Theorizing knowledge from women's political practices

Abstract

Over the past decade there has been much debate within IR/political theory about the nature and status of knowledge with much of the tension revolving around the conflicting positions of so called `modernist' and `postmodernist' scholars. This article aims to critically evaluate the insights of both these approaches to knowledge in light of feminist theory and the practices of one social movement, that is, the women's reproductive rights movement. The article argues that any understanding of the nature and sources of knowledge claims deployed within movements needs, on the one hand, to draw from both these perspectives -- rather than choose between them -- and, on the other, to reach beyond them. More specifically, it argues that we need to learn from feminist theory and explore different sources of knowledge which include, but are not limited to, reason.