ABSTRACT

Revolutionizing Feminism offers the first feminist analysis of the human rights crisis in the Philippines during the Arroyo presidency (2001-2010) and the declaration of the country as the 'second front' in the US-led 'war on terror'. During this period over 1,000 activists, including peasants, journalists and lawyers, were murdered. Lacsamana situates Filipino women within the international division of labour, showing the connection between the 'super-exploitation' of their labour power at home and their migration abroad as domestic workers, nurses, nannies, entertainers, and 'mail-order brides'. In contrast to the cultural turn in feminist theorising that has retreated from the concepts of class and class exploitation, Revolutionizing Feminism seeks to reorient feminist scholarship in order to better understand the material realties of those living in an increasingly unstable and impoverished global south.

chapter |13 pages

Introduction

chapter |18 pages

State of Emergency

Contemporary Crisis, Historical Roots

chapter |17 pages

Notes on the “Woman Question”

Nationalist Feminism in the Philippines

chapter |20 pages

From Balikbayans to “Supermaids”

The Gendering of the Philippine Export State

chapter |17 pages

Prostituted Women

Revisiting the Sex Work Debates in Feminist Theory

chapter |15 pages

Empire on Trial

The Subic Rape Case and the Struggle for Philippine Women's Liberation

chapter |5 pages

Conclusion