Explain why Gender was used for such diverse political purposes in the late 18th Century

        This purely misogynistic view of women in France can be most strikingly seen with the case of Marie Antoinette during the Revolution- a case which gives us much insight to the problems faced by French women of the day. Unlike no other royal women that had come before her, Marie Antoinette was subject to a constant barrage of abuse (particularly in the pornographic sector), which both undermined her high-born status as queen and her role as the ‘mother’ of France. Because women were unable to act politically outright, the queen was blamed for corrupting the mind of the king and for using her own male family members as pawns to ensure her political victories. Indeed, it appeared to the revolutionaries that her biggest crime was to use her sexual body to corrupt the body politic through “her ability to act sexually upon the king, his ministers, or his soldiers”. Her final charges of incest with her son, Louis-Charles, highlight that her failings as a wife and a mother are both the cause and the result of her failings as a woman; making her completely unsuitable to be the ‘mother’ of the French.

        This view of the woman as a wife and mother was extremely dictatorial in the part they could play in the political arena. Although after the Enlightenment views on women shifted slightly away from the teachings of the Catholic Church, there was still the view that woman was the subordinate of man, with femininity frequently portrayed as “a less perfect condition than masculinity”. However, even though femininity was lowly regarded in political terms, it is also easy to see the disturbance in the masculine world. Whilst it is clear that in fighting for ‘the Rights of Man’, the revolutionaries were mainly concerned with male suffrage for all, there were also some distinct conflictions in their psyche. After the Revolution, patriarchal authority at home was threatened by the condemnation of the hierarchical family which had provided a model for relations in the state. The execution of Louis XVI led to uncertainty amongst the revolutionaries as to the natural social order. As Lynn Hunt questions; “if absolutism had rested on the model of patriarchal authority, then wouldn’t the destruction of absolutism depend on the destruction of patriarchy?”. The question of how far the moderation of paternal authority should go led to further questions on whether this would make every member of the family equal? Unsurprisingly reason most enlightened thinkers turned to the answers that Rousseau would give them in that “fathers’ authority ends when the child no longer needs him. Beyond that moment, they become equals.”

        Alternatively, even though this period placed a great deal of emphasis on the political role of man in society, there began an emergence of interest in the role that women would have to play. After the traumatic experience of the French Revolution, the family was idealized by the bourgeoisie as a place of emotional and psychological refuge. In this environment of bourgeois ideals, the mother became the moral and emotional centre of the family, as it was she who instilled values into her children and exercised a moral influence over her husband. However, whilst it was idealized that “the middle class mother thus established a model of family life to be imitated, or imposed upon, the lower classes”, the reality was somewhat different; caused in turn by the rise of socialism.

        At the turn of the nineteenth century, women had a very narrow choice of job opportunities. However, as Grogan points out, “with the growth and mechanization of the textiles industry, employers drew heavily upon a pool of under employed rural women, drawing them into the mills and emergent spinning towns”, thus meaning that she could no longer live up to the bourgeois ideals placed upon her. Because the working class was almost entirely affected by insufficient salaries, there appeared to be more equality in marriage than in the bourgeois home because women were also seen as wage earners and so exercised more significant levels of power within the home.

        It is apparent that similar patterns were also occurring in Britain at this point; in terms of where both male and female members fitted into society. Also inspired by the ideas that were coming from the Continent from Rousseau, men understood women as being defined by their natural procreative functions. They believed that whilst men were constructed in terms of limitless potential for rationality and abstract thought, “women were seen as physical and sensual, deficient in rationality and incapable of rational thought” thus defining them in terms of their capacity to bear children. This, as in France, was also a time in history where the lower classes had begun to rise as a result of the Industrial Revolution. “Masculinity defined citizenship, [although] the definition of masculinity was historically mutable”. In this climate, only free male householders were seen as ‘citizens’, with everyone who came below them as inferior beings. The belief that workingmen did not deserve the vote highlights that class was defined by politics- which in turn, was defined in purely masculine terms. To assert their manhood, many radicals re-interpreted the old tradition of civic humanism to create a new version of masculine citizenship. Grafting Paine’s ideas onto this, they claimed that in the distant past “manhood suffrage was an English right”. Borrowing civic humanism’s critique of effeminacy and luxury to attack the Upper Classes, the Radicals were able to counter impose their own virile masculinity onto the femininity of aristocratic corruption and decadence.

        Whilst it is important to look at the way in which radicals used masculinity as a weapon against the ruling elite, it is also essential to discuss how they viewed women and the part which they could play politically in such a society. When looking at ‘The Making of the English Working Class’, it is clear to see that while women do feature in this book, they do so in a way “purely to underline and point up the overwhelming association of class, with the politics of male workers”. The fact that Scott singles out the incident where the house of Thomas Hardy was ransacked by the King’s men highlights that whilst men were able to defend their rights, women were the victims of the state and were subject to the full measure of Capitalist brutality. This, in itself, gives credence to the fact that it was the duty of the ‘masculine’ male to protect the ‘feminine’ female. What can be seen during this period is that women were able to voice their political opinions and defend their values through riots and crowd agitations. However, as soon as the radicals began to focus on formal organization and individual rights, they found it more difficult to find a place in politics and so had to voice their opinions through their husbands. What is important to consider is with the new idea that all men should have access to the vote by increasing their masculine status, it would have been somewhat more difficult to encompass women as well.

        Overall, what I think can be seen is that both the male and female played very distinct roles in politics during this era. Whilst the roles of both men and women were defined by the very masculine ideals of the day, both sexes came up against challenges which underlined their gendered status. The inseparability of politics and gender is perhaps best illustrated in the works of Rousseau, who often gave conflicting views on the matter. As Nye paraphrases, “it was sexual attraction that set mankind on the road to civilization, but it is sexual tyranny, in the form of women’s sexual power over men that has led to the corruption and vices of modern society”. This contemporary view that women were an immoral influence over men often led to the idea that they should be ostracised from politics as their main duties were to be wife and mother. When looking at the roles of femininity in society, historians can often become confused due to the conflicting viewpoints of the day. In France, women were celebrated as the “muse and Madonna of society” even though she was politically a non-person. Indeed the very notion of ‘Libertie’ was personified in a vulnerable feminine form, which conflicted with the Church’s teachings that woman was responsible for the downfall of man. Originating from the same teachings, it was clear that masculinity was to be celebrated in the patriarchal society where the man was the head of the household, thus making him the only member of a gendered society who was able to be politically active. In these terms, men were the only members of society that were seen as rational and thus able to make important political decisions. They often used their masculinity to attack each other and viewed femininity purely in masculine terms; as something to both be defended and shunned at will.

Bibliography

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Epstein, James A. ‘The Constitutional Idiom: Radical Reasoning, Rhetoric and Action in Early Nineteenth Century England’, Journal of Social History 23, no 3, 1990

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Hunt, Lynn. ‘The Family Romance of the French Revolution’, 1992

Nye, Robert A. ‘Masculinity and Male Codes of Honour in Modern France’, 1998

Scott, Joan W. ‘Gender and the Politics of History’, 1999