Contract's Influence on Feminism and Vice Versa

Handbook of Feminism and Law in the U.S. (Debora Burke, Martha Chamallas & Verna Williams eds., 2022 Forthcoming)

U of Maryland Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2021-08

40 Pages Posted: 10 May 2021 Last revised: 11 Feb 2022

See all articles by Martha M. Ertman

Martha M. Ertman

University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law

Date Written: May 6, 2021

Abstract

Feminist legal theory has both embraced and rejected contract. While contract-based conceptual and doctrinal tools have improved women’s economic and social status, feminists also critique contract-based reforms for colluding with hierarchies of gender, race and class. This chapter charts influential work on both sides of the contract debate and identifies a third approach that sees contract as a mechanism for law to move away from a hierarchal regime by stopping at a contractual way station en route to a more equal system of public ordering. It concludes by identifying ways that feminist legal theorists have injected feminist insights into traditional contract law via doctrines such as good faith in employment contracts, debtor rights in lending relationships, and defenses including unconscionability and duress.

Keywords: coverture, marriage contract, reproductive technologies, social contract theory, collaborative family law, intersectional analysis, feminist legal theory, transitional justice

Suggested Citation

Ertman, Martha M., Contract's Influence on Feminism and Vice Versa (May 6, 2021). Handbook of Feminism and Law in the U.S. (Debora Burke, Martha Chamallas & Verna Williams eds., 2022 Forthcoming), U of Maryland Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2021-08, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3841104

Martha M. Ertman (Contact Author)

University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law ( email )

500 West Baltimore Street
Baltimore, MD 21201-1786
United States

Do you have a job opening that you would like to promote on SSRN?

Paper statistics

Downloads
181
Abstract Views
1,014
Rank
354,393
PlumX Metrics