Kathrin Hönig

Universität Zürich

Relativism or Anti-Anti-Relativism? Epistemological and Rhetorical Moves in Feminist Epistemology and Philosophy of Science

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instance), rather they may rely on the scientistic ideal of an abstract concept of knowledge that presupposes gender to be a factor of ideological impurities blurring the fact-value distinction: hence, something that threatens the achievement of politically neutral, universally valid, objective knowledge. These presupposed ideological impurities are thought to entail that the results of feminist scholarship do not and in fact cannot match the ideal of objectivity as conceived by the opponents and, therefore, are to be ignored or to be rejected. (See Lloyd [1996] for an extensive analysis of that kind of anti-feminist argument.) Generally, charges of relativism become, as Code puts it, a 'trump card' (Code, 1995: 187) dismissing every argument in favour of contextualizing, localizing or situating knowledge.

Given this background, feminist epistemology, so to say, had and still has two tasks. On the one hand, it has to ward off charges of relativism. On the other hand, it has to show that feminist scholarship can appeal to objectivity for its results with strong justification; at least one strand in feminist epistemology has claimed such objectivity. From this view, the concept of objectivity has undergone a semantic change from its idealized, normative and abstract formulation committed to strong value-neutrality to a far more descriptive concept, taking into consideration not only a given scientific practice and its production of scientific knowledge but also the context of discovery (as opposed to the context of justification), i.e. by and large the social context of science. (See the survey essay of [START_REF] Betzler | Objektivität" als epistemische Norm feministischer Erkenntnistheorie[END_REF]; but also [START_REF] Barwell | Towards a Defence of Objectivity[END_REF][START_REF] Gorham | The Concept of Truth in Feminist Science[END_REF]Lloyd, 1995.) For an example of this altered understanding of objectivity one could appeal to Sandra Harding's concept of 'strong objectivity', Donna Haraway's 'situated knowledges', Helen Longino's 'contextual empiricism' or Lynn Hankinson Nelson's 'feminist empiricism' (Harding, 1991(Harding, , 1993(Harding, , 1995;;Haraway, 1991;Longino, 1990;Hankinson Nelson, 1990). The important and common point of those positions is that the concept of objectivity under (feminist) attack is understood as looking at the world from a point of nowhere -the 'God-trick' as Haraway calls it (Haraway, 1991: 189, 195) -and that this should be changed into a look from somewhere, where the 'some', precisely, has to be made transparent and to be included in the justification. This strand of feminist epistemology could be encapsulated under the programmatic title 'working for an improved or broader concept of objectivity' where gender as a relevant factor would quite naturally have its place. But this move has, in my opinion, not much to do with a straightforward relativist attitude. Of course, that is all the debate is about, and it has not come to an end yet. Moreover, there is no common consensus about it within either the feminist scientific community or the scientific community in a larger sense. The allegation of relativism to postpositivist positions, such as Kuhn's or Quine's, who certainly are not accountable for gender-sensitive intentions, is a case of attributed relativism outside the feminist field. In any case, as long as most of the adherents to the 'broader concept of objectivity' programme consider themselves to be realists of one (mitigated) form of realism or another and reject (radical) relativism, I am reluctant to consider the denial of strict value-neutrality, a prudent and careful incorporation of so-called external or contextual sociological factors into epistemic justification as a via regia towards relativism. 1 So, assuming this framework of feminist epistemology is working towards a broader or improved concept of objectivity, let us ask: what reasons could there be to plead for relativism, as Lorraine Code does, instead of joining the 'broader concept of objectivity' programme? Because pleading for relativism implies a twofold task to accomplish, namely to claim and prove objectivity for the position and to ground it in spite of and against the anti-relativist critique as a reasonable position. Taking Code as an example, I argue in this article that the reasons she gives in her essay are not sufficient for grounding a relativist position and that her claimed relativism would be more adequately described as a rhetorical gesture ending in an anti-anti-relativism; an anti-anti-relativism that is not reducible to epistemological relativism. The idea, going back to an argument developed by Clifford [START_REF] Geertz | Anti Anti-Relativism[END_REF], is that doubling the negative prefix 'anti' does not lead to a neutralization of that very prefix according to the law of double negation. Anti-anti-relativism, rather, is understood to represent a critique of certain forms of anti-relativism and a useful instrument in disarming overstated arguments concerning the negative consequences of relativism.

The main aim of this article is to contribute, via a critique of Code, to conceptual clarification and to explain the consequences and commitments following or rather not following from taking up a relativist stance à la Code. It will turn out that Code's rhetorical relativism, reinterpreted as anti-anti-relativism, can be classified into the aforementioned strand of feminist epistemology with its altered concept of objectivity. Conversely, anti-anti-relativism turns out to be highly recommendable to feminists.

Because of the notorious definitional difficulties, 2 I abstain from giving an extensive definition of relativism. Roughly speaking, relativism should be understood as a position denying the possibility of unrelativized, universally valid claims (be they truth claims, moral claims or else). Instead, claims are understood to be justifiable only relative to a framework that provides the criteria of both intelligibility and justification. Depending on the sort of relativism in question, the framework itself is conceived as being either a conceptual, a theoretical, a cognitive, a moral, a cultural or other framework. To get a relativist position in the strict sense, the notion of a framework, however, is not sufficient. Moreover, there has to be something like the impossibility of privileging one framework over another in case of conflicting claims on the same subject matter, given that claims are considered justified relatively to their respective framework. In the literature, the impossibility of privileging a framework is termed 'incommensurability'. 3 Frameworks are incommensurable, if questions about distributing bivalent truth-values between two conflicting claims fail to be conclusive.

Given this characterization of a relativist position, let me come back to Code's claim, that feminist epistemologists should subscribe to relativism. As I see it, there are two structurally different, however not clearly distinguished, clusters of arguments given by Code. One cluster is identifiable by its critique of the reductive scientistic ideal of certain -especially Anglo-American -forms of epistemology as Code perceives them. The other cluster is more diffuse and could best be characterized by a certain attitude of refusal, by a certain rebelliousness towards a discourse found to be hegemonic, and by the conscious provocation consisting in taking up a position considered unacceptable by others.

Whereas the first cluster, the cluster of critical reasons, as I would call them, clearly does not automatically imply relativism -after all, this is a form of critique very familiar to feminist approaches especially in the philosophy of science -the second cluster of reasons, the 'rebellious reasons', as I would like to call them, is more questionable. Does the disapproval of certain structures really lead to relativism? Does the refusal of the traditional epistemic concepts of objectivity and universalism that Code considers to be hegemonic imply an adherence to relativism? To answer those questions, let us take a closer look to Code's arguments. I start with her critique of the scientistically idealized epistemology. It is the kind of epistemology that has always attracted the feminist critique.

Epistemology traditionally centres around the threefold characterization of knowledge as true justified belief. Within that framework, philosophers usually work with the formula 'S knows that p', where S represents a subject holding a belief, p the propositional content of that belief, and the verb 'to know' the relation under investigation, holding between the subject and the belief-content. In the relativism essay Code builds on a line of critical arguments developed earlier [START_REF] Code | What Can She Know? Feminist Theory and the Construction of Knowledge[END_REF] in pointing out that the 'S' in the 'S knows that p' formula is typically conceived as an abstract, ahistorical, disembodied and faceless subject of knowing. She emphasizes:

Since a theory of knowledge, as I conceive of it, should aim to inform and explicate practice -to determine how people can know and act within the specific symbolic, cultural, and social structures and institutions they inhabit, and to incorporate those understandings into its own articulationthen what matters is the practical impact of any theoretical project, and its openness to modification, when practice reveals its shortcomings. (Code, 1995: 190-1) This emphasis on the practical aspects of a theory of knowledge is accompanied by a critique of scientism in epistemology. Epistemology, it is argued, takes its examples and paradigmatic statements almost exclusively from the natural sciences, especially from physics (p. 189); the examples are stated in idealized 'simple perceptual propositions' or '"elementary" propositions' (p. 189); there is an overly simple opposition between true and false statements postulated (p. 189) and an abstract and isolated subject of knowledge is presupposed (p. 204). In its abstract universalism this form of epistemology fails to be context sensitive (pp. 187-8) and, further, it presupposes, imperialistically, a false homogeneity (pp. 201, 206) with the 'often coercive view that we all see everything in the same way' (p. 201). In short: according to Code we are facing an epistemology which unduly constrains the concept of knowledge (p. 190). Code explicitly opposes 'the old positivist credo according to which knowledge is either scientific knowledge, or it is not knowledge at all ' (p. 195). Against this, she advocates 'developing [. . .] "an epistemology of everyday life"' (p. xi) and denies the possibility of generalization for an epistemology based on scientific examples because of there being 'no reasons to assume and expect homogeneity across the physical and social world ' (p. 206).

Whatever one thinks of the old positivist dream of a unified science based on physics or of the tasks an epistemology has to fulfil, it seems clear that Code's uneasiness with that kind of epistemology will not be relieved by simply changing the paradigms of what it means to know something or in changing the paradigmatic content of p. Taking your examples from everyday life instead of science will not get you any further as long as you continue to use, say, a propositional concept of knowledge. There is simply no guarantee that an epistemology based on everyday observational data does not yield abstract formulations and universalist claims of validity similar to the 'old' scientistic theory of knowledge (Kornblith [1999] is a good example for remaining abstract even with everyday life examples).

Furthermore, even if the charge were justified that scientistic epistemology unduly restricts the observable phenomena, it seems, in fact, that Code's central worry with such an epistemology lies elsewhere. For Code, the primary issue is, I think, the degree of abstraction of those theories, the fact that they can be modelled around the 'S knows that p' formula. For in this formula -precisely because it is only a formula -S is indeed genderless, ahistorical, socially unlocated, disembodied and so on. That is what it means to be a placeholder, a variable, which the in itself meaningless letter 'S' represents. 4 It is a completely different question whether such a formula is very informative concerning a random (or particular) instance of S or of p, or whether it is useful to work with that kind of formula, given that S had historically (i.e. contingently and not necessarily) been interpreted as being male. But it is exactly these questions that seem to be the real concern of Code and other feminist critiques of traditional epistemology. The concern is important. But one should be careful not to blur, at least not without argument, a feminist approach in history of science with a feminist approach in epistemology or philosophy of science.

Elsewhere, in her critique of naturalized epistemology [START_REF] Code | What is Natural about Epistemology Naturalized?[END_REF], Code has stated more clearly what she is after, namely a finely differentiated description of human epistemic activity: a description that attends very closely, scrutinizing the matter, metaphorically speaking, with a magnifying glass and giving concrete accounts of it, especially concrete accounts of S that, say, take S's gender into account. Although the direction that Code's own epistemic ideal points to is fairly clear, her formulations concerning a concrete epistemological programme remain vague. One thing, however, seems unavoidable, given this ideal: you have to pay the price of a more restricted possibility of generalization and/or to integrate a number of additional variables that could give an account of the claimed differentiated epistemic activities. This is what it would mean to take a view from somewhere and to make the 'some' transparent. The programme of epistemological contextualism for instance points in that direction, though one should note that gender-sensitivity is no primary concern of that approach.

But does this imply any relativism? Is restricting the scope of generalization or augmenting the number of variables the same as relativizing your claims to some framework? I don't think so. But let me consider first why, at all, the concept of relativism enters the discussion.

There seem to be relativistic tendencies in some of Code's claims. For instance, epistemic descriptions have to be context-sensitive (Code, 1995: 195, 201), they should take into account subjective factors (pp. 187, 188), there is no context-free truth (p. 197), there is no transcendent standpoint (p. 201) and 'knowledge is constructed in positions of varying power and privilege ' (p. 196). Relativist as this may seem, however, instead of concluding that relativism is the position to be endorsed, we could simply give up the ideal of having epistemic descriptions that are unconditionally universalizable. As a result, there would be a multiplication of epistemic descriptions accounting simultaneously for more or less the same practices or domains with slight differences due to a weighting of the different concrete factors involved: that is, to differences due to the number and kind of involved variables. It would be a pluralistic account of knowledge. Pluralism, however, does not necessarily imply the incompatibility of those different concrete epistemic descriptions. You can have your context-sensitive descriptions and still be able to logically conjoin them with others or 'translate' them into a more abstract language. (Moore [1997] for instance, has worked out that line of argument; see also Haack, 1998.) The crucial point -in contrast to relativism -is precisely not to make the conjunctive claim that epistemic descriptions are justified only relatively to a framework or a context and that different frameworks are, ultimately, incommensurable. It is incommensurability that, in this view, decides whether you are dealing with a relativist position or not. 5 Now, the remarkable thing about Code's position is that the concept of incommensurability is not mentioned in the text. 6 And this, at least in my opinion, makes her concept of relativism rather woolly. Furthermore, there is one specific case where she explicitly dismisses relativism because it entails incommensurability. It is the (admittedly extreme) case of a culture A claiming that the earth is flat and culture B claiming that it is round: 'If such were indeed the inevitable result of endorsing relativism, it needs no argument to show that feminists, with other theorists of knowledge, would have to resist it' (Code, 1995: 202). But because, according to Code, such cases are rare, they are easily mastered with a 'politically informed "strategic universalism"' (p. 199). This 'both-andand-also-position', as I would call it, is termed 'mitigated relativism' elsewhere (Code, 1991: 251, 264, 320;Code, 1998: 75). By 'mitigated relativism', Code means that one should be relativist from case to case, but in extreme cases one would better adhere to universalism. In other words, this seems to be a case of part-time relativism.

This part-time relativism is odd, not only because of conceptual or consistency reasons but also because Code gives no explicit criteria for its application. In which cases, exactly, should one be a relativist and in which, a strategic universalist? Why is the case of flat earth vs round earth adherents such an obvious and imperative instance of a strategic universalism?

There are at least two remarks to be made on that point. First, although Code is harshly criticizing a scientistically narrowed form of epistemology, she acknowledges scientific achievements in various domains such as medicine, physics, biology, etc. The practical success and the evident usefulness of the applied sciences seem to count heavily against attempts to make implausible contrary claims. Therefore, the apparent practical success of the round earth account seems to be enough to rule out flat earth accounts. 7 But one would nevertheless wish to have a normatively stronger rationale concerning the application of part-time relativism. Unfortunately, this is not to be found in Code. The second remark concerns a distinction that can most clearly be made at this point: the distinction between a relativist epistemology and a relativist rhetoric. It appears that Code's arguments should be appreciated more for their rhetorical than their epistemological value. What the rhetorical value amounts to can be better assessed after the discussion of the second cluster of arguments Code gives as reasons why feminists should be relativists, the so-called rebellious arguments, to which I now turn.

Although the rebellious arguments are related to the critique of the scientistic form of epistemology, the tone is strikingly different. It is defiant and often polemical. Code speaks of the 'discursive hegemony' (Code, 1995: 188, Given that these kinds of rebellious expressions appear rather frequently in the text, I feel justified in seeing in them Code's basic motivations and reasons for claiming relativism on behalf of feminists. This view is supported by the tone of the text as well as the reference to Feyerabend's dictum that relativism is a 'weapon against intellectual tyranny' (p. 206). Although I sympathize with that contumacious stance and even consider a portion of it necessary to a feminist perspective not only in epistemology -after all, critique of ideology is one of the oldest feminist pursuits -I still doubt that it is a compelling, let alone sufficient, reason for (epistemological) relativism.

First, the refusal of a position does not in itself entail a new position. Rather, the negation sign makes the 'new' derivative from the 'old', rejected position. So Code's 'refusal of the universalist-objectivist alternatives' would lead her at most to an anti-universalist (anti-objectivist) position. But things are more complicated, because the rebellious arguments are not only directed against 'imperialist epistemic practices' that are equated with the universalist mainstream epistemology, but also and explicitly against the anti-relativism inscribed in that position. She wants to argue, Code says, against the 'caricature of relativism' (p. 186) resulting from the anti-relativist's, i.e. universalist's, presentation. But in going against an anti-relativist caricature of relativism, Code is, I claim, less the rebellious (epistemological) relativist than a deliberate (rhetorical) antianti-relativist, or, at least, she should be understood as such.

Presumably Code would even agree being called an anti-anti-relativist -at least the expression casually appears in her text. 8 Being an acclaimed anti-universalist, and universalists being classically anti-relativists, she most certainly is an anti-anti-relativist as well. What Code possibly would not agree with is the thesis that the doubled prefix 'anti' is not dissolved without remainder by the law of double negation, but that it refers back to her anti-universalism.

Clifford Geertz, who coined the term 'anti-anti-relativism' [START_REF] Geertz | Anti Anti-Relativism[END_REF] reflected explicitly the relationship between the two prefixes. The double 'anti' before 'relativism' is, according to Geertz, an analogous construction to the double 'anti' before 'communism' in the time of US Senator McCarthy. Directed against the anti-communist hysteria of that time, an anti-anti-communist attitude is, however, far from representing a communist or a pro-Soviet attitude; in the same way, an anti-anti-abortion attitude does not imply that one takes abortion to be a wonderful thing.

In this frame, the double negative simply doesn't work in the usual way; and therein lies its rhetorical attractions. It enables one to reject something without thereby committing oneself to what it rejects. And this is precisely what I want to do with anti-relativism. (Geertz, 1989: 13) If my interpretation of Geertz is correct, then doubling the prefix results in a kind of dynamic move that sets things in motion and prevents recourse to the age-old philosophical positions on an epistemological level. The first 'anti' is directed against the second 'anti', that is, against certain forms of the critique of relativism (i.e. anti-relativist arguments) without being committed to using relativist arguments per se. The goal is to disarm the danger associated with a completely overstated form of relativism, regularly pointing to a breakdown of rational argument when adjudicating over competing claims or theories or to the immoral or irrational state of 'anything goes'. To do this, that is to disarm the overstated consequences of relativism, it is not even necessary to defend relativism or to ground a relativist position: it is enough to point out the absurdity of the anti-relativist critique. The latter but not the former is exactly what Code is doing in recalling the distortions of the anti-relativist critique in her text (Code, 1995: esp. 186-91, 205; note, however, that even Code is not free of falling into the trap of distorting images herself in invoking the flat earth vs round earth case as an unwelcome consequence of relativism and, therefore, an instance of an imperative strategic universalism).

I asked in the beginning what could one's and in particular what could Code's reasons be to plead for relativism instead of joining the 'broader or improved objectivity' programme in feminist epistemology. As matters stand now, the plea for relativism and this 'programme' have much more in common than it seemed at first glance. The relationship is twofold and bidirectional.

On the one hand, it turns out that the feminist uneasiness with traditional epistemology, represented here through Code's position, calls for more finely differentiated descriptions of concrete epistemic practices and for a certain degree of contextualization. For this purpose, it is enough to give up the abstract ideal of objectivity inherited from the positivist strand in philosophy of science. But the mainly anti-universalist (or perhaps: anti-simplificationist or anti-abstractionist) desire for situating, contextualizing or concretizing epistemic descriptions works easily within the 'broader objectivity' programme. It is deeply committed to the 'point of somewhere', representing the altered more complex concept of objectivity, and it accounts for it. Moreover, there is no need to weaken one's position with a part-time relativism by introducing strategic universalism.

On the other hand, it turns out that Code should be interpreted as pleading not for relativism but for anti-anti-relativism. This is something feminists could indeed take over from her. Only, instead of 'coming out' as relativists they might do well to come out as anti-anti-relativists. Thus, rather than ritually distance themselves from relativism and defend themselves with substantial arguments against charges of it, feminists could simply dismiss those charges as rhetorically overstated and being, in most of the cases, not relevant epistemologically. NOTES I would like to thank Henry Pickford for his help with the English version of the article.

1.

See, for instance, [START_REF] Giere | The Feminism Question in the Philosophy of Science[END_REF] or [START_REF] Fricker | Feminism in Epistemology. Pluralism without Postmodernism[END_REF] for a so-called perspectival realism, explicitly denying any relativism. An early attempt to 'transform' the concept of objectivity without being committed to any form of relativism and, moreover, issuing far from a feminist context, is presented by Scheffler (1967). See also Suppe's (1974) account of Weltanschauungen approaches to scientific theories, which ends up in a rather far-reaching reformulation of the former strictly value-free approaches. For feminists arguing against the very concept of a feminist epistemology, see [START_REF] Haack | Knowledge and Propaganda: Reflections of an Old Feminist[END_REF]Pinnick (1994). For a feminist accusing other feminists of relativism, see [START_REF] Clough | A Hasty Retreat from Evidence: The Recalcitrance of Relativism in Feminist Epistemology[END_REF][START_REF] Clough | Beyond Epistemology: A Pragmatist Approach to Feminist Science Studies[END_REF]. 2.

If one is not explicitly interested in a specific form of relativism (e.g. moral relativism) or in a specialized debate, then the observation is unavoidable that there are just too many forms of relativism. For instance, Code (1995: 200) Haack (1998: 149-66) starts with more than nine forms, which are furthermore to be multiplied by a permutation factor; and Rom Harré and Michael Krausz (1996: vii) speak of a 'proliferation of varieties of relativism'. (This list is not exhaustive.) 3.

The term 'incommensurability' was introduced into the sociology of science by Ludwik Fleck in 1935[START_REF] Fleck | Entstehung und Entwicklung einer wissenschaftlichen Tatsache[END_REF]. But it became famous, not to say notorious, only in the post-positivist philosophy of science debate following Thomas Kuhn's and Paul Feyerabend's reintroduction of the term in 1962 (Kuhn, 1962;[START_REF] Feyerabend | Explanation, Reduction, and Empiricism[END_REF]. 4.

Cf. in this connection the consciously provocative question of [START_REF] Trettin | Zwei Fragen zur feministischen Erkenntnistheorie[END_REF] whether gender as a parameter should be included in epistemology at all. 5.

The argument of incommensurability as differentia specifica of relativism is developed in Hönig (forthcoming). 6.

See especially pp. 192-3 and 196-9, where Code deals with charges of inconsistency of relativism without mentioning the incommensurability problem. In [START_REF] Code | What Can She Know? Feminist Theory and the Construction of Knowledge[END_REF] the problem is mentioned but, apparently, Code takes a Protagorean or pragmatist position in claiming that 'some knowledge is better than other knowledge' (Code, 1991: 4). 7.

It is particularly odd that Code steps back from her relativist claim with such a simplifying and overstating characterization of relativism as it is given in the flat earth vs round earth account. Her declared aim had been to argue against a 'caricature of relativism that no self-declared, self-respecting relativist would endorse' (Code, 1995: 186). A more subtle account of relativism in terms of flat earth vs round earth accounts would certainly draw on the underdeterminacy thesis and the following possible empirical equivalence of theories. Therefore, the confrontation between culture A claiming the earth's flatness and culture B claiming the earth's roundness would be much more complex than the confrontation between those two incompatible statements about the earth's shape. 8.

The term 'anti-anti-relativism' appears three times in Code's text: first in quoting from an essay of Clifford Geertz with that very title (Code, 1995: 187), second in the equation of 'a newly affirmed pro-relativist . . . position' with 'anti-anti-relativism' (p. 194) and third in the description of the realms of interest for the (i.e. her) so-called 'anti-anti-relativist' (p. 202).

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'Reflections on Relativism: From Momentous Tautology to Seductive Contradiction', pp. 149-66 in Manifesto of a Passionate Moderate: Unfashionable Essays. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Hankinson Nelson, Lynn (1990) Who Knows: From Quine to Feminist Empiricism. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press. Haraway, Donna (1991) 'Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective', pp. 183-201 in Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature. London: Routledge. Harding, Sandra (1991) Whose Science Whose Knowledge: Thinking From Women's Lives. Milton Keynes: Open University Press. Harding, Sandra (1993) 'Rethinking Standpoint Epistemology: What is "strong objectivity"?', pp. 49-82 in L. Alcoff and E. Potter (eds) Feminist Epistemologies. New York: Routledge. Harding, Sandra (1995) '"Strong Objectivity": A Response to the New Objectivity Question', Synthese 104: 331-49. Harré, Rom and Michael Krausz (1996) Varieties of Relativism. Oxford: Blackwell. Hollis, Martin and Steven Lukes, eds (1982) Rationality and Relativism. Oxford: Blackwell. Hönig, Kathrin (forthcoming) 'Im Spiegel der Bedeutung' -Über die Begründbarkeit von Relativismus. Kornblith, Hilary (1999) 'The Epistemology of Science and the Epistemology of Everyday Life', Facta Philosophica 1: 21-37. Krausz, Michael, ed. (1989) Relativism: Interpretation and Confrontation. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press. Kuhn, Thomas (1962) The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Lloyd, Elisabeth (1995) 'Objectivity and the Double Standard for Feminist Epistemologies', Synthese 104: 351-81. Lloyd, Elisabeth (1996) 'Science and Anti-Science: Objectivity and its Real Enemies', pp. 217-59 in L. Hankinson Nelson and J. Nelson (eds) Feminism, Science and the Philosophy of Science. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Longino, Helen (1990) Science as Social Knowledge: Values and Objectivity in Scientific Inquiry. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Moore, Adrian (1997) Points of View. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Niiniluoto, Ilkka (1996) 'The Relativism Question in Feminist Epistemology', pp. 139-57 in L. Hankinson Nelson and J. Nelson (eds) Feminism, Science and the Philosophy of Science. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Pinnick, Cassandra (1994) 'Feminist Epistemology: Implications for Philosophy of Science', Philosophy of Science 61: 646-57. Scheffler, Israel (1967) Science and Subjectivity. Indianapolis: Hackett. Suppe, Frederick (1974) 'The Search for Philosophic Understanding of Scientific Theories', pp. 3-232 in F. Suppe (ed.) The Structure of Scientific Theories. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.


READING EMILY DICKINSON'S SHE ATE AND DRANK THE PRECIOUS WORDS

Ana Mañeru Méndez

Emily Dickinson (1830Dickinson ( -1886)): She Ate and Drank the Precious Words Madrid: Ediciones del Orto, 2003, 96 pp., ISBN 84-7923-264-1 Ana Mañeru, poet, thinker, teacher, actively and lovingly involved in the thinking of sexual difference, offers us a succinct biography and a carefully chosen poetic anthology of Emily Dickinson. Setting out from herself, Ana Mañeru goes through the life and work of Emily Dickinson, who she situates within a feminine symbolic order and as forming part of a genealogy of women who create world. The words of these women and the authority that Ana Mañeru attributes to them is what helps her to confer meaning onto the texts of Emily Dickinson. Together with that is her conviction of the expressability of knowledge itself and the attribution of sense to her own experience of reading.

The work is divided into four parts. First there is 'Chronology', with a first section on the 'Life and Work of Emily Dickinson', where, apart from family events, the most significant events that were to happen to her work are referred to. An eloquent example of Ana Mañeru's position is that the deaths of Charlotte Brontë and George Eliot are included in this section, giving both authors a value of artistic and personal relationship with Emily Dickinson, that is, of genealogyin spite of the fact that they never knew one another -that would have been lost if they had been included in the second part of the chapter, 'Other Social and Cultural Political Events', where we are given the historical coordinates within which to place the North American poetess.

The second part, 'Emily Dickinson: My Approach Towards Her Life and Work', is divided into six epigraphs: 'Introduction'; 'On Her Life'; 'On Her Work'; 'On Her Freedom'; 'On Her Way of Writing'; and 'On the Attentive Listening to Her Words'. These consist of notes on the life and work of Emily Dickinson, narrated with a rhythm that is loving, sure and gentle. One of the themes that they are based on is the intimate relationship that she had from her youth with the friend who was to become her sister-in-law, Susan Huntington Gilbert, a source of inspiration, support, confidante, teacher, sister, and to whom Emily Dickinson would look for confirmation and measure. The second theme which Ana Mañeru uses to weave the biographical and artistic plot of Emily Dickinson is the profound sense of freedom that characterized it: in her thinking, in her judging, in her doing, in her creating . . . Chapter III is made up of a selection of texts/poems, translated by Ana Mañeru Méndez herself. Two facts stand out especially in these beautiful versions. In the first place, all the chosen poems reinforce and illustrate the arguments of the biographer in the first pages of the work. Second, Ana Mañeru does not hesitate to attribute a sexed voice to the American poetess, and gives a clear feminine identification to the English neutral pronouns and adjectives ('if one shall find again' from poem 22, 'Be sure you count' from 26, or 'One might depart at option', from 54). It is a translation that is decided in putting before it a symbolic order, the maternal one.

The final chapter, 'Consulted Biography', is devoted to the sources from which Ana Mañeru has nourished herself, and which she has opted to divide into two parts, 'On Editions of Poems and Letters of Emily Dickinson'; and 'On the Life and Work of Emily Dickinson and on Feminine Writing'. It must be pointed out, however, that the recognition of the role played by other women in her approximation to Emily Dickinson is not limited to this final chapter. From the first page, Ana Mañeru manifests her profound debt to a series of feminine mediations that make up a long genealogical chain of women who have created world. It is they who have permitted her to illuminate and come close to Emily 'without enclosing her in categories or establishing comparisons' that might distract attention from the American poetess's own words.

The main achievement of this book is exactly that which the author has set out to achieve: to help us not to miss the 'greatness amongst the multitude of conventional, banal and distorted interpretations' of the life and work of Emily Dickinson. In this sense, Ana Mañeru Méndez has clearly chosen to distance herself from academic approaches that insist upon a 'thematic' ordering of her work, or psychological interpretations of it that only repeat the same (dis)organization of the world. Neither does she stop to argue with -or share -the version of a violently repressed soul that is manifested in the chinks in her poetry, as Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar have managed to canonize in North American feminist studies. Tiptoeing past useless sterile polemics, she prefers to introduce us to her poetess and her words. Without any fuss, in her own particular sweet and clear style, with that writing of hers that is so beautiful, Ana Mañeru offers us a panorama of those interpretations of Dickinson's life, sometimes condescending, almost always erroneous, that Adrienne Rich was to denounce. Meanwhile, she introduces us into Dickinson's home, her family, the room where she wrote and in which, in the words of Dickinson herself, 'freedom is', in the books that she read and loved, in her sense of irony and her peculiar religious feeling, far from the 19th-century puritanism to which she has frequently been linked. At the same time, she introduces us to the poetess's relationship with her work, the family quarrels over her legacy and the successive editions of her poetry and correspondence, her reflective mind, her incredibly personal sense of what is correct, her experience as a measure of the real, the adventure of her unique style and her entirely free usage of the resources of language and poetry.

The style of Ana Mañeru becomes one of the essential elements of this book. Its beauty, its sweetness and clarity, its firm and paused rhythm, speak to us from other worlds of meaning; they are echoes of a voice that we recognize as her own. Because the author does not project her voice and disguise herself as a critic or biographer, but rather reads the words of Emily Dickinson from herself. In this sense, and above all, this book is an emotive testimony, manifested in its careful selection and its fine translation, of a woman poet who is concerned, not to rescue texts from oblivion, but to recover a voice that has been distorted by a tradition of male reading.

Mercedes Bengoechea University of Alcalá

(

  Translated by Caroline Wilson) SHAPING WOMEN'S IDENTITY IN NORTHERN IRELAND Alice McIntyre Women in Belfast: How Violence Shapes Identity Westport, CT: Praeger, 2004, ix + 207 pp., ISBN 0-275-97925-3 Alice McIntyre became interested in exploring the issues of 'race, ethnicity and discrimination' (p. 4) in Boston with African American youths within the


Ana Mañeru manifests her profound debt to a series of feminine mediations that make up a long genealogical chain of women who have created world. It is they who have permitted her to illuminate and come close to Emily 'without enclosing her in categories or establishing comparisons' that might distract attention from the American poetess's own words.

The main achievement of this book is exactly that which the author has set out to achieve: to help us not to miss the 'greatness amongst the multitude of conventional, banal and distorted interpretations' of the life and work of Emily Dickinson. In this sense, Ana Mañeru Méndez has clearly chosen to distance herself from academic approaches that insist upon a 'thematic' ordering of her work, or psychological interpretations of it that only repeat the same (dis)organization of the world. Neither does she stop to argue with -or share -the version of a violently repressed soul that is manifested in the chinks in her poetry, as Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar have managed to canonize in North American feminist studies. Tiptoeing past useless sterile polemics, she prefers to introduce us to her poetess and her words. Without any fuss, in her own particular sweet and clear style, with that writing of hers that is so beautiful, Ana Mañeru offers us a panorama of those interpretations of Dickinson's life, sometimes condescending, almost always erroneous, that Adrienne Rich was to denounce. Meanwhile, she introduces us into Dickinson's home, her family, the room where she wrote and in which, in the words of Dickinson herself, 'freedom is', in the books that she read and loved, in her sense of irony and her peculiar religious feeling, far from the 19th-century puritanism to which she has frequently been linked. At the same time, she introduces us to the poetess's relationship with her work, the family quarrels over her legacy and the successive editions of her poetry and correspondence, her reflective mind, her incredibly personal sense of what is correct, her experience as a measure of the real, the adventure of her unique style and her entirely free usage of the resources of language and poetry.

The style of Ana Mañeru becomes one of the essential elements of this book. Its beauty, its sweetness and clarity, its firm and paused rhythm, speak to us from other worlds of meaning; they are echoes of a voice that we recognize as her own. Because the author does not project her voice and disguise herself as a critic or biographer, but rather reads the words of Emily Dickinson from herself. In this sense, and above all, this book is an emotive testimony, manifested in its careful selection and its fine translation, of a woman poet who is concerned, not to rescue texts from oblivion, but to recover a voice that has been distorted by a tradition of male reading. Alice McIntyre became interested in exploring the issues of 'race, ethnicity and discrimination' (p. 4) in Boston with African American youths within the education system. She later learned of multiple interpretations of feminism and discovered participatory action research (PAR). All of these elements are brought together coherently in this book; the skills and knowledge have been transferred to the setting of 'Monument Road' in Belfast, where she carried out PAR with a unique group of nine women. McIntyre met the first two women in the USA, following a talk they gave on 'the violence in the North of Ireland' (p. 5). They then recruited the others from their friends and neighbours, based on whom they believed would enjoy the project. McIntyre lived with two of the participants when she was in Belfast and has clearly developed very close relationships with the group. The women range between 24 and 40 years of age and differ in their domestic arrangements, personalities and education/employment. Although they all describe themselves as nationalist or republican, there is some variability in the meanings they attach to these ideologies. . . . [PAR] seeks to bring together action and reflection, theory and practice, in participation with others, in the pursuit of practical solutions to issues of pressing concern to people, and more generally the flourishing of individual persons and their communities. (Reason and Bradbury, 2001: 1) McIntyre has adhered to the original principles of feminist PAR, being committed to the local participants and their issues. She has attempted to draw on the women's own desire to reflect on their experiences to achieve some clarity and collective action that may be of benefit to them. Much is made of the autonomy of the women in the process and their ownership of the research. The ultimate aim is not only to achieve a deeper understanding but also to 'effect a transformative change ' (p. 19).

Mercedes Bengoechea University of Alcalá

As well as issues of power and knowledge construction, the book covers a range of topics relevant to the women in Belfast. Although there is a focus on how violence has impacted on their identities, they also discuss gender, class, ideology, geographical location and other relevant areas. The section on 'women researching their own lives' (p. 17) provides the framework for the approach and focuses.

McIntyre uses grounded theory method to explore the social constructions in the women's early discussions. These then form the themes addressed in the project and the book.

Chapter 2, 'Past and Present Violence in Women's Lives', presents a most disturbing picture of the experience of violence in a community and is a stark reminder of what this community has actually had to endure. Indeed, research in the past has identified the deleterious impact of violence on the opportunities available to women in terms of education and public life and on their health, both physical and psychological. The most startling aspect of this chapter is McIntyre's analysis of the continuity between the past and present. Not only is there no qualitative change between the past violence and that of the present, there is a sense that, in terms of the level of violence, change is minimal.

The subheading 'Remembering the Past to Survive the Present' (p. 49) does aim to give a little insight into the ways past experiences shape present views and beliefs. This could have been developed in more depth in terms of how salient these past aspects of violence are in comparison to the present and why. The constructed meanings associated with violence are touched on but not explored in depth; I still do not feel I quite understand, in the round, what violence and aggression mean to the women of Monument Road. There are hints at the dual values expressed towards violence when on the one hand it emanates from the community and the women support it and on the other hand it is targeted against the community and is condemned.

Chapter 3, 'Geographies of Place and Identity: A Visual Story of Monument Road', exemplifies the use of photovoice to 'enable people to "reflect on photographs that mirror the everyday social and political realities that influence their lives" (Wang et al., 1998, p. 80)' (p. 75). The technique is creative and allows reflection (albeit highly selective) on significant aspects of life for the women on Monument Road, including places and structures. It is personal yet raises many broader issues and considerations for the research process. There is an interesting dichotomy between what the women are and what they want to have represented in the public record of the book -as illustrated when some, who do not speak Irish, want the captions for their photographs to be written in Irish.

Chapters 4 ('Baby Makers and Sweet Colleens') and 5 ('Women and/in Politics') focus more clearly on the feminist issues and theories that McIntyre also hoped to raise through the PAR project. While there is quite a bit of repetition of points and material and it is a little difficult to follow the logic of the structure, there are some extremely interesting and well-discussed subsections. In one subsection, 'Shaping the Identity of a New Generation', McIntyre outlines some of the views of the children of the community and the dilemmas facing the women about what should be passed on and how. Again, however, I was frustrated by the lack of depth about the construction and transmission of meanings, e.g. how protesting on the road is constructed as 'protecting' their children.

The fifth chapter, 'Women and/in Politics', reports the range of ways the women in Monument Road are active politically within the community and in the wider arena while their role is somewhat muted in the public sphere. McIntyre draws on the work of [START_REF] Mcwilliams | Struggling for Peace and Justice: Reflections on Women's Activism in Northern Ireland[END_REF]Millar et al. (1996) (pp. 148-9) to suggest reasons for this, including lack of opportunities as well as a lack of interest in representing issues that are important to women on the part of those in the political structures. 'The Contested Nature of Women's Roles: Doin' Politics and Doin' the Home' (p. 160) also highlights the conflict for women who want to become more politically active. In previous work, both the wider society and local communities have been found to send out conflicting and changing messages about the acceptability of women having prominent social roles [START_REF] Sullivan | Women in Northern Ireland: Cultural Studies and Material Conditions[END_REF]. McIntyre, like [START_REF] Aretxaga | Shattering Silence: Women, Nationalism and Political Subjectivity in Northern Ireland[END_REF], goes some way to recognizing women political activists in their own right, unlike some previous feminist researchers who erased women from the realm of political activism.

The final chapter of the book reflects on the process and the outcomes for both the researcher and the women. The feminist PAR project did achieve more than most methods could, as McIntyre claims. It was a wonderfully creative process that brought the subjects of the study along as full participants with a great level of control over the outcome. There was a sense that the women benefited from taking time out to express themselves in this way and had opportunities to explore some of their very deeply held hopes, fears and experiences. McIntyre suggests that violence is a pervasive (although differentiated) element in the lives of the women of Monument Road, however, she also provides a rounded picture:

Portraying Irish women as long-suffering victims of the war dismisses their considerable success as educators, community workers, humorists and the primary actors in everyday life. (p. 144) I was brought up in Belfast and have lived here for 40 years. Perhaps as a result, I am struck by the limitations and problems of this participant observation. The activist stance of the researcher is problematic and does highlight some ethical dilemmas as well as value issues. The conflict in Belfast is not quite as clear-cut as presented and there is a naivety inherent in McIntyre's/the PAR stance; more awareness should be shown of the contested nature of claims, such as whether internment ended just before the Good Friday Agreement (p. 130). The tone of the book is value-laden and biased, from the use of language to the information provided. McIntyre has adopted the ideology of the participants but without full transparency and without full acknowledgement of the context. For example, while it is essential to accept the meanings attached to terms and actions that are part of the narratives of the women of Monument Road, the researcher, herself, uses the terms 'war' and the 'North of Ireland' and refers to children throwing missiles as part of 'the various forms of resistance' without acknowledging their political inferences. One omission in this discussion of how violence affects identity is that there is virtually no recognition or discussion of the intracommunity violence.

McIntyre has claimed to be committed to 'researcher reflexivity, which included problematizing the power dynamics in participant-researcher relationships' (p. 20). Although there is acknowledgement of this and some awareness, for example, of being the outsider, I don't think McIntyre has reflected sufficiently on the complex nature of the researcher-researched relationship. These women are exceptionally astute and politically sophisticated and have political agendas as well as personal ones. McIntyre came to this community through links made with fundraisers in her home country of the USA, which is one of the main sources of income for the republican and nationalist cause. I would have expected greater reflection on the political discourses and power relationships inherent in her relationships with her participants and in their lives. Without such reflection, the promise that the book will throw light on this crucially important issue for the 21st century is not fulfilled.

(

  Translated by Caroline Wilson) SHAPING WOMEN'S IDENTITY IN NORTHERN IRELAND Alice McIntyre Women in Belfast: How Violence Shapes Identity Westport,CT: Praeger, 2004, ix + 207 pp., ISBN 0-275-97925-3


Mary Bryden

Beverley Baines

INTERROGATING CONSTITUTIONAL JURISPRUDENCE FROM A GENDERED POINT OF VIEW: ASKING TOO MUCH, OR NOT ENOUGH?

traversable' (p. 114) -finds itself realized in this study. The main chapters are accompanied with thorough notes, and an extensive Bibliography and wellmanaged index make this a valuable research resource. Using the diverse manifestations of écriture féminine as an analytical vehicle, the authors are able to suggest productive ways of travelling through and alongside Cixous's work. In so doing, they do not baulk at exposing what some have seen as inconsistencies in Cixous's exposition of écriture féminine. Appropriately, though, they allow Cixous to speak for herself: her project is to give the apple trees of gender a thorough shaking 'inside out, upside down ' (p. 30).

Perhaps if Adam had mustered a smile rather than a frown at Eve's joyful applegobbling, the flowering of oppositional 'masculine' and 'feminine' economies would have been nipped in the bud.

The Gender of Constitutional Jurisprudence is a wide-ranging and very interesting survey of constitutional principles on gender and their enforcement by the constitutional courts in 12 countries (Australia, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, France, Germany, India, Israel, South Africa, Spain, Turkey and the USA). The authors are all scholars highly qualified in themes related to gender. Each of the 12 chapters gives a quick but comprehensive account of the recent constitutional history of the country examined, then focuses on constitutional provisions about gender and on a review of gender-related case law. Each chapter also offers a brief bibliography. Technical aspects (e.g. the rules of constitutional proceedings) are plainly explained, and thus the reading of the book, even if obviously easier for experts in law, can be enjoyed by a larger public.

As the editors underline in their Introduction, the case law reported makes up a possible 'feminist constitutional agenda', and brings together a large number of themes. Most of them (from employment discrimination to political underrepresentation) are common to the different countries; some (e.g. the rights to land sacred to aboriginal women in Australia) are more specific to a single country.

Even if aware of the 'discursive power' of constitutions and of constitutional jurisprudence, even if conscious that (as Isabel Karpin and Karen O'Connel write in their profound essay on Australia) 'The Constitution -any Constitution -is limited by the forms of power in which it is embedded' (p. 46), and that, on the other hand, 'the interests of women are not unitary but diverse', the writings collected in this book share on the whole the idea that constitutional provisions and constitutional claims are useful tools in order to improve the condition of women as a group, especially when fully implemented by the courts (where even more women judges should sit), and provided that the mere 'formal equality' gives way to 'substantive equality'.

Whereas formal equality (equality before the law) neutralizes differences between men and women and between women, substantive equality is expected to be able to express, promote and protect differences between groups of individuals. Allowing reasonable and proportionate differences in treatment to persons who find themselves in different de facto situations, substantive equality is the principle that should grant positive or corrective measures specifically applicable to women (or to groups of women, as women in minorities, poor, lesbian, elderly women); it is the interpretative path to name male privileges and to uncover the inequalities embedded both in gender-neutral laws and in paternalistic benefits; and the judiciary instrument that makes it possible to overcome oppression and subordination of women by recognizing for them, in the various contexts of life (family, labour, decision-making processes, etc.), special and articulated rights.

In the work of recognizing and implementing substantive equality, the courts appear at times disappointing, at times progressive: the final comment that Blanca Rodríguez Ruiz and Ute Sacksofsky make about the German Federal Constitutional Court, 'quite helpful' but still having 'a long way to go', epitomizes the opinion expressed in the book as a whole towards the outcomes of constitutional jurisprudence.

The rich and varied case law reported (the very treasure which makes this book simply precious) is nevertheless challenging. It questions some of the premises of the analysis if not the possibility (or the opportunity) itself of selecting a portion of constitutional jurisprudence as the one which -as the editors say -'pertains to women'. The case law seems moreover to suggest that equality (even if substantive) is always a very ambiguous, paradoxical way to make differences speak.

Let us think of the delicate theme of abortion. It is of course a matter of 'women's reproductive rights', but the choice of addressing the courts is rarely made by women. Constitutional proceedings on abortion arise from male claims (as in the case of the Canadian doctor prosecuted for performing abortion, reported by Beverley Baines) or from public initiatives (as that of the Government of Bavaria in Germany). In effect, the complex balance of interests which the courts in such cases realize goes to show that at stake are not the rights of women, but the building of a 'secular moral', the drawing of boundaries (and linkages) between State and Religion, the effort of the court to demonstrate that a 'public conscience' does exist, aware of the needs of all the possible actors, unborn life included, and that it is legitimate to answer the 'ultimate questions' such as the beginning of life -the kind of questions that our culture likes to consider are involved in abortion. Whether or not successful in terms of achieving legality of abortion, the great narratives built up by the courts show that these kinds of claims are an important area, and perhaps the more sensitive one, where constitutional democracy constructs itself as a pluralistic arena. Far from outlining a field merely pertaining to women, and thus separate from the rest of the ('neutral'?) constitutional agenda, litigations on abortion prove that issues embodied in women are the cross-roads, the decisive points in the making of the symbolic, discursive and normative construction of contemporary democracies. Another example could be given: quotas and women's representative rights. How much are they an opportunity offered to women, and not an opportunity for the suffering value of democracy to renovate itself and appear useful and good?

Following the balance of interests made up by the courts, we discover that issues 'pertaining to women' are always situated at the heart of the most important institutions of western or westernized societies. When the courts discuss if maternal leave should or should not be extended to fathers, their reasoning, which tries to balance the interests of the child, the paternal role, the problems of married or unmarried couples and so on, ends by putting the institution of the Family at the centre. Sometimes against the interests of women, maybe, but always demonstrating that a fact is at work: the world is made up of different people, who find themselves always in different relations (with regard to this in Italian feminist thought, see Giardini, 2004). As women, as feminists, we will always risk feeling defeated by the law, if we don't allow ourselves to perceive, recognize and say that, in its own way, the law always reveals the dynamic strength of sexed relations. We will always feel displeased, if not defeated, if we don't stop waiting for the law to make 'justice' for women, without becoming aware that women are already inside the law, at the centre of its (at times, inconsistent) complex movements.

At times, we ourselves, as feminist lobbyists, law experts and scholars, do not facilitate the interaction between differences and the law. If we keep on entering claims to equality in the discourse of law, we should not be surprised when the law replies paradoxically, or does not reply at all.

Let us think of the headscarf issue in Turkey (another question, where, as Hilal Elver precisely observes, not only is a religious claim of women at stake, but a whole idea of the public and private spheres). Some women affirm that the prohibition of headscarves, e.g. in the universities, means that women and men are treated unequally before the law, because, as Elver explains, 'men who share the same belief with women . . . are admitted to universities . . . since they have no specific religious dress code' (p. 295). The courts (the Turkish court and the European Court of Human Rights) reply: sorry, you're wrong, it's just the wearing of headscarves that creates 'unequal treatment between male and female believers', so this form of dress must be prohibited in the name of equality (pp. 294, 296). Tricky, of course, but these are the outcomes of equality -and of substantive equality, also.

In this regard, we turn to the field of labour. The fight which in the 1990s took place between the German courts and the European Court of Justice about quotas (masterly reported by Rodríguez Ruiz and Sacksofsky) can be regarded as an exemplary one. According to the European judges, quotas are inconsistent with principles of equal treatment and non-discrimination when they give women absolute priority over male candidates with equal qualifications. In this fight, the national level speaks the language of a traditional constitutionalism innervated with (progressive or stereotyped?) values, and the supranational actor speaks the language of the uniformity of rules in the European context, which does not tolerate too many special rights for women, given that they are a cost in terms of market competition and free circulation of workers. The European Court of Justice, which upholds a strict 'non-discrimination' principle to be applied across the 25 countries of the European Union (not infrequently using this principle as a weapon against protectionist legislation for women), reminds us that the claims of substantive equality (special treatments granted out of protection of special needs of special social groups, as women) are not a way to escape formal equality.

In legal reasoning, every special treatment must first of all be proportional to its own end: a special treatment can never offer a disadvantaged group opportunities that would entail the discrimination of another group. Second, every special treatment must be justified on the basis of 'concrete' grounds: a 'positive measure' such as quotas finds its grounds in the 'under-representation of women in the field of Labour'. The grounds, which justify the positive measure, must continue to exist. Otherwise, the special treatment becomes discriminatory. That is to say: inconsistent with formal equality.

Thus, where would a battle for substantive equality bring us? There are two possibilities. The first would be that women and groups of women remain for ever so problematic, so needy, as to merit eternally some kind of special treatment. The second, that women and groups of women at last overcome their problems and become, finally, equal. Are these the images of women we dream of? A puzzling dilemma, perhaps recognized by those women who choose not to argue their claims from the perspective of equality and non-discrimination, but who defend their interests with arguments strictly related to the concrete features of single cases (as the child interest in a Spanish litigation case about child support, reported by Ruth Rubio-Marin). Were these women (and their lawyers, whose sex it would be interesting to know, and not only that of the judges!) wrong, or were they aware that equality is not the best way to express the centrality and full legitimacy of women's claims in the juridical discourse? In fact, they won, and their victory (Rubio-Marin notes) was perceived as a victory for women.

Thanks to the editors and authors for a book that helps to pose questions around the relevant theme of a feminist constitutional interpretation. REFERENCE Giardini, Federica (2004) Relazioni. Rome: Luca Sossella.

Silvia Niccolai

The University of Cagliari, Italy CONTROVERSIAL, DISTASTEFUL OR NECESSARY? LET'S TALK ABOUT RAPE Merril D. Smith, ed.

Encyclopedia of Rape

Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2004, 301 pp., ISBN 0-3133-2687-8 Can a four-lettered word really a merit an entire encyclopaedia? When that word is rape the answer has to be yes. If you take an interest in history, law, literature, cultural studies, criminology, in fact any facet of life connected to gendered relations, this book will prove a valuable addition to your bookshelves. To some extent it is not a conventional encyclopaedia: there are no tables, graphs, charts or illustrations. It is, however, a very readable series of cross-referenced articles that collectively provide insight into the issue of rape from a range of perspectives. The editor, Merril D. Smith, clearly states that the book takes a US focus to the subject matter and this focus is generally adhered to throughout, although there are some entries of historical and cultural relevance that go beyond these limits.

Aimed at the general reader, the Encyclopedia of Rape is a compendium of easily accessible information on all aspects of rape. It is written in a jargon-free, straightforward style and features 186 entries written by 79 scholars covering concepts and key individuals, emphasizing the historical and practical, rather than the deeply theoretical. A chronology of rape history precedes the general entries and spans events from the pre-Christian Babylonian code of Hammurabi, which legislated on the guilt or innocence of rape victims determined by their marital status, to the trial of Marc Dutroux in Belgium in 2004. It also provides alphabetical and topical lists of entries, which help to save time for the browser who is unsure of

European Journal of Women's Studies 13(2)


Sarah Childs

The Complicated Relationship between Sex, Gender and the Substantive Representation of Women

Keywords:

Simply counting the numbers of women present in politics is an inadequate basis for theorizing the difference they might make. Drawing on research on British MPs (interviews with Labour women MPs first elected in 1997, analysis of Labour MPs' voting behaviour and signing of early day motions in the 1997 parliament, and MPs' participation in parliamentary debates accompanying the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act), this article shows how insights gained from empirical research can inform and improve our theorizing. It suggests that the relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation is better conceived as complicated rather than straightforward.

INTRODUCTION

From all four corners of the world demands for women's political presence are being made. Yet, claims that women should be present do not, in themselves, explain why they should be present. When the demand is made on the basis of a relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation, Pitkin's classic criticism of descriptive representation is frequently articulated: that it is wrongly premised upon a link between representatives' characteristics and their actions (Pitkin, 1967: 66-72). Nonetheless, the claim of a relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation remains appealing. The assumption that women representatives are more likely to act for women European Journal of Women's Studies Copyright © 2006 SAGE Publications (London, Thousand Oaks andNew Delhi), 1350-5068 Vol. 13(1): 7-21; http://ejw.sagepub.com DOI: 10.1177/1350506806060003 than male representatives seems reasonable -to feminist academics, women and men representatives, as well as ordinary women and men. 1 This assumption is often understood in terms of the concept of critical mass: when there is a critical mass of women present (defined somewhere between 15 and 30 percent) politics will reflect to a much greater extent women's concerns. Yet, despite its popularity, the concept is increasingly being questioned. 2 Conceptually weak, it assumes, first, that the percentage of women in a particular political institution is the key to understanding women representatives' behaviour and effects. Second, it fails to consider why women might seek to act for women in the first place. Furthermore, studies reveal that the differences that follow from the presence of women representatives are contingent and mediated. 3 Informed by empirical research on MPs in the British House of Commons, this article reconsiders conceptions of women's substantive representation. First, it explores the oft-made elision between sex and gender and examines how understandings of women's substantive representation can be defended against essentialist criticism and meet the challenge of women's differences. It then questions a second elision, this time between women's bodies and feminist minds. Finally, it addresses other factors that determine whether women representatives act for women in practice, emphasizing in particular the importance of placing women representatives within the actual political environments in which they act. In the UK, party identity and institutional norms are highlighted as important determining factors. In short, this article contends that the relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation is better understood as complicated rather than straightforward.

In the study of women's substantive representation questions of methods are critical -to fully capture the difference women make and with regard to the status in which our findings are held by mainstream political science (Carroll and Liebowitz, 2003: 3). Quantitative surveys and qualitative interviews can establish whether women representatives are concerned with women's concerns and seek to act for women. 4 They can also demonstrate whether women representatives are attitudinally feminist -answering the question of whether they seek to act for women in feminist ways (see [START_REF] Lovenduski | Gender Politics: A Breakthrough for Women?[END_REF]. But studies must not be limited to finding observable and measurable sex differences in the attitudes and behaviour of representatives [START_REF] Lovenduski | Westminster Women: The Politics of Presence[END_REF]. While such differences -with women being more concerned about, and acting on, women's concerns -would demonstrate that the presence of women engenders women's substantive representation, their absence may not prove the opposite [START_REF] Reingold | Representing Women[END_REF]. Similarity in representatives' behaviour might reflect a convergence in gender roles that is hidden because sex is employed as a proxy for gender (Swers, 2002: 10). Alternatively, women's presence in politics may cause men to become more concerned with women's concerns, leaving no sex differences (Reingold, 2000: 50). It could also be the case that quantitative research finds similar behaviour but hides differences in women's and men's levels of support for, or feelings about, that behaviour. Such studies might also miss other factors that determine women representatives' behaviour -such as their position within a particular institution and the freedom (perceived or real) for women to act on those concerns. 5 The four research projects drawn on here, while not constituting the kind of large multi-method research projects that would comprehensively capture the relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation, should, nonetheless, help refine conceptions of women's substantive representation [START_REF] Carroll | New Challenges, New Questions, New Directions[END_REF]Dodson, 2001a;[START_REF] Swers | The Difference Women Make: The Policy Impact of Women in Congress[END_REF]. Interviews with 34 of the 65 newly elected Labour women MPs in 1997 (and follow-up interviews with 23 in 2000) provide rich qualitative data revealing women's perceptions and practice of the substantive representation of women [START_REF] Childs | New Labour's Women MPs: Women Representing Women[END_REF]). 6 However, as few strong conclusions about the behaviour of representatives can be drawn from self-reported claims (Lovenduski and Norris, 2003: 91) analysis of Labour MPs' voting records, signing of early day motions (parliamentary motions for which there is no debate) and contributions to the parliamentary debates that accompanied a piece of 'women's' legislation (the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act) are also considered [START_REF] Childs | Conceptions of Representation and the Passage of the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Bill[END_REF][START_REF] Childs | The Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act and its Implications[END_REF][START_REF] Childs | Women Representatives Acting for Women: Sex and the Signing of Early Day Motions in the 1997 British Parliament[END_REF][START_REF] Cowley | Too Spineless to Rebel? New Labour's Women MPs[END_REF]. As representatives may act for women by articulating women's concerns but with little or no effect, a distinction is made between the feminization of the political agenda (where women's concerns and perspectives are articulated) and a feminization of legislation (where output has been transformed) (Childs and Withey, forthcoming;[START_REF] Tamerius | Sex, Gender, and Leadership in the Representation of Women[END_REF]. 7

REVISITING FEMINIST CONCEPTIONS OF THE SUBSTANTIVE REPRESENTATION OF WOMEN

Arguments for women's political presence based on substantive representation claim that when present women are more likely to act for women than men. But this claim, especially when crudely portrayed, seems to be both reductive and essentialist. Unless one is happy to base the substantive representation of women on an essential understanding of women's identity or to reduce women's attitudes and behaviour back to their bodies, gender needs to replace sex as the basis upon which women representatives seek to act for women. And this is precisely what most feminist theorists do. In The Politics of Presence, Anne Phillips acknowledges that while there is no 'empirical or theoretical plausibility' to the idea that women share experiences or that women's shared experiences translate into shared beliefs or goals. women do have particular concerns that derive from women's gendered experiences (Phillips, 1995: 53-5).

But even if one employs gender rather than sex, women's differences are likely to mean that women's experiences in a gendered society will be multiple -differentiated in terms of class, ethnicity and sexuality at the very least (Reingold, 2000: 45, 49;Squires, 1999: 215;Sawer, 2002: 5). Notwithstanding these differences, Jane Mansbridge holds on to the belief that women representatives can act for other women. While women representatives may not have shared the same particular experiences as the women they are representing, they share 'the outward signs of having lived through' the same experiences. This gives them 'communicative and informational advantages' and enables them to 'forge bonds of trust' with the women they represent based on their gendered experiences (Mansbridge, 1999: 641).

Similarly, Iris Marion Young talks in terms of a shared women's social perspective (Young, 2002: 137). This is derived from women being 'similarly positioned' in society and means that women 'are attuned to particular kinds of social meanings' and share affinity with one another (Young, 2002: 123, 136-7). Her example of American women legislators coming together to demand an enquiry into allegations of sexual harassment suggests that her concept can contend with women's differences. Although the women legislators may have agreed that the issue should be taken seriously, they may well have differed as to their views on sexual harassment per se and/or the guilt or innocence of the senator in question (Young, 2002: 140).

Despite these more nuanced responses to the challenge of women's differences, such conceptions have not gone uncontested. Laurel Weldon cuts to the chase:

If she is a white, straight, middle class mother, she cannot speak for African American women, or poor women, or lesbian women, on the basis of her own experience any more than men can speak for women merely on the basis of theirs. (Weldon, 2002: 1156) 8 Accordingly, women's differences mean that there can be no set of women's policy positions or recommendations, only an 'agenda of topics for discussion or list of problem areas' [START_REF] Weldon | Beyond Bodies: Institutional Sources of Representation for Women in Democratic Policymaking[END_REF](Weldon, : 1157)). Neither do women's perspectives reside 'completely in any individual' woman but are created when women interact with other women 'to define their priorities' [START_REF] Weldon | Beyond Bodies: Institutional Sources of Representation for Women in Democratic Policymaking[END_REF](Weldon, : 1154-7)-7). 9 Yet Weldon's ideas do not seem to be so distant from other theorists. For one thing, her example of women's shared concern for childcare is arguably akin to Young's example of women's concern with sexual harassment. While women may be divided over the issue of childcare -with those seeking paid childcare desirous of lower wages and those women providing the care seeking higher wages -Weldon recognizes that both groups of women 'confront the issue of the relationship between motherhood and work' [START_REF] Weldon | Beyond Bodies: Institutional Sources of Representation for Women in Democratic Policymaking[END_REF](Weldon, : 1157)). Furthermore, although she argues that women's perspectives come from women interacting with one another, she admits that an individual woman representative can 'articulate a truncated version of the group perspective' 'without interacting' with other women 'if she is so inclined' [START_REF] Weldon | Beyond Bodies: Institutional Sources of Representation for Women in Democratic Policymaking[END_REF](Weldon, : 1158;;emphasis added). Although this 'truncated version' is inadequate, Weldon's statement implies that there is some kind of relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation. Otherwise, how can one explain why some women representatives are 'so inclined' to act for women (see Reingold, 2000: 35-6)?

What is needed for women's substantive representation is, then, not the presence of 'any old' women (some of whom may not see themselves as part of, or with obligations to, the group women) but the presence, in Dovi's terms, of 'preferable descriptive representatives' (Dovi, 2002: 729-34). 10 Such representatives experience a sense of belonging to, and have strong mutual relationships with, women (Dovi, 2002: 736, 729). They share aims with women -in that they would want to see women's 'social, economic and political status' improved -and experience a 'reciprocated sense of having [their] . . . fate linked' with women (Dovi, 2002: 736-7). Preferable women representatives also recognize differences between women and acknowledge that women may have 'different conceptions of what is necessary' to achieve women's aims (Dovi, 2002: 737). But there are limits: a woman representative who does not share either 'policy preferences' or 'values' with women could not be said to share their aims (Dovi, 2002: 737-8).

At the theoretical level, then, a number of contemporary feminist theorists tell us that neither simple notions of sex nor gender are sufficient when theorizing the relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation. At the same time they seem able to reconcile women's differences with theories of gender identity. But in order to draw any conclusions about the relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation in practice, it is necessary to establish both that women representatives are attitudinally predisposed to act for women (with their attitudes demonstrating a concern for women's concerns) and whether they are attitudinally feminist (whether they are predisposed to act for women in a feminist or non-feminist way) (Carroll, 2001: xv;Dodson, 2001a: 17-20;[START_REF] Duerst-Lahti | Institutions, Ideologies, and the Possibility of Equal Political Participation[END_REF].

Sex differences in attitudes among British MPs are long established. 11 The most recent study confirms a gap between women's and men's attitudes towards women's concerns (Lovenduski and Norris, 2003: 94-5). Interview-based research similarly provides supportive evidence [START_REF] Childs | New Labour's Women MPs: Women Representing Women[END_REF]. Many of those Labour women MPs first elected to the House of Commons in 1997 believe that acting for women is, at least, part of what they are elected for [START_REF] Childs | New Labour's Women MPs: Women Representing Women[END_REF]. Some 40 percent also considered that the concept of political representation included the representation of women. Nearly a third discussed a shared affinity with women and a similar proportion talked explicitly about the positive way in which they interpreted the responsibility to act for women. With nearly threequarters of Labour's new women MPs identifying themselves as feminists, the interview data also suggest that the difference the women will make -if their attitudes translate into behaviour -will be a feminist one [START_REF] Childs | New Labour's Women MPs: Women Representing Women[END_REF].

In line with contemporary feminist theory, the basis on which the women thought they could and would act for women was not sex but gender. Their sense of affinity with women derives from a belief in women's shared gendered experiences: 'I think there are common themes which touch upon the lives of many, if not most women; by and large women's experiences of life are different from men's' (Childs, 2004: 73). At the same time, the MPs are cognizant of the complexity of women's identities, with ethnicity the difference that is most often highlighted. Importantly, this is not perceived to prevent the substantive representation of different women. Although there is a sense that acting for black women is different -as one MP acknowledged, she would not 'presume because I am a woman therefore I know what you think' -there remains a perception that women's gender experiences are shared by women. As another MP made clear, she can act for women even though she has not 'lived through' the same experiences as other women because she shares a sense of affinity with them.

Demonstrating their awareness of women's multiple identities, some of the MPs claim also to have acted for different women: activities such as arranging specific meetings with, and supporting the self-organization of different groups of women are identified as practical strategies through which different women can be substantively represented by women representatives (and the latter, in turn, held to account). As long as women representatives seek out, listen and respond to the opinions and perspectives of different women then the substantive representation can occur, according to these representatives, even if women share only some experiences. 12 But gender is not, for these women representatives, everything. In political systems such as the UK, where party identity is a key feature structuring politics, women representatives' party identity complicates any understanding of the substantive representation of women (Mackay, 2001: 99;[START_REF] Squires | Quotas for Women[END_REF]. 13 While many of Labour's new women MPs were happy to agree that women representatives from across the political spectrum share a concern with women's concerns (akin to Young's social perspective) -they identified issues such as abortion, childcare, equal pay, housework, domestic violence, women's health, drugs, unemployment, peace, justice and international cooperation -they mostly felt, abortion aside, that a woman MP's analysis of, and response to, a particular concern is likely to be informed by (intertwined with) her party identity [START_REF] Childs | New Labour's Women MPs: Women Representing Women[END_REF]. As one of the MPs put it: 'It's when you come to the next stage about proposed policy and solutions then [you] get the divergence.' Furthermore, finding Labour's new women MPs predisposed to act for women and attitudinally feminist does not mean, necessarily, that they act in line with these attitudes. A failure to consider the particular contexts within which representatives act uncritically assumes that attitudes always and directly translate into behaviour. 14 Institutions have an impact: in political institutions characterized by masculinist norms, indirect discrimination and sexism, heightened inter-party conflict and party-controlled systems of rewards, the space for women to act for women is likely to be reduced [START_REF] Considine | Instituting Gender[END_REF]Dodson, 2001a: 22-3, 7;Mackay, 2001: 97). 15 So, how did Labour's new women MPs fare? The women MPs were themselves optimistic. They considered that the articulation of women's concerns would be the minimum effect of their presence. In 1997, half believed that their presence would enable the voicing of women's concerns and a feminization of the parliamentary agenda [START_REF] Childs | New Labour's Women MPs: Women Representing Women[END_REF]. Three years later -when the women had greater experiences of acting in parliament -they were even more confident of their effect. Nearly twothirds of the MPs argued that they had articulated women's concerns (violence against women, forced marriages, sexual harassment, childcare, caring, breast cancer and emergency contraception) in the House. Moreover, not only did half of them now explicitly accept the link between the presence of women and the substantive representation of women, many talked about how women's concerns would not have been raised, or would not have been raised in the same form, in their absence. Women MPs also claimed to have had an effect in select committees, with all of the MPs who discussed their work in select committees believing that their presence re-gendered their committees' agendas.

However, and despite the women's claims to have acted for women since their election, the dominant representation of them in the British media has been highly critical. Based on the classic, albeit increasingly criticized, approach of analysing representatives' legislative voting behaviour, a sex difference between Labour MPs during the 1997 parliament is found: the newly elected women were less than half as likely to rebel against the party whip as the rest of the parliamentary party, and even those who did rebel, did so around half as often [START_REF] Cowley | Too Spineless to Rebel? New Labour's Women MPs[END_REF]). Yet, with male and female MPs (apparently) facing the same environmental pressures, the expectation was that this difference was an artefact that would disappear once other factors were controlled for. However, sex continues to exert an influence on the MPs' propensity to rebel even after controlling for a range of factors (sex, newness, all-women shortlists, previous political history, ideology, ambition, legislative roles, age, marginality, personal characteristics), although the difference between the new women and men is not large enough (or consistent enough) to be statistically significant.

While it is not possible to explain why Labour's new women were more loyal -it cannot be deduced from their sex, because it was Labour's new women and not all women who behaved in this way -the women MPs themselves (or, rather, half of them) explain the difference by claiming to prefer a different style of politics: more 'behind the scenes' and less 'macho'. Unfortunately, such claims are difficult to test and the contention that there is a women's style of politics (held by more than two-thirds of the new Labour women MPs interviewed) is contested by other MPs, both male and female (Childs, 2004: Ch. 10;[START_REF] Cowley | Too Spineless to Rebel? New Labour's Women MPs[END_REF]. The same difficulty applies to another possible explanation suggested by a few of Labour's new women; in a parliament where women feel alien, uncomfortable and under pressure to conform to dominant norms, the costs of rebelling (that is, of behaving like men) are simply too high (Cowley and Childs, 2003: 365).

Another way to capture the factors that mediate the relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation in practice is to look beyond voting, at the other activities MPs engage in to see if representatives are acting for women in these places (Dodson, 2001a;[START_REF] Tamerius | Sex, Gender, and Leadership in the Representation of Women[END_REF]. Indeed, when other activities that MPs engage in are looked at, a different picture emerges from that depicted by the analysis of their voting.

The parliamentary debates that accompanied the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act -an Act which allows political parties to introduce positive discrimination in the selection of parliamentary candidates -reveal that women MPs spoke disproportionately in the debates with male MPs (especially backbenchers) conspicuous by their absence [START_REF] Childs | Conceptions of Representation and the Passage of the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Bill[END_REF][START_REF] Childs | The Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act and its Implications[END_REF]. In addition to supporting the claim that women representatives are more likely to act for women than men, this research also shows the role of the party. Though women MPs of all parties were acting for women by speaking and (for the most part) supporting the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Bill, those MPs who were more likely to favour positive discrimination and to draw on the concept of substantive representation to support the legislation were Labour members (both male and female). In contrast, those MPs who spoke against the legislation, were hostile to positive discrimination and rejected the concept of substantive representation were mostly Conservative [START_REF] Childs | Conceptions of Representation and the Passage of the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Bill[END_REF].

Analysis of the signing of early day motions (EDMs) provides another opportunity to examine the behaviour of MPs, in this instance in respect of a parliamentary activity that is relatively unconstrained (either by party or parliamentary norms): because the signing of a particular EDM takes very little effort and has few costs, it is likely that MPs will feel free to sign those that they agree with [START_REF] Berrington | Backbench Opinion in the House of Commons 1945-55[END_REF][START_REF] Finer | Backbench Opinion in the House of Commons 1955-9[END_REF]. Analysis of EDMs in the 1997 parliament shows that Labour's (permanent backbencher) women MPs 16 are more likely to sign 'women's' EDMs -those that have as their primary subject matter women and/or their concernswhile Labour's male MPs are more likely to sign EDMs in general, although the differences are not statistically significant [START_REF] Childs | Women Representatives Acting for Women: Sex and the Signing of Early Day Motions in the 1997 British Parliament[END_REF]). 17 Significant sex differences are, however, found in the percentage of 'women's' EDMs signed (Figure 1) (p = .000) 18 and in the number and percentage of feminist 'women's' EDMs signed (Figure 2) (p = .000): women signed an average of 28.7 feminist 'women's' EDMs compared with 23.4 for men (p = .009).

The nature of the 'women's' EDMs disproportionately signed by Labour's women MPs are those concerned, for the most part, with women's bodily integrity and which were coded as 'feminist' [START_REF] Childs | Women Representatives Acting for Women: Sex and the Signing of Early Day Motions in the 1997 British Parliament[END_REF].

Proportion of women's EDMs signed in 1997 parliament The assumption that the presence of women in politics will make a difference is widely held. Supporters of the concept of critical mass maintain that women representatives will act for women when there are enough of them present -although the point when this is supposed to happen is unclear. However, critical mass's failings are more fundamental: there is a failure to adequately theorize the relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation; why should (on what basis will) women representatives act for women? Feminist theory suggests that it is gender, rather than sex, that is the key to understanding this relationship: women representatives have gendered experiences as women that make them more likely to act for women. Though such claims are better than ones based on sex, feminist theories of women's substantive representation still have to contend with concerns related to essentialism and women's differences. If women do not constitute a homogeneous group (and both theory and empirical study suggest that they do not), how can women representatives act for them?

In addition to rejecting the oft-made elision between sex and gender, the elision between women's bodies and feminist minds should also be rejected. Whether women are attitudinally predisposed to act regarding women's concerns and whether they seek to act on these in a 'feminist' way needs to be established rather than assumed. Women representatives' party identities also need to be examined (at least in electoral systems where party is important) in conjunction with consideration of the particular gendered environments in which they act.

If theories of women's substantive representation cannot simply count the number of women present and draw inferences about the likely effect, good empirical research must also think about the best way to investigate the nature and extent of the difference women representatives make in practice. The efficacy of different research methods should be reflected upon and sex differences should not be regarded as the proof that women make a difference; the changes effected by women may not show themselves in differences between women and men.

The discussion of the four different studies into the effect of Labour women MPs in the 1997 and 2001 parliaments presented here has illustrated the complicated relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation. The balance of these studies supports the claim that women representatives will seek to act for women. Moreover, the basis for Labour's women MPs acting for women is, in line with feminist theorizing, not sex but gender. Most of the new Labour women MPs were also found to be attitudinally feminist. Party identity also matters.

Feminist claims that differences between women do not inherently rupture the acclaimed relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation also find support among Labour's women. To be sure, their claims to have acted for different women are self-reported, but at the very least, they demonstrate that many of the women MPs (who are overwhelmingly white, middle class and highly educated) underpin their understanding of women's substantive representation on gender and not sex and are conscious of, and recognize the need to respond to, women's differences.

Nonetheless, knowing only the attitudes of Labour's women MPs is limited in what it can tell us about the relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation. This can only be fully understood with reference to the gendered environments in which they act. In the UK, there is now behavioural evidence of sex differences between Labour's women and men MPs. In terms of their voting, the new women are behaving differently from their male peers, although this should not necessarily be interpreted as them acting for women [START_REF] Cowley | Too Spineless to Rebel? New Labour's Women MPs[END_REF]. Analysis of the signing of EDMs and of MPs' contributions in the parliamentary debates that accompanied the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act suggests that Labour's women are acting for women [START_REF] Childs | Conceptions of Representation and the Passage of the Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Bill[END_REF][START_REF] Childs | The Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act and its Implications[END_REF][START_REF] Childs | Women Representatives Acting for Women: Sex and the Signing of Early Day Motions in the 1997 British Parliament[END_REF]Childs and Withey, forthcoming). These findings are important: the EDM analysis should convince sceptics who seek observable, measurable and 'hard' data; while both studies are suggestive of how the MPs might act in the absence of institutional constraining factors.

The balance of the research reported in this article suggests that there is some evidence of the substantive representation of women by Labour's women MPs since 1997. This is not to say that the relationship between women's descriptive and substantive representation is straightforward. Indeed, it remains messy, complicated by their identities and the political institutional contexts in which they act.

EDMs signed were compared. However, because the data were skewed and the two sex groups were of very unequal size, the non-parametric Mann Whitney test was used. 17. The difference here is just outside of the 5 percent significance level (p = .058). 18. The total number of 'women's' EDMs signed is divided by the total number of all EDMs signed.

a

  FIGURE 1 Proportion of 'Women's' EDMs Signed as a Total of EDMs Signed in the 1997Parliament by Sex a

of Feminist EDMs Signed as a Total of EDMs Signed in the 1997 Parliament by Sex

	16	European Journal of Women's Studies 13(1)
			FIGURE 2
	Proportion
		80
		60
	Percentage	40
		20			Sex of MP
					Male
		0			Female
		0%-3%	3%-5%	5%-10%	Over 10%
		Proportion of feminist EDMs signed in 1997 parliament

European Journal of Women's Studies 13(1)

When cumulative signings were considered, then the mean number of European Journal of Women's Studies 13(1)