Book contents
- The Cambridge History of Philosophy, 1945–2015
- The Cambridge History of Philosophy, 1945–2015
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- Part I Analytic Philosophy
- Part II Continental Philosophy
- Section Five Central Movements and Issues
- 26 Existentialism
- 27 Sartre and Merleau-Ponty on Freedom
- 28 Heidegger, Critical Theory, and the Critique of Technology
- 29 Authenticity and Social Critique
- 30 Hermeneutics in Post-War Continental European Philosophy
- 31 Feminist Philosophy since 1945
- 32 Philosophies of Difference
- Section Six Continental Moral, Social, and Political Philosophy
- Section Seven Continental Aesthetics and Philosophy of Religion
- Part III Bridge Builders, Border Crossers, Synthesizers, and Comparative Philosophy
- Part IV Epilogue: On the Philosophy of the History of Philosophy
- References
- Index
31 - Feminist Philosophy since 1945
Constructivism and Materialism
from Section Five - Central Movements and Issues
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 08 November 2019
- The Cambridge History of Philosophy, 1945–2015
- The Cambridge History of Philosophy, 1945–2015
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- Part I Analytic Philosophy
- Part II Continental Philosophy
- Section Five Central Movements and Issues
- 26 Existentialism
- 27 Sartre and Merleau-Ponty on Freedom
- 28 Heidegger, Critical Theory, and the Critique of Technology
- 29 Authenticity and Social Critique
- 30 Hermeneutics in Post-War Continental European Philosophy
- 31 Feminist Philosophy since 1945
- 32 Philosophies of Difference
- Section Six Continental Moral, Social, and Political Philosophy
- Section Seven Continental Aesthetics and Philosophy of Religion
- Part III Bridge Builders, Border Crossers, Synthesizers, and Comparative Philosophy
- Part IV Epilogue: On the Philosophy of the History of Philosophy
- References
- Index
Summary
In an opinion piece for the New York Times written shortly after the election of Donald Trump to the US Presidency, Thomas Edsall diagnoses early twenty-first-century global politics with reference to “post-materialist” values championed in the decades immediately following the Second World War. Edsall (2017) argues that the Brexit vote in Britain, the invigoration of anti-immigrant parties across Europe, and the ascendancy of right-wing populism in America can be attributed to a ubiquitous and damaging “post-materialism.” Edsall’s claim is that resentment surrounding economic inequity has sparked a resurgence of right-wing, class-based politics. On his reading, the cultural revolution of the 1960s and 1970s drew attention away from economic and material inequalities and drew focus instead to myriad social and identitarian concerns. But the daily realities of economic hardship work against the liberal preoccupation with matters of self-expression and tolerance that have been the mainstay of liberal politics for decades. Edsall believes that where day-to-day economic and material inequities take center-stage as an object of concern, social and cultural liberalism suffers. Making a similar claim in reference to contemporary feminism, Amanda Hess has argued that Trump’s “win suggested that Americans were more comfortable with misogyny than many had thought, but it also burst the bubble of cheery pop feminism, which had achieved its huge popularity at the expense of class consciousness and racial solidarity” (Hess 2017). Hess’s claim is that popular feminism’s negligence of class consciousness and racial solidarity – and more broadly its negligence of the concrete concerns that frame political commitment – has precipitated its undermining. These analyses by Edsall and Hess are contemporary articulations of a criticism that has met certain strands of feminist theory since its inception: namely that mainstream feminists’ abiding ignorance and/or neglect of racial and class differences have undermined not only the efficacy of their theories but also their ability to speak to the concrete and material conditions that motivate individuals to hold the political convictions that they do.
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- The Cambridge History of Philosophy, 1945–2015 , pp. 416 - 426Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019