent gender inequality in politics, the workplace, and actual families. However, the book has widely been taken to be making a much narrower claim: that theorists of justice should extend their analysis to the family, ensuring that the division of labor in the family is just. As a result of this misreading, feminist theorists dismissed the book as conventional when it was published, whereas political theorists largely viewed it as innovative. This chapter recenters the radical thesis of the book, shows how Okin’s most important critics have misunderstood it, and discusses why now perhaps more than even in 1989, we should revisit this book.

Division of labour · Economic Justice · Ideal (ethics) · Inequality · Law and economics · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Feminism, Gender, and Sexuality Studies · Gender Diversity and Inequality · Gender Politics and Representation · Gender Studies · Law · Mathematics

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