Mackinnon feminism, Marxism, aretha, and the State It1 a tlitudles alld feelings as powerful components of social reality is irrelevant. In this sense, the argunent is(to some It can also justify limiting the extension of the franchise to women who 1 sI purportedly of middlle-cliass eclu planation for its opportunism "lecong to"men of the s: me class that already exercises it, to the further linits charge tlit marxisn is Imale defined in theory and in Detriment of the excluded underclass, "their "women inclucled goi lite. meaning that it moves within the world view and in the interest This kindl of ng is confined neither to the issue of the vor al tell. Fe ists argue that analyzing society exclusively in class terms nor to the nineteenth century. Mill's logic is embedded in a theoretical :)res the distinctive social experiences of the sexes, obscuring w'omen's ch contemporary feminist theory and nni. M exist clemands, it is claimed, could be (and in part have been stifles much of the marxist critique. That women should be allowed to isfied without alering women's inequality to men. Feminists have engage in politics expressed Mill's concern that the state not restrict olel fod tlat working-class movements and the left undervalue individuals'sell-government, their freedom to develop talents for their nens work and concerns, neglect the role of feelings and fo us on institutional and material change, denigrate women in proce humanity. As an empirical rationalist, he resisted attributing to biology life, and in general fail to distinguish them- any other ideology or group domin:ed by m: le interests Inost sex-balsedl ine litics inaccurate or dubious, inefficient, and there- M i sisIs and feminists thus accuse each other of secking (what in each fore unjust. T'he liberty of women as inclividluials to achieve the limits of n, terus is) reforin-changes that appease and assuage without ad self-clevelopment without arbitrary interference extended to women his oing tie grounds of cliscontent-where (again in each one's terins)a meritocratic goal of the self-made man, condemning(what has since cone to be icrinedl)sexism as an interference with personal initiative and n)I only that the uther's analysis is incorrect, but that its laissez-faire The hospitality of such an analysis to marxist concerns is su y uli tt o allegations is groundless. In the feminist view, sex,in lematic. One might extend Mill's argument lll sis illl in reality, does divide classes, a fact imore arbitrary, socially conditioned factor that produces inefficient de- velopment of talent aud unjust distribution of resources among individ lave seen parts of tie woumen's movement function as it special interest uals. But although this might be in a sense materialist, it would not be a group to advance the class-privileged: educated and professional class analysis. Mill does not even allow for income leveling. Unequal ll.To consider this group coextensive with"the womens move- distribution of wealth is exactly what laissez-faire and unregulated pe men"precludes questioning a definition of coalesced interest and resis- sonal initiative produces. The individlual concept of rights that this theory requires on a juridical level (especially but not only in the eco Broadly lased segment. But advocates of woen's interests have not nomic sphere), a concept which produces ihe tension between liberty for alwa ys been class conscious; some have exploited class-basecl arguer each and equality among all, pervades liberal feminisan, substantiating lor advantage, even when the interests of working-class women were the criticism that feminism is for the privileged few The marxi Declin ple, in 1866. in an act often thought to inaugurate the first titudes is also based on something real: the centrality of e of feminism, Join Stuart Mill petitioned the English parliament Io raising Consciousness raising is the major technique of analysis, struc suffrage with the following partial justification:"Under what ure of organization, method of practice, and theory of social change of ever conditions, and within whatever limits, men are admittedl to sul- he womens movement. G In consciousness raising, often in groups, the on:ally supported universal suffrage. under the same. The majority of women of any class are not likely to gon the stle Perhaps Mill means that, to the extent class determines opi is nethod in the way developed lere. See I'ameLt Allen, Free Space: d Perspect o SNiall Group in tended to exclude from"the hess Raising, "in Aother Ivas Hsm+15hEm.的Aes duette(New York: Juln wiley Sons, 1971): Joan Cassell, A Group Called Ivomlen (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970), Pp rrhoNd& Symbolism in the Feminist Alowement(New York: David McKay, 1977); and Nancy