Why stress the feminist case? Sexism in science and society

4.1.1 Haack’s general suspicion

Feminism, as I have conceptualized it so far, is a critical project, in a general sense; feminists make judgments about things with reference to certain standards. Feminism is, however, also,

239 Several of the points made in this chapter were developed in a previous paper, “A Standpoint Theory to the Point?”. I wish to thank Hilary Rose, Kari Wærness, Evelyn Fox Keller and Roger Strand for comments. I have since 2002 been teaching at a course in feminist theory at the University of Bergen. I wish to thank my students for discussing the merits of feminist standpoint epistemology with me.

more specifically, critical of contemporary society. Feminists criticize, for example, practices of contemporary society with reference to a standard of justice (including gender justice):

Feminists consider gender injustice to be a real problem. Haack does not deny that gender injustice may be a real problem in several settings, on several occasions (1998: 118-119).

However, she suspects that there is less sexism than feminists have argued, for example in the

“processes of academic recruitment”, and when “funding policies” are made, and that sexism is more seldom an explanation of “bad science” than feminist scholars have claimed (op.cit.:

176, 203). Presented as it is, as a general suspicion, it is highly problematic. Studies, whether pursued by feminists or by others, should be scrutinized and assessed individually, case by case, with reference to standards of genuine inquiry. Feminists’ conclusions about state of affairs in contemporary science and society cannot be dismissed based on general uninvestigated assumptions about the biases of such conclusions.

But can we not at least suspect there to be certain biases? Will feminists not tend to overestimate the presence of sexism? Overestimation of sexism may mean, for example, that:

i) Human actions are presented as more determined by patriarchal social structures, cultural or psychoanalytical patterns than they in fact are.

ii) The persuasiveness of patriarchal structures and patterns are overestimated.

iii) The persuasiveness of patriarchal structures or patterns on one level (for example on a psychoanalytical level) is taken to prove that patriarchal structures or patterns on a different level (for example, on a cultural level) are also persuasive, without additional argument.

iv) The distinction between patriarchal structures and patterns and gendered structures and patterns (which may or may not be patriarchal) is evaded.

v) The emphasis on gender injustice results in an underestimation of other kinds of injustice.

vi) The harmful consequences of patriarchal structures and patterns for individual men or groups of men are underestimated.

Underestimation of sexism, on the other hand, may mean, for example, that:

i) Human actions are presented as less determined by patriarchal social structures, cultural or psychoanalytical patterns than they in fact are.

ii) The persuasiveness of patriarchal structures and patterns are underestimated.

iii) The persuasiveness of patriarchal structures or patterns on one level (for example on a

psychoanalytical level) is not considered an impetus to investigate whether there are also persuasive patriarchal structures or patterns on other levels (for example on a cultural level).

iv) Gendered patterns (which may or may not be patriarchal) are not investigated as possible patriarchal patterns.

v) The emphasis on kinds of injustice other than gender injustice results in an underestimation of gender injustice.

vi) The harmful consequences of patriarchal structures and patterns for individual men or groups of men are overestimated.

There is no general reason to believe that the degree of overestimation of sexism among feminist inquirers would be very different from the degree of overestimation of, for example, racism among inquirers committed to anti-racist norms. The question is whether we have a general reason to expect that inquirers explicitly committed to, for example, anti-racism or anti-sexism, overestimate the degree of racism or sexism. Were this the case, it would not be because their commitments were made explicit: Problems of over- and underestimation are not solved by hiding or ignoring the commitments that are possibly biasing one’s investigations.²⁴⁰

There may, however, be possibly biasing professional interests involved when feminists study sexism (and anti-racists study racism). If it, for example, turns out that sexism in contemporary society is in fact a marginal problem, why fund feminist inquirers investigating it? Why not concentrate on other issues? The fear of being confronted with such questions may tempt feminist inquirers to overestimate the problem of sexism. In addition, questions of truthfulness may occur: What if feminists’ engagement against sexism – an engagement often of a comprehensive ethical-political and deep existential kind – has been based on wishful or fearful thinking, rather than on theories of state affairs established on the basis of genuine inquiry? Have feminists been deceiving themselves? To overestimate sexism may seem a convenient thing to do, when confronted by such disturbing questions concerning one’s self-understanding.

However, not only feminist inquirers have professional interests and vulnerable identities.

Inquirers investigating problems other than sexism, or who consider the problem of sexism to

240 See also Chapter 2.

be marginal, may have a professional interest in presenting sexism as marginal – and so be tempted to underestimate it – in order to have their investigations properly funded. Also the self-understanding of many scientists is at stake, moreover, if feminist analyses of the persuasiveness of sexism in contemporary science and society turn out to be accurate.

Hence, generally speaking, we should not expect feminist inquirers to do either better or worse as genuine inquirers. Rather, we should scrutinize their particular contributions according to the same criteria as other contributions. Feminists should be treated as reason-givers and reason-takers on par with other reasons-reason-givers and reason-takers. This is an issue of what is truth-functional, but also an issue of respecting fundamental norms of civility.

General suspicions about the intellectual integrity of feminist inquirers of the kind Haack notoriously raises thus disturb not only genuine truth-seeking, they are also morally disturbing.

4.1.2 Sexism in the natural sciences?

Haack denies in particular that sexism infects “the physical sciences” (1998: 117). Feminists who claim this, exaggerates “the supposed ubiquity of sexual metaphors in the writing of scientists and philosophers of science”: “[…] whether a cognitively important metaphor is fruitful, whether it makes us look in the right or in the wrong direction, is independent of the desirability or otherwise of the social phenomena on which it calls” (original emphasis, ibid.).

Her position is, in short, that metaphors that reflect patriarchal norms may be truth-functional, even if these patriarchal norms are undesirable. Initially, Haack has, I think, a point.²⁴¹ The point is illuminatingly explicated by Herta Nagl-Docekal in her criticism of Evelyn Fox Keller’s dissection of the sexist metaphors in Francis Bacon’s writings:

Bacon verknüpft verschiedene Elemente – er beschreibt zum einen die Stellung, die Wissenschaft und Technik der Natur gegenüber einnehmen, als eine beherrschende, und er befindet zum anderen, dass sich das Verhältnis der Geschlechter als Analogie bzw. als Metaphor heranziehen lässt. Aus feministischer Perspektive geht es nun primär darum zu thematisieren, wie die Geschlecterbeziehung hier imaginiert ist – es geht also darum, die Subordination der Frau sichtbar zu machen und zurückzuweisen. Eine solche Kritik impliziert die Forderung: Das Verhältnis der Geschlechter muss so gedacht werden, dass es sich nicht als ein Modellfall für die Characterisierung hierarchischer Strukturen eignet. Der Einwand gegen Bacon, der daraus abzuleiten ist, betrifft freilich nur eines der beiden unterschiedenen Elemente seiner Reflexion – er betrifft Bacons Sicht der Beziehung von Mann und Frau,

241 Sexism may, however, infect the physical sciences in ways other than through the use of sexist metaphors (see Chapter 2). Haack, unfortunately, does not deliberate upon this possibility.

während er seine Konzeption des Verhältnisses von Wissenschaft und Technik zur Natur als solche untangiert lässt (original emphasis, 1999: 154).

That is: Bacon’s “These von der Herrschaft des Menschen über die Natur” might be correct, even if he were using the fact that men have power over women – a fact that can be criticized from the point of view of justice – as a metaphor for this “Herrschaft” (ibid.). Hence, whether Bacon’s thesis is correct or not is a specific problem, a problem in its own right:²⁴² “Das Anliegen einer Befreiung der Frau macht es nicht eo ipso erforderlich, für andere Bereiche angenommene Unterordnungsstrukturen abzulehnen” (ibid.).²⁴³ However, the issue is perhaps not so clear. It may be, for example, that Fox Keller is correct when she claims that metaphors of symmetry, interrelatedness and connectedness are more cognitive fruitful for genuine inquiry in the natural sciences than Baconian metaphors of “Herrschaft”.²⁴⁴ Thus, if patriarchal norms of women’s subordination cause us to avoid such metaphors, because symmetry, interrelatedness and connectedness are something we associate with the female qua the subordinate, these norms are truth-dysfunctional.²⁴⁵ Such norms are, moreover, morally unjustified, because they are incompatible with fundamental norms of civility. This does not mean that using metaphors which utilize in one way or another the fact that patriarchal relations do exist (a fact that few feminists would deny), is in itself morally questionable. The problem occurs if the inquirer claims, more or less explicitly, that such relations are legitimate.²⁴⁶

4.2 Sandra Harding’s feminist standpoint epistemology: An