Women and the Subversion of the Community

892019 Women and the Subversion of the Community

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullwomen-and-the-subversion-of-the-community 134

983144983141983155983141 983151983138983155983141983154983158983137983156983145983151983150983155 983137983154983141 983137983150 983137983156983156983141983149983152983156 983156983151 983140983141983142983145983150983141 983137983150983140 983137983150983137983148983161-ze the ldquoWoman 983121uestionrdquo and to locate this question in the entireldquoemale rolerdquo as it has been created by the capitalist division o labor

We place oremost in these pages the housewie as the central figure inthis emale role We assume that all women are housewives and eventhose who work outside the home continue to be housewives Tat ison a world level it is precisely what is particular to domestic work not

only measured as number o hours and nature o work but as qualityo lie and quality o relationships which it generates that determinesa womanrsquos place wherever she is and to whichever class she belongs Weconcentrate here on the position o the working class woman but this isnot to imply that only working class women are exploited Rather it is toconfirm that the role o the working class housewie which we believehas been indispensable to capitalist production is the determinant orthe position o all other women Every analysis o women as a caste then

must proceed rom the analysis o the position o working class housewives

In order to see the housewie as central it was first o all necessary toanalyze briefly how capitalism has created the modern amily and thehousewiersquos role in it by destroying the types o amily group or com-munity which previously existed

Tis process is by no means complete While we are speaking o the Western world and Italy in particular we wish to make clear that tothe extent that the capitalist mode o production also brings the Tird

World under its command the same process o destruction must and istaking place there Nor should we take or granted that the amily as weknow it today in the most technically advanced Western countries is thefinal orm the amily can assume under capitalism But the analysis onew tendencies can only be the product o an analysis o how capitalism

created this amily and what womanrsquos role is today each as a moment ina process

We propose to complete these observations on the emale role by analyz-ing as well the position o the woman who works outside the home butthis is or a later date We wish merely to indicate here the link between

2





4

I983150 983154983141983139983141983150983156 983161983141983137983154983155 983141983155983152983141983139983145983137983148983148983161 983145983150 983156983144983141 983137983140983158983137983150983139983141983140 983139983137983152983145983156983137983148983145983155983156countries there have developed a number o womenrsquos movements odifferent orientations and range rom those which believe the Funda-mental conflict in society is between men and women to those ocusingon the position o women as a specific maniestation o class exploita-tion

I at first sight the position and attitudes o the ormer are perplexing

especially to women who have had previous experience o militant par-ticipation in political struggles it is we think worth pointing out that women or whom sexual exploitation is the basic social contradiction provide an extremely important index o the degree o our own rus-tration experienced by millions o women both inside and outside themovement Tere are those who define their own lesbianism in theseterms (we reer to views expressed by a section o the movement in theUS in particular) ldquoOur associations with women began when because

we were together we could acknowledge that we could no longer toleraterelationships with men that we could not prevent these rom becoming power relationships in which we were inevitably subjected Our atten-tions and energies were diverted our power was diffused and its objec-tives delimitedrdquo From this rejection has developed a movement o gay

women which asserts the possibilities o a relationship ree o a sexual power struggle ree o the biological social unit and asserts at the sametime our need to open ourselves to a wider social and thereore sexual

potential

Now in order to understand the rustrations o women expressing them-selves in ever-increasing orms we must be clear what in the nature othe amily under capitalism precipitates a crisis on this scale Te oppres-sion o women afer all did not begin with capitalism What began withcapitalism was the more intense exploitation o women as women andthe possibility at last o their liberation



5

THE ORIGINS OF THE CAPITALIST FAMILY

I983150 983152983154983141-983139983137983152983145983156983137983148983145983155983156 983152983137983156983154983145983137983154983139983144983137983148 983155983151983139983145983141983156983161 983156983144983141 983144983151983149983141 983137983150983140 983156983144983141 amily were central to agricultural and artisan production With the

advent o capitalism the socialization o production was organized withthe actory as its center Tose who worked in the new productive centerthe actory received a wage Tose who were excluded did not Womenchildren and the aged lost the relative power that derived rom the am-

ilyrsquos dependence on their labor which was seen to be social and necessary Capital destroying the amily and the community and production as one

whole on the one hand has concentrated basic social production in theactory and the office and on the other has in essence detached the manrom the amily and turned him into a wage laborer It has put on themanrsquos shoulders the burden o financial responsibility or women chil-dren the old and the ill in a word all those who do not receive wagesFrom that moment began the expulsion rom the home o all those who

did not procreate and service those who worked or wages Te first to beexcluded rom the home afer men were children they sent childrento school Te amily ceased to be not only the productive but also theeducational center2

o the extent that men had been the despotic heads o the patriarchalamily based on a strict division o labor the experience o women chil-dren and men was a contradictory experience which we inherit But in

pre-capitalist society the work o each member o the community o sers was seen to be directed to a purpose either to the prosperity o the eu-dal lord or to our survival o this extent the whole community o sers

was compelled to be co-operative in a unity o unreedom that involved

2 Tis is to assume a whole new meaning or ldquoeducationrdquo and the work now be-ing done on the history o compulsory education ndash orced learning ndash proves this InEngland teachers were conceived o as ldquomoral policerdquo who could 1) condition childrenagainst ldquocrimerdquo ndash curb working class reappropriation in the community 2) destroyldquothe mobrdquo working class organization based on amily which was still either a produc-tive unit or at least a viable organizational unit 3) make habitual regular attendanceand good timekeeping so necessary to childrenrsquos later employment and 4) stratiy theclass by grading and selection As with the amily itsel the transition to this new ormo muni control was not smooth and direct and was the result o contradictory orcesboth within the class and within capital as with every phase o the history o capitalism



6

to the same degree women children and men which capitalism had tobreak3 In this sense the unfee individual the democracy o unfeedom4 entered into a crisis Te passage rom serdom to ree labor power sepa-rated the male rom the emale proletarian and both o them rom their

children Te unree patriarch was transormed into the ldquoreerdquo wageearner and upon the contradictory experience o the sexes and the gen-erations was built a more proound estrangement and thereore a moresubversive relation

We must stress that this separation o children rom adults is essentialto an understanding o the ull significance o the separation o womenrom men to grasp ully how the organization o the struggle on the part

o the womenrsquos movement even when it takes the orm o a violent rejec-tion o any possibility o relations with men can only aim to overcomethe separation which is based on the ldquoreedomrdquo o wage labor

THE CLASS STRUGGLE IN EDUCATION

Te analysis o the school which has emerged during recent years ndash par-ticularly with the advent o the studentsrsquo movement ndash has clearly identi-

fied the school as a center o ideological discipline and o the shaping othe labor orce and its masters What has perhaps never emerged or atleast not in its proundity Is precisely what precedes all this and thatis the usual desperation o children on their first day o nursery school

when they see themselves dumped into a class and their parents suddenlydesert them But it is precisely at this point that the whole story o schoolbegins5

Seen in this way the elementary school children are not those append-

3 Wage labor is based on the subordination o all relationships to the wage relationTe worker must enter as an ldquoindividualrdquo into a contract with capital stripped o the protection o kinships4 Karl Marx ldquoCritique o Hegelrsquos Philosophy o the Staterdquo Writings o the Young

Marx on Philosophy and Society ed and trans Lloyd D Easton and Kurt H GuddatNY 1967 p1765 We are not dealing here with the narrowness o the nuclear amily that prevents

children rom having an easy transition to orming relations with other people nor with what ollows rom this the argument o psychologists that proper conditioning would have avoided such a crisis We are dealing with the entire organization o thesociety o which amily school and actory are each one ghettoized compartment Soevery kind o passage rom one to another o these compartments is a painul passageTe pain cannot be eliminated by tinkering with the relations between one ghetto andanother but only by the destruction o every ghetto



7

ages who merely by the demands ldquoree lunches ree ares ree booksrdquolearnt rom the older ones can in some way be united with the stu-dents o the higher schools6 In elementary school children in those

who are the sons and daughters o workers there is always an awareness

that school is in some way setting them against their parents and their peers and consequently there is an instinctive resistance to studying andto being ldquoeducatedrdquo Tis is the resistance or which Black children areconfined to educationally subnormal schools in Britain7 Te European

working class child like the Black working class child sees in the teachersomebody who is teaching him or her something against her mother andather not as a deense o the child but as an attack on the class Capital-ism is the first productive system where the children o the exploited are

disciplined and educated in institutions organized mid controlled by theruling class8

6 ldquoFree ares ree lunches ree booksrdquo was one o the slogans o a section o the Ital-ian students movement which aimed to connect the struggle o younger students with workers and university students7 In Britain and the US the psychologists Eysenck and Jensen who are convincedldquoscientificallyrdquo that Blacks have a lower ldquointelligencerdquo than whites and the progressiveeducators like Ivan Illyich seem diametrically opposed What they aim to achieve links

them Tey are divided by method In any case the psychologists are not more racistthan the rest only more direct ldquoIntelligencerdquo is the ability to assume your enemyrsquos caseas wisdom and to shape your own logic on the basis o this Where the whole societyoperates institutionally on the assumption o white racial superiority these psycholo-gists propose more conscious and thorough ldquoconditioningrdquo so that children who donot learn to read do not learn instead to make molotov cocktails A sensible view with which Illyich who is concerned with the ldquounderachievementrdquo o children (that is rejec-tion by them o ldquointelligencerdquo) can agree8 In spite o the act that capital manages the schools control is never given once

and or all Te working class continually and increasingly challenges the contentsand reuses the costs o capitalist schooling Te response o the capitalist system is tore-establish its own control and this control tends to be more and more regimented onactory-like lines

Te new policies on education which are being hammered out even as we writehowever are more complex than this We can only indicate here the impetus or thesenew policies (a) Working class youth reject that education prepares them or anythingbut a actory even i they will wear white collars there and use typewriters and drawingboards instead o riveting machines (b) Middle class youth reject the role o mediator

between the classes and the repressed personality this mediating role demands (c) Anew labor power more wage and status differentiated is called or Te present egalitar-ian trend must be reversed (d) A new type o labor process may be created which willattempt to interest the worker in ldquoparticipatingrdquo instead o reusing the monotony andragmentation o the present assembly line

I the traditional ldquoroad to successrdquo and even ldquosuccessrdquo itsel are rejected by the young new goals will have to be ound to which they can aspire that is or which they



8

Te final proo that this alien indoctrination which begins in nurseryschool is based on the splitting o the amily is that those working classchildren who arrive (those ew who do arrive) at university are so brain-

washed that they are unable any longer to talk to their community

Working class children then are the first who instinctively rebel againstschools and the education provided in schools But their parents carrythem to schools and confine them to schools because they are concernedthat their children should ldquohave an educationrdquo that is be equipped toescape the assembly line or the kitchen to which they the parents areconfined I a working class child shows particular aptitudes the wholeamily immediately concentrates on this child gives him the best condi-

tions ofen sacrificing the others hoping and gambling that he will carrythem all out o the working class Tis in effect becomes the way capitalmoves through the aspirations o the parents to enlist their help in disci-

plining resh labor power

In Italy parents less and less succeed in sending their children to schoolChildrenrsquos resistance to school is always increasing even when this resis-tance is not yet organized

At the same time that the resistance o children grows to being educatedin schools so does their reusal to accept the definition that capital hasgiven o their age Children want everything they see they do not yetunderstand that in order to have things one must pay or them and inorder to pay or them one must have a wage and thereore one must alsobe an adult No wonder it is not easy to explain to children why they can-not have what television has told them they cannot live without

But something is happening among the new generation o children and youth which is making it steadily more difficult to explain to them thearbitrary point at which they reach adulthood Rather the younger gen-eration is demonstrating their age to us in the sixties six-year-olds have

will go to school and go to work New ldquoexperimentsrdquo in ldquoreerdquo education where thechildren are encouraged to participate in planning their own education and there isgreater democracy between teacher and taught are springing up daily It is an illusionto believe that this is a deeat or capital any more than regimentation will be a victoryFor in the creation o a labor power more creatively manipulated capital will not in the process lose 01 o profit ldquoAs a matter o actrdquo they are in effect saying ldquoyou can be armore efficient or us i you take your own road so long as it is through our territoryrdquo Insome parts o the actory and in the social actory capitalrsquos slogan will increasingly beldquoLiberty and raternity to guarantee and even extend equalityrdquo



9

already come up against police dogs in the South o the United Statesoday we find the same phenomenon in Southern Italy and NorthernIreland where children have been as active in the revolt as adults Whenchildren (and women) are recognized as integral to history no doubt

other examples will come to light o very young peoplersquos participation(and o womenrsquos) in revolutionary struggles What is new is the auton-omy o their participation in spite o and because o their exclusion romdirect production In the actories youth reuse the leadership o older

workers and in the revolts in the cities they are the diamond point Inthe metropolis generations o the nuclear amily have produced youthand student movements that have initiated the process o shaking theramework o constituted power in the Tird World the unemployed

youth are ofen in the streets beore the working class organized in tradeunions

It is worth recording what Te imes o London (1 June 1971) reportedconcerning a headteachersrsquo meeting called because one o them wasadmonished or hitting a pupil ldquoDisruptive and irresponsible elementslurk around every corner with the seemingly planned intention o erod-ing all orces o authorityrdquo Tis ldquois a plot to destroy the values on which

our civilization is built and on which our schools are some o the finestbastionsrdquo



10

THE EXPLOITATION OF THE WAGELESS

W 983141 983159983137983150983156983141983140 983156983151 983149983137983147983141 983156983144983141983155983141 983142983141983159 983139983151983149983149983141983150983156983155 983151983150 983156983144983141 983137983156983156983145-tude o revolt that is steadily spreading among children and

youth especially rom the working class and particularly Black peoplebecause we believe this to be intimately connected with the explosion othe womenrsquos movement and something which the Womenrsquos movementitsel must take into account We are dealing with the revolt o those

who have been excluded who have been separated by the system o pro-duction and who express in action their need to destroy the orces thatstand in tinrsquo way o their social existence but who this time are comingtogether as individuals

Women and children have been excluded Te revolt o the one againstexploitation through exclusion is an index o the revolt o the other

o the extent to which capital has recruited the man and turned himinto a wage laborer it has created a racture between him and all theother proletarians without a wage who not participating directly insocial production were thus presumed incapable o being the subjectso social revolt

Since Marx it has been clear that capital rules and develops throughthe wage that is that the oundation o capitalist society was the wage

laborer and his or her direct exploitation What has been neither clearnor assumed by the organizations o the working class movement is that precisely through the wage has the exploitation o the non-wage laborerbeen organized Tis exploitation has been even more effective becausethe lack o a wage hid it Tat is the wage commanded a larger amount olabor than appeared in actory bargaining Where women are concernedtheir labor appears to be a personal service outside o capital Te womanseemed only to be suffering rom male chauvinism being pushed around

because capitalism meant general ldquoinjusticerdquo and ldquobad and unreason-able behaviorrdquo the ew (men) who noticed convinced us that this wasldquooppressionrdquo but not exploitation But ldquooppressionrdquo hid another andmore pervasive aspect o capitalist society Capital excluded childrenrom the home and sent them to school not only because they are in



11

the way o othersrsquo more ldquoproductiverdquo labor or only to indoctrinate themTe rule o capital through the wage compels every ablebodied personto unction under the law o division o labor and to unction in waysthat are i not immediately then ultimately profitable to the expansion

and extension o the rule o capital Tat undamentally is the meaningo school Where children are concerned their labor appears to be learning

or their own benefit

Proletarian children have been orced to undergo the same educationin the schools this is capitalist levelling against the infinite possibilitieso learning Woman on the other hand has been isolated in the homeorced to carry out work that is considered unskilled the work o giving

birth to raising disciplining and servicing the worker or productionHer role in the cycle o social production remained invisible becauseonly the product o her labor the laborer was visible there She hersel

was thereby trapped within pre-capitalist working conditions and never paid a wage

And when we say ldquopre-capitalist working conditionsrdquo we do not reeronly to women who have to use brooms to sweep Even the best equipped

American kitchens do not reflect the present level o technological devel-opment at most they reflect the technology o the 19th century I youare not paid by the hour within certain limits nobody cares how long ittakes you to do your work

Tis is not only a quantitative but a qualitative difference rom other work and it stems precisely rom the kind o commodity that this work is destined to produce Within the capitalist system generally

the productivity o labor doesnrsquot increase Unless there is a conronta-tion between capital and class technological innovations and co-oper-ation are at the same time moments o attack or the working class andmoments o capitalistic response But i this is true or the production ocommodities generally this has not been true or the production o thatspecial kind o commodity labor power I technological innovation canlower the limit o necessary work and i the working class struggle inindustry can use that innovation or gaining ree hours the same cannot

be said o housework to the extent that she must in isolation procreateraise and be responsible or children a high mechanization o domesticchores doesnrsquot ree any time or the woman She is always on duty orthe machine doesnrsquot exist that makes and minds children9 A higher pro-

9 We are not at all ignoring the attempts at this moment to make test-tube babies



12

ductivity o domestic work through mechanization then can be relatedonly to specific services or example cooking washing cleaning Her

workday is unending not because she has no machines but because sheis isolated10

CONFIRMING THE MYTH OF FEMALE INCAPACITY

With the advent o the capitalist mode o production then women were relegated to a condition o isolation enclosed within the amilycell dependent in every aspect on men Te new autonomy o the ree

wage slave was denied her and she remained in a pre-capitalist stageo personal dependence but this time more brutalized because in con-

trast to the large-scale highly socialized production which now prevails Womanrsquos apparent incapacity to do certain things to understand certainthings originated in her history which is a history very similar in cer-tain respects to that o ldquobackwardrdquo children in special 983141983155983150 classes o theextent that women were cut off rom direct socialized production andisolated in the home all possibilities o social lie outside the neighbor-hood were denied them and hence they were deprived o social knowl-edge and social education When women are deprived o wide experi-

ence o organizing and planning collectively industrial and other massstruggles they are denied a basic source o education the experience osocial revolt And this experience is primarily the experience o learning

your own capacities that is your power and the capacities the powero your class Tus the isolation rom which women have suffered hasconfirmed to society and to themselves the myth o emale incapacity

But today such mechanisms belong completely to capitalist science rtfid control Teuse would be completely against us and against the class It is not in our interest to abdi-cate procreation to consign it to the hands o the enemy It is in our interest to conquerthe reedom to procreate or which we will pay neither the price o the wage nor the price o social exclusion10 o the extent that not technological innovation but only ldquohuman carerdquo can raisechildren the effective liberation rom domestic work time the qualitative change odomestic work can derive only rom a movement o women rom a struggle o womenthe more the movement grows the less menrdquordquoand first o all political militants ndash cancount on emale babyminding And at the same time the new social ambiance that themovement constructs offers to children social space with both men and women thathas nothing to do with the day care centers organized by the State Tese are already victories o struggle Precisely because they are the results o a movement that is by itsnature a struggle they do not aim to substitute any kind o co-operation or the struggleitsel



13

It is this myth which has hidden firstly that to the degree that the work-ing class has been able to organize mass struggles in the community rentstrikes struggles against inflation generally the basis has always beenthe unceasing inormal organization o women there secondly that in

struggles in the cycle o direct production womenrsquos support and organi-zation ormal and inormal has been decisive At critical moments thisunceasing network o women suraces and develops through the talentsenergies and strength o the ldquoincapable emalerdquo But the myth does notdie Where women could together with men claim the victory ndash to sur-

vive (during unemployment) or to survive and win (during strikes) ndash thespoils o the victor belonged to the class ldquoin generalrdquo Women rarely iever got anything specifically or themselves rarely i ever did the strug-

gle have as an objective in any way altering the power structure o thehome and its relation to the actory Strike or unemployment a womanrsquos

work is never done

THE CAPITALIST FUNCTION OF THE UTERUS

Never as with the advent o capitalism has the destruction o woman asa person meant also the immediate diminution o her physical integrity

Feminine and masculine sexuality had already beore capitalism under-gone a series o regimes and orms o conditioning But they had alsoundergone efficient methods o birth control which have unaccount-ably disappeared Capital established the amily as the nuclear amilyand subordinated within it the woman to the man as the person whonot directly participating in social production does not present herselindependently on the labor market As it cuts off all her possibilities ocreativity and o the development o her working activity so it cuts off

the expression o her sexual psychological lid emotional autonomy

We repeat never had such a stunting o the physical integrity womantaken place affecting everything rom the brain to the uterus Participat-ing with others in the production o a train a mi or an airplane is not thesame thing as using in isolation the same broom in the same ew squareeet o kitchen or centuries

Tis is not a call or equality o men and women in the construction oairplanes but it is merely to assume that the difference between the twohistories not only determines the differences in the actual orms o strug-gle but brings also finally to light what has been invisible or so long thedifferent orms womenrsquos struggles have assumed in the past In the same



14

way as women are robbed o the possibility o developing their creativecapacity they are robbed o their sexual lie which has been transormedinto a unction or reproducing labor power the same observations

which we made on the technological level o domestic services apply

to birth control (and by the way to the whole field o gynaecology)research into which until recently has been continually neglected while

women have been orced to have children and were orbidden the rightto have abortions when as was to be expected the most primitive tech-niques o birth control ailed

From this complete diminution o woman capital constructed theemale role and has made the man in the amily the instrument o this

reduction Te man as wage worker and head o the amily was the spe-cific instrument o this specific exploitation which is the exploitation o

women

THE HOMOSEXUALITY OF THE DIVISION OF LABOUR

In this sense we can explain to what extent the degraded relationshipsbetween men and women are determined by the racturing that society

has imposed between man and woman subordinating woman as objectthe ldquocomplementrdquo to man And in this sense we can see the validity o theexplosion o tendencies within the womenrsquos movement in which women

want to conduct their struggle against men as such11 and no longer wishto use their strength to sustain even sexual relationships with them sinceeach o these relationships is always rustrating A power relation pre-cludes any possibility o affection and intimacy Yet between men and

women power as its right commands sexual affection and intimacy In

this sense the gay movement is the most massive attempt to disengagesexuality and power

But homosexuality generally is at the same time rooted in the ramework o capitalist society itsel women at home and men in actoriesand offices separated one rom the other or the whole day or a typicalactory o 1000 women with 10 oremen or a typing pool (o womeno course) which works or 50 proessional men All these situations are

already a homosexual ramework o living

11 It is impossible to say or how long these tendencies will continue to drive themovement orward and when they will turn into their opposite



15

Capital while it elevates heterosexuality to a religion at the same timein practice makes it impossible or men and women to be in touch witheach other physically or emotionally-it undermines heterosexualityexcept as a sexual economic and social discipline We believe that this is

a reality rom which we must begin Te explosion o the gay tendencieshave been and are important or the movement precisely because they

pose the urgency to claim or itsel the specificity o womenrsquos struggleand above all to clariy in all their depths all acets and connections othe exploitation o women



16

SURPLUS VALUE amp THE SOCIALFACTORY

A983156 983156983144983145983155 983152983151983145983150983156 983156983144983141983150 983159983141 983159983151983157983148983140 983148983145983147983141 983156983151 983138983141983143983145983150 983156983151 983139983148983141983137983154 983156983144983141ground o a certain point o view which orthodox Marxism espe-

cially in the ideology and practice o so-called Marxist parties has alwaystaken or granted And this is when women remain outside social pro-duction that is outside the socially organized productive cycle they arealso outside social productivity Te role o women in other words hasalways been seen as that o a psychologically subordinated person whoexcept where she is marginally employed outside the home is outside

production essentially a supplier o a series o use values in the homeTis basically was the viewpoint o Marx who observing what happenedto women working in the actories concluded that it might have beenbetter or them to be at home where resided a morally higher orm o

lie But the true nature o the role o housewie never emerges clearly inMarx Yet observers have noted that Lancashire women cotton workersor over a century are more sexually ree and helped by men in domesticchores On the other hand in the Yorkshire coal mining districts wheres low percentage o women worked outside the home women are moredominated by the figure o the husband Even those who have been ableto define the exploitation o women in socialized production could notthen go on to understand the exploited position o women in the home

men are too compromised in their relationship with women For thatreason only women can define themselves and move on the woman ques-tion

We have to make clear that within the wage domestic work producesnot merely use values but is essential to the production o surplus val-ue12 Tis is true o the entire emale role as a personality which is subor-

12 Some first readers in English have ound that this definition o womenrsquos work

should be more precise What we meant precisely is that housework as work is produc-tive in the Marxian sense that is is producing surplus value We speak immediately afer about the productivity o the entire emale role o makeclearer the productivity o the woman both as related to her work and as related to herentire role must wait or a later text on which we are now at work In this the womanrsquos place is explained in a more articulated by rom the point o view o the entire capitalistcircuit



17

dinated at all levels physical psychical and occupational which has hadand continues to have a precise and vital place in the capitalist divisiono labor in pursuit o productivity at the social level Let us examine morespecifically the role o women as a source o social productivity that is o

surplus value making Firstly within the amily

A THE PRODUCTIVITY OF WAGE SLAVERY BASED ON

UNWAGED SLAVERY

It is ofen asserted that within the definition o wage labor women indomestic labor are not productive In act precisely the opposite is truei one thinks o the enormous quantity o social services which capital-

ist organization transorms into privatized activity putting them on thebacks o housewives Domestic labor is not essentially ldquoeminine workrdquoa woman doesnrsquot ulfill hersel more or get less exhausted than a manrom washing and cleaning Tese are social services inasmuch as theyserve the reproduction (i labor power And capital precisely by institut-ing its amily structure has ldquoliberatedrdquo the man rom these unctions sothat he is completely ldquoreerdquo or direct exploitation so that he is ree toldquoearnrdquo enough or a woman to reproduce him as labor power13 It has

made men wage slaves then to the degree that it has succeeded in allo-cating these services to women in the amily and by the same processcontrolled the flow o women onto the labor market In Italy womenare still necessary in the home and capital still needs this orm o theamily At the present level o development in Europe generally in Italyin particular capital still preers to import its labor power-in the ormo millions o men rom underdeveloped areas-while at the same timeconsigning women to the home14

13 See Introduction p11 [ Part I o this series ndashPeacutetroleuse] labor power ldquois a strangecommodity or this is not a thing Te ability to labor resides only in a human being whose lie is consumed in the process o producinghellipo describe its basic productionand reproduction is to describe womenrsquos workrdquo14 Tis however is being countered by an opposite tendency to bring women intoindustry in certain particular sectors Differing needs o capital within the line geo-graphical sector have produced differing and even opposing propaganda and policies Where in the past amily stability has been based on a relative-standardized mythol-

ogy (policy and propaganda being uniorm and officially uncontested) today varioussectors o capital contradict each other and undermine the very definition o amily asa stable unchanging ldquonaturalrdquo unit Te classic example o this is the variety o viewsand financial policies on birth control Te British government has recently doubledits allocation o unds or this purpose We must examine to what extent this policyis connected with a racist immigration policy that is manipulation o the sources omature labor power and with the increasing erosion o the work ethic which results



And women are o service not only because they carry out domesticlabor without a wage and without going on strike but also because theyalways receive back into the home all those who are periodically expelledrom their jobs by economic crisis Te amily this maternal cradle

always ready to help and protect in time o need has been in act the bestguarantee that the unemployed do not immediately become a horde odisruptive outsiders

Te organized parties o the working class movement have been careulnot to raise the question o domestic work Aside rom the act that theyhave always treated women as a lower orm o lie even in actories toraise this question would be to challenge the whole basis o the trade

unions as organizations that deal (a) only with the actory (b) only witha measured and ldquopaidrdquo work day (c) only with that side o wages whichis given to us and not with the side o wages which is taken back that isinflation Women have always been orced by the working class parties to

put off their liberation to some hypothetical uture making it dependenton the gains that men limited in the scope o their struggles by these

parties win or ldquothemselvesrdquo

In reality every phase o working class struggle has fixed the subordina-tion and exploitation o women at a higher level Te proposal o pen-sions or housewives15 (and this makes us wonder why not a wage) servesonly to show the complete willingness o these parties urther to insti-tutionalize women as housewives and men (and women) as wage slaves

Now it is clear that not one o us believes that emancipation liberationcan be achieved through work Work is still work whether inside or out-

side the home Te independence o the Wage earner means only beinga ldquoree individualrdquo or capital no less or women than or men Tose

who advocate that the (liberation o the-working class woman lies in hergetting a job outside the home are part o the problem not the solutionSlavery to an assembly line is not a liberation rom slavery to a kitchensink o deny this is also to deny the slavery o the assembly line itsel

proving again that i you donrsquot know how women are exploited you cannever really know how men are But this question is so crucial that we

in movements o the unemployed and unsupported mothers that is controlling births which pollute the purity o capital with revolutionary children15 Which is the policy among others o the Communist Party in Italy who orsome years proposed a bill to the Italian parliament which would have give a pensionto women at home both housewives and single women when they reached 55 years oage Te bill was never passed

18



deal with it separately What we wish to make clear here is that by thenon-payment o a wage when we are producing in a world capitalisticallyorganized the figure o the boss is concealed behind that o the husbandHe appears to be the sole recipient o domestic services and this gives an

ambiguous and slavelike character to housework Te husband and chil-dren through their loving involvement their loving blackmail becomethe first oremen the immediate controllers o this labor

Te husband tends to read the paper and wait or his dinner to be cookedand served even when his wie goes out to work as he does and comeshome with him Clearly the specific orm o exploitation representedby domestic work demands a correspondingly specific orm o struggle

namely the womenrsquos struggle within the amily

I we ail to grasp completely that precisely this amily is the very pillar othe capitalist organization o work i we make the mistake o regardingit only as a superstructure dependent or flimge only on the stages o thestruggle in the actories then we will be moving in a limping revolutionthat will always perpetuate and aggravate a basic contradiction in the class

struggle and a Contradiction which is unctional to capitalist development

We would in other words be perpetuating the error o considering our-selves as producers o use values only o considering housewives externalto the working class As long as housewives are considered external tothe class the class struggle at every moment and any point is impededrustrated and unable to find ull scope or its action o elaborate thisurther is not our task here o expose and condemn domestic work asa masked orm o productive labor however raises a series o questionsconcerning both the aims and the orms o struggle o women

SOCIALIZING THE STRUGGLE OF THE ISOLATED LABORER

In act the demand that would ollow namely ldquopay us wages or house- workrdquo would run the risk o looking in the light o the present rela-tionship o orces in Italy as though we wanted urther to entrench thecondition o institutionalized slavery which is produced with the condi-tion o housework ndash thereore such a demand could scarcely operate in

practice as a mobilizing goal16

16 oday the demand o wages or housework is put orward increasingly and withless opposition in the womenrsquos movement in Italy and elsewhere Since this document was first drafed (June rsquo71) the debate has become more proound and many uncertain-ties that were due to the relative newness o the discussion have been dispelled Butabove all the weight o the needs o proletarian women has not only radicalized the de-

19



Te question is thereore to develop orms o struggle which do notleave the housewie peaceully at home at most ready to take part inoccasional demonstrations through the streets waiting or a wage that

would never pay or anything rather we must discover orms o struggle

which immediately break the whole structure o domestic work reject-ing it absolutely rejecting our role as housewives and the home as theghetto o our existence since the problem is not only to stop doing this

work but to smash the entire role o housewie Te starting point is nothow to do housework more efficiently but how to find a place as protagonistin the struggle that is not a higher productivity o domestic labor but ahigher subversiveness in the struggle

o immediately overthrow the relation between time-given-to-housework and time-not-given-to-housework it is not necessary to spend timeeach day ironing sheets and curtains cleaning the floor until it sparklesnor to dust every day And yet many women still do that Obviously it isnot because they are stupid once again we are reminded o the parallel

we made earlier with the 983141983155983150 school In reality it is only in this work thatthey can realize an identity precisely because as we said beore capitalhas cut them off rom the process o socially organized production

But it does not automatically ollow that to be cut off rom socialized production is to be cut off rom socialized struggle struggle howeverdemands time away rom housework and at the same time it offers analternative identity to the woman who beore ound it only at the levelo the domestic ghetto In the sociality o struggle women discover andexercise a power that effectively gives them a new identity Te new iden-tity is and can only be a new degree o social power

mands o the movement It has also given us greater strength and confidence to advancethem A year ago at the beginning o the movement in Italy there were those who stillthought that the State could easily suffocate the emale rebellion against housework byldquopayingrdquo it with a monthly allowance o pound7 - pound8 as they had already done especially withthose ldquowretched o the earthrdquo who were dependent on pensions Now these uncertain-ties are largely dissipated

And it is clear in any case that the demand or a wage or housework is only a basisa perspective rom which to start whose merit is essentially to link immediately emaleoppression subordination and isolation to their material oundation emale exploita-tion At this moment this is perhaps the major unction o the demand o wages orhousework Tis gives at once an indication or struggle a direction in organizationalterms in which oppression and exploitation situation o caste and class find themselvesinsolubly linked Te practical continuous translation o this perspective is the task themovement is acing in Italy and elsewhere

20



Te possibility o social struggle arises out o the socially productive character o womenrsquos work in the home It is not only or mainly the socialservices provided in the home that make womenrsquos role socially produc-tive even though in act at this moment these services are identified with

womenrsquos role But capital can technologically improve the conditions othis work What capital does not want to do or the time being in Italyat least is to destroy the position o the housewie as the pivot o thenuclear amily For this reason there is no point in our waiting or theautomation o domestic work because this will never happen the main-tenance o the nuclear amily is in compatible with the automation othese services o really automate them capital would have to destroythe amily as we know it that is it would be driven to socialize in order

to automate ully

Hut we know all too well what their socialization means it is always atthe very least the opposite o the Paris Commune

Te new leap that capitalist reorganization could make and that wecan already smell in the US and in the more advanced capitalist coun-tries generally is to destroy the pre-capitalist relation o production in

the home by constructing a amily winch more nearly reflects capitalistequality and its domination through co-operative labor to transcendldquothe incompleteness o capitalist developmentrdquo in the home with the

pre-capitalist unree woman as its pivot and make the amily morenearly reflect in its orm its capitalist productive unction the reproduc-tion o labor power

o return then to what we said above women housewives identiy-

ing themselves with the home tend to a compulsive perection in their work We all know the saying too well you can always find work to doin a house

Tey donrsquot see beyond their own our walls Te housewiersquos situation as a pre-capitalist mode o labor and consequently this ldquoemininityrdquo imposedupon her makes her see the world the others and the entire organiza-tion o work as a something which is obscure essentially unknown and

unknowable not lived perceived only as a shadow behind the shoulderso the husband who goes out each day and meets this something

So when we say that women must overthrow the relation o domestic- work-time to non-domestic-time and must begin to move out o the

21



home we mean their point o departure must be precisely this willing-ness to destroy the role o housewie in order to begin to come together

with other women not only as neighbors and riends but as workmatesand anti-workmates thus breaking the tradition o privatized emale

with all its rivalry and reconstructing a real solidarity among womennot solidarity or deense but solidarity or attack or the organizationo the struggle

A common solidarity against a common orm o labor In the same way women must stop meeting their husbands and children only as wie andmother that is at mealtime afer they have come home rom the outside

world

Every place o struggle outside the home precisely because every sphere ocapitalist organization presupposes the home offers a chance or attack by

women actory meetings neighborhood meetings student assemblieseach o them are legitimate places or womenrsquos struggle where womencan encounter and conront men ndash women versus men i you like butas individuals rather than mother-ather son-daughter with all the pos-sibilities this offers to explode outside o the house the contradictions

the rustrations that capital has wanted to implode within the amily

A NEW COMPASS FOR CLASS STRUGGLE

I women demand in workersrsquo assemblies that the night-shif be abol-ished because at night besides sleeping one wants to make love ndash anditrsquos not the same as making love during the day i the women work duringthe day ndash that would be advancing their own independent interests as

women against the social organization o work reusing to be unsatisfiedmothers or their husbands and children

But in this new intervention and conrontation women are also express-ing that their interests as women are not as they have been told separateand alien rom the interests o the class F or too long political partiesespecially o the lef and trade unions have determined and confined theareas o working class struggle o make love and to reuse night work to

make love is in the interest o the class o explore why it is women andnot men who raise the question is to shed new light on the whole historyo the class

22



o meet your sons and daughters at a student assembly is to discoverthem as individuals who speak among other individuals it is too present

yoursel to them as an individual Many women have had abortions and very many have given birth We canrsquot see why they should not express

their point o view as women first whether or not they are students inan assembly o medical students (We do not give the medical acultyas an example by accident In the lecture hall and in the clinic we cansee once more the exploitation o the working class not only when thirdclass patients exclusively are made the guinea pigs or research Womenespecially are the prime objects o experimentation and also o the sexualcontempt sadism and proessional arrogance o doctors)

o sum up the most important thing becomes precisely this explosiono the womenrsquos movement as an expression o the specificity o emaleinterests hitherto castrated rom all its connections by the capitalistorganization o the amily Tis has to be waged in every quarter o thissociety each o which is ounded precisely on the suppression o suchinterests since the entire class exploitation has been built upon the spe-cific mediation o womenrsquos exploitation

And so as a womenrsquos movement we must pinpoint every single area in which this exploitation is located that is we must regain the whole spec-ificity o the emale interest in the course o waging the struggle

Every opportunity is a good one housewives o amilies threatened witheviction can object that their housework has more than covered the rento the months they didnrsquot pay On the out-skirts o Milan many amilieshave already taken up this orm o struggle

Electric appliances in the home are lovely things to have but or the workers who make them to make many is to spend time and to exhaust yoursel Tat every wage has to buy all o them is tough and presumesthat every wie must run all these appliances alone and this only meansthat she is rozen in the home but now on a more mechanized levelLucky worker lucky wie

Te question is not to have communal canteens We must remember thatcapital makes Fiat or the workers first then their canteen

For this reason to demand a communal canteen in the neighborhood without integrating this demand into a practice o struggle against theorganization o labor against labor time risks giving the impetus or a

23



new leap that on the community level would regiment none other than women in some alluring work so that we will then have the possibility atlunchtime o eating shit collectively in the canteen

We want them to know that this is not the canteen we want nor do we want play centers or nurseries o the same order17 We want canteens tooand nurseries and washing machines and dishwashers but we also wantchoices to eat in privacy with ew people when we want to have time tobe with children to be with old people with the sick when and where

we choose o ldquohave timerdquo means to work less o have time to be withchildren the old and the sick does not mean running to pay a quick visitto the garages where you park children or old people or invalids It means

that we the first to be excluded are taking the initiative in this struggleso that all those other excluded people the children the old and the illcan re-appropriate the social wealth to be re-integrated with us and allo us with men not as dependents but autonomously as we women wantor ourselves since their exclusion like ours rom the directly produc-tive social process rom social existence has been created by capitalistorganization

THE REFUSAL OF WORK

Hence we must reuse housework as womenrsquos work as work imposedupon us which we never invented which has never been paid or in

which they have orced us to cope with absurd hours 12 and 13 a day inorder to orce us to stay at home

We must get out o the house we must reject the home because we want

to unite with other women to struggle against all situations which pre-sume that women will stay at home to link ourselves to the struggles oall those who are in ghettos whether the ghetto is a nursery a school a

17 Tere has been some conusion over what we have said about canteens A similarconusion expressed itsel in the discussions in other countries as well as Italy about wages or housework As we explained earlier housework is as institutionalized as ac-tory work and our ultimate goal is to destroy both institutions But aside rom whichdemand we are speaking about there is a misunderstanding o what a demand is It is a

goal which is not only a thing but like capita) at any moment essentially a stage o an-tagonism o a social relation Whether the canteen or the wages we win will be a victoryor a deeat depends on the orce o our struggle On that orce depends whether thegoal is an occasion or capital to more rationally command our labor or an occasion orus to weaken their hold on that command What orm the goal hikes when we achieveit whether it is wages or canteens or ree birth control emerges and is in act created inthe struggle and registers the degree o power that we reached in that struggle

24



hospital an old-age home or asylum o abandon the home is already aorm o struggle since the social services we perorm there would thencease to be carried out in those conditions and so all those who workout o the home would then demand that the burden carried by us until

now be thrown squarely where it belongs ndash onto the shoulders o capitalTis alteration in the terms o struggle will be all the more violent themore the reusal o domestic labor on the part o women will be violentdetermined and on a mass scale

Te working class amily is the more difficult point to break because it isthe support o the worker but as worker and or that reason the supporto capital On this amily depends the support o the class the survival o

the class ndash but at the womanrsquos expense against the class itsel Te womanis the slave o a wage-slave and her slavery ensures the slavery o her manLike the trade union the amily protects the worker but also ensuresthat he and she will never be anything but workers And that is why thestruggle o the woman o the working class against the amily is crucial

o meet other women who work inside and outside their homes allowsus to possess other chances o struggle o the extent that our struggle is

a struggle against work it is inscribed in the struggle which the work-ing class wages against capitalist work But to the extent that the exploi-tation o women through domestic work has had its own specific his-tory tied to the survival o the nuclear amily the specific course o thisstruggle which must pass through the destruction o the nuclear amilyas established by the capitalist social order adds a new dimension to theclass struggle

B THE PRODUCTIVITY OF PASSIVITY

However the womanrsquos role in the amily is not only that o hidden supplier o social services who does not receive a wage As we said at thebeginning to imprison women in purely complementary unctions andsubordinate them to men within the nuclear amily has as its premise thestunting o their physical integrity In Italy with the successul help othe Catholic Church which has always defined her as an inerior being

a woman is compelled beore marriage into sexual abstinence and afermarriage into a repressed sexuality destined only to bear children oblig-ing her to bear children It has created a emale image o ldquoheroic motherand happy wierdquo whose sexual identity is pure sublimation whose unc-tion is essentially that o receptacle or other peoplersquos emotional expres-

25



sion who is the cushion o the amilial antagonism What has beendefined then as emale rigidity has to be redefined as an imposed pas-sive receptivity in the sexual unction as well

Now this passivity o the woman in the amily is itsel ldquoproductiverdquoFirstly it makes her the outlet or all the oppressions that men suffer inthe world outside the home and at the same time the object on whomthe man can exercise a hunger or power that the domination o the capi-talist organization o work implants In this sense the woman becomes

productive or capitalist organization she acts as a saety valve or thesocial tensions caused by it Secondly the woman becomes productiveinasmuch as the complete denial o her personal autonomy orces her to

sublimate her rustration in a series o continuous needs that are alwayscentered in the home a kind o consumption which is the exact paral-lel o her compulsive perectionism in her housework Clearly it is notour job to tell women what they should have in their homes Nobodycan define the needs o others Our interest is to organize the strugglethrough which this sublimation will be unnecessary

DEAD LABOR AND THE AGONY OF SEXUALITY

We use the word ldquosublimationrdquo advisedly Te rustrations o monoto-nous and trivial chores and o sexual passivity are only separable in wordsSexual creativity and creativity in labor are both areas where human needdemands we give ree scope to our ldquointerplaying natural and acquiredactivitiesrdquo18 For women (and thereore or men) natural and acquired

powers are repressed simultaneously Te passive sexual receptivity o women creates compulsively tidy housewie and can make a monoto-

nous assembly line therapeutic Te trivia o most o housework and dis-cipline which is required to perorm the same work over every day every

week every year double on holidays destroys the possibilities o unin-hibited sexuality Our childhood is a preparation or martyrdom we aretaught to derive happiness rom clean sex on whiter than white sheetsto sacrifice sexuality and other creative activity at one and the same time

18 Karl Marx Das Kapital Kritik der politischen Okonomie Band 1 Berlin DietzVerlag 1962 p5 12 ldquoLarge-scale industry makes it a question o lie mid death toreplace that monstrosity which is a miserable available working population kept in re-serve or the changing needs o exploitation by capital In replace this with the absoluteavailability o the individual or changing requisites o work to replace the partial individual a mere bearer o a social detail unction with the ully developed individual or whom varied social unctions are modes o interplaying natural and acquired activitiesrdquo

26



So ar the womenrsquos movement most notably by destroying the myth othe vaginal orgasm has exposed the physical mechanism which allowed

womenrsquos sexual potential to be strictly defined and limited by men Now we can begin to reintegrate sexuality with other aspects o creativity

to see how sexuality will always be constrained unless the work we dodoes not mutilate us and our individual capacities and unless the per-sons with whom we have sexual relations are not our masters and are notalso mutilated by their work o explode the vaginal myth is to demandemale autonomy as opposed to subordination and sublimation But it isnot only the clitoris versus the vagina It is both versus the uterus Eitherthe vagina is primarily the passage to the reproduction o labor powersold as a commodity the capitalist unction o the uterus or it is part o

our natural powers our social equipment Sexuality afer all is the mostsocial o expressions the deepest human communication It is in thatsense the dissolution o autonomy Te working class organizes as a classto transcend itsel as a class within that class we organize autonomouslyto create the basis to transcend autonomy

THE ldquoPOLITICAL rdquo ATTACK AGAINST WOMEN

But while we are finding our way o being and o organizing ourselvs instruggle we discover we are conronted by those who are only too eagerto attack women even as we orm a movement In deending herselagainst obliteration through work and through consumption they saythe woman is responsible or the lack o unity o the class Let us make a

partial list o the sins o which she stands accused Tey say

1 She wants more o her husbandrsquos wage to buy or example clothes or

hersel and her children not based on what he thinks she needs buton what she thinks she and her children should have He works hardor the money She only demands another kind o distribution otheir lack o wealth rather than assisting his struggle or more wealthmore wages

2 She is in rivalry with other women to be more attractive than they tohave more things than they do and to have a cleaner and tidier house

than her neighborsrsquo She doesnrsquot ally with them as she should on aclass basis

3 She buries hersel in her home and reuses to understand the struggleother husband on the production line She may even complain when

27



he goes out on strike rather than backing him up She votes Conser- vative

Tese are some o the reasons given by those who consider her reaction-

ary or at best backward even by men who take leading roles in actorystruggles and who seem most able to understand the nature o the socialboss because o their militant action It comes easy to them to condemn

women or what they consider to be backwardness because that is the prevailing ideology o the society Tey do not add that they have ben-efitted rom womenrsquos subordinate position by being waited on handand oot rom the moment o their birth Some do not even know thatthey have been waited on so natural is it to them or mothers and sis-

ters and daughters to serve ldquotheirrdquo men It is very difficult or us on theother hand to separate inbred male supremacy rom menrsquos attack whichappears to be strictly ldquopoliticalrdquo launched only or the benefit o the class

Let us look at the matter more closely

I WOMEN AS CONSUMERS

Women do not make the home the center o consumption Te processo consumption is integral to the production o labor and i womenreused to do the shopping (that is to spend) this would be strike actionHaving said that however we must add that those social relationships

which women are denied because they are cut off rom socially organizedlabor they ofen try to compensate or by buying things Whether it isadjudged trivial depends on the viewpoint and sex o the judge Intellec-tuals buy books but no one calls this consumption trivial Independent

o the validity o the contents the book in this society still representsthrough a tradition older than capitalism a male value

We have already said that women buy things or their home because thathome is the only proo that they exist But the idea that rugal consump-tion is in any way a liberation is as old as capitalism and comes rom thecapitalists who always blame the workerrsquos situation on the worker For

years Harlem was told by head- shaking liberals that i Black men would

only stop driving Cadillacrsquos (until the finance company took them back)the problem o color would be solved Until the violence o the strugglendash the only fitting reply ndash provided a measure o social power that Cadil-lac was one o the ew ways to display the potential or power Tis andnot ldquopractical economicsrdquo caused the liberals pain

28



In my case nothing any o us buys would we need i we were ree Notthe ood they poison or us nor the clothes that identiy us by class sexand generation nor the houses in which they imprison us In any casetoo our problem is that we never have enough not that we have too

much And that pressure which women place on men is a deense o thewage not an attack Precisely because women are the slaves o wage slavesmen divide the wage between themselves and the general amily expenseI women did not make demands the general amily standard o living

would drop to absorb the inflationrdquordquothe woman o course is the first todo without Tus unless the woman makes demands the amily is unc-tional to capital in an additional sense to the ones we have listed it canabsorb the all in the price o labor power19 Tis thereore is the most

ongoing material way in which women can deend the living standardso the class And when they go out to political meetings they will needeven more money

II WOMEN AS RIVALS

As or womenrsquos ldquorivalryrdquo Frantz Fanon has clarified or the Tird World what only racism prevents rom being generally applied to the class Te

colonized he says when they do not organize against their oppressorsattack each other Te womanrsquos pressure or greater consumption may attimes express itsel in the orm o rivalry but nevertheless as we have said

protects the living standards o the class Which is unlike womenrsquos sexualrivalry that rivalry is rooted in their economic and social dependence onmen o the degree that they live or men dress or men work or menthey are manipulated by men through this rivalry20

19 ldquoBut the other more undamental objection which we shall develop in theensuing chapters flows rom our disputing the assumption that the general level o real wages is directly determined by the character o the wage bargainhellipWe shall endeavorto show that primarily it is certain other orces which determine the general level o real wageshellipWe shall argue that there has been a undamental misunderstanding o bow inthis respect the economy in which we live actually worksrdquo (Emphasis added) Te GeneralTeory o Employment Interest and Money John Maynard Keynes NY HarcourtBrace and World 1964 p 13 ldquoCertain other orcesrdquo in our view are first o all women20 It has been noticed that many o the Bolsheviks afer 1917 ound emale partnersamong the dispossessed aristocracy When power continues to reside in men both atthe level o the State and in individual relations women continue to be ldquothe spoil andhandmaid o communal lustrdquo (Karl Max Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts o1844 Progress Publishers Moscow 1959 p94) Te breed o ldquothe new tsarsrdquo goes backa long way

Already in 1921 rom ldquoDecisions o the Tird Congress o the Communist Interna-tionalrdquo one can read in Part I o ldquoWork Among Womenrdquo ldquoTe Tird Congress o the

29



As or rivalry about their homes women are trained rom birth to beobsessive and possessive about clean and tidy homes But men cannothave it both ways they cannot continue to enjoy the privilege o havinga private servant and then complain about the effects o privatization I

they continue to complain we must conclude that their attack on us orrivalry is really an apology or our servitude I Fanon was not right thatthe strie among the colonized is an expression o their low level o orga-nization then the antagonism is a sign o natural incapacity When wecall a home a ghetto we could call it a colony governed by indirect ruleand be as accurate Te resolution o the antagonism o the colonized toeach other lies in autonomous struggle Women have overcome greaterobstacles than rivalry to unite in supporting men in struggles Where

women have been less successul is in transorming and deepeningmoments o struggle by making o them opportunities to raise their owndemands Autonomous struggle turns the question on its head not ldquowill

women unite to support menrdquo but ldquowill men unite to support womenrdquo

II I WOMEN AS DIVISIVE

What has prevented previous political intervention by women Why

can they be used in certain circumstances against strikes Why in other words is the class not united From the beginning o this document wehave made central the exclusion o women rom socialized production

Comintern confirms the basic proposition o revolutionary Marxism that is that thereis no lsquospecific woman questionrsquo and no lsquospecific womenrsquos movementrsquo and that every sorto alliance o working women with bourgeois eminism as well as any support by the women workers o the treacherous tactics o the social compromisers and opportun-ists leads to the undermining o the orces o the proletariathellipIn order to put an end

to womenrsquos slavery it is necessary to inaugurate the new Communist organization osocietyrdquo

Te theory being male the practice was to ldquoneutralizerdquo Let us quote rom one othe ounding athers At the first National Conerence o Communist Women o theCommunist Party o Italy on March 26 1922 ldquoComrade Gramsci pointed out thatspecial action must be organized among housewives who constitute the large major-ity o the proletarian women He said that they should be related in some way to ourmovement by our setting up special organizations Housewives as ar as the quality otheir work is concerned can be considered similar to the artisans and thereore they will

hardly be communists however because they are the workersrsquo mates and because theyshare in some way the workersrsquo lie they are attracted toward communism Our propa-ganda can thereore have an influence over [sic] these housewives it can be instrumen-tal i not to officer them into our organization to neutralize them so that they do notstand in the way o the possible struggles by the workersrdquo (From Compagna the ItalianCommunist Party organ or work among women Year I No3 [April 2 1922]p2)

30



Tat is an objective character o capitalist organization co-operativelabor in the actory and isolated labor in the home Tis is mirrored sub-

jectively by way workers in industry organize separately rom the com-munity What is the community to do What are women to do Sup-

port be appendages to men in the home and in the struggle even orma womenrsquos auxiliary to unions Tis division and this kind o division isthe history o the class At every stage o the struggle the most peripheralto the productive cycle are used against those at the center so long as thelatter ignore the ormer Tis is the history o trade unions or examplein the United States when Black workers were used as strikebreakers ndashnever by the way as ofen as white workers were led to believe ndash Blackslike women are immediately identifiable and reports o strikebreaking

reinorce prejudices which arise rom objective divisions the white onthe assembly line the Black sweeping round his eet or the man on theassembly line the woman sweeping round his eet when he gets home

Men when they reject work consider themselves militant and when wereject our work these same men consider us nagging wives When someo us vote Conservative because we have been excluded rom politicalstruggle they think we are backward while they have voted or parties

which didnrsquot even consider that we existed as anything but ballast and inthe process sold them (and us all) down the river

C THE PRODUCTIVITY OF DISCIPLINE

Te third aspect o womenrsquos role in the amily is that because o the spe-cial brand o stunting o the personality already discussed the womanbecomes a repressive figure disciplinarian o all the members o the am-

ily ideologically and psychologically She may live under the tyranny oher husband o her home the tyranny o striving to be ldquoheroic motherand happy wierdquo when her whole existence repudiates this ideal Tose

who are tyrannized and lack power are with the new generation or thefirst years o their lives producing docile workers and little tyrants in thesame way the teacher does at school (In this the woman is joined by herhusband not by chance do parent-teacher associations exist) Womenresponsible or the reproduction o labor power on the one hand disci-

pline the children who will be workers tomorrow and on the other handdiscipline the husband to work today or only his wage can pay or labor

power to be reproduced

31



H983141983154983141 983159983141 983144983137983158983141 983151983150983148983161 983137983156983156983141983149983152983156983141983140 983156983151 983139983151983150983155983145983140983141983154 983142983141983149983137983148983141domestic productivity without going into detail about the psycho-logical implications At least we have located and essentially outlined thisemale domestic productivity as it passes through the complexities o therole that the woman plays (in addition that is to the actual domestic

work the burden o which she assumes without pay) We pose then asoremost the need to break this role that wants women divided romeach other rom men and rom children each locked in her amily as the

chrysalis in the cocoon that imprisons itsel by its own work to die andleave silk or capital o reject all this as we have already said means orhousewives to recognize themselves also as a section o the class the mostdegraded because they are not paid a wage

Te housewiersquos position in the overall struggle o women is crucial sinceit undermines the very pillar supporting the capitalist organization o

work namely the amily

So every goal that tends to affirm the individuality o women against thisfigure complementary to everything and everybody that is the house-

wie is worth posing as a goal subversive to the continuation the pro-ductivity o this role

In this same sense all the demands that can serve to restore to the womanthe integrity o her basic physical unctions starting with the sexual one

which was the first to be robbed along with productive creativity have tobe posed with the greatest urgency

It is not by chance that research in birth control has developed so slowlythat abortion is orbidden almost the world over or conceded finallyonly or ldquotherapeuticrdquo reasons

o move first on these demands is not acile reormism Capitalist man-agement o these matters poses over and over discrimination o class anddiscrimination o women specifically

Why were proletarian women Tird World women used as guinea pigsin this research Why does the question o birth control continue to be

posed as womenrsquos problem o begin to struggle to overthrow the capi-

32



talist management over these matters is to move on a class basis and on aspecifically emale basis o link these struggles with the struggle againstmotherhood conceived as the responsibility o women exclusivelyagainst domestic work conceived as womenrsquos work ultimately against

the models that capitalism offers us as examples o womenrsquos emancipation which are nothing more than ugly copies o the male role is tostruggle against the division and organization o labor

33



WOMEN amp THE STRUGGLE NOT TO WORK

L983141983156 983157983155 983155983157983149 983157983152 983144983141 983154983151983148983141 983151983142 983144983151983157983155983141983159983145983142983141 983138983141983144983145983150983140 983159983144983151983155983141 983145983155983151-lation is hidden social labor must be destroyed But our alternatives

are strictly defined Up to now the myth o emale incapacity rootedin this isolated woman dependent on someone elsersquos wage and there-ore shaped by someone elsersquos consciousness has been broken by onlyone action the woman getting her own wage breaking the back o per-sonal economic dependence making her own independent experience

with the world outside the home perorming social labor in a socializedstructure whether the actory or the office and initiating there her ownorms o social rebellion along with the traditional orms o the class Te

advent o the womenrsquos mo983158ement is a rejection o this alternative

Capital itsel is seizing upon the same impetus which created a move-ment ndash the rejection by millions o women o womenrsquos traditional placendash to recompose the work orce with increasing numbers o womenTe movement can only develop in opposition to this It poses by its

very existence and must pose with increasing articulation in action that women reuse the myth o liberation through work

For we have worked enough We have chopped billions o tons O cot-ton washed billions o dishes scrubbed billions o floors typed billionso words wired billions o radio sets washed billions o nappies by handand in machines Every time they have ldquolet us inrdquo to some traditionallymale enclave it was to find or us a new level o exploitation Here again

we must make a parallel different as they are between underdevelop-ment in the Tird World and underdevelopment in the metropolis ndash tobe more precise in the kitchens o the metropolis Capitalist planning

proposes to the Tird World that it ldquodeveloprdquo that in addition to its

present agonies it too suffer the agony o an industrial counter revolu-tion Women in the metropolis have been offered the same ldquoaidrdquo Butthose o us who have gone out o our homes to work because we had toor or extras or or economic independence have warned the rest infla-tion has riveted us to this bloody typing pool or to this assembly line and

34



in that there is no salvation We must reuse the development they areoffering us But the struggle o the working woman is not to return to theisolation o the home appealing as this sometimes may be on Mondaymorning any more than the housewiersquos struggle is to exchange being

imprisoned in a house or being clinched to desks or machines appeal-ing as this sometimes may be compared to the loneliness o the 12th storyflat

Women must completely discover their own possibilities ndash which areneither mending socks nor becoming captains o ocean-going ships Bet-ter still we may wish to do these things but these now cannot be locatedanywhere but in the history o capital

Te challenge to the womenrsquos movement is to find modes o struggle which while they liberate women rom the home at the same timeavoid on the one hand a double slavery and on the other prevent anotherdegree o capitalistic control and regimentation Tis ultimately is thedividing line between reormism and revolutionary politics within thewomenrsquos mo983158ement

It seems that there have been ew women o genius Tere could not besince cut off rom the social process we cannot see on what matters theycould exercise their genius Now there is a matter the struggle itsel

Freud said also that every woman rom birth suffers rom penis envy Heorgot to add that this eeling o envy begins rom the moment when she

perceives that in some way to have a penis means to have power Even lessdid he realize that the traditional power o the penis commenced upon a

whole new history at the very moment when the separation o man rom woman became a capitalistic division

And this is where our struggle begins

Mariarosa Dalla Costa amp Selma James29 December 1971





4






potential




5













6















7














8












9









10












11















12












13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















4






potential




5













6















7














8












9









10












11















12












13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















5













6















7














8












9









10












11















12












13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















6















7














8












9









10












11















12












13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















7














8












9









10












11















12












13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















8












9









10












11















12












13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















9









10












11















12












13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















10












11















12












13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















11















12












13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















12












13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















13





work is never done









14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















14







women












15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















15






16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















16












17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34















17




UNWAGED SLAVERY




















18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34



























18














19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34


























19












20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34
























20





to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34

















to automate ully










21







world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34



















world









22












23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34
























23







THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34



















THE REFUSAL OF WORK







24












25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34
























25













26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34

























26















27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34



























27
















28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34




























28







II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34



















II WOMEN AS RIVALS






29














30















31
















32





33














34


























30















31
















32





33














34



























31
















32





33














34




























32





33














34

















33














34


























34

























Documents

Women and the Subversion of the Community