The New Normal is about women in pursuit of autonomy, that is, sovereignty, self-determination. It's about women seeking to wrest control from men over both the economic and sexual/reproductive spheres. Inspired by the eighteenth-century Age of the Enlightenment, Mary Wollstonecraft incited the struggle that was then carried forward throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Consequently, the New Normal pursued today among advantaged segments (upper middle class) of the population is the result of more than two centuries of New Lights social and political action.

Note that I said women in pursuit of autonomy. Claiming sovereignty over their economic and sexual spheres is just the beginning. A once-for-all declaration does not abruptly make it happen. Recall that the US Declaration of Independence ignited a long and bitter war. And all too many of today's men, though not always with malice, tend to push back and resist the efforts of women to gain and maintain sovereignty. Hence, in order to preserve and expand their autonomy, women continually find themselves enmeshed in a lifetime of complex negotiations with men. Throughout their life-course women must negotiate and renegotiate the terms of their autonomy. And that is what Chapter 5 is about.

Earlier chapters showed that Old Lights are composed of that subset of conservatives who are dubious re social change— that is, theocratic evangelicals and traditional Catholics, among others. The historic complaint New Lights have against Old Lights is that they sacrifice women's justice, freedom, and human development on the altar of tradition. And a more recent New Lights complaint is that the Old Lights agenda is particularly hurtful to the socioeconomic well-being of women (and men) who are less advantaged (lower middle class, working class, poor, persons of color, and Latinx). That complaint— highlighted and underscored by the emerging Digital Era— alleges that the Old Normal is out of sync with the demands and opportunities of what, in the West, is fast becoming the pivotal economic way of life. Old Normal beliefs and practices— especially when written into laws and statutes— tend to hamper the capabilities of less advantaged women in particular (but also men) to cope with the awesome and daunting challenges posed by the developing economic arena.