ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews that the challenge cultural relativism presents to universalist theories of human rights generally and to global feminism in particular. It shows that feminist anti-essentialism has raised objections to general theories of women's oppression similar to those raised by cultural relativism and suggests that feminist anti-essentialism and cultural relativism share a critical stance toward universal accounts of women's condition. The chapter looks at the question of the degree to which relativist defenses of culture threaten global feminism. It attempts to answer this question by analyzing the logic of cultural relativism and feminist anti-essentialism and distinguishes them according to their different normative commitments. The chapter elaborates a vision of international feminist theory as poised between universalism and cultural relativism and explores the implications of this position for constructive cross-cultural evaluation. Feminist anti-essentialists' emphasis on culture's role in creating and regulating human beings helps to explain their departure from both liberal pluralism and cultural relativism.
