The Patriarchal Heritage and the Working-Class Women

Abstract

The debate on women's emancipation has reached an impasse of similarity between men and women and has arrived in the backwater of female distinctive character. What generates this oscillation between self -sacrificing 'common' interest and the assertion of women's particular interests? Both these orientations are reasonable if it is kept in mind that domination of men originates in the heritage of the patriarchy that preceded industrial capitalism Today, the personal subordination in the rule of masters has changed into the abstract order of the market This was a very gradual process and it is only during the after-war penod that the traditional patn archy has disappeared. But the culture of market is still dominated by men. Socialistic and liberal ideologies start from the assumption of the similarity between men and women and from the fact that they prevent the articulation of contradictions between men's and women's interests By asserting their distinctive character, women have brought out the societal claims of human reproduction partly at the expense of their position in production. The social-democratic woman's movement has followed its party brothers when promoting home-working wives and honouring women's wage work. It is only dunng the last decade that working-class women have begun to question the leadership of their party men.