In-Progress
Real Men on Top: The Metaphysics of Patriarchy
(under contract with Oxford University Press)
Patriarchy is complex, contingent, and dynamic. A metaphysical model of patriarchy should capture these features. Raising Real Men offers such a model. In it, I develop and defend a 'dynamic system model' of patriarchy, on which patriarchy is understood as a dynamic, adaptive system that produces 'real men' dominance.
'Real men', on my view, are not simply males. Rather, they are the primary beneficiaries of dominant cultural ideals of maleness and masculinity, or the features considered ‘natural’ for men. These ideals concern physical, psychological, and social features, they change across time, and they reproduce other social hierarchies. For example, historically (and still), features considered ‘natural’ for men have been such that trans and queer persons, racialized persons, persons with disabilities, and the working class are barred from access to 'real manhood'.
Patriarchy, I argue, is adaptive and self-reinforcing. It is continually reproduced or resisted by social forces that stabilize or destabilize it. Queer and trans embodiments, for example, are central cases of such destabilizing forces. However, by drawing out the adaptive nature of the patriarchal system, my account provides a conceptual framework for interrogating the destabilizing potential of queer and trans embodiments or, indeed, any group that threatens to destabilize patriarchy. Is there a way to destabilize patriarchy without simultaneously reinforcing it? Is there a way to destabilize patriarchy that is invulnerable to being assimilated within in? While I will not argue for particular answers to these questions, my model will clarify the entrenched difficulties that face any attempt to destabilize the patriarchal system.
'Real men', on my view, are not simply males. Rather, they are the primary beneficiaries of dominant cultural ideals of maleness and masculinity, or the features considered ‘natural’ for men. These ideals concern physical, psychological, and social features, they change across time, and they reproduce other social hierarchies. For example, historically (and still), features considered ‘natural’ for men have been such that trans and queer persons, racialized persons, persons with disabilities, and the working class are barred from access to 'real manhood'.
Patriarchy, I argue, is adaptive and self-reinforcing. It is continually reproduced or resisted by social forces that stabilize or destabilize it. Queer and trans embodiments, for example, are central cases of such destabilizing forces. However, by drawing out the adaptive nature of the patriarchal system, my account provides a conceptual framework for interrogating the destabilizing potential of queer and trans embodiments or, indeed, any group that threatens to destabilize patriarchy. Is there a way to destabilize patriarchy without simultaneously reinforcing it? Is there a way to destabilize patriarchy that is invulnerable to being assimilated within in? While I will not argue for particular answers to these questions, my model will clarify the entrenched difficulties that face any attempt to destabilize the patriarchal system.
Oppressive Categories (manuscript)
Who can justly demand recognition as a woman? as disabled? as black? All sides often assume that answers to these and similar questions will turn on who in fact has membership in the relevant category. As a result, attempts to answer these questions quickly become debates over metaphysical questions such as What makes someone a woman? or Is obesity really a disability? In this paper, I argue that such debates are orthogonal to the question of who can justly demand recognition in a socially significant category, such as woman or disabled. These categories can be unjust with respect to the grounds for category membership. Call these 'oppressive categories'. Oppressive categories show that what features ought to determine category membership can come apart from the features that do determine membership. After developing a framework for understanding oppressive categories, I argue from this framework to the possibility that persons who do not belong to a socially significant category can nevertheless justly demand recognition as category members.
