ABSTRACT
This essay traces the development of Rousseau’s political thought with regard to women and eighteenth-century egalitarian feminism from his early career working as a secretary for Madame Dupin in the late 1740s, through the rise of his public identity as a defender of patriarchy during the 1750s and 1760s. It concludes with a reassessment of the egalitarian feminism he espoused while working for Madame Dupin and its relevance for republican political theory today.
