Marxism And Feminism
For many Millennia, women have been Othered, dominated, and made property by men. Thus, the ownership of women, like all private property must be abolished. It is the mission of all Socialists to abolish the patriarchy. Many groups have attempted to reform the existing mode of production, Capitalism, as a means of delivering equality without radical change. These conservative groups either fail to understand the problems inherent to Capitalism, or, sometimes, more maliciously, they deliberately divert attention away from the necessary revolution. Despite the fact that women have supposedly made ‘huge gains’ in the twentieth century, systemic oppression is ignored, as token gestures are attended to. Why might this be? Capitalism has acted as a catalyst for many existing labour relations; Labourers have traded material rewards for abstract ideals. Previously, a labourer was only concerned with production of commodities, but now the labourer is a commodity. For women, there has never been any substantial difference. Women were already commodities.
However, as Capitalism grew, the bourgeoisie needed to expand its accumulation of wealth. Female employment, under Capitalism, did not happen with “equality” as a goal, but was a means for Capitalists to accumulate further wealth. What is more, is that division of labour that has existed since the beginning of Patriarchy, some 10,000 years ago, has been magnified under Capitalism. Women are expected to perform “feminine” jobs, such as child care. Capitalism has further delineated this boundary of masculinity and femininity by creating “careers” for women, such as secretarial work and nursing, and for men, like heavy industry work, management, and accountancy. This not only gave men more power by ’affirming’ their “natural” leadership qualities, but it also created more labour for women in the home; labour that was unpaid. Despite the impression that women were gaining the opportunity to work, their presence in the workplace often lead to more problems for working women, problems that benefitted the bourgeoise. Working men, in turn, sometimes resent Feminism because it has, by their perception, slowly deprived them of one of their only existing properties which, like everything else, has been concentrated into the hands of the few.
Capitalism is incompatible with Women's liberation. As such Liberal Feminism, which individualistically focuses on women’s ability to maintain their equality through their own actions and choices, fails to acknowledge the ways in which underlying social structures and values disadvantage women. Even if women are not dependent upon individual men, they are still dependent upon a patriarchal state. Institutional changes like the introduction of women's suffrage are insufficient to emancipate women. Having established the irreconcilable natures of Capitalism and Feminism, we must seek the radical liberation of women through Socialist means.
The promotion of Socialism, of any kind, is a support of public ownership of the means of production. This can be achieved in various ways but there are two main schools of thought on how best to achieve this: the first is Marxism and the second is Anarchism. While there are various offshoots of these schools they need not be mentioned within this particular discussion. These schools have the same aim: achieving greater worker participation in the workplace, public ownership of the means of production, and the abolition of all private property. Anarchism focuses on the immediate elimination of the State while Marxism, particularly Leninist influenced Marxism, believes that the State will wither over time. Anarchism calls for a spontaneous revolution that insists on the immediate abolition of State. This will fail to successfully abolish Patriarchy, which exists separately to the State. Without proper organisation women will not be able to engage in revolution. A spontaneous revolution traditionally lends itself to ‘heroic masculine’ figures who are readily able to be violent.
As Emily Eisner, author of Red Feminism, outlines “to hit the streets during a nighttime chaos of rioting men and to have physical confrontations with male cops requires a lot of macho confidence and male privilege”. Women often cannot realistically charge against the police without fear of violent reaction, including sexual assault. The idea that without a State, women would begin to thrive, is ridiculous. The anarchists suggest that with the lack of the oppressive social structures associated with the State, Patriarchy would simply disappear. And whom might we ask, will intervene in cases of domestic abuse in the absence of the police? Who shall be responsible for enforcing policies that seek to end sexual harassment? Who will sentence rapists in the absence of the courts? Who will silence of male oppressors?The anarchists do not have an answer.
The elimination of the exploitation of Women, and the proletariat, requires an organised revolution to seize the means of production and a removal of enemies of the people, those who refuse to cease their exploitative activities. These acts require “the proletariat organized as a ruling class. ”The doctrine of Lenin, which reminds us that “the supersession of the bourgeois state by the proletarian state is impossible without a violent revolution,” has historically achieved victories over the exploitative bourgeoisie, and consequently made incredible gains for women under the Marxist feminist policy that once existed. For example, in the USSR they “almost immediately. . . legalized divorce and stripped religious institutions of legal marrying power, followed by the legalization of abortion and recognition of unregistered cohabitational unions. After instituting quotas for women in vocational schools to accelerate the introduction of women to the workforce, women made up “one-third of the labor force and 41% of students in higher and technical education” by 1936”. The Dictatorship of the Proletariat is the use of State apparatus to suppress bourgeois insurgency. The correct line of Feminist thought is to have a similar Dictatorship in order to suppress Patriarchy.
Contrary to anarchist belief, “the abolition of the proletarian state, i. e. , of the state in general, is impossible except through the process of ‘withering away’. ” The bourgeois state is a social relation whose aim is to suppress the majority of workers for the minority of capitalists. The proletarian state is the only tactic to protect revolutionary gains and mandate radical changes to society. The proletarian state is the means that the working people have to transition to a classless society where women and third-world people will be free of exploitation. A simple smashing or abolition of the bourgeois state alone will guarantee nothing for the exploited and oppressed. Having said this, it is important to recognise the failures of previous Marxist states, not as an argument against such states but as a lesson.
Historically, while Marxist States have been far more progressive for the cause of feminism they have had their shortcomings. Whilst the USSR and China made a series of radical legal changes regarding women, “sometimes the states plowed forward with radical legal change to destroy the old patriarchal order without having the material resources or policy to support women in the new order while male exploitation and predation continued to exist. ” Therefore, the State must be more focused on the elimination of male exploitation as well as granting freedoms to women. There must be a greater effort to encourage men to perform the work of the home in the unburdening of women to eliminate the division of labour between men and women, as has been the case in Cuba. There also must be a greater effort to punish and suppress misogynistic tendencies in society. In conclusion, a proletarian state is necessary for the liberation of women.
Furthermore, such a state should be clear in its goals and must not be shy in discouraging misogyny and encouraging a Dictatorship of the Working Woman. Women must engage in a Protracted War against Patriarchy. This is not a statement supporting the elimination of men, as some may be inclined to read, but rather a call for women to engage in guerilla warfare when the opportunity arises to achieve the abolition of their servitude.
