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oapen-20.500.12657-638852023-07-13T02:46:49Z Law and the Quest for Gender Equality Thornton, Margaret feminist jurisprudence public/private legal profession legal academy caring responsibilities bic Book Industry Communication::J Society & social sciences::JF Society & culture: general::JFS Social groups::JFSJ Gender studies, gender groups bic Book Industry Communication::L Law::LA Jurisprudence & general issues::LAQ Law & society::LAQG Gender & the law For centuries, law was used to subordinate women and exclude them from the public sphere, so it cannot be expected to become a source of equality instantaneously or without resistance from benchmark men—that is, those who are white, heterosexual, able-bodied and middle class. Equality, furthermore, was attainable only in the public sphere, whereas the private sphere was marked as a site of inequality; a wife, children and servants could never be the equals of the master. Despite their ambivalence about the role of law and its contradictions, women and Others felt that they had no alternative but to look to it as a means of liberation. This skewed patriarchal heritage, the subtext of this collection of essays, has continued to impede the quest for equality by women and Others. It informs not only gender relations in the private sphere, as illustrated by domestic violence and sexual assault, but also the status of women in the public sphere. Despite the fact that women have entered the paid workforce—including the professions—in large numbers, they are still expected to assume responsibility for the preponderance of society's caring. The essays show how maternal and caring roles, which are still largely viewed as belonging to an unregulated private sphere, continue to be invoked to detract from the authority of the feminine in the public sphere. The promise of antidiscrimination legislation in overcoming the heritage of the past is also shown to be somewhat hollow. 2023-07-12T14:24:46Z 2023-07-12T14:24:46Z 2023 book ONIX_20230712_9781760465506_6 9781760465506 9781760465490 https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/63885 eng Global Thinkers Series application/pdf Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International book.pdf ANU Press ANU Press 10.22459/LQGE.2022 10.22459/LQGE.2022 ddc8cc3f-dd57-40ef-b8d5-06f839686b71 9781760465506 9781760465490 ANU Press 424 Canberra open access
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For centuries, law was used to subordinate women and exclude them from the public sphere, so it cannot be expected to become a source of equality instantaneously or without resistance from benchmark men—that is, those who are white, heterosexual, able-bodied and middle class. Equality, furthermore, was attainable only in the public sphere, whereas the private sphere was marked as a site of inequality; a wife, children and servants could never be the equals of the master. Despite their ambivalence about the role of law and its contradictions, women and Others felt that they had no alternative but to look to it as a means of liberation. This skewed patriarchal heritage, the subtext of this collection of essays, has continued to impede the quest for equality by women and Others. It informs not only gender relations in the private sphere, as illustrated by domestic violence and sexual assault, but also the status of women in the public sphere. Despite the fact that women have entered the paid workforce—including the professions—in large numbers, they are still expected to assume responsibility for the preponderance of society's caring. The essays show how maternal and caring roles, which are still largely viewed as belonging to an unregulated private sphere, continue to be invoked to detract from the authority of the feminine in the public sphere. The promise of antidiscrimination legislation in overcoming the heritage of the past is also shown to be somewhat hollow.
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