ABSTRACT
Socialist approaches to masculinity build on three basic ideas. First, that masculinity is shaped and created primarily by the relations of production, which include the relations of power and the divisions of labor that are part of a class-structured capitalist society. Second, that the costs of masculinity are alienations produced by these relations. Third, that there can be no significant alteration of masculinity until the class structure, with its relations of power, is itself altered. Classical Marxists are committed to the view that sexism benefits capitalism and is so intrinsically tied to the class structure that, if capitalism were to end, the oppression of women would virtually disappear. Classical Marxists claim that socialist feminists are seeking to change something that does not exist—namely, a specific oppression of women apart from class structure. An antisexist workplace supportive of strong solidarity between men and women would indeed go a long way toward undercutting male owning-class control over women's labor.
