Abstract legal recognition of rights fails to overturn women’s concrete economic inferiority

Evidence

In no country is her legal status identical to man’s, and often it puts her at a considerable disadvantage. Even when her rights are recognized abstractly, long-standing habit keeps them from being concretely manifested in customs. Economically, men and women almost form two castes; all things being equal, the former have better jobs, higher wages, and greater chances to succeed than their new female competitors; they occupy many more places in industry, in politics, and so forth, and they hold the most important positions. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 57

Categorization

• XREF: Prefigures the later liberal/equality debates (e.g., MacKinnon on formal vs. substantive equality) about why legal rights alone do not liberate. — connects to: Women’s defenselessness functions as the legal title of their oppression; Abstract rights alone cannot guarantee women a concrete hold on the world — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 292; Socioeconomic and political conditions affect women’s rights far more than Islam itself — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 289 (+9 more)

Broader Connections

• Abstract rights alone cannot guarantee women a concrete hold on the world #corroborates (0.95) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 292
• Formal legal equality obscures real inequality because equivalence as a legal norm ignores difference #expands (0.85) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 786
• Women’s legal equality arose from economic shifts, not ideology or religion. #complicates (0.80) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 209
• Economic emancipation alone does not place women in a situation identical to men’s #complicates (0.80) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1920
• Economic property rights persist independent of legal recognition #corroborates (0.80)
• Socioeconomic and political conditions affect women’s rights far more than Islam itself #complicates (0.75) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 289
• Legal rights exert real effects despite being fictitious entities #qualifies (0.75) — Jeremy Bentham, The Panopticon Writings, 71
• Legal equality before the law requires negating actual individuality #expands (0.75) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 793