1 - Theorising gender

Summary

IN this chapter I begin by exposing some of the flaws in the Marxist analysis of gender relations as expounded by Friedrich Engels in his work The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, first published in 1884. Whilst it may at first seem far removed from our concerns here, a consideration of Engels' work is in fact of central importance to this study because it has been the starting point for both Chinese Marxist and western socialist feminist analyses of gender relations. Understanding the weaknesses in Engels' arguments will thus help us to understand why it is that despite professing a commitment to gender equality, the CCP has far from achieved this goal. In addition, a critique of the arguments of Engels and of those who followed in his footsteps, as it were, will provide a basis from which to develop a more satisfactory theoretical approach to the questions raised in this book.

In The Origin … Engels undertook a historical materialist analysis in which he linked the emergence of women's subordination with changes in the social relations of production. His work provided both Chinese revolutionaries and feminists in the West with a valuable framework for challenging assumptions that women's subordination to men stems directly from biological differences between the sexes, and hence is natural and, by extension, inevitable and right.

In China, the Marxist approach, based on Engels' arguments, has undeniably been very useful for tackling key areas of women's oppression.