Emotional labour: a case of gender-specific exploitation

Abstract

In this paper, I argue that women are exploited in a gender-specific way. Women’s exploitation is gender-specific (i) if they are exploited in virtue of their social position within hierarchical gender relations and (ii) if the object of exploitation, the good that is transferred, is in a specific way linked to gender and as a result not adequately valued. This form of exploitation is unjustifiably overlooked by dominant accounts of exploitation. My argument proceeds in two steps. First, I will challenge dominant accounts for failing to accommodate gender-specific exploitation. Second, I will develop a positive account of gender-specific exploitation and use the case of emotional labour to illustrate this form of exploitation. A gender-specific account of exploitation will provide a new instrument to analyse how hierarchical gender relations are sustained and reproduced.