Title: The Feminization of the Corporation, the Masculinization of the State
Abstract: UNDER THE IMPACT OF FEMINISM, THE WESTERN GENDER ORDER HAS IN RECENT decades been on the move. In the process, bastions of male power and privilege have been held to account and women have successfully fought for and gained access to the sites of privilege and power that the male order traditionally defined as its own. Indeed, for Giddens (1993) the degree of change wrought was such that he was able to pronounce that, at the symbolic level, the Western gendered order was no longer in thrall to the order of the phallus, but to the penis, an altogether less impressive entity. In the face of this challenge, fixed and seemingly immutable definitions of what it is to be male have also been undermined. This is so much so that MacInnes (1998) concluded that masculine privilege has all but disappeared. Western society had become more complex and diverse, with women now routinely performing roles once held by men; and men have at last begun to embrace roles and values traditionally ascribed to the This historical process has delivered many benefits, but the shift from a paternalistic and starkly patriarchal society toward what could be described as a more effeminized one is not a one-way journey. Moreover, the direction of change is not necessarily progressive in the sense that sites and sources of male power have come to speak with another voice. Indeed, the response to the challenge posed by feminism has been to embrace modes of social control that either appear to appropriate elements of an effeminized culture, while abandoning its associated values at the point of practice, or to engage in forms of control that mark a stark repudiation of everything that can be construed as feminine. Below I will examine these contradictory movements by looking at how the corporate sector and the state in Anglo-American societies have responded to qualities and values the Western gendered order has traditionally ascribed to the For the purpose of this article, these include the idea that women embody by nature a nurturing orientation toward the world, in which the nurturing (maternal) element is mediated through practices that emphasize care, empathy, and compassion. (1) The first section examines how intensively aggressive and ruthless corporations have embraced elements of an effeminized culture in the form of an appropriation. In the second section, I analyze the punitive crusade initiated by the neoliberal state in its war against crime, a strategy of control that, far from appearing to accept feminine values, involves practices that mark their stark repudiation. The Feminization of the Corporation Where once pollution, environmental despoliation, and ill health figured as inevitable by-products of industrial development, this equation is no longer sustainable in the risk society of today. Corporate responsibility is now big business, and all major corporations invest significantly in their public image to prove they exercise it. Underpinning this shift, we find concerted moves to re-brand corporations in ways that intimate a friendly, ethical, and nurturing orientation toward the world and its problems. In the process, corporations known for their contribution to environmental destruction have re-branded themselves as ecologically friendly and corporations notorious for placing profit before health now pledge themselves to the wonderful task of promoting it. Others that, until recently, experienced severe criticism from activists for their tawdry relationship with human rights, now actively proclaim their commitment to human rights agendas. Ethical audits are now in vogue and an ethnical, nurturing orientation toward the world and its resources now regularly appears in corporate advertising. Cumulatively, this process heralds the emergence--at the level of public image at least--of corporate greening and softening. Perhaps more accurately regarding this movement, in this softening we are also witnessing a process characterized by the progressive effeminization of corporate practice. …
Publication Year: 2005
Publication Date: 2005-03-22
Language: en
Type: article
Access and Citation
Cited By Count: 4
AI Researcher Chatbot
Get quick answers to your questions about the article from our AI researcher chatbot