Counting on Marilyn Waring: new advances in feminist economics

Abstract

COUNTING ON MARILYN WARING: NEW ADVANCES IN FEMINIST ECONOMICS Edited by Margunn Bjornholt and Ailsa McKay Toronto, Canada: Demeter Press, 2014 ISBN 978 1 927335 2 7 7When Marilyn Waring's If Women Counted: A New Feminist Economics was published in 1988 (renamed Counting for Nothing: What Men Value and What Women are Worth in later editions), it was instantly picked up as path-breaking scholarship. In testimonials, feminist legends of the time called it 'the definitive feminist economic analysis' (Robin Morgan), 'a breakthrough book' (Andrea Dworkin), 'a stunning radical feminist text on patriarchal economics' (Mary Daly), and one that would 'challenge the fundamental premises of our political, economic and moral systems' (Bella Abzug). To suggest that their words were prescient seems not to be an overreaction. As this collection Counting on Marilyn Waring shows, a generation later, her work not only continues to be relevant in its own right but has also contributed to the radical expansion of conceptual and applied scholarship pertinent to women and economic life in the 21st century. The core themes that she advanced about the undercounting and invisibility of women's care work, its significance to economic activity, and the dominance of economic models that emphasise (wrongly) market exchange as the basis for economic worth have proven to be valid in a diverse range of contemporary domains, amongst them, financial crises and austerity, sexual violence and child abuse, HIV/AIDS, infant mortality and mother's milk, art activism and policy advocacy.The volume comprises seventeen essays authored by academics and researchers, practitioners, policymakers, activists, and even artists. Its geopolitical coverage is likewise broad - country case studies are drawn from Norway, Mexico, the Pacific Islands, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, India, and Israel. The end result is a book that surprises; it is the culmination of innovative thinking and research that deepens feminist economic theory as academic critique but is demonstrably broad enough to be relevant in various fields of practice. Stylistically, this is an accessible book. Although it deals with conceptually complex material, its succinct chapters are presented in language aimed at academic and non-academic audiences.The essays broadly address themes drawing heavily on Waring's original work. Some develop and build on her conceptual ideas. Bjornholt and McKay (Chapter 1) review the core tenets of an inclusive feminist economics and apply them to the current financial crisis pointing to a crisis in the discipline of economics which parallels the crisis in wider society. Aslaken, Bragstad and As (Chapter 2) explore conceptual continuities and intersections between feminist and sustainable economics. In her essay, O'Hara (Chapter 3) elucidates the concept of 'care work' for understanding rest, restoration and recreation, making a case for accounting each of these into an analysis of economic activity. Another cluster of chapters conceptually develop care work for integration of into national statistics - Chapters 4 and 5 examine Norwegian and Finnish national statistical systems respectively while Julie Smith's analysis (Chapter 14) calls for accounting mother's milk in economic statistical valuation.Chapters also employ Waring's theorisations as a methodological critique against the language and methods of economics. Casper and Simmons' paper 'Accounting for Death' (Chapter 6) deftly contests dominant economic framings that quantify infant mortality at an aggregate level rather than acknowledge the grief and trauma associated with the loss of a child. In their view, this aggregate framing is deliberately intended to advance neoliberal economic solutions to what should be issues of women's empowerment. Julich's chapter (Chapter 7) likewise discusses the necessity of costing child sexual abuse but challenges the idea that trauma can be converted to numbers. …