A Study Of Feminist Concept Of Justice In Contemporary West

Feminism is one of the important trends of thought in contemporary western countries. During its development of more than200years, western feminism has branched into different factions, including socialist, liberal, ecological, and radical feminism. Different factions of feminism hold different perspectives, some of which are opposed intensely to each other, however, all of them share a common belief that women’s life has been shaping unjust by political, social, and cultural arrangements, and that in all known societies, biological gender is the decisive factor of social status, opportunities and power, therefore women are subordinate in social systems. Through the examination of mainstream theories of justice, feminism discovers that they have always argued the female subordinate status is legitimate, and that they either ignore women’s being radically, or confine women to the private field of family without the regulation of justice principle. Consequently, various factions of feminism explore successively the roots from which derives the female subordination in the human history, and seek actively the solutions to terminating the women’s subordinate status. The feminist conception of justice (FCJ in abbreviation)comes into being in the very critique of the dominant male-oriented theories of justice. From the female standpoint and viewpoint, some of feminists condemn the absence of gender in the mainstream theories of justice and attempt to construct their FCJ, which has great theoretical and practical significances, and yet has some insuperable theoretical predicament of its own.Western FCJ results in the western feminist movement and theory. Its presence may be traced back into historical and theoretical roots. The movement of female liberation since the occurrence of feminism is the historical root for FCJ. It is the theoretical incitement of FCJ that theorists of justice devaluate and ignore the female in the history of political philosophy. The thoughts of Wollstonecraft, a famous pioneer of feminism, become a direct theoretical source for FCJ. Rawls’theory of justice and its enormous repercussions set up an academic platform for FCJ. Finally, FCJ is logically an offspring out of the development of feminist theory.Feminism focuses mainly on three aspects in its critique of the mainstream theories of justice. First of all, feminists disapprove the idea of gender neutrality in the mainstream theories of justice. In the view of feminists, the mainstream theories of justice express justice in generally neutral terms, which virtually is a deeply male-centered theory of justice. Secondly, feminists reprobate the dualist division of public and private areas in the mainstream theories of justice. Feminists note that the separation between public and private areas has always found itself in the history of political philosophy, in which many thinkers take the public political field as male-dominated and hold-the female be confined within the private field beyond the scope of justice theory. The separation between public and private areas is the prime cause for the ignorance of gender in the mainstream theories of justice, so it is necessary for the realization of gender justice to remove the separation. Finally, feminists condemn the dualist opposition between justice ethics and caring ethics in the mainstream theories of justice. The direct consequence carried on the separation between public and private areas is that men and women are respectively nurtured different patterns of emotion and thinking, and that their different kinds of moral quality are described as justice ethics and caring ethics. Although feminists generally agree justice ethics and caring ethics present in two different moral approaches, but in their eyes, justice ethics and caring ethics are not opposed wholly to each other as the mainstream theories of justice think. Caring ethics is not inferior to justice ethics, on the contrary, because of making up some defects of justice ethics, caring ethics has a special value. Caring ethics is not only applicable to the private field, but also has a more extensive value, and it should be expanded into the public field. At the same time, according to feminists, the dualist opposition between caring ethics and justice ethics in the mainstream theories of justice has hindered women’s development.Among contemporary feminist thinkers with the remarkable academic power stand out Susan Moller Okin, Iris Marion Yang and Nancy Frazer who inquiry into the roots of gender in justice and the means of achieving gender justice in establishing FCJ. Liberal feminist Susan Moller Okin complains about the disability of traditional theories of justice to treat the female just in her book of Justice, Gender and the Family. Thinkers in the Enlightenment advocated liberty and justice, but the female, a half of human beings, has never shared the equal status with the male in economy, politics and family. Women are excluded from the mainstream theories of justice. In Okin’s view, the family based on the traditional gender structure is the root of this injustice. The mainstream theories of justice is used to make a distinction between private family life and public political life, and urges that the two domains of life are operated in conformity with different principles and that women’s features are only suitable for private family life, whereas men born with resolute characteristics are suitable for public political life, consequently family is excluded from the theory of justice. Therefore, Susan advocates the principle of distributive justice should be applied to the field of family ignored by the thinkers such as John Rawls in the mainstream theories of justice, to regulate the unfair distribution within the family, eventually to achieve an ideal society without unjust gender difference. Different from Okin’s taking just distribution as the paradigm of justice theory, Iris Marion Yang as a multiculturalist feminist, disagreeing in simplifying justice to distributive justice, shifts the theme of justice from the paradigm of distribution to that of interpersonal relations, taking the concepts of domination and oppression as the starting point, rather than the concept of distribution. She focuses on the structural origin which causes women’s long-term inequality in societies, and pays close attention to the system background of justice. Yang examines women’s multidimensional inequality from the perspective of the relationship of domination and oppression, which she summarizes into five aspects, i.e., exploitation, peripherization, powerlessness, cultural imperialism and violence. Yang argues that the oppression suffered by women ascribes one hand to the capitalist patriarchy, on the other hand to the stress of the traditional theories of justice on homogeneity or their belittling and ignoring differences among groups. Therefore, in order to eliminate the social injustice against women, besides the socially and economically equal treat, it is much more important to confirm the female as a different group from the male and to give the female some special rights, which is a fundamental way to eliminate gender injustice. So Yang advocates an apprehensively just treat. Fraser puts forward to a three-dimensional theory of justice based on the justice of participation as a dominant principle. Fraser thinks that,’since women have suffered politically improper representation, economically unfair distribution as well as culturally incorrect acknowledgement, the perfect explanation of gender injustice must integrate all three aspects including economic, cultural, and political one, each of which is independent of others, and none of which can be understood from others. Therefore, in order to achieve gender justice, the three dimensions of injustice must be corrected at the same time, and the three dimensions of justice must obey the principle of equal participation. Thus, Fraser has established her conception of multidimensional gender fairness.FCJ has advanced the development of contemporary theories of justice with its firm and inflexible spirit of protestation, and has led a great impact into practice. First of all, its significance in justice theory lies in that FCJ provides us with a new perspective of understanding justice and a new thinking pattern leading justice theory out of the patriarchal mode, and that it enriches the content of justice theory and highlights the female’s value in societies. Secondly, FCJ may broaden the ideas and practice of justice in the construction of harmonious society, and provide an abundant academic resource to promote the construction of advanced gender culture in today’s China. However, FCJ has undeniably some confusion and contradiction of its own. The claim for equality or for difference is a major problem encountered by FCJ. The stress on gender awareness or on non-gender consciousness is its second problem. And the third problem is the call for homogeneity or for heterogeneity. So far, the debates on these problems are on the way, therefore, FCJ is still in the process of exploring.Justice is one of eternal pursuits of human societies, and has also been one of the goals of feminism from the very beginning. To achieve an ideal society of justice, it is necessary to pay attention to the rights in existence, development and economy of women as human beings equal to those of men, as well as to consider the differences between the male and the female. Feminism should pursue equality based on difference which might help in bringing forth an ideal society of justice.