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Citizenship and Gender

Citizenship - is a status bestowed on those


who are full members of a community. All who possess
the status are equal with respect to the rights and duties
with which the status is endowed. T.H. Marshall
3 parts/elements: civil, political and social.

Civil the rights necessary for individual


freedom-liberty of the person
Political the right to participate in political
power
Social Right in economic welfare and security
to the right to share to the full in the social
heritage and to live the life of a civilized being
according to the standards prevailing in the
society

Civic
Republicanis
m
Classical
Liberalism

Rights - Women struggled to achieve equal


rights with men in civil, political and social spheres as
crucial to their achievement of full citizenship.
Dual nature of the law
a. Emancipation
b. Oppression

Political Participation

Gender

- a socially constructed roles,


behaviors, activities and attributes that a particular
society considers appropriate for men and women.

2 main sources of challenge to a rights-based approach:


1. Political participation
2. Promoting care as a citizenship obligation

Historical Relationship

Women have been denied the full and


effective title of citizen
Feminist revealed that in both theory and
practice,
citizenship
has
been
quintessentially male or that men always
represent

Rian Voet
Citizenship Rights
Rights Citizenship

Classical Greece

Public Sphere Men


Private Sphere Women (unfit for citizenship)

PUBLIC-PRIVATE DICHOTOMY
together with the male-female qualities
Public (Men)
Private (Women)
Non-Citizen
Citizen
Rational
Irrational
Independent; Useful
Dependent; Emotional;
Obedient
Care common interest; Busy with private affairs
Political Agency
and family affairs
Positive; Heroic; Strong

Passive; Weak

Why Re-Gender Citizenship?

Citizenship is a pivotal contested concept on the


contemporary political and social theory
Women dont claim citizenship simply as women

Nature of Citizenship

Citizenship
Status involving rights
Practice involving responsibilities
to society
Citizen is primarily a political
actor
Rights were confined to the civil and
political sphere

Liberalism

Instead of seeing citizenship as the means to


realize rights, we should see rights as one of the
means to realize equal citizenship.
This implies that Feminism is a movement not
for womens rights alone but a movement for
womens participation
Citizenship- an active and sex-equal citizenship

Mary Dietz

Advocates a vision of citizenship


Politics involves the collective and participatory
engagement of citizens in the determination of
the affairs of their community speaker of
words and doers of deeds

Responsibilities - Paid work / duties


Diemut Bubeck

Revised conception of citizenship in which the


performance of her or his share of care has
become a general citizens obligation
A Critical Synthesis

Issue: Where the balance should lie


Re-gendering citizenship should be pursued in
terms of citizenship as status and as practice.
Re-gendering citizenship needs:
Embrace Individual rights and political
participation
Analyze the relationship of individual rights and
political participation

Gender-Differentiated Citizen

RE-GENDERING CITIZENSHIP

Gender-neutrality; Gender-differentiation ;
Gender-pluralism

Gender-Neutral Citizen

Model of women as equal with men


Equal rights and equal obligations (gender
should be irrelevant)
Commonly associated with liberal feminism
Example:
Policeman and Stewardess (Genderspecific)
Corresponding gender-neutral terms:
Police Officer and Flight Attendant
In Political sphere womens full and equal
participation in formal politics (winning of the
vote and formal political representation)
In Social sphere women to compete in equal
terms with men in labor market

Anne Phillips

Citizen should assume its full meaning, and


participate as equals in deciding their common
goals
Gender should become less relevant and the
abstractions of humanity more meaningful
Acknowledges that sexual differentiation is
necessary in order to redress the imbalance that
centuries of oppression have wrought

Criticisms

Dismisses attempt to insert women into the


ready-made, gender neutral spaces of traditional
conceptions of citizenship which are a chimera

Kathleen B. Jones

Model of women as different from men; equality


vs difference
Jones: we need to recognize the political
relevance of sexual differences and how to
include these differences within definition of
political action and civic virtue without
constructing sexually segregated norms of
citizenship
Incorporate womens political activities rather
than simply mirroring male definition of what
counts as politics
Example:
AdDUs Blue Knight Song

Maternalist Approach

Motherhood is the equivalent male civic


republicanism
- Motherhood bears the next
generation
of
citizens
- Women could bring qualities and
gifts to
politics as mothers

Non Maternalist Approach

Ursula Vogel

Require women to mold themselves to fit


citizenship

Notion of care is not confined to women


Care is not gender specific
Gender-Pluralist Citizen
Women and men are members of multiple
groups and/or holders of multiple identities.
Mouffe- Citizenship as a political practice and a
common political identity of persons belonging to
different groups with different traditions and
interest but are bound by their common
identification
Criticism- danger of freezing group identities,
suppressing/overpowering
differences,
impeding/hindering wider solidarities
Example: African Women, American Women,
Asian Women = WOMEN
Women-Friendly Citizenship (Ruth Lister)

Pateman: enables the substance of equality to


differ according to the diverse circumstances
and capacities of citizens, men and women

Change in public and private spheres

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