Anarcha-feminism, also known asanarchist feminism oranarcho-feminism, is a system of analysis which combines the principles and power analysis ofanarchist theory withfeminism. It closely resemblesintersectional feminism. Anarcha-feminism generally posits thatpatriarchy and traditionalgender roles as manifestations of involuntarycoercivehierarchy should be replaced bydecentralizedfree association. Anarcha-feminists believe that the struggle againstpatriarchy is an essential part ofclass conflict and the anarchist struggle against thestate andcapitalism. In essence, the philosophy sees anarchist struggle as a necessary component of feminist struggle and vice versa. Canadian anarcha-feminist writerL. Susan Brown claims that "as anarchism is a political philosophy that opposes all relationships of power, it is inherently feminist".[1]
Anarchism first emerged as a political current at a time whengender inequality was systematically enforced and women were excluded from public life. Their existence was confined to the traditionalgender roles of mothers and wives, within the construct of thenuclear family. In particular, working-class women were both politically and economically disenfranchised, which drove them closer tosocialism andpolitical militancy. They began to agitate forreproductive rights andfree love, which formed the basis for an anarchist feminism.[2]
The earliest proponents of anarchism were initially reluctant to approach the subject of feminism:Pierre-Joseph Proudhon was openly hostile to feminist demands ofgender equality and upheld traditionalfamily values;[3]Peter Kropotkin thought that feminist goals should be subordinated to theclass struggle;[4] andBenjamin Tucker opposed the demand of "equal pay for equal work".[5] It was only afterMikhail Bakunin made the abolition ofgender inequality one of the aims of theInternational Alliance of Socialist Democracy that women's rights became a primary concern for the anarchist movement.[6]Anarcho-communists adoptedFriedrich Engels'critique of the family, which held it to be the origin of both gender inequality andeconomic inequality.[7] Thisanti-authoritarian critique ofpower within the institutions ofmarriage and the nuclear family began to attract many feminists towards anarchism.[8] The subsequent synthesis of anarchism and feminism, although not explicitly labelled as such at the time, later came to be known as anarcha-feminism.[9]
During the 1880s, a current of anarchist feminism was first developed by the Catalan activistsTeresa Mañé andTeresa Claramunt.[10] By the 1890s, anarchist feminism had spread across the globe, brought by immigrants to and from Europe.[11] The anarchist press started to publish feminist analyses ongender equality and critiques of marriage, the nuclear family andprostitution. ThroughErrico Malatesta'sLa Questione Sociale, Teresa Mañé's pamphlets onfemale education andgender inequality received widespread publication.[12] Anarchist feminism was further taken up by the American anarchistsVoltairine de Cleyre andEmma Goldman,[13] the latter of whom came to be considered a "founding mother" of anarcha-feminism.[14]Lucy Parsons also established the Working Women's Union inChicago and ensured women's participation in theIndustrial Workers of the World as one of its founding members.[15] In England, the anarchistCharlotte Wilson became an advocate for "equal pay for equal work" and promoted women's education.[16]
Anarchist women took prominent positions within the editorial boards of magazines (such asMother Earth), in the publication of books, and as public speakers.[17] Specifically feminist publications were also circulated, includingGerminal,El Oprimido andLa Voz de la Mujer, in which anarchist women defended a revolutionary form of feminism.[18] As a way to counter theCulture of Domesticity, which upheld theprivate property of the nuclear family, anarchist women like Charlotte Wilson opened their homes into "quasi-public spaces" for political meetings and communal meals.[19] Anarchist women even took part in violentdirect actions, includingVera Zasulich's attempted assassination of the Russian police chiefFyodor Trepov;Germaine Berton's murder of the French far-right politicianMarius Plateau;[20] andKanno Sugako's plot to assassinate the JapaneseEmperor Meiji.[21]
The rise of anarchist feminism provoked ananti-feminist reaction among many of the men of the anarchist movement,[22] who deemphasised the struggle forwomen's rights as secondary to theclass struggle.[23] In turn,La Voz de la Mujer denounced these men as "false anarchists" who prioritised their own liberation over that of women.[24] In the Chinese anarcha-feminist journalNatural Justice,He Zhen also criticised what she saw as "men's pursuit of self distinction in the name of women's liberation".[25] Anarcha-feminists generally concluded that male hostility to feminism proved them unreliable to the cause for women's rights, and began to organise their own movement to address their own needs.[26]
First-wave feminists established women's groups asflat organizations that usedconsensus decision-making, reflecting an "unconscious libertarian consciousness".[27] Anarchist women's groups were established throughout the United States, largely by Italian immigrant women, with the goal of pursuing "women's emancipation" throughmutual aid andself-organization.[28] InPaterson, New Jersey, theGruppo Emancipazione della Donna formed women's theater and music clubs, and publicised works of anarchist feminism that linked the struggle against thepatriarchy with the struggle against thepatria.[29] In contrast to the Italian anarchists,Jewish anarchists rarely formed specific women's groups, with anarchists of the journalFraye Arbeter Shtime declaring themselves to all be feminists.[30]
One of the most notable libertarian women's groups was theMujeres Libres, an anarchist feminist organisation that aimed forwomen's liberation from their "triple enslavement" by ignorance, exploitation and discrimination. Founded during theSpanish Revolution of 1936 byLucía Sánchez Saornil,Mercè Comaposada andAmparo Poch y Gascón, the Mujeres Libres implemented programmes ofwomen's education that taught women technical skills and increased female literacy.[31] Sánchez Saornil herself wrote poetry that called for women to take action against their oppression, which attracted Emma Goldman to visit Spain and participate in the work of the Mujeres Libres as an advocate.[32]
But the anarchist feminism of the time, focused more on developing small activist groups than creating amass movement, lacked a precise strategy for achieving women's rights, so little action in that way was taken.[33] During the early 20th century, anarchist feminism was progressively supplanted bysocialist feminism, which took a reformist approach towards achievingwomen's suffrage.[34] By this time Charlotte Wilson had herself abandoned anarchist activism, becoming involved in women's suffrage advocacy and later joining theIndependent Labour Party.[35] Anarchist feminist critiques of the family and authoritarianism went into remission, only to be reformulated when a new wave of feminism emerged.[34]
By the late 1960s,second-wave feminism had emerged from theNew Left, as part of a broad wave of anti-oppression activism that included thecivil rights movement and culminated with theprotests of 1968.[36] Drawing from socialist feminism, this second-wave sought to encourage solidarity between women, bringing them together into a "sisterhood" based on their shared experiences.[37] During this period, feminists rediscovered the work of first-wave anarchist feminists like Emma Goldman and before long thewomen's liberation movement began to reshape the anarchist movement.[38] Many second-wave feminists came to consider anarchism to be the "logically consistent expression of feminism", due to its synthesis of the struggle for individualliberty with that forsocial equality.[39]Peggy Kornegger claimed that feminists had already been "unconscious anarchists in both theory and practice" and were the only activist tendency to be "practic[ing] what anarchism preaches".[40]
The pervasive environment of sexism within many sections of the New Left gave an impulse to the establishment of women's groups as part of a strategy offeminist separatism, which led to the coining and adoption of the term "anarcha-feminist" by anarchist women.[41] Second-wave anarchist feminists developed their ownaffinity groups according to cooperative, decentralist and federalist principles, as an alternative to both patriarchal and structureless organisations.[40] The anarcha-feminist drive to reckon with these hierarchical forms of organisation was particularly influenced byJo Freeman's 1972 essayThe Tyranny of Structurelessness, which encouraged an organized egalitarian tendency within the movement.[42]
The second wave of anarchist feminism was also characterised by an often violent militancy, as displayed in theSCUM Manifesto.[43] Anarcha-feminists such asAnn Hansen participated in the bombing attacks by the urban guerrilla groupDirect Action, which targeted companies that produced parts for weapons of war and a chain video store that was distributingsnuff films andpaedophilic pornography.[20]
By the 1980s, thefeminist sex wars had caused a divide within second-wave feminism, which fragmented into multiple different tendencies, while many former feminists moved intoacademic careerism.[44]
The beginnings of theanti-globalization movement spurred the development of a new wave, with reflections on the earlier second-wave and the influence ofpostcolonial feminism leading to an integration ofidentity politics into the framework of anarchist feminism.[43] The emergence of a third-wave of anarcha-feminism brought with it a new focus onintersectionality, as anarcha-feminists came together to address the intersecting issues ofpoverty,racism andreproductive rights, among many others.[45] The early feminist conception of a "New Woman" also formed part of the foundation for third-wave anarcha-feminism, which encouraged women to practice equality rather than to demand it.[46] InBolivia, theMujeres Creando carried outdirect actions that challenged poverty and traditionalgender roles.[47] In the United States, anarcha-feminists within theanarcho-punk scene spurred the development of theRiot grrrl subculture.[48]
With the turn of the 21st century, there was a concerted effort to rethink approaches to anarcha-feminist histories, placing value incollective,open and non-hierarchical methods of gathering and exchanging knowledge.[49] Collective research projects were carried out by groups such as the Dark Star Collective, which in 2002 published an anthology of anarcha-feminist works titledQuiet Rumours.[50] In 2010, the feminist historian Judy Greenway elaborated five different methodologies of anarcha-feminist historiography:[51]
Greenway concluded that a complete anarcha-feminist historiography needed to actively challenge hierarchical biases within dominant historiographies, rather than merely reincorporating erased aspects of history or focusing excessively on one or two individuals.[51]
The fourth wave of feminism emerged through the development ofpostfeminism, taking concern with theobjectification of women by market forces and characterised by its use ofsocial networking.[52] The fourth wave of anarchist feminism was particularly influenced bypostmodern feminism.[53]
In a 2017 article,Chiara Bottici argued that anarcha-feminism has been the subject of insufficient discussion in public debate and in academia, due in part to a broader hostility to anarchism but also due to difficulties in distinguishing between the tendency of anarcha-feminism and the broader philosophy of anarchism.[54] Bottici argued that the risk of economicreductionism that appears inMarxist feminism, in which women's oppression is understood solely in economic terms, "has ... always been alien to anarcha-feminism"; as such, she argues, anarchism is better suited than Marxism for an alliance with feminism.[55]
Anarcha-feminism has a diverse range of thought, but is generally characterised by the principles of women'sautonomy,free love andintersectionality.[56] Anarcha-feminists are committed towomen's empowerment in social and political life, opposingcapitalism and thestate as key instruments ofinstitutional discrimination against women.[57]
Anarcha-feminism expanded on the traditional anarchist principles ofanti-statism,anti-clericalism andanti-capitalism, demonstrating their role ininstitutional discrimination such assexism,racism andhomophobia.[58] In her 1895 essay entitledSex Slavery, Voltairine de Cleyre claimed that sexism was caused by the institutionalauthoritarianism upheld by theclergy and thestate.[59]
Anarcha-feminists see thepatriarchy and thestate as two expressions of the same system ofoppression, and concluded that the destruction of all forms of patriarchy would necessarily include the abolition of the state.[39] Emma Goldman herself took anintersectional analysis of the state which saw it as an instrument ofsexual repression, and thus rejected the strategy ofreformism.[60] As such, the first-wave of anarchist feminists criticised calls forwomen's suffrage, considering them to be insufficient for achieving gender equality.[61]He Zhen was skeptical of the limited gender equality achieved in westernliberal democracies, which she described as "false freedom and sham equality", even criticising the women's suffrage movement and male feminists for espousing an "empty rhetoric of emancipation".[62]
Anarchist feminists have developed a non-coercive approach to interpersonal relationships, which particularly upholds the value ofconsent.[63] Anarchist feminists such asVoltairine de Cleyre andEmma Goldman fiercely criticised the institution ofmarriage, as they considered it to be inherently oppressive towards women due to its lack of consent.[64]
Their critiques of marriage led them to advocate for and practicefree love, which they held to be a remedy to women'ssocial alienation.[65] With its basis in freely-given consent, free love provided room for women to reconstruct theirsexuality in a way that centered their own agency and autonomy.[66] Emma Goldman herself saw sexuality as a "critical social force" offree expression,[60] She extended this to a public defense of gay rights,[67] which led to some scholars speculating about her own sexuality.[68]
On the other hand, free love was opposed byLucy Parsons, who criticised it as being inconsistent with anarchism and for its increased risks of pregnancy andsexually transmitted infections, instead arguing for a form of "monogamy without marriage".[15]
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From the inception of anarcha-feminism as a current, anarchist feminists have engaged with other struggles that intersect with women's issues, participating in a number of different anti-racist and anti-colonial movements.[69] A specifically anti-racist anarcha-feminism was pioneered during the 1970s byRoxanne Dunbar-Ortiz and her organizationCell 16.[70]
In 1976, a statement produced by theCombahee River Collective lay the groundwork for the development ofintersectionality.[71] Since the third-wave, intersectionality has formed one of the core concepts of anarchist feminism, which has used it as a method to develop afeminist ethics ofself-organization against all forms ofoppression.[43] Groups within the activist networkNo one is illegal (NOII) have since engaged in an anti-racist anarcha-feminism as part of their anti-border advocacy, which was itself rooted in an anti-statist critique of institutional sexism and racism within state immigration regimes.[72]
Drawing frompost-structuralism,postcolonialism andcritical theory, Deric Shannon has proposed a contemporary construction of anarcha-feminism that engages with each of these theories, combininganti-capitalism with a comprehensive intersectional stance against all forms of oppression.[73]
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Anarcha-feminism holds the principle that "the personal is political", developing a critique ofeveryday life that aims to erodesocial and political power, in pursuit of a society where each individual had control over "[their] own life, and no others".[40] Anarcha-feminists considered thenuclear family to be the root of allgender inequality; thus, equality could only be achieved through the extension of personal autonomy and economic independence to women.[74] Although the institution ofprivate property was roundly critiqued by anarcho-communists such asEmma Goldman, it was upheld as a means of women's economic emancipation byVoltairine de Cleyre.[75]
Anarchist feminists such asItō Noe have upheld the ideal of a "New Woman", encouraging women to assert their own individuality and develop independent thought.[76]Emma Goldman conceived of a revolution that takes place within individual minds, as well as in society.[74] Goldman advocated for women to exercise their autonomy by overcoming their own "internal tyrants", whether that be the opinions of their family members or traditionalSocial norms.[68] According to Martha Hewitt, the anarcha-feminist conception of revolution is "as process, transformativepraxis of thought, feeling, and collective social activity."[46]
In the 1993 bookThe Politics of Individualism, the anarcha-feminist L. Susan Brown developed what she called an "existential individualism", which upheld individualautonomy and voluntarycooperation.[27]
During the late 19th century, anarchist women were among the earliest to take up the call for reproductive rights, as part of the anarchist feminist opposition to the nuclear family. Anarchist feminists have distributed information about and resources for birth control, for which many were put in jail.[77] While working as a midwife during the 1890s, Emma Goldman became a prominent advocate of women's reproductive rights,[78] calling for women's rights to practicefamily planning and publicly rallying support forMargaret Sanger.[79] In contrast, other anarchist feminists such asItō Noe opposed abortion from ahumanist perspective, as she believed that life began at conception.[80]
Anarchist advocacy for birth control increased followingWorld War I, as the practice was banned in countries like France and the United States, which anarchist feminists criticised a means to continue increasing the population in order to wage war.[81] Anarchist feminist direct action for birth control continued even after the partial legalisation of abortion, as "feminist outlaw" groups like theJane Collective provided food and medical care for women without access to safe methods of birth control.[82] Anarchist feminists have also participated in the movement forreproductive justice, which has prioritised bodily autonomy and the reproductiveself-determination of women of color.[83]
Anarcha-feminists have been at the forefront of advocacy forsex workers' rights since the late-19th century, when anarchist women in Germany and France campaigned for thedecriminalisation of sex work.Louise Michel blamedcapitalism for creating the economic conditions that drove women towards sex work, which she claimed could only be brought to an end by means of asocial revolution.[84]Itō Noe likewise argued that the root cause of women taking up sex work was poverty, and that instead of campaigning to abolish sex work, people should address the root causes of poverty.[85] Emma Goldman also publicly criticised sex work abolitionists for using male legal systems to criminalise women, which she held to be a form ofclass discrimination.[84]
Following the second-wave of feminism, sex worker advocacy was taken up by anarchist feminists that themselves engaged in sex work.Grisélidis Réal organised sex workers and carried out a series of direct actions for sex workers' rights, going on to establish an archive for the history of sex work. Canadian anarchist sex workers were also involved in an advocacy campaign, culminating with the declaration of an "International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers".[86]
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