State Feminism Research Articles

Le Mariage heureux du féminisme et du néolibéralisme: pistes pour analyser une union récente

By tracing the transformations of gender-based violence policies in France, this article highlights how they reflect neoliberal feminist dynamics. While the notion of ‘neoliberal feminism’ was developed to focus on the cultural and symbolic arena to analyse the changing representations of feminism, as well as the norms and subjectivities that were shaped by both a managerial and an egalitarian ethos, the role of the state in these processes was left aside. Therefore, the article aims at putting the state back into the analysis of neoliberal feminism by showing how state feminism has been driven in part by a neoliberal rationale when designing policies and has progressively excluded a structural perspective on the problem of gender-based violence.

Dependency as Situated Knowledge: A Reflexive Politics of Location on the Positionalities of Chinese Feminist Scholars

While feminist knowledge has historical roots in China, the academic knowledge production about women’s and gender studies (WGS) as situated knowledge has always been a contestation between opposing forces. The Fourth United Nations World Conference on Women, held in Beijing in 1995, marked the critical discursive and organizational moment for grounding the feminist concept of gender as an analytical and action framework. Since then, WGS have flourished, but the label of feminism has been ambivalent. To examine the complicated state of academic dependency and the politics of location in this interdisciplinary academic field, I interrogate researchers’ positionalities in some recent publications on feminism and gender studies about China by pointing out the interplay of diasporic and domestic positionalities in English and Chinese publication outlets. This article argues that for an interdisciplinary program like WGS, with its inextricable connection to the political state of China and socialist state feminism, the theory of academic dependency cannot adequately capture the often contested, strategic, and situated standpoints of feminist scholars. While diasporic and domestic scholars are deeply aware of their own positionalities in the channel of publications that grant them voices, they are also caught in the current hegemonic political economy of knowledge. This article interrogates the contested positionalities of overseas and domestic feminist scholars in creating a feminist academic field about China.

The digital storytelling of feminist foreign policy: Sweden’s state feminism in digital diplomacy

This article interrogates the digital storytelling of Sweden’s feminist foreign policy. Drawing on scholarship on state feminism and digital diplomacy, it shows how digital platforms offer opportunities to reproduce narratives of state feminism through storytelling. We propose that digital diplomacy is used to advance feminist foreign policy through emotional sense-making that requires the telling of personal stories. The article provides a narrative analysis of the stories of women and girls that symbolise and embody feminist foreign policy, and the way in which they are communicated by the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. The article concludes by noting that the digital storytelling of feminist foreign policy allows the Ministry for Foreign Affairs to communicate to a wider digital audience. These stories, however, run the risk of obscuring the feminist ambitions of feminist foreign policy by insufficiently considering the gendered injustices that undergird the global gender order and by bringing together seemingly incompatible stories of feminist exceptionalism and success.

Feminism and Counter-Trafficking: Exploring the Transformative Potential of Contemporary Feminism in Portugal

Focusing on the Portuguese case, this article explores the role of feminism in counter-trafficking. Through analysing feminist discourse on human trafficking, the article interrogates feminism's ability and its limitations in challenging or reinforcing some of the most controversial policy outcomes. The article argues that, due to a structural weakness within feminism itself and the profound institutionalisation of counter-trafficking, any possibility of challenging dominant discourses on trafficking remains a distant dream. Rather, counter-trafficking attempts ultimately help create a controversial neoliberal space that strains feminism's transformative potential while simultaneously strengthening bureaucratic state feminism.

Girls’ portrayals in fast fashion advertisements

ABSTRACT This study analyses the visual construction of girls and notions surrounding young femininities articulated by 15 contemporary advertisements of Nordic fast fashion companies, available on their public Facebook pages in Finland. A visual discourse analysis identifies some blatantly stereotypical and a few complex visual constructions of girls as heterosexual, caring, innocent, sexy posers, active self-presenters and self-surveyors, carefree and environmental activists. The implications of our findings, particularly in shaping societal notions surrounding girls, are discussed. The study contributes primarily to the research field of visual commercial representation of girls by unpacking how their complex portrayals can create an equivocation that eventually resurrects stereotypes surrounding young femininities. It advances studies on Nordic consumer culture by highlighting that girls’ portrayals by Nordic companies may not clearly reflect the values of state feminism. The study can benefit marketers by sensitising them to how the complex visual representations of girls may (re)produce stereotypes.

Women Labour Models and Socialist Transformation in early 1950s China

AbstractThis article investigates Chinese women labour models (or labour heroines) of the early 1950s as actors and symbols of socialist transformation. It centres on the example of Shen Jilan (1929–2020), who was one of the most prominent women labour models of the time. Shen rose to fame through her struggle for equal pay for equal work in her native village, became a delegate to China's National People's Congress, and even participated in the Third World Congress of Women in Copenhagen in 1953. The article critically engages with the concept of “state feminism” and proposes a shift in focus from state–society relations to work as a means to understanding the transformation of women's lives under socialism. Socialist society was a society of producers and work shaped people's daily lives; it was central to identity formation and constituted the regulating mechanism of social relations. Indeed, women labour models, together with related categories of working women, came to typify the new Chinese woman, who was integral to and symbolic of socialist modernity. They epitomized communist theory about women's participation in production being the mechanism of their liberation. The article has three main parts, each of which addresses a different level (local, national, international), different constellations of actors and agency, and different aspects of the relationship between working women and socialist transformation. By tracing Shen Jilan's activities in various contexts, the article reveals the complexity, contradictions, multilayered nature, and also incompleteness of socialist transformation.

3 - The Rocket in the Haystack: Between Nasser’s Developmental Vision and the Neo-Imperialist Mission


 
 
 This article assesses Gamal Abdel Nasser’s efforts to transform Egypt’s postcolonial economy via his industrialisation policies, drawing lessons for today from both his successes and shortcomings. By analysing outcomes through indicators of industrial production, employment patterns, productivity, and main beneficiaries in the post-independence period, the article critiques Nasser’s incremental approach, the undermining of workers’ movements, and the limiting nature of ‘state feminism’, which contributed to the failure to achieve full economic and political independence, leading to its eventual collapse in the face of imperialist resurgence. Nasser’s industrialisation project, however, does demonstrate the superiority of active policy intervention, particularly of planning and import-substitution- industrialisation, and suggests the need to pursue central planning, economic inclusion, self-sufficiency, and social production aimed at meeting the material needs of the population in the contemporary period.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Kareem Megahed, Political economy, history researcher / Post-Colonialisms Today researcher. Email: k.megahed@sjplatform.org
 Omar Ghannam, Political economy researcher / Post-Colonialisms Today researcher. Email: o.ghannam@sjplatform.org
 
 

Between Archaic and Modernity (gender aspect of African culture)

The article is an analytical review of the materials of the scientific conference "Gender aspects of African Culture: between Archaic and Modernity", held at the Institute of Africa of the Russian Academy of Sciences in November 2021. The conference discussed such issues as gender characteristics of the transmission of traditions to the younger generation (archaic and modern forms and methods); the education system in the context of the transmission of universal (European) models of values; reflection of the struggle between traditional and modern in the development of African languages at the present stage. A number of reports were devoted to the problems of traditional art as an integral part of modern cultural forms. The attention of the speakers was focused on the problems of the sacred role and political significance of the activities of representatives of national culture (including their civic position, criticism of the policy of the authorities, the fight against the dictates of religious movements). The problems of cultural interaction within the framework of a mixed family and mestizo children as intermediaries of two cultures occupied a large place in the work of the conference. Considerable attention was paid to the issues of feminism as an expression of women's self-realization and self-identification, the struggle against all forms of exploitation and for the freedom of will of an individual through artistic means, as well as "state feminism" as a radical means in the fight against archaism.

Role of State Feminism in Reducing Gender Lag: A Study of Pakistan

State is considered to be the custodian of rights of vulnerable segments like women. Neo liberal ideology advocates women's participation in the economic arena, yet it resists state role in the economic sphere for protection of the "second" gender. State role for protection of women is equally intolerable for the custodians of tradition. Ideology of state feminism believes that interest articulation for the protection of women must be done on the system/state level. The paper aims to reflect on the state's role in eliminating the prevalent gender lag in the context of cultural and economic lag between regions and classes? The qualitative methodology of "gap analysis" is employed. The study is based on data analysis of Pakistan's performance on Sustainable Development Goals and Global Gender Gap index2021. The core finding of the study is that though the equality/equity between genders is still an imagined reality yet state initiatives are the first steps from baseline.

Comparison and Analysis of Feminism in China and the West: A Case Study of the 1950s

1950 is a very special period for the development of feminism in both China and the West. The Peoples Republic of China was just established and the West was experiencing the second wave of feminist. However, the feminism in these two areas developed in different ways, that Chinses feminism is the state feminism while the West is liberal feminism. This kind of difference results from the different social environment, especially the political policy in China and the West. The Communist Party of China took feminism as a tool to consolidate socialist construction, so it launched the feminist movement from top to bottom. The second feminism in the West is a bottom-up movement for women to fight for their own rights and interests, and they use magazines and other mass media as a means of struggle. By comparing the difference of the feminism in China and the West, the flaws of these two kinds of development of feminism could also be shown.

Secular feminism in Tunisia: a political generations approach

ABSTRACT We argue that the ‘youth movements’ of the Arab uprisings are better understood through a political generations framework that shifts the analytical lens away from a transitional stage towards a collective identity forged as the result of a major event. We identify a pre-revolutionary generation of feminists, a political generation of the revolution – those who, as a result of the revolution identified themselves as feminist for the first time and, consequently, founded or joined a feminist organization – and an incipient generation of feminists, that emerged from the recent protests marking the 10th anniversary of the revolution. We demonstrate how the revolution created a new political generation of secular feminists that can be distinguished from pre-revolutionary feminism along four important lines: state feminism; decolonization; intersectionality; and their perspective on and use of the term gender. We conclude with a discussion of the fragmentation of the secular feminist movement.

Confucian Democracy in East Asia: A Discussion of Sungmoon Kim’s Democracy After Virtue: Toward Pragmatic Confucian Democracy

Confucian Democracy in East Asia: A Discussion of Sungmoon Kim’s <i>Democracy After Virtue: Toward Pragmatic Confucian Democracy</i>

Reconfiguring State–Movement Relations in the Context of De-democratization

Abstract De-democratization and hostility to gender equality alter relations between states and feminists. State feminism, which focuses on cooperation between feminists and states, needs amendments for applicability in such contexts. We propose the integration of anti-gender actors into the analysis. We also suggest moving away from the assumption that transactional activism targeting states is the most effective strategy for feminists to respond to such hostile contexts and discuss the potential of more diversified forms of engagement. To illustrate our conceptual framework, we look at changing political dynamics in three recent democracies: Croatia, Hungary, and Poland.

A (female) country doctor in Egypt: the life and times of Nawal Al-Saadawi

ABSTRACT This article explores the experience of female doctors in postcolonial Egypt assigned by the government to work in rural communities through the writings of physician and feminist author Nawal El-Saadawi. Although Saadawi reflected extensively on her rural service in her books and essays, its effect on her and other female doctors’ gendered and political identity has hardly received scholarly attention. Informed by the intersectionality framework and relying mainly on Saadawi as a source for writing a social history of Egyptian women, this article sheds light on Egyptian female medical practitioners and the unintended consequences of state feminism. It finds that the linkage with the state’s socialist policies made for a novel and empowering professional experience for many women. Importantly, this novel role involved structural conditions and duties that gave female doctors social and professional autonomy and allowed them to perform according to their subjective understanding. These performances, in turn, held the potential of transforming their concepts of medicine, ideal womanhood, and gendered power relations. Most significantly, rural service empowered female doctors to transgress and resist patriarchal values and practices.

A comparative study of the cultural strategies of Iran and Turkey

This chapter scrutinizes the changing roles of women and gender roles, particularly in the Arab world. It sketches not only how gender relations have been inflected by religion, politics, and colonialism since the early twentieth century, but also the multitude of ways that women in different societies have articulated their autonomy in spheres of work, education, and home life. More assertive expressions of women’s rights have increased over the past two decades through mechanisms such as civil society activism, legislative representation, changing legal codes, and uprisings like the Arab Spring, but indigenous women’s rights movements have existed since colonial times. The chapter also examines state feminism, which has been mobilized for both authoritarian and democratic ends, as well as Islamic feminism, which seeks to advance women’s rights by drawing on understandings of egalitarian practices in early Islam. The discussion finally touches on sexual orientation, in particular how new voices are questioning the historical treatment of queerness while also interrogating the changing nature of sexuality for cultural discourse.

Women’s policy agencies and government ideology: the divergent trajectories of Argentina and Brazil, 2003–2019

ABSTRACT This article examines the institutional evolution of women’s policy agencies (WPAs) in Argentina and Brazil over a 15-year period. By using a classification of WPA institutional types proposed by scholarly literature on state feminism, I identify contrasting trajectories of how WPAs developed under left- and then right-wing governments: in Argentina the WPA moved from overt irrelevance to a marginal position, whereas in Brazil a robust WPA embedded in feminist movements became an anti-feminist agency. What factors explain these divergent institutional outcomes? More broadly, what processes mediate the link between WPA attributes and government ideology? My longitudinal case comparison shows that political authorities do not make decisions about the formal structure and policy orientation of WPAs based on ideology alone. WPA attributes are part of what governments more instrumentally negotiate when they need to build constituencies or, alternatively, reciprocate loyalties, depending on their popular support, the overall demands and mobilization capacities of their core allies, and the extent to which feminists play a role in party politics and electoral campaigns.

Feminist digital diplomacy and foreign policy change in Sweden

This article analyses how the launch of Sweden’s feminist foreign policy marked a change in Sweden’s digital diplomatic efforts. It draws on three strands of research: digital diplomacy, foreign policy analysis (FPA) and feminist scholarship. Informed by FPA, the article explores the relevance of political leadership, bureaucratic agency and political context as drivers of policy change, and, specifically, Sweden’s feminist digital diplomacy. The article provides an empirical case analysis of Sweden’s foreign policy change and conduct of digital diplomacy during the period 2006–2020. It draws on documents available on the official websites of the Government Offices of Sweden and the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, including sites such as SwedenAbroad and Swedish Foreign Policy Stories. The article concludes that Sweden acted on a window of opportunity in global politics, which advanced a novel feminist digital diplomacy. Sweden’s competitive edge was based on a strong transformative political leadership in foreign policy, state feminism and an early engagement of digital diplomatic management of its state image online.

Not Part of the Plan? Women, State Feminism and Indian Socialism in the Nehru Years

The 1950s are often derided in the scholarship as a period of welfarist policies which reinforced women’s role in the family and entrenched women’s economic dependence. This paper examines the Central Social Welfare Board, and in particular its Welfare Extension Projects, to provide a new characterisation of the approach to women’s issues during the period. It argues that the Central Social Welfare Board, with its unique administrative structure, its preference for voluntary activity, and its adherence to persuasion as a mode of action reflected many of the characteristics of Indian socialism of the time. It also sketches, from this angle, a partial picture of state feminism in India. In the Central Social Welfare Board, state feminism was concerned with the gradual transformation of women and a radical, if short-lived, makeover of the state.

The Women Want The Fall of The (Gendered)Regime

The post-2011 breakdown of state media authority in Syria exposed a multilayered terrain of competing counter-discourses, in which citizen journalists were positioned as narrators of events on the ground. Conceptualized in this paper as Emerging Syrian Media (ESM), the rapid pluralization of Syria’s media landscape has irrevocably transformed how citizens engage with the discourse disseminated by the al-Assad regime. However, this phenomenon has not been examined through a gender-based approach. Employing a feminist post-structuralist perspective and utilizing subaltern counterpublic theory, this paper examines whether the opening up of a virtual space has enabled the creation of an online feminist counterpublic, through which Syrian women are able to challenge the dominant representations of gender within the Syrian state feminism discourse. A Critical Discourse Analysis of texts produced by two state-affiliated media outlets reveals the intrinsically patriarchal nature of Syrian state feminism, while a narrative analysis of seven interviews with women participating in Emerging Syrian Media explores the ways in which such a discourse is being challenged. Through their performance of ‘active narrator’ identities, production of anti-regime discourses, and participation in women’s discussion groups, all seven women expressed an ability to counter the gender discourse of the regime. The occurrence of such challenges within confined spheres of activity results in the theorizing of a specifically ‘inward-oriented’ online feminist counterpublic within the ESM online space, whereby alternative discourses on gender can be both established and enacted.

ОСОБЛИВОСТІ ФОРМУВАННЯ ҐЕНДЕРНОЇ ТЕРМІНОЛОГІЇ В СУЧАСНОМУ КИТАЙСЬКОМУ ЛІТЕРАТУРОЗНАВСТВІ

This article is devoted to the cause of semantic ambiguity of Chinese gender terminology by the example of the most controversial concepts, such as "feminism", "gender", "feminist literature", "women's literature", "women's writing". The author pays attention to the socio-historical context, perception of Western feminist theories and actualization of traditional Chinese Philosophic Doctrines, as well as the unique phenomenon of "figurative terminology" creation. In this research, the author used cultural-historical and typological methods, as well as the method of semantic and contextual analysis. The development of a feminist (and later gender) trend in Chinese literary criticism began in the early 1980s. This process took place under the influence of three factors: 1) communist ideology and "state feminism"; 2) the spread of Western theories of feminism; 3) traditional Chinese concepts of gender relations. Chinese researchers were borrowing terms by translating them from English or other European languages. However, the process of semantic adaptation of new concepts was quite complex and had its own features. In particular, Chinese scholars sought to avoid a radical opposition of "the masculine and feminine principles" in the semantics of new terms. Instead they were trying to implement the Chinese philosophical concept of complementing the categories of Yin and Yang, which reflects the "situational worldview" of the Chinese people. One of the special phenomena of Chinese gender literary criticism is the development of "figurative concepts." Such concepts are vivid images of Western literature and literary criticism, which are gaining new meaning in the Chinese cultural environment. In particular, the concept of "The Blank Page", suggested by S. Gubar to denote female identity in a patriarchal society, is associated by Chinese scholars with the activity of Tang Empress Wu Zetian and her "Wordless Tomb Stele". The author concluded that the process of the gender terminology development in Chinese literary criticism is not complete, it balances between the new Western and traditional Chinese concepts of gender relations.