Identity Politics: Lesbian Feminism and the Limits of Community

Women in the Political Economy

by Shane Phelan

"Lesbian feminism began and has fueled itself with the rejection of liberalism.... In this rejection, lesbian feminists were not alone. They were joined by the New Left, by many blacks in the civil rights movement, by male academic theorists.... What all these groups shared was an intense awareness of the ways in which liberalism fails to account for the social reality of the world, through a reliance upon law and legal structure to define membership, through individualism, through its basis in a particular conception of rationality." In tracing how lesbian feminism came to be defined in uneasy relationships with the Women’s Movement and gay rights groups, Shane Phelan explores the tension between liberal ideals of individual rights and tolerance and communitarian ideals of solidarity. The debate over lesbian sado-masochism—an expression of individual choice or pornographic, anti-feminist behavior?—is considered as a test case. Phelan addresses the problems faced by "the woman-identified woman" in a liberal society that presumes heterosexuality as the biological, psychological, and moral standard. Often silenced by laws defining their sexual behavior as criminal and censured by a medical establishment that persists in defining homosexuality as perversion, lesbians, like blacks and other groups, have fought to have the same rights as others in their communities and even in their own homes. Lesbian feminists have also sought to define themselves as a community that would be distinctly different, a community that would disavow the traditional American obsession with individual advancement in the world as it is. In this controversial study of political philosophy and the women’s movement, Phelan argues that "the failure to date to produce a satisfying theory and program for lesbian action is reflective of the failure of modern political thinking to produce a compelling, nonsuspect alternative to liberalism."

Genres: Nonfiction, LGBT, Lesbian

256 pages, Paperback

First published September 5, 1989

Reviews

[Colleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a difficult read due to the academic language and my unfamiliarity with the theories of political thought presented within. However, despite the fact that this book was published in 1989, I found much of what was discussed relevant to issues today. Phelan was adamant that pure liberal individualism is too weak to be a good basis for argument. If everybody is "entitled to their own opinion," it becomes impossible to pass judgement on anything. Nothing can be condemned or supported. (Free speech even for Nazis) She also condemns total communitarianism, stating that there will always be those excluded from the community. When the community tries to widen to accommodate the previously excluded, the people in the community will feel threatened. (Trans-exclusionary radical feminists come to mind) She explains that what is necessary is a middle ground where communities can exist for support but coalition, though painful, is necessary. Though I did not always agree with Phelan, I enjoyed reading this book and I feel that my understanding has improved drastically concerning the politics of oppressed groups both historically and today.

[Audrey Saltarelli]

This book provides a good overarching history of lesbian feminism and how identify politics has played into but it does not provide much theory or depth on a philosophical level. However if one is unfamiliar with the timeline of lesbian feminism this is a valuable read.