“On ne naоt pas femme, on le devient.”

Simone de Beauvoir (Le deuxieme sexe II)

Basic overview of the main ideas

In order to understand feminist methodology let us first situate it in the wider scope of feminist thought. It is important to clarify that feminism does not have a monolithic and homogenous theoretical corpus. “The normative agenda of feminism is itself a matter of political contestation amongst feminists.” (Hutchings 2006: 111). It is an approach laden with internal tensions.

Modern feminism (with Wollstonecraft onwards) is associated with the political struggle for women"s emancipation. It is manifested in different battles for recognition both overt and hidden. Women movements have been advocating for equal rights and suffrage, non-discrimination, equal opportunities in work and private sphere recognition. Their demands encompass inter alia: right to vote, equal access to education, prestigious work positions, legalisation of abortion etc.

Public/private cleavage is an important dichotomy associated with power relations based on gender (Elstein 1981). Elstein seeks to deconstruct this division by thinking the personal sphere as a political arena. Equality and difference is another division which causes tensions within feminism. One tradition stipulates the equality of men and women. Differential feminists argue that by making women “equal to men” it implies that women are becoming “like men”. Differential feminists do not want to regard “men” as some of “standard” to be achieved. They argue instead for preservation of “woman identity” and put the emphasis on the notion of “sisterhood” rather than the sexless “personhood”. Within the broad notion of feminism various streams can be identified. Moreover, within those traditions another division can be made on the generational basis. There exist: liberal, Marxist, black, radical, postmodern and Muslim feminism etc. The variety is so great that a way of approaching feminism is only possible on a Wittgensteinian “family resemblance” basis.

Methodology

We need to adopt a critical approach towards feminism

“If we are to gain understanding, we must get out of these ruts; we must discard the vague notions of superiority, inferiority, equality which have hitherto corrupted every discussion of the subject and start afresh.” (Beauvoir 1956: 25)

Feminisms seeks to destroy the androcentric bias in our understanding.

“Thus humanity is male and man defines woman not in herself but as relative to him; she is not regarded as an autonomous being. Michelet writes: ‘Woman, the relative being ...’ And Benda is most positive in his Rapport d’Uriel: ‘The body of man makes sense in itself quite apart from that of woman, whereas the latter seems wanting in significance by itself ... Man can think of himself without woman. She cannot think of herself without man.’ And she is simply what man decrees; thus she is called ‘the sex’, by which is meant that she appears essentially to the male as a sexual being. For him she is sex – absolute sex, no less. She is defined and differentiated with reference to man and not he with reference to her; she is the incidental, the inessential as opposed to the essential. He is the Subject, he is the Absolute – she is the Other.’ (Beauvoir 1956: 15-16)”

Gender is a social construction and as such we should not take it as naturally given. This is what Beauvoir means when she says: “One is not born but rather becomes a woman. […] civilisation as a whole produces this creature.” (Beauvoir 1956: 273) Judith Butler introduces deconstruction in feminist research. “To deconstruct the subject of feminism is not, then, to censure its usage, but, on the contrary, to release the term into a future of multiple significations, to emancipate it from the maternal or racialist ontologies to which it has been restricted, and to give it play as a site where unanticipated meanings might come to bear.” (Butler 1992: 16) From the deconstructive method follows also a refusal to assume. “To refuse to assume, that is, to require a notion of the subject from the start is not the same as negating or dispensing with such a notion altogether; on the contrary, it is to ask after the process of its construction and the political meaning and consequentiality of taking the subject as a requirement or presupposition of theory.” (Butler 1992: 391)

Sandra Harding argues against the idea of distinct feminist method of research (Harding 1987: 1) Feminsm shares the established methods of the social sciences such as listening to informants, observing behaviour, examining historical traces and records. The difference for feminists is how these methods are carried out. One way is to simply “add woman” in the research. Harding rejects this approach. It is women"s experience in the plural that provide the new resources of research. Since there is no universal “Man” there is no “Woman” as a singular archetype either and thus “woman"s” experience. Experiences vary in different contexts: classes, races, cultures (Harding 1987: 7) Moreover Beauvoir insists that: “The fact is that every concrete human being is always a singular, separate individual.” (1956: 22)

Feminism introduces three important innovations to methodology which themselves turn into criteria for feminist research. Firstly feminism tries to study women from the perspective of their own experiences. The introduction of this subjective element into the analysis in fact increases objectivity of research and decreases Objectivism (Harding 1987: 9). Empirical data gathering can never be value free. The social context of the examiners shapes the way they do research.

Feminism explores the social construction of gender. It examines the sources of power and joins with other “underclass” approaches on the emphasis on “studying up”. (Harding 1987: 8) Very much in the spirit of Critical Theory feminism not only aims to bring new ways of understanding of social phenomena but also to instigate social change. The second innovation is the new purpose these scholars assign to social sciences. Social sciences have to be for women. The third innovation relates to the subject matter of inquiry. It is about locating the researcher on the same critical plane as the overt subject matter without however this leading to relativism. Harding leaves room also for men to participate in feminist studies as long as they satisfy her three criteria.

Elizabeth Frazer (1997) finds two threads in feminist political theory: commitment to interdisciplinarity and centrality of interpretive methods. She borrows ideas from Gadamer and Derrida and puts an emphasis on the interpretation of text proper and text analogues such as social events. In fact the world is a text which requires an interpretive reading.

Hartsock (1998) integrates Marxist thought within feminist methodology. The emphasis is put on work. What people do is what defines them. She studies the sexual divisions of labour and exploitation. Engles argues that the bourgeois family which arose as a consequence of capitalism and private property is patriarchal and oppressive. It is the first class oppression in history. Men have dominated women economically since they were the breadwinners.

Feminism and international political theory

Care ethics should be the starting point for transforming the values and practices of international society (Hutchings 2000; Robinson 1999). For Ruddick the “realm of international politics is primarily a realm of human relations, not of human, nation or state rights/interests or an international state system” (2002: 115). Human relations imply “not transcendent impartiality but a sympathetic apprehension of another grounded in one’s own particular suffering’. This is not just a matter of ‘feeling for’ another’s pain, but assuming an attitude of responsibility for it and therefore trying to do something about it.” (Ruddick 1993: 123)

“For Ruddick, both militarism and just war theory share a commitment to the expendability of concrete lives in abstract causes to which maternal thinking is inherently opposed.” (Hutchings 2002: 116) There is a remarkable similarity between Ruddick"s ideas and the attitude of Lysistrata in the eponymous ancient Greek play of Aristophanes. Lysistrata wants to stop the pointless Peloponnesian war and organises what we might today call an international women"s conference. Its aim is to stop male militarism.

Very important contribution feminism makes in the study of International Political Theory is the deconstruction of the idea that violence is a necessary means in world politics. Hutchings does not go as far as to endorse unconditional pacifism within feminism as it is the case with Ruddick. Instead Hutchings" idea is to make us rethink what we take for self-evident: that the international sphere is necessarily violent. She deconstructs this “necessity”. “What is forbidden is the assumption of the necessity of violence”... “Feminists, along with other ethicists of a liberal or communitarian persuasion, live in a world in which violence is possible. It is never a world in which violence is necessary in the sense of there being no other way in which the world could be or any particular agent could act.” (Hutchings 2000: 15).

To sum up feminist methodology seeks to reveal and overcome androcentric biases in research, advocate human diversity, acknowledge the positionality of the researcher and bring about social change. Methods must involve women as participants and researchers and must explore their diverse experiences within social hierarchies. The implications for IPT entail deconstruction of core traditional IR assumptions and enhancement of the process of the introduction of various historically silenced alternative perspectives into the field of study.

Bibliography:

Beauvoir, S., 1956, “The Second Sex”, London, Lowe and Brydone.

Butler, J., J. Scott, 1992, “Feminists Theorise the Political” New York: Routledge.

Eltstein, J. B., 1981, “Public Man, Private Woman: Women in Social and Political Thought” Oxford: Martin Robertson.

Engels, F., 2000, “The Origins of the Family, Private Property and the State” London: Pathfinder.

Frazer, E., 1997, “Method Matters: Feminism, Interpretation and Politics”, in Andrew Vincent (ed.), Political Theory: Tradition & Diversity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Harding, S., 1987 “Introduction: Is There a Feminist Method?”, in Sandra Harding (ed.), Feminism and Methodology: Social Science Issues Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

Hartsock, N., 1998, “The Feminist Standpoint: Developing the Ground for a Specifically Feminist Historical Materialism”, in The Feminist Standpoint Revisited and Other Essays Boulder: Westview Press.

Hutchings, K., 2000 “Towards a Feminist International Ethics”, Review of International Studies 26/5

S. Ruddick, 1993 ‘Notes Toward a Feminist Peace Politics’, in M. Cooke and A. Woollacott (eds.), Gendering War Talk Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

A provocative position of the neo-liberal economist Milton Friedman AGAINST equal pay for men and women.