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Motherhood: the modern woman's dilemma: do the current writings on motherhood represent a third wave in feminism's attempts to transform structural barriers to women's freedom and happiness?

Article Excerpt
The so-called 'motherwars' have dominated the feminist debate in recent years. We have come full circle, it seems, since the time when separating the definition of 'woman' from that of 'mother' was at the heart of the feminist cause. Speaking to another mother at my son's kindergarten recently, she complained that 'feminism was hijacked by the Marxist feminists who were only on about equality in the workplace'. While for young women the old agenda may appear unbalanced, in actual fact Marxist feminism was not just about women's integration into the workforce, but about supplanting capitalism with a socialist society in which men and women would share in raising children and in paid labour. Interestingly, having since been caught up in the radical individualism of the 80s, the contemporary feminist debate has returned, if not explicitly to socialism, then to the obvious need for a substantial restructuring of the workplace to allow men and women the opportunity for a balanced existence, patricularly the flexibility to raise their own children.

The paradox of progress in the West is seeing a high standard of living matched by a comparatively low standard of wellbeing, particularly among women, who are bearing the brunt of modern life. While access for women into the world of paid work might no longer be at issue, the industrial relations system has worsened dramatically over recent decades, with the Howard government eroding workers' most basic conditions. As a result, the interests of children and family have made a comeback onto centre stage, and not merely in the name of conservative values. Researcher Andrea O'Reilly argues that motherhood is still not valued or even viewed as work--more importantly, it is 'not seen as a practice with profound cultural significance or political import'. However, with a context of increasing public discontent about work-family balance and the related fertility crisis, this might all be set to change.

Central to the recent feminist backlash was the accusation from conservative commentators that feminism has forgotten what it is that makes life worth living. At first glance, it appears left-wing commentators now agree. But instead of coming to the conclusion that we best don our aprons and remember how to put our man first, feminists are arguing for a direct challenge to the real barrier to happiness: the organisation of work. Only economic restructure will enable women's right to balance the satisfactions of creative and productive employment with the rewards of caring for others. In What Women Want Next (Text, 2005), Susan Maushart is quick to point out that the joys of motherhood 'need not be debased by association with backward-looking social policy or the guilt-mongers who dish it up to us'. It should now be safe to reassert maternal pleasure without having this used against us by those seeking a return to the 50s. As she says, 'It is possible to make conventional choices for revolutionary reasons'. This is the central point of maternal feminist Anne Manne's book, Motherhood: How Should We Care for Our Children? (Allen & Unwin, 2005). What is being left out of the whole debate about work-family balance, argues Manne, is the love affair--the eros--of the child-mother bond. Along with Leslie Cannold, in What, No Baby? How Women have Lost the Freedom to Mother and How They Can Get it Back (Fremantle Arts Centre Press, 2005), these writers are focused on the choices women would make given the freedom to choose; and what needs to change in order to facilitate such freedom.

This current phase of the feminist debate is in part a reaction to the controversial notion that women can 'have it all'. It seems Western women are now finding themselves in a position where they can fully evaluate the benefits as well as the side effects of the 'equal opportunity revolution'. Despite all that has been achieved--with work and the financial independence it offers now central to women's identity, good health and self-esteem--women are statistically less happy than ever. Women might no longer be oppressed, argues Susan Maushart; instead they are, 'Depressed, perhaps. Hard-pressed, almost certainly'. Evidently,...

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