Women, gender and feminism

The issue of women in a solidarity-based economy started with the awareness of the invisibility, the marginalization and the unacknowledged importance of the role played by women. By giving visibility to the experiences of women positive references are created, the women are strengthened as individuals, and it encourages consideration of the problems of the initiatives from the point of view of gender. The visibility of women’s work, of the sphere of reproduction, of the conditions for the involvement of women in the labor market, and criticism of the capitalist economy and its neo-liberal tendency, are all viewpoints shared by the economic feminist theory. All these issues are on its agenda, which goes one step further and proposes a rupture with the hegemonic economy, posing the challenge of abandoning the market as the center around which all economic and social activities are organized, and replacing it with the sphere of reproduction. Alternative experiences of income generation arise for women as a possibility to access the property of the means of production through collective property, and to access remuneration; and mainly as an opportunity to experience a different working relationship, based on companionship and democratic management. In addition, the economy can be strengthened by feminist criticism of capitalist economy, which uses gender and race/ethnic inequalities to further its own means by securing the grounds for its operation.