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The Sexual Contract
In this remarkably original work of political philosophy, one of today's foremost feminist theorist challenges the way contemporary society functions by questioning the standard interpretation of an idea that is deeply embedded in American and British political that our rights and freedoms derive from the social contract explicated by Locke, Hobbes, and Rousseau and interpreted in the United States by the Founding Fathers.
The author shows how we are told only half the story of the original contract that establishes modern patriarchy. The sexual contract is ignored and thus men's patriarchal right over women is also glossed over. No attention is paid to the problems that arise when women are excluded from the original contract but incorporated into the new contractual order.
One of the main targets of the book is those who try to turn contractarian theory to progressive use, and a major thesis of the book is that this is not possible. Thus those feminists who have looked to a more "proper" contract- one between genuinely equal partners, or one entered into without any coercion- are misleading themselves. In the author's words, "In contract theory universal freedom is always a hypothesis, a story, a political fiction. Contract always generates political right in the forms of domination and subordination." Thus the book is also aimed at mainstream political theorists, and socialist and other critics of contract theory.
The author offers a sweeping challenge to conventional understandings- of both left and right- of actual contracts in everyday the marriage contract, the employment contract, the prostitution contract, and the new surrogate mother contract. By bringing a feminist perspective to bear on the contradictions and paradoxes surrounding women and contract, and the relation between the sexes, she is able to shed new light on fundamental political problems of freedom and subordination.
The author shows how we are told only half the story of the original contract that establishes modern patriarchy. The sexual contract is ignored and thus men's patriarchal right over women is also glossed over. No attention is paid to the problems that arise when women are excluded from the original contract but incorporated into the new contractual order.
One of the main targets of the book is those who try to turn contractarian theory to progressive use, and a major thesis of the book is that this is not possible. Thus those feminists who have looked to a more "proper" contract- one between genuinely equal partners, or one entered into without any coercion- are misleading themselves. In the author's words, "In contract theory universal freedom is always a hypothesis, a story, a political fiction. Contract always generates political right in the forms of domination and subordination." Thus the book is also aimed at mainstream political theorists, and socialist and other critics of contract theory.
The author offers a sweeping challenge to conventional understandings- of both left and right- of actual contracts in everyday the marriage contract, the employment contract, the prostitution contract, and the new surrogate mother contract. By bringing a feminist perspective to bear on the contradictions and paradoxes surrounding women and contract, and the relation between the sexes, she is able to shed new light on fundamental political problems of freedom and subordination.
276 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1988
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About the author
Carole Pateman
25 books30 followersCarole Pateman is a feminist and political theorist. She is known as a critic of liberal democracy.
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November 1, 2012
Carole Pateman’s The Sexual Contract is perhaps her most acclaimed and recognized work in a very distinguished academic career. Published in 1988, the book analyses the classic political theory of social contract through the lens of feminism and democratic theory. More than twenty years after publication, Pateman’s opus remains a relevant critique of political theories that ignore the profound connections between feminism and democracy. As indicated by the title, The Sexual Contract seeks to demonstrate that underlying the supposedly free and equal civil social relations based on a theoretical contract is a relation of subjugation that Pateman calls ‘the sexual contract’. She begins by breaking down the philosophical basis of social contract, bringing out the often obscured patriarchal presumptions in the ideas of contract and of civil society that were developed during the period of the Enlightenment. She argues that the theory of social contract is inconsistent with both democracy and feminism, because it presumes the subjugation of women, and she demonstrates this through her analysis of the foundational philosophical works on the social contract.
Pateman does not use the typical feminist arguments that the sexual contract is coercive due to the lack of freedom of choice of whether to marry, or that it is exploitative because the conditions of the contract are not equally beneficial for all parties. Despite the fact that she acknowledges that they are important in themselves, the genius of Pateman’s argument lies in her ability to go beyond these problems into the question of whether such a contract could ever be equal or free. She outlines how the concept of marriage contracts have hidden the broader sexual contract, where men (as a caste) are provided access to women’s bodies both in the divided public and private spheres of social life. Pateman does not only use the idea of sexual contract to analyse the adaptation of patriarchy to modern political structures, instead she also brilliantly counters the entire theory of social contract itself. Using women’s subjugation as only one example, Pateman argues that all contracts which involve property in the person, such as marriage contracts, employment contracts, and the social contract between citizens and government, inevitably create relations of subjugation.
Property in the person, Pateman explains, is a fundamental presumption of social contract theory. While this is fundamental to social contract theory, there are many problems with this idea. First, there is the logical inconsistency of the alienation of a person’s abilities or labour from themselves, which Pateman neatly dismisses, since a person’s entire self is necessary for the use of either. Therefore the question is not of contracting labour or abilities, but of contracting a person’s entire body and mind. Second, the idea that a person can be contractually obligated to hand over the use of their body to another, submit to the will of another, but at the same time be free and equal, is shown to be completely absurd. Any contract involving property in the person “(c)reates a relationship of subordination” (69). The idea of free and equal contracting under such circumstances is revealed as an ideological fraud.
When applied to the idea of the traditional sexual contract, that is the exchange of women’s obedience and their bodies for sex and domestic labour with men’s protection and economic support, the problem of women’s subjugation in all areas of modern social life can be clarified. Rape was (is) not seen to be possible within marriage because wives were (are) seen as having contracted away their sexual choice. Rape of another man’s wife is problematic because it goes against the fraternal order. Domestic violence continues to be a problem predominantly of men abusing women, or even murdering them. Sex work and pornography continues to be about men having access to women, or at least images of them. Women continue to be underpaid for their work outside of the home, and continue to be responsible for more than their share of the work inside the home. The question might be posed of how it is that even when divorce is rampant and women have entered the workforce in such large numbers, have abolished so many sexist laws and effected so much social change, women’s subjugation continues on such a massive scale and such a consistent basis. Pateman would answer that these developments, although important and necessary, have not changed the fundamental structure of the sexual contract, because it is imbued into our social relations on all levels.
Her later chapters show other examples of contracts involving property in the person, beginning with slavery and the idea of the ‘civil slavery contract’, and moving on to prostitution and surrogacy. Prostitution, or in more contemporary terms ‘sex work’, is a very important issue for feminism, and often a dividing line between different feminist perspectives. As in the case for domestic violence, rape, and women’s domestic labour, Pateman’s thesis delves deeper than less radical feminist analyses, not only looking at questions of exploitation or unequal contractual terms. Certainly the idea that ‘wage slavery’ is inherently exploitative is not new, having been a long-held position of socialists and anarchists, but Pateman deftly ties in the sexual contract with the idea of the ‘civil slave’ to clarify the importance of understanding women’s oppression in critiques of capitalist economics. When she applies her considerable intellectual skills to the issue of sex work, she comes up with a refreshingly respectful yet accurate assessment of the difficulties: she refuses to either accept that sex work (as it is practiced in the modern world) can ever be a free and equal exchange no matter how theoretically ideal the circumstances, or to allow sex work to be viewed as a problem of women.
Her analysis of surrogacy is particularly ahead of its time, as Pateman foresaw the inevitable power inequality in a practice that is increasingly common, and now has become an international industry where wealthy people from powerful nations can contract for the use of the bodies of poor women from developing nations. In each of her arguments Pateman demonstrates why attempts in standard feminist and anti-capitalist analyses, using questions of exploitation or coercion to work within the framework of social contract to argue for liberation will inevitably fail because the philosophical foundation of modern life is based on domination, and not free contractual relations.
Pateman’s brilliance is in her willingness to shine the light of her analysis far beyond where many of her contemporaries in various academic fields were prepared to look. While others discussed readily apparent expressions of women’s oppression, Pateman looked beyond the surface into the very structure of society. She elucidates the presuppositions that the ideology of the contract is based on, and what it means in practice for women’s subjugation. The challenge of her work is to go beyond the obvious problems of exploitation and abuse- which is not to dismiss them but to attack the foundation upon which they are created. In doing so, the interconnectedness of the systems of inequality are laid bare. Feminisms which do not see the root of the problem have always had the difficulties of trying to understand how all forms of women’s oppression are tied together (and thus how they can be simultaneously dismantled), as well as being unable to integrate feminism with other anti-oppressive analyses.
The history of white Western feminism has been fraught with problems of internal racism, classism, and other systems of subjugation. Sojourner Truth asked “Ain’t I a woman?” in 1851, and yet so many years later many forms of feminism exclude or downplay the importance of white supremacy. Pateman’s analysis of a specific group in a specific time period (e.g. Western women and modernity) is so thorough that it provides a model for the analysis of many other situations, not the least of which she alludes to herself in this book and goes on to explore in later works, that of racial oppression.
Pateman’s book is not perfect. Notably, she sometimes veers into an essentialism which does not seem to fit with the rest of her thesis. Calling transsexual women “simulacra” does not strengthen her argument in any way, especially given the high level of systemic violence experienced by these women, which belies the idea that transsexuality is in any way “pretence” (223). While the transsexual body is read as a male body within patriarchy, transsexual streetwalking women can be disposed of in the same way as any other kind of woman prostitute. Transsexual women are seen as predatory, in the same way that other women deemed unattractive (e.g. “fat”) seek to entrap men into relationships while they fail to live up to the standards of acceptable women’s bodies, though the consequences for transsexual women are often much more severe. Thus, transsexual women fit neatly within Pateman’s argument about women’s subjugation, and she neither needs to nor logically should exclude them. One could make the argument that this oversight (or prejudice) is due to the era in which Pateman was writing, but this seems weak for two reasons. First, Pateman is amazingly avant-garde in all other aspects of her thinking. This is not an author who follows the trends set by others, instead this entire book evidences a rare originality in its analysis. Furthermore, the book has been reprinted much more recently, giving Pateman ample opportunity to retract a sentence that lends nothing to her argument and is irrelevant to her point.
Another problem with The Sexual Contract is the somewhat circular writing style. Pateman is rarely explicit about her own view, requiring the reader to reconstruct this based on what she does not say. Her actual thesis is often inserted almost as an afterthought in the midst of a paragraph, which makes it less evident to the reader. For example, on page 146, Pateman says:
The issue is not abstract, unconstrained liberty, but the social relations of work, production, marriage and sexual life. Are relations between women and men to be politically free, and is there to be collective participation in the task of deciding what is to be produced and how it is to be produced; or is political right to be exercised by men, husbands, bosses, civil masters?
This is an excellent question, and almost a summary of the book’s entire subject. However, the reader is more than two-thirds of the way through the book before she makes this point.
Further hindering the clarity of her argument is the structure of the book. Although the chapters each cover the subject they purport to, there is a lot of repetition of the same themes. This leads to a very thorough argument but it can also cause confusion, particularly at the beginning of the book when it is sometimes unclear where Pateman is heading with her meticulous philosophical analysis.
Nonetheless, these problems of clarity cannot obscure the intellectual virtuosity of Pateman’s political analysis in this profoundly important book. Rarely have I read any other work in the fields of feminism or political analysis that so clearly demonstrates how intrinsic women’s subjugation is in our current social, political and economic structures. Pateman pinpoints exactly the source of the contradictions and problems in social contract theory, and she makes a very strong and thorough argument for the indivisibility of issues of women’s subjugation in modern societies from the question of democracy as a whole. Liberal feminism, libertarian capitalism, and patriarchal Marxism are thoroughly trounced without even being directly addressed, because they share common assumptions that Pateman brings forth from obscurity and unabashedly reduces to their absurd foundations.
For these reasons, The Sexual Contract is a remarkable contribution to political thought, and should be required reading for any student of political theory, feminist theory, or issues of democracy. It is not a particularly accessible text, due to Pateman’s meticulous engagement of classic Enlightenment philosophy, and because of the author’s somewhat roving writing style. This is unfortunate, as it offers such a unified and original critique of so many unspoken presumptions that continue to hold sway in political discourse today, on all sides of the political spectrum. An integral part of Pateman’s impressive academic career, this book evidences her importance as an intellectual and as a critic of social systems that work against democracy.
Pateman does not use the typical feminist arguments that the sexual contract is coercive due to the lack of freedom of choice of whether to marry, or that it is exploitative because the conditions of the contract are not equally beneficial for all parties. Despite the fact that she acknowledges that they are important in themselves, the genius of Pateman’s argument lies in her ability to go beyond these problems into the question of whether such a contract could ever be equal or free. She outlines how the concept of marriage contracts have hidden the broader sexual contract, where men (as a caste) are provided access to women’s bodies both in the divided public and private spheres of social life. Pateman does not only use the idea of sexual contract to analyse the adaptation of patriarchy to modern political structures, instead she also brilliantly counters the entire theory of social contract itself. Using women’s subjugation as only one example, Pateman argues that all contracts which involve property in the person, such as marriage contracts, employment contracts, and the social contract between citizens and government, inevitably create relations of subjugation.
Property in the person, Pateman explains, is a fundamental presumption of social contract theory. While this is fundamental to social contract theory, there are many problems with this idea. First, there is the logical inconsistency of the alienation of a person’s abilities or labour from themselves, which Pateman neatly dismisses, since a person’s entire self is necessary for the use of either. Therefore the question is not of contracting labour or abilities, but of contracting a person’s entire body and mind. Second, the idea that a person can be contractually obligated to hand over the use of their body to another, submit to the will of another, but at the same time be free and equal, is shown to be completely absurd. Any contract involving property in the person “(c)reates a relationship of subordination” (69). The idea of free and equal contracting under such circumstances is revealed as an ideological fraud.
When applied to the idea of the traditional sexual contract, that is the exchange of women’s obedience and their bodies for sex and domestic labour with men’s protection and economic support, the problem of women’s subjugation in all areas of modern social life can be clarified. Rape was (is) not seen to be possible within marriage because wives were (are) seen as having contracted away their sexual choice. Rape of another man’s wife is problematic because it goes against the fraternal order. Domestic violence continues to be a problem predominantly of men abusing women, or even murdering them. Sex work and pornography continues to be about men having access to women, or at least images of them. Women continue to be underpaid for their work outside of the home, and continue to be responsible for more than their share of the work inside the home. The question might be posed of how it is that even when divorce is rampant and women have entered the workforce in such large numbers, have abolished so many sexist laws and effected so much social change, women’s subjugation continues on such a massive scale and such a consistent basis. Pateman would answer that these developments, although important and necessary, have not changed the fundamental structure of the sexual contract, because it is imbued into our social relations on all levels.
Her later chapters show other examples of contracts involving property in the person, beginning with slavery and the idea of the ‘civil slavery contract’, and moving on to prostitution and surrogacy. Prostitution, or in more contemporary terms ‘sex work’, is a very important issue for feminism, and often a dividing line between different feminist perspectives. As in the case for domestic violence, rape, and women’s domestic labour, Pateman’s thesis delves deeper than less radical feminist analyses, not only looking at questions of exploitation or unequal contractual terms. Certainly the idea that ‘wage slavery’ is inherently exploitative is not new, having been a long-held position of socialists and anarchists, but Pateman deftly ties in the sexual contract with the idea of the ‘civil slave’ to clarify the importance of understanding women’s oppression in critiques of capitalist economics. When she applies her considerable intellectual skills to the issue of sex work, she comes up with a refreshingly respectful yet accurate assessment of the difficulties: she refuses to either accept that sex work (as it is practiced in the modern world) can ever be a free and equal exchange no matter how theoretically ideal the circumstances, or to allow sex work to be viewed as a problem of women.
Her analysis of surrogacy is particularly ahead of its time, as Pateman foresaw the inevitable power inequality in a practice that is increasingly common, and now has become an international industry where wealthy people from powerful nations can contract for the use of the bodies of poor women from developing nations. In each of her arguments Pateman demonstrates why attempts in standard feminist and anti-capitalist analyses, using questions of exploitation or coercion to work within the framework of social contract to argue for liberation will inevitably fail because the philosophical foundation of modern life is based on domination, and not free contractual relations.
Pateman’s brilliance is in her willingness to shine the light of her analysis far beyond where many of her contemporaries in various academic fields were prepared to look. While others discussed readily apparent expressions of women’s oppression, Pateman looked beyond the surface into the very structure of society. She elucidates the presuppositions that the ideology of the contract is based on, and what it means in practice for women’s subjugation. The challenge of her work is to go beyond the obvious problems of exploitation and abuse- which is not to dismiss them but to attack the foundation upon which they are created. In doing so, the interconnectedness of the systems of inequality are laid bare. Feminisms which do not see the root of the problem have always had the difficulties of trying to understand how all forms of women’s oppression are tied together (and thus how they can be simultaneously dismantled), as well as being unable to integrate feminism with other anti-oppressive analyses.
The history of white Western feminism has been fraught with problems of internal racism, classism, and other systems of subjugation. Sojourner Truth asked “Ain’t I a woman?” in 1851, and yet so many years later many forms of feminism exclude or downplay the importance of white supremacy. Pateman’s analysis of a specific group in a specific time period (e.g. Western women and modernity) is so thorough that it provides a model for the analysis of many other situations, not the least of which she alludes to herself in this book and goes on to explore in later works, that of racial oppression.
Pateman’s book is not perfect. Notably, she sometimes veers into an essentialism which does not seem to fit with the rest of her thesis. Calling transsexual women “simulacra” does not strengthen her argument in any way, especially given the high level of systemic violence experienced by these women, which belies the idea that transsexuality is in any way “pretence” (223). While the transsexual body is read as a male body within patriarchy, transsexual streetwalking women can be disposed of in the same way as any other kind of woman prostitute. Transsexual women are seen as predatory, in the same way that other women deemed unattractive (e.g. “fat”) seek to entrap men into relationships while they fail to live up to the standards of acceptable women’s bodies, though the consequences for transsexual women are often much more severe. Thus, transsexual women fit neatly within Pateman’s argument about women’s subjugation, and she neither needs to nor logically should exclude them. One could make the argument that this oversight (or prejudice) is due to the era in which Pateman was writing, but this seems weak for two reasons. First, Pateman is amazingly avant-garde in all other aspects of her thinking. This is not an author who follows the trends set by others, instead this entire book evidences a rare originality in its analysis. Furthermore, the book has been reprinted much more recently, giving Pateman ample opportunity to retract a sentence that lends nothing to her argument and is irrelevant to her point.
Another problem with The Sexual Contract is the somewhat circular writing style. Pateman is rarely explicit about her own view, requiring the reader to reconstruct this based on what she does not say. Her actual thesis is often inserted almost as an afterthought in the midst of a paragraph, which makes it less evident to the reader. For example, on page 146, Pateman says:
The issue is not abstract, unconstrained liberty, but the social relations of work, production, marriage and sexual life. Are relations between women and men to be politically free, and is there to be collective participation in the task of deciding what is to be produced and how it is to be produced; or is political right to be exercised by men, husbands, bosses, civil masters?
This is an excellent question, and almost a summary of the book’s entire subject. However, the reader is more than two-thirds of the way through the book before she makes this point.
Further hindering the clarity of her argument is the structure of the book. Although the chapters each cover the subject they purport to, there is a lot of repetition of the same themes. This leads to a very thorough argument but it can also cause confusion, particularly at the beginning of the book when it is sometimes unclear where Pateman is heading with her meticulous philosophical analysis.
Nonetheless, these problems of clarity cannot obscure the intellectual virtuosity of Pateman’s political analysis in this profoundly important book. Rarely have I read any other work in the fields of feminism or political analysis that so clearly demonstrates how intrinsic women’s subjugation is in our current social, political and economic structures. Pateman pinpoints exactly the source of the contradictions and problems in social contract theory, and she makes a very strong and thorough argument for the indivisibility of issues of women’s subjugation in modern societies from the question of democracy as a whole. Liberal feminism, libertarian capitalism, and patriarchal Marxism are thoroughly trounced without even being directly addressed, because they share common assumptions that Pateman brings forth from obscurity and unabashedly reduces to their absurd foundations.
For these reasons, The Sexual Contract is a remarkable contribution to political thought, and should be required reading for any student of political theory, feminist theory, or issues of democracy. It is not a particularly accessible text, due to Pateman’s meticulous engagement of classic Enlightenment philosophy, and because of the author’s somewhat roving writing style. This is unfortunate, as it offers such a unified and original critique of so many unspoken presumptions that continue to hold sway in political discourse today, on all sides of the political spectrum. An integral part of Pateman’s impressive academic career, this book evidences her importance as an intellectual and as a critic of social systems that work against democracy.
May 4, 2019
Nunca sé cómo puntuar un ensayo sobre feminismo. No es una lectura sencilla ni rápida, tengo mil anotaciones y casi cada esquina doblada. Me ha hecho replantearme muchas ideas que tenía asentadas y afirmar otras. Eso ya me hace considerarlo bastante bueno e interesante pero necesito releerlo otra (o varias) vez.
April 6, 2022
I don't know if I agree with everything she says, but it got me thinking a lot.
After all, the book shows how liberalism and the theory of contract are the genesis of many contemporary evils and it would be good to find a way around that rereading of the classic texts, as well as the true inclusion of women in a system of relationships where they are truly free, without the suppression of sexual difference. I must pose the warning that it's quite dense, it's not a simple and quick read.
The strongest critique I'd be daring to make is 'what is the way out?', which is, after all, essential. But we must not diminish the importance of the arguments leveled against a blank slate individual which now graciously includes women while denying their physical reality, more than ever in the wake of the trans trend.
After all, the book shows how liberalism and the theory of contract are the genesis of many contemporary evils and it would be good to find a way around that rereading of the classic texts, as well as the true inclusion of women in a system of relationships where they are truly free, without the suppression of sexual difference. I must pose the warning that it's quite dense, it's not a simple and quick read.
The strongest critique I'd be daring to make is 'what is the way out?', which is, after all, essential. But we must not diminish the importance of the arguments leveled against a blank slate individual which now graciously includes women while denying their physical reality, more than ever in the wake of the trans trend.
June 4, 2012
The feminist take-down of contract theory, this book offers a gender-conscious genealogy of the development of contractarianism, and shows its fundamentally male-supremacist character. Good companion read with Merchant's "Death of Nature" and MacIntyre's "After Virtue."
February 10, 2008
I was forced to read this book as part of a university philosophy course. I use the word 'forced' intentionally here, since ordinarily I would lauded exposure to another quality philosophical text in a classroom setting. However, this screed rails against classical contract theorists with the following two beautifully ridiculous arguments:
First, that since all classical social contract theorists were men writing about dividing up the 'goods' of social organizations, they must have included women in those lists of goods (even though none seem to do so explicitly). Since they (presumptively) include women and sexual access to women as things validly the part of distributive justice, their contract theories should be rejected. That this first argument is specious is patently obvious. Not only do none of the theorists concern themselves with divvying up sexual access to women in any explicit way (at least none that I've ever encountered), but even if they did, that wouldn't be a call to reject their theories any more than it would be to reject modern evolutionary theory by critiquing Darwin's "Origin of Species" - the origial works don't usually reflect modern concensus in many academic discplines, particularly not ones with massive amounts of work being done in them.
The second argument is that all of the classical social contract theorists talk about "men" forming the social contracts, and since they excluded women from forming the contracts, they should be rejected. This argument is also ridiculous. At no period did men sit down in the fashion discussed in social contract theories and decide on social organizations, so there could never be any exclusion of women from such decisions. Now, admittedly, historically women HAVE been excluded from making the types of important decisions which impact them, but Patemon must prove that the current incarnation, in which women have EQUAL say with men (in fact, greater say if we are to believe modern demographical data), that the social contract is not in their best interest - an assertion which should be falsified in any democratic nation with a bare majority of women voters.
All in all, a shockingly awful read.
First, that since all classical social contract theorists were men writing about dividing up the 'goods' of social organizations, they must have included women in those lists of goods (even though none seem to do so explicitly). Since they (presumptively) include women and sexual access to women as things validly the part of distributive justice, their contract theories should be rejected. That this first argument is specious is patently obvious. Not only do none of the theorists concern themselves with divvying up sexual access to women in any explicit way (at least none that I've ever encountered), but even if they did, that wouldn't be a call to reject their theories any more than it would be to reject modern evolutionary theory by critiquing Darwin's "Origin of Species" - the origial works don't usually reflect modern concensus in many academic discplines, particularly not ones with massive amounts of work being done in them.
The second argument is that all of the classical social contract theorists talk about "men" forming the social contracts, and since they excluded women from forming the contracts, they should be rejected. This argument is also ridiculous. At no period did men sit down in the fashion discussed in social contract theories and decide on social organizations, so there could never be any exclusion of women from such decisions. Now, admittedly, historically women HAVE been excluded from making the types of important decisions which impact them, but Patemon must prove that the current incarnation, in which women have EQUAL say with men (in fact, greater say if we are to believe modern demographical data), that the social contract is not in their best interest - an assertion which should be falsified in any democratic nation with a bare majority of women voters.
All in all, a shockingly awful read.
March 22, 2019
Imprescindible.
December 18, 2021
Pateman'ın aslında teorik yaklaşımında kusurlar eksiklikler ve anlam veremediğiniz bazı keskin yargıları olsa da özellikle döneminde çığır açan bir eser yazmış. Tıpkı Rousseau'ya karşı Kadın Haklarının Gerekçelendirilmesi adlı eseri yazan Marry Wollstonecraft gibi. Pateman da özellikle sözleşme teorisyenleri arasında öne çıkan Rousseau ve Toplum Sözleşmesi adlı eserine karşı yazılmış diyebiliriz. Sadece ona deginmiyor tabiki diğer teorisyenlerden de söz ediyor ve cinsler arasındaki ilişkilerdeki/ sözleşmelerdeki eşitsiz inşalara işaret ediyor. Bunun ardından Pateman'dan oldukça etkilenmiş Charles Wills'in Irksal Sözleşme'si ve Barış Ünlü'nun Türklük Sözleşmesi eserlerini okumak tamamlayıcı olacaktır diye düşünüyorum. Sözleşme asla sadece bir sözleşme değildir çünkü.
Ülkemizde kadın çalışmaları görece geç ortaya çıktığı için de türkçeye çok geç kazandırılmış Cinsel Sözleşme bana göre. Eleştirel bir gözle günümüzün koşullarıyla kiyaslamadan okunmalı ki özellikle Batı dünyasını şekillendiren siyaset ve toplumsal tarihinin çok değerli düşünürlerinin kendi özgürlükçü (!) kuramlari ile eşitsiz ilişkileri sözleşme koşullarını toplumsal yapıları kültürel önyargılarını nasıl oluşturduklarını, bunlara nasıl katkida bulunduklarını gösteriyor.
Ülkemizde kadın çalışmaları görece geç ortaya çıktığı için de türkçeye çok geç kazandırılmış Cinsel Sözleşme bana göre. Eleştirel bir gözle günümüzün koşullarıyla kiyaslamadan okunmalı ki özellikle Batı dünyasını şekillendiren siyaset ve toplumsal tarihinin çok değerli düşünürlerinin kendi özgürlükçü (!) kuramlari ile eşitsiz ilişkileri sözleşme koşullarını toplumsal yapıları kültürel önyargılarını nasıl oluşturduklarını, bunlara nasıl katkida bulunduklarını gösteriyor.
October 21, 2018
En riktig klassiker. Kan ibland kännas att den har några år på nacken men gör inte så mycket!
June 21, 2019
I was very disappointed, especially near the end, where we get a brief discussion of trans issues and homosexual marriage. She denies trans people (or specifically trans women, she doesn't appear to be aware trans men exist) can be or transition to the opposite gender as their sex assigned at birth, and she claims marriage is intrinsically between a man and a woman (as part of a critique of marriage to be fair).
Many aspects of her discussion involve equivocations between libertarian-style/Hobbesian "contracts all the way down" contractarianism and all other social contract theories (such as Locke and Rawls, who explicitly do not start with contracts as the only source of morality). The latter are acknowledged to be distinct only briefly to say that they've "smuggled" non-contractual aspects into their theories through appeals to "nature" - not accurate especially for Rawls. The same often arises in her discussions of man/woman, where she seems to blur the lines between her discussions of actual men and women, and the masculine and feminine as symbols (esp. in the chapter on prostitution). This leads her to make some claims that are less morally outrageous but I still think wrong, such as that only women can be prostitutes.
Many of her critiques do hit the mark, but on topics like marital rape that are far more obvious in retrospect. Often these critiques coincide with contractual feminist critiques of marriage, and it isn't obvious what she's doing differently in many of those passages. She does do a good job of introducing forgotten feminist critics (or at least, ones who I was not familiar with) and incorporating empirical sources (esp. discussions of prostitution and to a lesser extent in her discussion of surrogacy). There are also interesting critiques of Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau, and to differing extents I buy the claim of hers that they rely implicitly on a previous sexual contract. Her key insight is that women would not choose to enter the social contract under the conditions they have if they were seen as full parties to the contract (almost a direct quote, but I cannot find it right now, I believe it is in her discussion of Hobbes).
She makes a few other criticisms that are good (e.g. the worry that self-ownership implies the civil slave contract is permissible is still widely held, that pornography, prostitution, surrogacy, marital rape, etc aren't all distinct issues but rather that they ought to be addressed together). Some of the conceptualizations are at least new to me, such as status versus contractual versions of patriarchy, or the inclusion of Freud as a contractarian. But overall I wasn't happy with the book and I am not convinced of any of the main theses, that contractualism both assumes the personhood and non-personhood of women, or that making marriage more contractual isn't a viable strategy for feminists.
Many aspects of her discussion involve equivocations between libertarian-style/Hobbesian "contracts all the way down" contractarianism and all other social contract theories (such as Locke and Rawls, who explicitly do not start with contracts as the only source of morality). The latter are acknowledged to be distinct only briefly to say that they've "smuggled" non-contractual aspects into their theories through appeals to "nature" - not accurate especially for Rawls. The same often arises in her discussions of man/woman, where she seems to blur the lines between her discussions of actual men and women, and the masculine and feminine as symbols (esp. in the chapter on prostitution). This leads her to make some claims that are less morally outrageous but I still think wrong, such as that only women can be prostitutes.
Many of her critiques do hit the mark, but on topics like marital rape that are far more obvious in retrospect. Often these critiques coincide with contractual feminist critiques of marriage, and it isn't obvious what she's doing differently in many of those passages. She does do a good job of introducing forgotten feminist critics (or at least, ones who I was not familiar with) and incorporating empirical sources (esp. discussions of prostitution and to a lesser extent in her discussion of surrogacy). There are also interesting critiques of Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau, and to differing extents I buy the claim of hers that they rely implicitly on a previous sexual contract. Her key insight is that women would not choose to enter the social contract under the conditions they have if they were seen as full parties to the contract (almost a direct quote, but I cannot find it right now, I believe it is in her discussion of Hobbes).
She makes a few other criticisms that are good (e.g. the worry that self-ownership implies the civil slave contract is permissible is still widely held, that pornography, prostitution, surrogacy, marital rape, etc aren't all distinct issues but rather that they ought to be addressed together). Some of the conceptualizations are at least new to me, such as status versus contractual versions of patriarchy, or the inclusion of Freud as a contractarian. But overall I wasn't happy with the book and I am not convinced of any of the main theses, that contractualism both assumes the personhood and non-personhood of women, or that making marriage more contractual isn't a viable strategy for feminists.
January 5, 2022
When people think of contract, they think of Rosseau and other modernist contract thinkers. Mills' racial contract and Pateman's sexual contract bring into perspective what modern contract theorists forget about. Great read!
October 30, 2025
Releerlo ha sido completamente refrescante, afianzando conceptos que no había integrado o profundizado en ellos. Completamente necesario y rompedor, una pionera en el desmontaje teórico del contrato social desde la teoría política feminista.
October 29, 2012
Very much a political theory book aka hard to read. Had to slowly work my way through this one for one of my classes. Worth the time and effort though.
October 27, 2024
Demasiado poderoso. Sobre la idea de que aquello que fundamenta el contrato social en la teoría liberal es, en realidad, el contrato sexual; en otras palabras, el derecho político se ha fundado siempre en la desigualdad. El contrato sexual entendido como una diferencia entre sexos signada por la dominación del hombre sobre la mujer y su derecho sobre ella en el ámbito público y privado. Habla sobre el origen del patriarcado moderno y descarta que el patriarcado (poder del padre sobre los hijos) haya sido eliminado por el contrato social, sino que más bien el patriarcado moderno es un poder fraternal; al final, la mujer ya no se subordina al padre, sino al esposo (en el contrato matrimonial), al jefe (en el contrato laboral), o a cualquier hombre (en el contrato de la prostitución). Una crítica feminista incisiva a la teoría liberal del contrato social como fuente de igualdad y de libertad.
February 22, 2021
Mislim da se ovaj spis komotno može svrstati u treći val feminizma, pa kome se da čitati nešto radikalnije ideje, slobodno neka pročita.
August 1, 2023
This is one of the darkest books you may read as a feminist. It speaks about the fact that philosophical heroes like Kant in one breath spoke about categorical imperatives and in the other said that political agency did not apply to women. Their hypocrisy evaded them.
What is most disturbing about this book is the application of Hobbesian State of Nature to the woman. The book clearly states that sex is not subordination, and that whenever it is, it is considered rape, or violent encounters of intercourse. Yet, many women know the true reality of what sex has become (and has been for ages) in such an entitled male world.
The author makes the clear point that in a world where you can't expect to not be raped and you can't expect equal exercise of justice as a woman, it is in your interest to not have children. The children will hold you down. He makes it clear that many civilizations that relied on rape luckily died out on this point, and will continue to.
In addition, the author speaks of political life as that which creates value. Rape is the failure to validate that agents are actually exchanging and not validate an exchange as actual. No benefit comes to the other party, in fact harm, and no compensation is made (they juxtapose this in contrast to the prostitute that has no pleasure from the sex but nevertheless is compensated). The economy is destroyed by rape as the agent so demanded never wants to exchange again because nothing of equal or greater value to that which was demanded from them is provided.
Finally, they also speak on the truth that there is no such thing as consent in a world where women do not have equal access to justice. If a woman cannot expect the justice of a man, then contract is just a sham to make the pain a little less. If this is the case, then it's true that women are in a state of nature and benefit from not having children who will hold down their survival where they can't expect to not be raped. They need to be able to leave the rapist unburdened. Having a child due to being unable to expect not being raped and not having the rapist see justice will hold them down.
The closing remark is that while men feel they have the sex-right (the unspoken right to have sex with a woman they find attractive) without believing that she also has a compensation right, women in high sexual demand will see their nonsexual labor depreciated to quietly suggest more can be made fulfilling the male sex right. Yet, by giving into this market should she do so, she sacrifices the value of her nonsexual labor perhaps permanently. Thus, neither choice is optimal to her and her best bet is to try to lose sexual attractiveness as much as is possible and to remain in the nonsexual labor force.
This book will make you sick but it will also open your eyes.
Women live in a state of nature. We can no longer expect rapists to see justice, it is clear. It is important to not have their children.
What is most disturbing about this book is the application of Hobbesian State of Nature to the woman. The book clearly states that sex is not subordination, and that whenever it is, it is considered rape, or violent encounters of intercourse. Yet, many women know the true reality of what sex has become (and has been for ages) in such an entitled male world.
The author makes the clear point that in a world where you can't expect to not be raped and you can't expect equal exercise of justice as a woman, it is in your interest to not have children. The children will hold you down. He makes it clear that many civilizations that relied on rape luckily died out on this point, and will continue to.
In addition, the author speaks of political life as that which creates value. Rape is the failure to validate that agents are actually exchanging and not validate an exchange as actual. No benefit comes to the other party, in fact harm, and no compensation is made (they juxtapose this in contrast to the prostitute that has no pleasure from the sex but nevertheless is compensated). The economy is destroyed by rape as the agent so demanded never wants to exchange again because nothing of equal or greater value to that which was demanded from them is provided.
Finally, they also speak on the truth that there is no such thing as consent in a world where women do not have equal access to justice. If a woman cannot expect the justice of a man, then contract is just a sham to make the pain a little less. If this is the case, then it's true that women are in a state of nature and benefit from not having children who will hold down their survival where they can't expect to not be raped. They need to be able to leave the rapist unburdened. Having a child due to being unable to expect not being raped and not having the rapist see justice will hold them down.
The closing remark is that while men feel they have the sex-right (the unspoken right to have sex with a woman they find attractive) without believing that she also has a compensation right, women in high sexual demand will see their nonsexual labor depreciated to quietly suggest more can be made fulfilling the male sex right. Yet, by giving into this market should she do so, she sacrifices the value of her nonsexual labor perhaps permanently. Thus, neither choice is optimal to her and her best bet is to try to lose sexual attractiveness as much as is possible and to remain in the nonsexual labor force.
This book will make you sick but it will also open your eyes.
Women live in a state of nature. We can no longer expect rapists to see justice, it is clear. It is important to not have their children.
July 17, 2016
A feminist critique of the social contract philosophers (Locke, Rousseau, Kant, Hobbes, etc), the current social organization built on their views, and modern contract philosophers. My takeaways: the Enlightenment idea of social contract was one among men, not men and women (they really meant that all MEN (not people) are created equal, and liberty, equality, FRATERNITY). I hadn't read the contract philosophers' comments on women, who all but Hobbes considered as innately inferior and naturally subject to men, incapable of reason or of understanding and following universal principles, and fit only for the private (as opposed to the civil) sphere subordinated to one of the "free and equal" men (father, husband, master). Civil society was formed of those men who were not subject to another person and who in the private sphere could be master of wife, minor sons, daughters, domestic servants, apprentices and slaves. Civil society depended on its members being supported by those in the private (domestic) sphere and civil law largely did not apply to those in a man's household. A friend of mine was one of the first people to take advantage of the then-innovative (mid-1980s) program by the local police dept to aid domestic violence victims. When she phoned a friend who worked at Scotland Yard and told him about how she'd been helped, he said that Scotland Yard wouldn't consider any such interference in domestic matters. This book made that detective's thinking very clear to me.
The second takeaway was that women, despite having gotten many legal rights, won't really achieve equality in a system that assumes that its free individuals have their domestic needs taken care of, as men used to have, and so are free to give the bulk of their time and effort to matters in the civil sphere (jobs, politics, etc). Simply inserting women into the traditional male-oriented paradigm is not enough; it leaves matters in the domestic sphere very distorted as women act as "equals" in one sphere while still carrying the traditional domestic or private sphere that is necessary for the care of children and the elderly.
This is an academic book, and while not light reading, it is very clearly written.
The second takeaway was that women, despite having gotten many legal rights, won't really achieve equality in a system that assumes that its free individuals have their domestic needs taken care of, as men used to have, and so are free to give the bulk of their time and effort to matters in the civil sphere (jobs, politics, etc). Simply inserting women into the traditional male-oriented paradigm is not enough; it leaves matters in the domestic sphere very distorted as women act as "equals" in one sphere while still carrying the traditional domestic or private sphere that is necessary for the care of children and the elderly.
This is an academic book, and while not light reading, it is very clearly written.
December 4, 2024
The book of Carole Pateman starts with a chapter describing the sexual contract and then moves to listing all the confusions arising from a patriarchal society.
1. The Illusion of Gender Neutrality in Contracts
Confusion: Social contracts are presented as neutral agreements among equals. However, Pateman argues that they are based on a foundational "sexual contract" that assumes male dominance and female subordination.
Impact: This masks the systematic exclusion of women from the public sphere while justifying their relegation to the private, domestic sphere.
2. Public vs. Private Spheres
Confusion: Patriarchal societies claim a separation between the public and private spheres, with contracts governing the public realm. Yet, the sexual contract underpins the private sphere, ensuring male authority within families and marriages.
Impact: Women's oppression in the private sphere (e.g., through marriage and unpaid labor) is excluded from political scrutiny and seen as "natural," while public contracts are celebrated as sites of freedom.
3. Freedom vs. Domination
Confusion: Social contract theory upholds freedom and equality as its core values, yet the sexual contract institutionalizes male domination, especially through structures like marriage and employment.
Impact: Women's submission to men is rationalized as a voluntary choice, ignoring the broader systemic coercions of patriarchy.
4. The Myth of Consent
Confusion: Consent is a cornerstone of contract theory, yet in patriarchal society, women's consent is often assumed rather than freely given. The sexual contract assumes women’s bodies and labor are available to men by default.
Impact: Marriage, prostitution, and labor arrangements perpetuate exploitation under the guise of consensual agreements.
5. Equality Among Men, Not All People
Confusion: The social contract envisions equality but only among men. Women are excluded as full participants because they are relegated to the status of dependents.
Impact: Patriarchal structures deny women the agency and autonomy that are theoretically central to contract theory.
6. Naturalization of Patriarchy
Confusion: Patriarchal society treats male dominance and female subordination as natural and inevitable, rather than as products of historical and social constructs like the sexual contract.
Impact: This naturalization obscures the fact that patriarchy is sustained by legal and political systems, not biological determinism.
7. Economic Exploitation Through Gender Roles
Confusion: The sexual division of labor is justified by the sexual contract, which assigns unpaid reproductive labor to women and productive labor to men.
Impact: Women's economic dependency on men is perpetuated, even in contexts that claim to champion economic freedom and independence.
Then, she talks about slavery, the political liberty of sons, about the labour agreements as examples of confusions in the patriarchal society. She also talks about marriage as the institution where the subordination of the women happens in the private sphere, which is not, as the public sphere, entitled to voting or deliberation. In that way, the subordination seems as natural in the patriarchal, traditional social contract society.
To finalise, she criticises prostitution. She argues that prostitution is not merely a consensual economic transaction but a deeply exploitative practice rooted in patriarchal domination. According to Pateman, the problems with prostitution are as follows:
1. Alienation of the Female Body
Argument: Prostitution commodifies women’s bodies, reducing them to objects of male use and satisfaction. Pateman argues that the sexual contract turns women’s bodies into property that can be bought and sold, alienating them from their own physical selves.
Critique: This alienation is unlike other forms of labor because it involves the commodification of a woman’s sexual being, which is central to her personhood.
2. False Consent and Coercion
Argument: The apparent "consent" in prostitution is often not freely given but coerced by structural inequalities, such as poverty, gendered power dynamics, and societal pressures. For Pateman, this so-called consent cannot legitimize the inherent exploitation of the practice.
Critique: Women may "choose" prostitution, but this choice is constrained by a lack of viable alternatives, making it a reflection of systemic oppression rather than genuine autonomy.
3. Reinforcement of Patriarchal Power
Argument: Prostitution upholds patriarchal norms by perpetuating the idea that men are entitled to access women’s bodies for their pleasure. It reinforces the sexual contract, which positions women as subordinates whose primary value lies in their sexual availability.
Critique: This entitlement feeds broader patterns of gender inequality, sustaining male dominance both within and outside the realm of prostitution.
4. Dehumanization of Women
Argument: Prostitution dehumanizes women by treating them as commodities rather than as individuals with dignity and agency. This dehumanization extends beyond individual transactions, shaping societal views of women as objects rather than full persons.
Critique: The transactional nature of prostitution reduces women to their sexual function, undermining their humanity and reinforcing stereotypes that harm all women, not just those engaged in prostitution.
5. Exploitation Disguised as Work
Argument: Proponents of prostitution often frame it as "work," equating it with other forms of labor. Pateman rejects this equivalence, arguing that the intimate, embodied nature of sexual labor makes it fundamentally exploitative in ways other work is not.
Critique: Unlike other forms of labor, prostitution involves the sale of access to one’s sexuality and personhood, making it a uniquely degrading form of exploitation.
6. Economic and Social Inequality
Argument: Prostitution thrives on and perpetuates structural inequalities, particularly those of gender and class. It exploits vulnerable women, often from marginalized backgrounds, for the benefit of wealthier, more powerful men.
Critique: This dynamic reinforces the economic and social subordination of women, making prostitution a symptom of broader systemic injustices.
7. The Myth of Sexual Liberation
Argument: Some view prostitution as a form of sexual liberation or empowerment. Pateman counters that this narrative ignores the broader context of patriarchy, where women’s sexuality is commodified and controlled by men.
Critique: Far from being liberating, prostitution perpetuates the patriarchal logic that ties women’s value to their sexual availability.
1. The Illusion of Gender Neutrality in Contracts
Confusion: Social contracts are presented as neutral agreements among equals. However, Pateman argues that they are based on a foundational "sexual contract" that assumes male dominance and female subordination.
Impact: This masks the systematic exclusion of women from the public sphere while justifying their relegation to the private, domestic sphere.
2. Public vs. Private Spheres
Confusion: Patriarchal societies claim a separation between the public and private spheres, with contracts governing the public realm. Yet, the sexual contract underpins the private sphere, ensuring male authority within families and marriages.
Impact: Women's oppression in the private sphere (e.g., through marriage and unpaid labor) is excluded from political scrutiny and seen as "natural," while public contracts are celebrated as sites of freedom.
3. Freedom vs. Domination
Confusion: Social contract theory upholds freedom and equality as its core values, yet the sexual contract institutionalizes male domination, especially through structures like marriage and employment.
Impact: Women's submission to men is rationalized as a voluntary choice, ignoring the broader systemic coercions of patriarchy.
4. The Myth of Consent
Confusion: Consent is a cornerstone of contract theory, yet in patriarchal society, women's consent is often assumed rather than freely given. The sexual contract assumes women’s bodies and labor are available to men by default.
Impact: Marriage, prostitution, and labor arrangements perpetuate exploitation under the guise of consensual agreements.
5. Equality Among Men, Not All People
Confusion: The social contract envisions equality but only among men. Women are excluded as full participants because they are relegated to the status of dependents.
Impact: Patriarchal structures deny women the agency and autonomy that are theoretically central to contract theory.
6. Naturalization of Patriarchy
Confusion: Patriarchal society treats male dominance and female subordination as natural and inevitable, rather than as products of historical and social constructs like the sexual contract.
Impact: This naturalization obscures the fact that patriarchy is sustained by legal and political systems, not biological determinism.
7. Economic Exploitation Through Gender Roles
Confusion: The sexual division of labor is justified by the sexual contract, which assigns unpaid reproductive labor to women and productive labor to men.
Impact: Women's economic dependency on men is perpetuated, even in contexts that claim to champion economic freedom and independence.
Then, she talks about slavery, the political liberty of sons, about the labour agreements as examples of confusions in the patriarchal society. She also talks about marriage as the institution where the subordination of the women happens in the private sphere, which is not, as the public sphere, entitled to voting or deliberation. In that way, the subordination seems as natural in the patriarchal, traditional social contract society.
To finalise, she criticises prostitution. She argues that prostitution is not merely a consensual economic transaction but a deeply exploitative practice rooted in patriarchal domination. According to Pateman, the problems with prostitution are as follows:
1. Alienation of the Female Body
Argument: Prostitution commodifies women’s bodies, reducing them to objects of male use and satisfaction. Pateman argues that the sexual contract turns women’s bodies into property that can be bought and sold, alienating them from their own physical selves.
Critique: This alienation is unlike other forms of labor because it involves the commodification of a woman’s sexual being, which is central to her personhood.
2. False Consent and Coercion
Argument: The apparent "consent" in prostitution is often not freely given but coerced by structural inequalities, such as poverty, gendered power dynamics, and societal pressures. For Pateman, this so-called consent cannot legitimize the inherent exploitation of the practice.
Critique: Women may "choose" prostitution, but this choice is constrained by a lack of viable alternatives, making it a reflection of systemic oppression rather than genuine autonomy.
3. Reinforcement of Patriarchal Power
Argument: Prostitution upholds patriarchal norms by perpetuating the idea that men are entitled to access women’s bodies for their pleasure. It reinforces the sexual contract, which positions women as subordinates whose primary value lies in their sexual availability.
Critique: This entitlement feeds broader patterns of gender inequality, sustaining male dominance both within and outside the realm of prostitution.
4. Dehumanization of Women
Argument: Prostitution dehumanizes women by treating them as commodities rather than as individuals with dignity and agency. This dehumanization extends beyond individual transactions, shaping societal views of women as objects rather than full persons.
Critique: The transactional nature of prostitution reduces women to their sexual function, undermining their humanity and reinforcing stereotypes that harm all women, not just those engaged in prostitution.
5. Exploitation Disguised as Work
Argument: Proponents of prostitution often frame it as "work," equating it with other forms of labor. Pateman rejects this equivalence, arguing that the intimate, embodied nature of sexual labor makes it fundamentally exploitative in ways other work is not.
Critique: Unlike other forms of labor, prostitution involves the sale of access to one’s sexuality and personhood, making it a uniquely degrading form of exploitation.
6. Economic and Social Inequality
Argument: Prostitution thrives on and perpetuates structural inequalities, particularly those of gender and class. It exploits vulnerable women, often from marginalized backgrounds, for the benefit of wealthier, more powerful men.
Critique: This dynamic reinforces the economic and social subordination of women, making prostitution a symptom of broader systemic injustices.
7. The Myth of Sexual Liberation
Argument: Some view prostitution as a form of sexual liberation or empowerment. Pateman counters that this narrative ignores the broader context of patriarchy, where women’s sexuality is commodified and controlled by men.
Critique: Far from being liberating, prostitution perpetuates the patriarchal logic that ties women’s value to their sexual availability.
May 16, 2020
I recognise that this is a seminal feminist text, and it was probably better when it was written, but viewed from a third-wave feminist lens it did not age particularly well, though Pateman thankfully sidesteps any overtly TERF-y arguments. The analysis of Filmer vs Locke and the way that contract theory managed to relegate women to a permanently unequal status is probably the best part of the book, and I found some of the arguments about contract as it relates to sexual consent particularly relevant for today's world. This book was a dense read at times and definitely a work of critical theory rather than a feminist manifesto.
Currently reading
February 16, 2010another required school read, but enjoying pateman's further (and necessary) exploration of traditional social contract theory
February 12, 2026
Por primera vez en mucho tiempo me encontré devorando un libro en pocos días. Carole Pateman, feminista (radical?) británica y teórica politica. Hace un exaustivo analisis del contrato social y propone que en esta ficción politica se esconde el contrato sexual, anterior al mismo y sin el cual el contrato social no existiría.
Una critica al contractualismo y a las teorias feministas contractualistas, muy bien argumentada durante todo el libro. Retoma esta idea de la mujer como 'segundo sexo' (ella no lo dice asi, pero me recuerda a De Bouvieur), cuando refiere al concepto de individuo como una ambiguedad, donde entramos todos y todas en tanto individuo, pero en realidad no refiere a todos y todas, solo a los hombres (y mas especificamente, a los hombres propietarios).
En la actualidad se toma la idea de individuos que abarca a todos, se presupone que debe abarcar a todos y entonces se la incluye a la mujer sin cuestionamiento, sin prever que la mujer no parte desde la misma base en los derechos civiles politicos, porque hay un contrato sexual que se ignora.
El contrato sexual es el pacto que otorga a los hombres el rol de amo y a la mujer el lugar de la subordinación, de esclavitud. Pero el pacto no es entre hombres y mujeres, es entre hombres para distribuirse a las mujeres.
Podemos ver entonces, e incluso lo hace explicito la autora, que la subordinación de las mujeres en relación a los hombres, se construye sobre la diferencia sexual. Aqui el genero es la forma en la que se estructura historicamente el comportamiento de los cuerpos según su sexo.
Aborda como ese contrato se reproduce en la actualidad, estando siempre la mujer en una situacion de desigualdad y no siendo tomada como individuo, si no relegada a su condicion de mujer, a su cuerpo, en los 'pactos' contemporáneos: tanto en el matrimonio, como en el trabajo, en la prostitucion y subrogración de vientre.
Un libro muy facil de digerir y de vital importancia, tanto en la teoria feminista como en la teoria politica. Feliz con el descubrimiento de esta autora, muy completa en su argumentación y muy clara en su forma de transmitirla. Recomiendo, mi primer 5 estrellas del año.
Una critica al contractualismo y a las teorias feministas contractualistas, muy bien argumentada durante todo el libro. Retoma esta idea de la mujer como 'segundo sexo' (ella no lo dice asi, pero me recuerda a De Bouvieur), cuando refiere al concepto de individuo como una ambiguedad, donde entramos todos y todas en tanto individuo, pero en realidad no refiere a todos y todas, solo a los hombres (y mas especificamente, a los hombres propietarios).
En la actualidad se toma la idea de individuos que abarca a todos, se presupone que debe abarcar a todos y entonces se la incluye a la mujer sin cuestionamiento, sin prever que la mujer no parte desde la misma base en los derechos civiles politicos, porque hay un contrato sexual que se ignora.
El contrato sexual es el pacto que otorga a los hombres el rol de amo y a la mujer el lugar de la subordinación, de esclavitud. Pero el pacto no es entre hombres y mujeres, es entre hombres para distribuirse a las mujeres.
Podemos ver entonces, e incluso lo hace explicito la autora, que la subordinación de las mujeres en relación a los hombres, se construye sobre la diferencia sexual. Aqui el genero es la forma en la que se estructura historicamente el comportamiento de los cuerpos según su sexo.
Aborda como ese contrato se reproduce en la actualidad, estando siempre la mujer en una situacion de desigualdad y no siendo tomada como individuo, si no relegada a su condicion de mujer, a su cuerpo, en los 'pactos' contemporáneos: tanto en el matrimonio, como en el trabajo, en la prostitucion y subrogración de vientre.
Un libro muy facil de digerir y de vital importancia, tanto en la teoria feminista como en la teoria politica. Feliz con el descubrimiento de esta autora, muy completa en su argumentación y muy clara en su forma de transmitirla. Recomiendo, mi primer 5 estrellas del año.
July 13, 2018
The scholarship in this book remains impressive, covering a vast breadth of early modern thought on paternal, patriarchal, and fraternal foundations of political right, with a bunch of Freud thrown in. For me somewhat surprising, however, is that it hasn’t aged so well. The core insight—that notions of social contract between free and equal individuals are parasitic on a prior, unacknowledged denial of women’s freedom in a sexual contract between men for sexual access to women—remains radical and thought provoking. (See the first part of Mary Rawlinson’s book Just Life for an update on this idea of the fraternal reorganization of patriarchal right.)
The problem with Pateman’s approach is that the argument equivocates between positing a flaw in the social contract narrative (i.e. revealing a contradiction that casts those theory into doubt) and positing a real account of the historical/logical origins of sexual subjection. Because she does not signal when she ventriloquizes Hobbes or Locke and when she speaks in her own voice, the argument seems often to beg the question. And maybe it does.
For those seeking to read this book seriously, I recommend Nancy Fraser’s commentary “Beyond the Master/Subject Model” in Social Text (1993) which really sheds light on Pateman’s dependence on a 1980’s radical feminist notion of power inequality as subjection. Also, check out Moira Gatens’ “Sex, Contract, and Genealogy” (1996) for a Nietzschean/Foucauldian critique that has since become a classic starting point for queer theorists who seek to distance themselves from feminism. (IMHO Gatens does this maneuver far more elegantly than Janet Halley and her cohort of contemporary feminist/queer sex warriors, but that’s a debate for another day.)
The problem with Pateman’s approach is that the argument equivocates between positing a flaw in the social contract narrative (i.e. revealing a contradiction that casts those theory into doubt) and positing a real account of the historical/logical origins of sexual subjection. Because she does not signal when she ventriloquizes Hobbes or Locke and when she speaks in her own voice, the argument seems often to beg the question. And maybe it does.
For those seeking to read this book seriously, I recommend Nancy Fraser’s commentary “Beyond the Master/Subject Model” in Social Text (1993) which really sheds light on Pateman’s dependence on a 1980’s radical feminist notion of power inequality as subjection. Also, check out Moira Gatens’ “Sex, Contract, and Genealogy” (1996) for a Nietzschean/Foucauldian critique that has since become a classic starting point for queer theorists who seek to distance themselves from feminism. (IMHO Gatens does this maneuver far more elegantly than Janet Halley and her cohort of contemporary feminist/queer sex warriors, but that’s a debate for another day.)
January 13, 2026
Looking forward to integrating discussion of this book into our engagement of social contract theorists (Hobbes Locke and Rousseau). Most interested to see how these three quotes create insights for my seniors with respect to to the two books they read last semester on the crisis of liberalism (Lowi and Deneen)
1) Women can attain the formal standing of civil individuals but as embodied feminine beings we can never be "individuals" in the same sense as men
2) The body, sex and sexual difference are inseparable from civil subordination, but the body and sex must be separated from the individual if civil subordination is to be created and called freedom
3) Men have a vested interest in maintaining the silence about the law of male sex-right , but the opportunity exists for political argument and action to move outside the dichotomies of patriarchal civil society, and for the creation of free relations in which manhood is reflected back from autonomous femininity
Chapters 3 and 4 are gold and I particularly appreciate discussion of Kant and the marriage contract which came as a total surprise
1) Women can attain the formal standing of civil individuals but as embodied feminine beings we can never be "individuals" in the same sense as men
2) The body, sex and sexual difference are inseparable from civil subordination, but the body and sex must be separated from the individual if civil subordination is to be created and called freedom
3) Men have a vested interest in maintaining the silence about the law of male sex-right , but the opportunity exists for political argument and action to move outside the dichotomies of patriarchal civil society, and for the creation of free relations in which manhood is reflected back from autonomous femininity
Chapters 3 and 4 are gold and I particularly appreciate discussion of Kant and the marriage contract which came as a total surprise
October 29, 2018
3.5
Un livre très intéressant qui est venu compléter, pour ma part, des lectures matérialistes et radicales du féminisme.
Il n'a cependant pas été facile à lire, c'est écrit de façon très "académique", à en perdre un peu le fil par moment... Avant de le lire, j'aurais probablement du me replonger un peu dans le contrat social de Rousseau afin de comprendre plus facilement les références que Pateman y fait.
Pateman aborde dans un chapitre relativement long les rapports entre le père et le fils, et entre le fils et la mère, qui m'a rappelé les théories de Refuser d'être un Homme de Stoltenberg, sorti l'année suivante.
Le chapitre sur la prostitution se distingue de toutes les façons dont les feminismes abordent habituellement le problème, il constitue à lui seul la pépite du livre, c'est pourquoi je le conseille vivement.
Un livre très intéressant qui est venu compléter, pour ma part, des lectures matérialistes et radicales du féminisme.
Il n'a cependant pas été facile à lire, c'est écrit de façon très "académique", à en perdre un peu le fil par moment... Avant de le lire, j'aurais probablement du me replonger un peu dans le contrat social de Rousseau afin de comprendre plus facilement les références que Pateman y fait.
Pateman aborde dans un chapitre relativement long les rapports entre le père et le fils, et entre le fils et la mère, qui m'a rappelé les théories de Refuser d'être un Homme de Stoltenberg, sorti l'année suivante.
Le chapitre sur la prostitution se distingue de toutes les façons dont les feminismes abordent habituellement le problème, il constitue à lui seul la pépite du livre, c'est pourquoi je le conseille vivement.
May 7, 2023
okay no i havent read the entire thing but i feel like the amount of time ive spent w it counts as me reading the entire thing right guys
just let me add to my reading goal okay
ANYWAYS i am a little too stupid to read the entire thing bc its really fawking hard guys HOWEVER NOW THAT I FKIN GET IT AFTER 50953483 YEARS shes changed my life a little like omfg. who else up thinking about the oppression of women fr.
i do think pateman is a little crazy, still. BUT i also think a big part of me doesnt know whats going on so like ITS ME NOT U PATEMAN FR.
5 stars for changing for my life a little but 3 stars for being a little inaccessible for silly girls
just let me add to my reading goal okay
ANYWAYS i am a little too stupid to read the entire thing bc its really fawking hard guys HOWEVER NOW THAT I FKIN GET IT AFTER 50953483 YEARS shes changed my life a little like omfg. who else up thinking about the oppression of women fr.
i do think pateman is a little crazy, still. BUT i also think a big part of me doesnt know whats going on so like ITS ME NOT U PATEMAN FR.
5 stars for changing for my life a little but 3 stars for being a little inaccessible for silly girls
March 30, 2021
Pateman makes the necessary connection between social contract theory, liberal ideology and what historically has been known as "the sex question". She proves that writers of social contracts had very different ideas for men and for women and how that affected the role of women in civil life. I was particularly interested in the points she makes regarding the contract of marriage and its relation to the contract of prostitution. Absolutely fascinating. However, there are tints of un-nuanced radical feminism (the typical comparison between heterosexual relationships and rape, trans-exclusion, etc.) which is often present in radical feminist essays, especially in the 80s. Notwithstanding of the biases, it's a thought-provoking seminal book that must be read by everyone interested in political philosophy or feminism.
February 6, 2023
I have trouble understanding what she’s doing in this book, at a very basic level. I’m never sure what’s critique and what’s construction, or what the dialectic is. What I think I understand I disagree with in an uninteresting way. Maybe I have an analytic beam in my eye that prevents me from getting it. Some of it is definitely compelling, like the bits about Freud, but I’m not convinced that Freud’s legacy is really responsible for much oppression in the world. Certainly a good thing to watch out for.
September 21, 2022
I forgive the mild gender essentialism because Pateman does take pains to reject the category of the Eternal Woman as 'patriarchal fiction', and also she integrates black feminist critiques of racial differences among women, and also she seems less interested in defining 'woman' and more interested in what the state defines it as so as to regulate certain relationships, and also it was the '80s, and also you gotta read her takedown of Kant. Because that was ice-cold.
December 2, 2023
Dôsledná dekonštrukcia kontraktarizmu - náhľady na texty klasických teoretikov zmluvy genderovou prizmou sú vždy šťavnaté. Pateman presvedčivo vykresľuje sexuálnu zmluvu zaručujúcu prístup mužov k ženskému telu ako základ občianskej spoločnosti a bratskej "rovnosti". Plusové body za to, že ma podnietila k prehodnoteniu názoru na prostitúciu/sex work (ku ktorej je veľmi kritická), mínusové za explicitnú transfóbiu, ktorá príde nečakane. 1988, no.
December 9, 2025
1.5 ⭐️. Recomendación del máster de igualdad y género de profesora liberal… quizás por eso no deberia de haberle hecho caso. Puntos buenos las analogias y análisis con Locke/Rousseau y demás, junto al capítulo sobre la prostitución. Demasiado largo y repetitivo para las ideas que queria dar y que, a dia de hoy, quizás solo el efecto contractual es lo nuevo, pero no ha descubierto novedades y me ha cansado y aburrido.
January 29, 2024
Considero que acierta de pleno al señalar el "derecho conyugal" sobre el "paternal", incluyendo una intuición en relación con la maternidad subrogada. Excelente exposición de lo que implica el contrato de matrimonio y de la prostitución. Lo único a señalar negativamente sería cierto esencialismo en lo que sería la "mujer".
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