Feminism is often defined as a movement seeking full equality of rights with men...

Feminism is often defined as a movement seeking full equality of rights with men, but it is important to emphasize that the equality of rights sought by feminists goes far beyond equality under the law.

Feminism aims at the eradication of any difference in social roles based on gender difference, and this is what distinguishes it from other women's movements.[^2] Nevertheless, the feminist movement includes within its ranks writers and activists who differ on many fundamental issues in philosophy, politics and morals. What unites them is the social ideal of the elimination of traditional gender roles.

Feminism may thus be defined as a branch of the women's movement that aims at the elimination of traditional gender roles. However, confusion exists about the use of the term 'feminism', for there are writers who fail to distinguish feminism from the more general women's movement.

The focus of attention in what follows will be on feminist philosophy (including political philosophy) and feminist theology, however, among the important feminist writings there are also works on psychoanalysis, jurisprudence and literary criticism. Feminism And Socialism Perhaps the first use of the term 'feminism' was in the early nineteenth century by the socialist, Charles Fourier (1772-­1837).

The followers of another early socialist, Henri de Saint-Simon (1760-1825), introduced the androgyny principle, according to which there was a mixed male and female being at the beginning of history.

(Muslims will find it amusing to learn that Saint-Simon's disciples went to Turkey to seek the female savior after having lost hope of finding a truly free woman in Europe!) Socialist feminists advocated the abolition of any division of labor along sex specific lines, and called for quotas whereby half of all the positions in every field of employment are to be filled by women.

With the domination of Marxism among the various forms of socialism, socialist feminism also came to be dominated by Marxist feminism, first elaborated in 1844 by Engels in Der Ursprung der Familie (The Origen of the Family). In this work Engles demands the abolition of the family, uniform integration of men and women into the labor force and the communal raising of children in order to achieve equality among all people and an end to the domination of one person over another.