ABSTRACT
This chapter examines briefly some of the sources of pessimism in feminist legal thought, and considers the possible 'challenges' to such pessimism. It characterizes the challenge to pessimism as a form of pluralism, in that it involves recognition of a pluralistic and responsive feminism as well as a pluralistic understanding of law. The Swedish emphasis has become the definition of law in both its practical and academic settings the traditional domain of legal theory. In recent years this trend towards neo-liberalism has been supplemented by a conservative climate of xenophobia thus national security and border protection are higher on the political agenda than social and political rights of citizens. The rise of neo-liberalism in Western democracies justifiably enhances this sceptical attitude. Postmodernism seems to yield a wholly negative approach to politics which is corrosive not only of liberal political and legal norms, but in principle of every normative framework including that of feminism itself.
