ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on the key concepts discussed in the preceding chapters of this book. The book discusses the gender-related legacies of Maoism, as such legacies stand historically between traditional China and China while ideationally claiming the liberation of women from both patriarchic oppression and capitalist exploitation. The gender dynamics of China’s social transformation first targets patriarchy as both an historical reality and contemporary practice of oppressing women’s rights and gender equality. The second reason, overlapping with the first, concerns the legacies of continuous efforts against patriarchy over centuries and their effectiveness and/or ineffectiveness in improving women’s wellbeing, gaining women’s liberation, and lifting the status of women and other marginalized sex/gender groups in their relationships with men. The third reason to take the long-term perspective in analyzing gender issues comes from China’s interactions with the rest of the world in both its social transformation and its feminist struggles.
