The four WAVES of FEMINISM

Today, at least formally and theoretically, both women and men maintain the same rights. However, if women have managed to acquire the current representation in society, it has been thanks to the struggle of many women during the last centuries, thanks to the feminist movement.

Throughout history, women have been oppressed by men, in unequal conditions, being recognized only for being her mother, wife and housewife, she has been denied the right to vote, the opportunity to study, to be able to practice professions that she only were “For men”, she has been denied the possibility of deciding if she wants to be a mother, the entrance to public spaces because she is a woman, among others inequalities. If you want to know how the movement has managed to abolish some inequalities between genders, keep reading this article from Psychology-Online, about the four waves of feminism.

Index

1. What is feminism
2. History of feminism
3. First wave of feminism
4. Second wave of feminism
5. Third wave of feminism
6. Fourth wave of feminism

What is feminism? Throughout history, women have starred in her struggle to achieve equal representation with men in society. The gender struggle It has been involved in different stages, processes and changes, in which the women's movement has managed to achieve great achievements thanks to its struggle. The trajectory of the changes achieved, thanks to the Feminist movement, has been divided to date into three stages, called the waves of feminism, currently entering the fourth wave of feminism.

The stages of feminism began with the first wave of the movement that took place in the French Revolution, being called enlightened feminism. Subsequently, from the mid-19th century until the end of World War II, the movement embarked on the second wave, liberal-suffragette feminism. In the sixties, the third wave of feminism appeared, sixties feminism or contemporary feminism. Today, we can see the beginning of the fourth wave of feminism, feminism after the eighties. Thus, we can affirm that today four feminist waves are known.

The birth of the feminist movement It dates back to the 18th century, during the beginning of the French Revolution and the Enlightenment. The feminist movement arose from the need for the liberation of women, seeking a change in social relations, through the hierarchical elimination and inequalities between genders. It was then that the women came together as a collective to fight for freedom, civil rights, justice and equality, rights pawned by and for men at that time, excluding women from them.

As a result of this first awareness of the oppression of women in our society, throughout the history there have been great movements or stages of feminism, reaching great advances to date from today. These stages, known as the waves of feminism, compress the history of the movement with its achievements and difficulties, which feminism has had to overcome to this day. Let us therefore see the historical journey of the feminist movement, starting from its four great stages, the four waves of feminism. In the following article you will find more information about the history and currents of feminism.

The first of the four waves of feminism was born in the 18th century, in front of the start of the French Revolution and the Enlightenment. The main objective of the French Revolution consisted in the achievement of the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity. However, the freedoms, rights and legal and political equality so persecuted by the revolution, excluded women.

Thus, the first wave of feminism began with the lack of representation of women in the principles that the revolution upheld, three principles directly related to man and exclusive for the woman. It was then that the women's collective began to fight for your equal rights and by the need to highlight the role of women in society, which had remained hidden until then.

The demands of the women's collective that arose in the first wave of feminism focused on women's access to the following rights:

• To education.
• To Liberty.
• To equality.
• To the political rights: expressing her right to vote.

However, the response they obtained to their demand in the Napoleonic Civil Code was the creation of discriminatory laws, such as ruling that the home was an exclusive area for women, it was established that women would be considered minors and specific crimes such as adultery or abortion. In addition to this, women continued to be excluded from education.

In the framework of the stages of the feminist movement, it was in the first wave when the female collective began to become aware of oppression of society about women, women wanted to stop being only mother and wife.

The second wave of feminism, known socially as suffrage, took place between the mid-nineteenth century until the fifties of the twentieth century, at the end of the Second World War.

Second wave of feminism in the United States

The second of the stages of the feminist movement began in the United States, where four women joined the fight for the country's independence and the cause for the liberation of slaves. These two events led to women beginning to deal with social and political issues. Given this, suffragism was born, which pursued two objectives: the right to vote for women and the right to education, which remained related, since the movement defended that with the possibility of being educated it would be more difficult to deny them the right to vote.

The group of the movement remained interclass, since it was considered that every woman suffered such inequalities, regardless of her social class. At that time, the passive revolution that had begun to take place changed its strategy to become an active movement, where women began to have a more activist role taking actions such as interrupting speeches or going on hunger strikes.

The strength of the movement began when the four women who had fought for independence and the slaves in The United States traveled to England to attend an antislavery congress, in which they were denied entry because they were women. After several years of struggle in England, John Stuart Mill positioned himself as an ally of the movement, indicating that the solution in the women's struggle was to eliminate discriminatory legislative positions, since once these restrictions are removed, women could emerge from subordination and begin to become independent.

Second wave of feminism in Europe

It was not until the end of World War II that the women of England did not get their right to vote, as during the war women began to occupy men's jobs that they had gone to war and, faced with this, society could not oppose their demands. Faced with this, by the 1930s, the vast majority of developed countries had reconsidered and recognized the right to vote of women.

The fight of feminism continued with the demand for free access to higher education, equality in all professions, as well as in salary and civil rights, the right to share the parental authority of their children. They also claimed the injustice that the husband should be the administrator of the marital property.

Even and the effort, after the war, the media and governments focused on the objective of removing women from wartime work, returning them home, a maneuver named The mystique of femininity.

The third wave of feminism came in the Sixties decade, where in the face of the Mystique of femininity, women felt empty because of the role they should play in society, that of mother, wife and housewife. It was then that Betty Friedan created the National Organization of Women (NOW), becoming the most representative women's organization of liberal feminism.

The liberal feminism It was characterized by its opposition to inequality, and not in terms of oppression and exploitation, it was about reforming the system to acquire equality between genders. The liberals argued that the basis of the problem centered on the exclusion of women in the public sphere, appealing their right to enter the labor market.

What is radical feminism

Was the radical feminism the one that gained prominence in the sixties. Radical feminism was opposed to the ideas of liberalism, which was based on a reformist policy, since they had the objective of abolishing the patriarchal order, which was remained intact, because although they had achieved legitimation of rights, the social system continued to be based on sexist, class, racist and social values. imperialists.

Faced with this reality, the New Left and new radical social movements appeared, such as radical feminism, which pursued the objective of forging a new form of society. The following article explains in more depth the difference between radical and liberal feminism.

The first proposal of this movement was sustained in the women's liberation movement, which consisted of let the woman organize herself autonomously, separating from men. The entire collective agreed with the need for separation from the male gender, however two ramifications were born: radical feminism of politics and radical feminists. For the first group, the oppression of women was produced by capitalism, considering feminism a part of the left, while radical feminists opposed subordination to the left, stating that men benefited from its domination. However, they shared most of his ideals.

The common goal of radical feminism was to abolition of patriarchy, defined as a system governed by the sexual denomination, oppressive of women, under the slogan "the personal is political", defending that the values ​​of patriarchy also affected private life, such as family structure or sexuality.

The fourth wave of feminism begins after eighty is concentrated today, where the feminist collective claims the need for another wave, due to the continuity of abuse gender, abuses and violations, still existing differences in the world of work, inequality in judicial decisions, etc.

Faced with this, the feminist movement is stronger than ever and is characterized by its activism on the Internet. They make use of social networks to increase their visibility and their greater international impact, demanding the fight for equality, civil rights, the right to abortion, opposition to sexist violence and stereotypes, the defense of sexual freedom, where it enters with force the LGTBI collective and the denunciation of sexism in the media.

The movement is described under the name of sisterhood, understood as the existing relationship between brotherhood and solidarity that should exist between women, enhancing the activist role of women. For example, in the creation of self-awareness groups that consist of raising awareness among women based on own experiences, mass demonstrations, acts of protest, sabotage, creating centers of self help, etc. These actions continue the principle that no woman should overcome another, fighting for communitarianism. However, the claim on the Internet stands out above all, cyberfeminism. In the following article you will find the types of feminism that exist today.

This article is merely informative, in Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.

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