Book Review: Introduction to Feminist Jurisprudence

Jane Scoular’s book review published in the inaugural issue of Feminist Theory in 2000 discusses Hilaire Barnett’s “Introduction to Feminist Jurisprudence.” As a feminist legal scholar at the University of Strathclyde School of Law, Scoular provides a professional evaluation of this work intended as a student textbook on feminist jurisprudence, revealing how law continues to maintain male dominance beneath the veneer of formal equality.

Scoular’s Academic Background and Expertise

Understanding Scoular’s evaluation of this book requires knowledge of her important academic position:

Feminist Socio-Legal Scholar

Jane Scoular is Professor of Law at the University of Strathclyde:

• Socio-legal scholar working across issues relating to law, gender, and sexuality
• Focus on sex work, prostitution law regulation, and socio-legal studies
• Her work cited by 3,086 scholars globally
• Regarded as primary reference work in research on legal regulation of commercial sex

Pioneering Contributions to Sex Work Law Research

Scoular’s most renowned work, “The Subject of Prostitution: Sex/work, Law and Social Theory”:

• Analyzes contemporary citizenship discourse and law’s ability to meet competing demands
• Explores tensions between sex workers’ empowerment claims and radical feminists’ protection arguments
• The latter view prostitution as epitome of patriarchal sexual and economic relations
• Provides theoretical framework for understanding intersections of gender, law, and sexuality

Policy Engagement and Applied Research

Scoular actively participates in policy-making:

• Member of Scottish Parliament’s Expert Panel on Prostitution
• Continues to advise policy in this area
• Principal Investigator on ESRC-funded project “Sex work and Sexual Violence” (2021-23)
• Explores how socio-legal contexts shape sexual violence experiences of people in sex work

This makes her ideally positioned to evaluate a feminist jurisprudence textbook, possessing both theoretical depth and practical engagement.

Structure and Content of the Reviewed Book

Barnett’s “Introduction to Feminist Jurisprudence” (Cavendish Publishing, 1998) aims to provide a student textbook covering major issues in feminist jurisprudence:

Four-Part Structure

Part 1: The Foundations of Feminist Jurisprudence

• Historical development of feminist jurisprudence
• Core concepts and theoretical frameworks
• Relationship with traditional jurisprudence
• Methodological issues

Part 2: Conventional Jurisprudence and Feminist Critique

• Gender blindness in natural law tradition
• Male-centrism in legal positivism
• Legal realism’s neglect of women’s experiences
• Complex relationship between Critical Legal Studies and feminism

Part 3: Schools of Feminist Jurisprudential Thought

• Liberal feminist legal theory
• Radical feminist legal theory
• Cultural feminist legal theory
• Postmodern feminist legal theory
• Critical race feminist legal theory

Part 4: Key Issues in Feminist Jurisprudence

• Equality and difference
• Public/private divide
• Sexual violence and law
• Reproductive rights
• Work and family

Core Argument

Barnett’s central thesis is that despite vast strides in formal legal equality, traditional jurisprudence and law itself remain masculine disciplines. She analyzes how law maintains male domination through its structures, concepts, and practices.

Major Schools of Feminist Jurisprudence

Scoular’s review likely deeply explores Barnett’s presentation of different feminist legal schools:

Liberal Feminist Legal Theory

Core claims and strategies:

• Equal treatment thesis: Emphasizes similarities between men and women as rights-bearing autonomous persons
• Formal equality: Achieving equality of opportunity through legal reform
• Rights framework: Operating within liberal legal paradigm, embracing rights-based approach
• Private sphere: Believes domain of private life should be reserved for individual choice

Limitations:

• Male as standard: Equality means “being treated like men”
• Ignores structural inequality: Assumes legal neutrality exists
• Public/private divide: May leave domestic violence beyond legal intervention
• Assimilationist logic: Requires women to adapt to masculinized law and workplaces

Radical Feminist Legal Theory

Core claims:

• Domination analysis: Society premised on male domination and female subordination
• Epistemological critique: Epistemological preconditions of law and politics profoundly gendered
• Power central: Central question not whether men and women alike or different, but that women as group lack power
• Sexual exploitation: Views sexual violence, prostitution, pornography as central mechanisms of male domination

Legal reform pathways:

• Emphasizes how state might foster women’s empowerment
• Fundamental skepticism toward “neutral” law
• Advocates laws specifically targeting gender violence
• Questions whether legal system can truly be reformed

Cultural Feminist Legal Theory

Core claims:

• Valorizing difference: Celebrates feminine qualities and women’s experiences
• Ethics of care: Emphasizes care, connection, relationality over abstract rights
• Concrete context: Values specific situations over abstract principles
• Women’s voice: Law should reflect women’s moral reasoning and values

Legal applications:

• Relational considerations in criminal justice
• Recognizing value of care work
• Alternative dispute resolution mechanisms
• Communal rather than individualistic legal frameworks

Postmodern and Intersectional Feminist Legal Theory

Core claims:

• Anti-essentialism: Questions “women” as unified category
• Multiple identities: Emphasizes intersections of race, class, sexuality, etc.
• Discourse analysis: Focuses on how law constructs gender through language
• Knowledge-power: Reveals power dimensions of “objective” legal knowledge

Impact on jurisprudence:

• Rise of critical race feminist legal theory
• Challenge to single-axis analysis
• Questioning universal legal principles
• Emphasis on positionality and situated knowledge

Core Debates in Feminist Jurisprudence

Scoular likely evaluates Barnett’s treatment of these key debates:

Equality vs. Difference

This is the central debate in feminist jurisprudence:

Equal treatment approach:

• Claim: Men and women should receive same legal treatment
• Advantage: Challenges obvious discrimination, easy to implement
• Problem: Male as standard, ignores biological differences (e.g., pregnancy)

Special treatment approach:

• Claim: Recognize and accommodate gender differences
• Advantage: Addresses real differences (reproduction, care)
• Problem: May reinforce stereotypes, women’s “special” equals “inferior”

Beyond binary:

• Dominance theory: Problem not similarity/difference but power
• Intersectionality: Different women have different needs
• Contextual approach: Based on specific situations not abstract principles

Public/Private Divide

Traditional legal distinction:

• Public sphere: State, market, legal regulation
• Private sphere: Family, intimate relations, personal choice

Feminist critique:

• This distinction itself gendered: Men dominate public, women confined to private
• Violence and inequality in “private” sphere viewed as beyond legal intervention
• Actually, state maintains inequality in private sphere through non-intervention
• “Personal is political” feminist insight challenges this division

Legal consequences:

• Domestic violence long not treated as crime
• Marital rape exemption
• Distinction between employment discrimination vs. family “choice”
• Public/private dimensions of reproductive rights

Law’s Gendered Nature

Barnett’s core argument: Law is masculine. This manifests at:

Structural level:

• Male domination of legal profession
• Gendered legal education
• Male-centrism of judiciary

Conceptual level:

• Masculinization of “reasonable person” standard
• False promise of objectivity and neutrality
• Individualism and abstractness of rights discourse
• Formalization and decontextualization of legal reasoning

Substantive level:

• Law’s protection of male interests (property, contract)
• Marginalization of women’s concerns (care, reproduction)
• Masculinized legal language and procedures
• Lack of gender justice masked by “rule of law”

Scoular’s Likely Evaluative Perspectives

Based on her expertise, Scoular likely evaluates the book from these angles:

Pedagogical Value

As a textbook, strengths:

• Systematic: Four-part structure covers foundations, critique, schools, issues
• Accessible: Provides introduction to feminist theory for law students
• Comprehensive: Covers major schools from liberal to postmodern
• Practical: Connects theory to specific legal issues

Possible limitations:

• Risk of simplification: Are complex theories oversimplified?
• School divisions: Clear categorization may mask cross-pollination and evolution
• Critical depth: Does introductory level sacrifice critical edge?
• Geographic scope: Does it focus mainly on Anglo-American law?

Gender, Sexuality, and Law

Based on Scoular’s research on sex work law:

She likely particularly examines how the book handles:

• Sexual violence: Feminist critique of rape law, construction of consent
• Prostitution: Abolition vs. decriminalization debate, sex worker agency
• Sexual harassment: Gendered power dynamics in workplace
• Pornography: Free speech vs. sexual exploitation debate

Critical perspectives:

• Are sex workers’ own voices adequately represented?
• Debate between radical feminism and sex-positive feminism?
• How does legal regulation actually affect marginalized women?
• Tensions between moralism and rights-based approaches?

Possibilities for Legal Reform

Scoular as policy researcher likely considers:

Reformism vs. Radicalism:

• Barnett’s position: Leaning toward gradual reform or fundamental reconstruction?
• Possibilities and limitations of working within existing system?
• Strategic choices for feminist legal scholars?

Theory and Practice:

• How does feminist jurisprudence guide actual legal reform?
• Relationship between academic critique and policy-making?
• Interaction between grassroots movements and legal change?

Context of 1990s Feminist Legal Scholarship

The book’s 1998 publication and Scoular’s 2000 review occurred during a period characterized by:

Theoretical Developments

• Rise of intersectionality theory: Crenshaw and others challenge single-axis analysis
• Postmodern turn: Questioning essentialism and grand narratives
• Global perspectives: Non-Western feminist legal voices
• Gender theory: Queer theory’s challenge to gender binary

Legal Practice

• Sexual harassment law: Developments in US and Europe
• Domestic violence: Expansion of legal and policy interventions
• Reproductive rights: Ongoing struggles and backlash
• Equality legislation: Shift from formal to substantive equality

Challenges and Debates

• Backlash: Conservative reaction against feminist legal victories
• Neoliberalism: Market logic’s impact on legal equality discourse
• School wars: Fierce feminist internal debates (sex wars, essentialism)
• Institutionalization: Gains and losses of feminist law in academy

Contemporary Relevance

More than two decades later, the review and reviewed book’s significance today:

Enduring Core Issues

Many 1990s debates remain relevant:

• Equality vs. difference: Continues to manifest in parental leave, quotas, etc.
• Public/private: Domestic violence, reproductive rights still battlegrounds
• Law’s masculinization: Despite more women lawyers, legal culture remains highly masculinized
• Reform possibilities: Can law truly achieve gender justice?

Emerging Issues

Contemporary feminist jurisprudence faces new challenges:

• Transgender rights: Gender identity law, defining women’s spaces
• Intersectionality: Translating theory to practice, multiple marginalization
• Globalization: Transnational law, trafficking, global care chains
• Technology: Digital surveillance, reproductive tech, AI bias legal dimensions

#MeToo Movement’s Legal Impact

The #MeToo movement from 2017 reactivated:

• Legal definitions of sexual harassment and assault
• Legal construction of consent
• Believe institutions or believe survivors?
• Accountability mechanisms beyond law

Evolution of Scoular’s Research

Scoular’s own work shows continued focus:

• Sex work and Sexual Violence project (2021-23): Exploring how legal contexts shape sexual violence experiences of sex workers
• This continues feminist jurisprudence’s core question: How can law both protect and harm marginalized women?
• Decriminalization debate: Law and justice not always aligned

Broader Significance of the Review

This review’s appearance in Feminist Theory’s inaugural issue has special significance:

Establishing Interdisciplinary Dialogue

• Connecting law with feminist theory
• Jurisprudence as component of feminist theory
• Importance of theoretical journals addressing legal issues

Educating New Generations

• Taking student textbooks seriously
• Dissemination and popularization of feminist knowledge
• Critically evaluating teaching resources

Setting Research Agendas

• Identifying core issues in feminist legal scholarship
• Indicating future research directions
• Assessing theoretical progress and continuing challenges

Conclusion

Jane Scoular’s review of Hilaire Barnett’s “Introduction to Feminist Jurisprudence” is not merely an evaluation of one textbook but a reflection on the state of feminist legal scholarship at the turn of the century. As a scholar focused on intersections of gender, law, and sexuality, Scoular provides key insights into understanding how law maintains gender inequality beneath the veneer of formal equality.

This review reminds us that law is not a neutral tool but a profoundly gendered institution. From the formation of legal concepts (like “reasonable person”) to the organization of legal practice (like the public/private divide), from the composition of the legal profession to the modes of legal reasoning, male experience and male perspectives are constructed as universal standards. Feminist jurisprudence’s task is to reveal this hidden gendering and explore possibilities for legal transformation.

Both Barnett’s work and Scoular’s review emphasize debates among different feminist legal schools—liberalism emphasizing equal treatment, radicalism analyzing power domination, cultural feminism valorizing difference, postmodernism critiquing essentialism. These debates are not merely academic but concern strategies for legal reform: Should we seek equality within the existing system or fundamentally reconstruct legal institutions? Should we emphasize male-female similarities or acknowledge differences? How do we address diversity within the “women” category?

Scoular’s own research on sex work law embodies these questions’ complexity. How to balance empowering sex workers and protecting vulnerable women? How to ensure legal reform actually improves rather than worsens marginalized women’s situations? These questions remain urgent today, from the #MeToo movement to transgender rights debates, from reproductive justice to digital surveillance.

In an era when neoliberalism, globalization, and technological change profoundly transform the legal environment, feminist jurisprudence faces new challenges, but its core insights—that law is gendered, that equality requires more than form, that justice requires more than procedure—remain key tools for understanding and transforming law.

This article was written by an AI assistant based on Jane Scoular’s 2000 book review published in Feminist Theory, incorporating her contributions to feminist legal scholarship and sex work law research to explore feminist jurisprudence’s importance for understanding law’s gendering and advancing legal transformation.