ABSTRACT: The term intersectionality invokes “race, class and gender” as dimensions of inequality that operate in and through each other, but different understandings of inequality shape how they are addressed politically. This has been long understood in the case of class inequality, where the US is very different than Europe in what ways of talking about social justice are most familiar. But race, nationality or ethnicity and gender are also framed differently in different political systems and also reflect social struggles of long historical duration. In this talk, I draw attention to the ways that struggles for gender equality have intersected with those for class and race justice and continue intersectionally to shape the meaning of all forms of inequality. To illustrate this, I contrast the race-centered framing of gender equality as the outcome of dismantling stereotypes and ending discrimination that dominates in the US with the class-centered framing of gender equality as the outcome of effective government actions to promote women’s full participation in governance and equal inclusion in the distribution of social goods that characterizes Germany. I suggest that the EU mixes these models in a uniquely hybrid model which offers both potential and risks for actually reducing inequalities in its member states. I point to the problems of growing class inequality in the US and growing racialization of religious minorities in Europe as intersecting dangerously with gender inequalities in both parts of the world.

SPEAKER BIO: Myra Marx Ferree is the Alice H. Cook Professor of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Director of the European Union Center of Excellence there. She is a long-time student of women’s movements, especially in the US, Germany, and the EU, and her book, Varieties of Feminism: German Gender Politics in Global Perspective is out this month from Stanford University Press. In addition, she has authored numerous articles on German feminist politics in German Politics & Society, Social Politics, Gender & Society, and the American Sociological Review. Her previous books include Shaping Abortion Discourse: Democracy and the Public Sphere in Germany and the US (2002) and Global Feminism: Women’s Activism, Organizing and Human Rights (2006) and she is currently editing a collection on new gender perspectives on human security issues.

Part of the EU Center of Excellence Director Lecture series.