Women and the Politics of Class

Johanna Brenner writes with a clarity of purpose that arises out of a lifetime of participation in the struggles of working-class women. A major voice on the American left.--Mike Davis, May 2000Is there a future for feminism? The debate over the direction and politics of the women's movement has been joined recently by post-feminists and anti-feminists, in addition to competing feminist perspectives. In Women and the Politics of Class, Johanna Brenner offers a distinctive view, arguing for a strategic turn in feminist politics toward coalitions centered on the interests of working-class women.Women and the Politics of Classengages many crucial contemporary feminist issues-abortion, reproductive technology, comparable worth, the impoverishment of women, the crisis in care-giving, and the shredding of the social safety net through welfare reform and budget cuts. These problems, Brenner argues, must be set in the political and economic context of a state and society dominated by the imperatives of capital accumulation.Drawing on historical explorations of the labor movement and working-class politics, Brenner provides a fresh materialist approach to one of the most important issues of feminist theory today: the intersection of race, ethnicity, nationality, gender, sexuality, and class.

Johanna Brenner is Coordinator of Women's Studies at Portland State University in Portland, Oregon. She has written for New Left Review, Gender and Society, and other periodicals, and is a long-time activist for reproductive rights, welfare rights, and socialism