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Abstract
The scholarship on Mary Wollstonecraft (1759-1797) is divided concerning her views on women’s role in public life, property rights and distribution of wealth. Her critique of inequality of wealth is undisputed, but is it a complaint only of inequality or does it strike more forcefully at the institution of property? The argument in this article is that Wollstonecraft’s feminism is partly defined by a radical critique of property, intertwined with her conception of rights. Dissociating herself from the conceptualization of rights in terms of self-ownership, she casts economic independence – a necessary political criterion for personal freedom – in terms of fair reward for work, not ownership. Her critique of property moves beyond issues of redistribution to a feminist appraisal of a property structure that turns people into either owners or owned, rights holders or things acquired. The main characters in Wollstonecraft’s last novel – Maria who is rich but has nothing, and Jemima, who steals as a matter of principle – illustrate the commodification of women in a society where even rights are regarded as possessions.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 942-957 |
Journal | Hypatia |
Volume | 29 |
Issue number | 4 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2014 |
Subject classification (UKÄ)
- Philosophy, Ethics and Religion
Free keywords
- independence
- inequality
- rights
- property
- Mary Wollstonecraft
- Locke
- feminism
- economic independence
- self-ownership
- freedom
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- 1 Finished
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Mary Wollstonecraft and Feminist Republicanism
Halldenius, L. (PI)
2009/01/01 → 2018/12/31
Project: Research