ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the question of whether a ‘woman-friendly’ State is a theoretical possibility and under what circumstances this might occur in practice. During the late 1970s and early 1980s critical social policy theory strongly influenced the academic discipline of social policy although its impact on government policy-making was smaller. Since the 1980s, increasing numbers of writers have argued that gender inequalities at work can be explained primarily in terms of their benefits to men. Working men’s organizations have colluded with employers at the level of the State to disadvantage women at work relative to men. The strand of feminist theorizing which has arguably made the greatest contribution, since the late 1970s, to an understanding of the ongoing patterns of gender divisions at work is known as materialist feminism. The chapter concludes with a discussion of some alternative principles that could inform future policies and benefit working women.
