On Civic Friendship: Including Women in the State

Women have performed the vast majority of often unpaid friendship labor for centuries. Embodying the freedom, equality, and ideals of the Constitution, civic friendship emerges as a necessary condition for genuine justice. Through a critical examination of social and political relationships from ancient times to today, Sibyl Schwarzenbach develops a truly innovative, feminist theory of the democratic state. Beginning with an analysis of Aristotle's notion of political friendship, Schwarzenbach brings the philosopher's insights to bear on the social and political requirements of t

Introduction: Metaphor and theory change -- The forgotten category of ethical reproduction -- The liberal production model -- The socialist turn : missing faculties -- The possibility of a modern civic friendship -- Women, democracy, and the U.S. Constitution -- The state of feminist theory -- Looking outward : beyond the national security state