Sylvia Walby

Available Open Access under CC-BY-NC licence. The need to stop rape is pressing and, since it is the outcome of a wide range of practices and institutions in society, so too must the policies be to stop it This important book offers a comprehensive guide to the international policies developed to stop rape , together with case study examples on how they work. The book engages with the law and criminal justice system, health services, specialised services for victim-survivors, educational and cultural interventions, as well as how they can best be coordinated. It is informed by theory and evidence drawn from scholarship and practice from around the world. The book will be of interest to a global readership of students, practitioners and policy makers as well as anyone who wants to know how rape can be stopped.

First published in 1991, Sex Crime in the News is a unique examination of the nature of sex crime reporting in the press. Analysing examples from forty years of newspaper coverage, the authors provide a systematic study of this controversial topic. The book reveals the misleading and trivializing nature of sex crime coverage, with serious research reports on rape and discussions on law reform being given short shrift. The authors examine the increasing gap between the reality of sexual abuse and the coverage it receives in the press, and they set their detailed empirical work within a context of broader concerns about the relationship between the media, the individual and the state. Critical though it is of the press, this book will be of special interest to people working in the media, and to legislators involved in debates about the press. It will also be of value to students on course in women’s studies, cultural and media studies, and deviancy.

Violence is increasing on many measures. As criminal justice and security interventions become more punitive, rising inequalities diminish the resources needed for resilience. When all governments proclaim the need to end violence, how can we make sense of this? Sylvia Walby offers new ways to theorize violence, placing it at the centre of society, not the periphery, and rethinking the relationship between violence and security. Arguing for an integrated analysis of internal and external security within a theory of society, she shows how neoliberal transformations have led to the growth of violence. Understanding these changes requires gendering theories of the state, the economy and civil society. With securitization growing while welfare and the regulation of the economy shrink, Walby uses complexity science to investigate the contradictions in state responses. Crucially, this book offers a way forward, drawing on inspirational practices and cutting-edge social theory, to better understand violence and the causes of its variations.

Violence is increasing on many measures. As criminal justice and security interventions become more punitive, rising inequalities diminish the resources needed for resilience. When all governments proclaim the need to end violence, how can we make sense of this? Sylvia Walby offers new ways to theorize violence, placing it at the centre of society, not the periphery, and rethinking the relationship between violence and security. Arguing for an integrated analysis of internal and external security within a theory of society, she shows how neoliberal transformations have led to the growth of violence. Understanding these changes requires gendering theories of the state, the economy and civil society. With securitization growing while welfare and the regulation of the economy shrink, Walby uses complexity science to investigate the contradictions in state responses. Crucially, this book offers a way forward, drawing on inspirational practices and cutting-edge social theory, to better understand violence and the causes of its variations.

Available open access digitally under CC-BY-NC-ND license. This book offers a theory of trafficking and modern slavery with implications for policy. Despite economic development, modern slavery persists all around the world. The issue is not only one of crime but the regulation of the economy, better welfare, and social protections. Going beyond polarized debates on the sex trade, an original empirical analysis shows the importance of profit-taking. Although individual experience matters, the root causes lie in intersecting regimes of inequality of gender regimes, capitalism, and the legacies of colonialism. This book shows the importance of coercion and the societal complexities that perpetuate modern slavery.

First published in 1991, Sex Crime in the News is a unique examination of the nature of sex crime reporting in the press. Analysing examples from forty years of newspaper coverage, the authors provide a systematic study of this controversial topic. The book reveals the misleading and trivializing nature of sex crime coverage, with serious research reports on rape and discussions on law reform being given short shrift. The authors examine the increasing gap between the reality of sexual abuse and the coverage it receives in the press, and they set their detailed empirical work within a context of broader concerns about the relationship between the media, the individual and the state. Critical though it is of the press, this book will be of special interest to people working in the media, and to legislators involved in debates about the press. It will also be of value to students on course in women’s studies, cultural and media studies, and deviancy.

Available Open Access under CC-BY-NC licence. The extent of violence against women is currently hidden. How should violence be measured? How should research and new ways of thinking about violence improve its measurement? Could improved measurement change policy? The book is a guide to how the measurement of violence can be best achieved. It shows how to make femicide, rape, domestic violence, and FGM visible in official statistics. It offers practical guidance on definitions, indicators and coordination mechanisms. It reflects on theoretical debates on ‘what is gender’, ‘what is violence’, and ‘the concept of coercive control’. and introduces the concept of ‘gender saturated context’. Analysing the socially constructed nature of statistics and the links between knowledge and power, it sets new standards and guidelines to influence the measurement of violence in the coming decades.

We are living in a time of crisis which has cascaded through society. Financial crisis has led to an economic crisis of recession and unemployment; an ensuing fiscal crisis over government deficits and austerity has led to a political crisis which threatens to become a democratic crisis. Borne unevenly, the effects of the crisis are exacerbating class and gender inequalities. Rival interpretations – a focus on ‘austerity’ and reduction in welfare spending versus a focus on ‘financial crisis’ and democratic regulation of finance – are used to justify radically diverse policies for the distribution of resources and strategies for economic growth, and contested gender relations lie at the heart of these debates. The future consequences of the crisis depend upon whether there is a deepening of democratic institutions, including in the European Union. Sylvia Walby offers an alternative framework within which to theorize crisis, drawing on complexity science and situating this within the wider field of study of risk, disaster and catastrophe. In doing so, she offers a critique and revision of the social science needed to understand the crisis.

We are living in a time of crisis which has cascaded through society. Financial crisis has led to an economic crisis of recession and unemployment; an ensuing fiscal crisis over government deficits and austerity has led to a political crisis which threatens to become a democratic crisis. Borne unevenly, the effects of the crisis are exacerbating class and gender inequalities. Rival interpretations – a focus on ‘austerity’ and reduction in welfare spending versus a focus on ‘financial crisis’ and democratic regulation of finance – are used to justify radically diverse policies for the distribution of resources and strategies for economic growth, and contested gender relations lie at the heart of these debates. The future consequences of the crisis depend upon whether there is a deepening of democratic institutions, including in the European Union. Sylvia Walby offers an alternative framework within which to theorize crisis, drawing on complexity science and situating this within the wider field of study of risk, disaster and catastrophe. In doing so, she offers a critique and revision of the social science needed to understand the crisis.

Feminism is not dead. This is not a postfeminist era. Feminism is still vibrant, despite declarations that it is over. Feminism is a success, although many gender inequalities remain. Feminism is taking powerful new forms, which makes it unrecognisable to some. In The Future of Feminism, Sylvia Walby offers a provocative riposte to the notion that feminism is dead. Substantiating her arguments with evidence of the vibrancy of contemporary feminism in civil society and beyond, she provides a succinct yet comprehensive critical review of recent treatments of feminism explaining why they have got it wrong. The book provides the definitive account of feminism's new and varied projects, goals, alliances and organizational forms, including feminism as a global wave. It offers engaged accounts of feminist activities across a range of domains in the economy, polity, violence and civil society. Successful feminist projects are not always named as feminist, sometimes being mainstreamed into coalitions with social democratic and global human rights activists. Feminism is now global, though also taking local forms, and these new coalitions are the basis for the future of feminism. On the future of feminism depends not only the future of gender inequality but the future of social inequality more generally.

Feminism is not dead. This is not a postfeminist era. Feminism is still vibrant, despite declarations that it is over. Feminism is a success, although many gender inequalities remain. Feminism is taking powerful new forms, which makes it unrecognisable to some. In The Future of Feminism, Sylvia Walby offers a provocative riposte to the notion that feminism is dead. Substantiating her arguments with evidence of the vibrancy of contemporary feminism in civil society and beyond, she provides a succinct yet comprehensive critical review of recent treatments of feminism explaining why they have got it wrong. The book provides the definitive account of feminism's new and varied projects, goals, alliances and organizational forms, including feminism as a global wave. It offers engaged accounts of feminist activities across a range of domains in the economy, polity, violence and civil society. Successful feminist projects are not always named as feminist, sometimes being mainstreamed into coalitions with social democratic and global human rights activists. Feminism is now global, though also taking local forms, and these new coalitions are the basis for the future of feminism. On the future of feminism depends not only the future of gender inequality but the future of social inequality more generally.

How has globalization changed social inequality? Why do Americans die younger than Europeans, despite larger incomes? Is there an alternative to neoliberalism? Who are the champions of social democracy? Why are some countries more violent than others? In this groundbreaking book, Sylvia Walby examines the many changing forms of social inequality and their intersectionalities at both country and global levels. She shows how the contest between different modernities and conceptions of progress shape the present and future. The book re-thinks the nature of economy, polity, civil society and violence. It places globalization and inequalities at the centre of an innovative new understanding of modernity and progress and demonstrates the power of these theoretical reformulations in practice, drawing on global data and in-depth analysis of the US and EU. Walby analyses the tensions between the different forces that are shaping global futures. She examines the regulation and deregulation of employment and welfare; domestic and public gender regimes; secular and religious polities; path dependent trajectories and global political waves; and global inequalities and human rights.

How has globalization changed social inequality? Why do Americans die younger than Europeans, despite larger incomes? Is there an alternative to neoliberalism? Who are the champions of social democracy? Why are some countries more violent than others? In this groundbreaking book, Sylvia Walby examines the many changing forms of social inequality and their intersectionalities at both country and global levels. She shows how the contest between different modernities and conceptions of progress shape the present and future. The book re-thinks the nature of economy, polity, civil society and violence. It places globalization and inequalities at the centre of an innovative new understanding of modernity and progress and demonstrates the power of these theoretical reformulations in practice, drawing on global data and in-depth analysis of the US and EU. Walby analyses the tensions between the different forces that are shaping global futures. She examines the regulation and deregulation of employment and welfare; domestic and public gender regimes; secular and religious polities; path dependent trajectories and global political waves; and global inequalities and human rights.

The answer of course is both. In this lucid and subtle investigation, Sylvia Walby, one of the world's leading authorities on gender shows how undoubted increases in opportunity for women in Europe and America have been accompanid by new forms of inequality. She charts changes in women's employment, education and political representation and the complex relations between gender, class and ethnicity, between local conditions and global pressures which together determine the place of women both in the labour market and in the wider social, political and economic world of today. An eagerly awaited successor to Walby's classic Theorising Patriarchy, Transforming Gender will be essential reading for anyone with an interest in how questions of gender remake and are remade by the social and economic conditions in which they occur.

The answer of course is both. In this lucid and subtle investigation, Sylvia Walby, one of the world's leading authorities on gender shows how undoubted increases in opportunity for women in Europe and America have been accompanid by new forms of inequality. She charts changes in women's employment, education and political representation and the complex relations between gender, class and ethnicity, between local conditions and global pressures which together determine the place of women both in the labour market and in the wider social, political and economic world of today. An eagerly awaited successor to Walby's classic Theorising Patriarchy, Transforming Gender will be essential reading for anyone with an interest in how questions of gender remake and are remade by the social and economic conditions in which they occur.

The NHS is the largest employer in Western Europe. It embraces two of the oldest professions - doctors and nurses - whose work practices are still highly traditional and yet currently at the forefront of radical change as health work is being reorganized to reflect the new political priorities of the 1990s. This book focuses on the collaborative work of doctors and nurses in one particular area: the acute hospital ward, looking at the effects of `new wave' management on formerly independent, autonomous teams. The authors examine the impact of changes in health service on professional boundaries and inter-professional relations, exploring the paradox of the ostensible drive to decentralise responsibility introduced alongside the increased management of professionals. They discuss the tensions between simultaneous application of Fordist to post-Fordist modes of governance and describe an increasingly fragmented service, in which inflexible working patterns are generated by demand for the optimal use of labour, but where there remain examples of effective collaborative working.

Sylvia Walby provides an overview of recent theoretical debates - Marxism, radical and liberal feminism, post-structuralism and dual systems theory. She shows how each can be applied to a range of substantive topics from paid work, housework and the state, to culture, sexuality and violence, relying on the most up-to-date empirical findings. Arguing that patriarchy has been vigorously adaptable to the changes in women's position, and that some of women's hard-won social gains have been transformed into new traps, Walby proposes a combination of class analysis with radical feminist theory to explain gender relations in terms of both patriarchal and capitalist structure.

The concept of 'patriarchy' is one which signals a sharp divide between traditions of feminist thought. Sylvia Walby attempts to conceptualize 'patriarchy' in a way that takes account not only of the complexity of relationships of gender, but also of the subtleties of the interconnections of patriarchy and capitalism. She rejects those accounts which treat patriarchy as a unified set of relations, or which confine the site of patriarchy to any one privileged sphere such as the family. Instead, she elaborates a novel view of patriarchy as a set of 'relatively autonomous relations', the connections between which are spelled out through a variety of detailed case studies. In contrast to many other views of 'capitalist patriarchy', Sylvia Walby characterizes the relationship between capitalism and patriarchy as a relationship, not of harmony and mutual accommodation, but of tension and conflict. This thesis is substantiated through a comparative historical analysis of three contrasting areas of employment: cotton textiles, engineering and clerical work. These analyses show the shortcomings of much conventional literature in sociology, history and economics on women's employment, which pays insufficient attention to the independence of patriarchal relations. The book draws upon sociological, historical, economic and geographic materials to argue for an understanding of gender relations in terms of the specific tensions and compromises between patriarchal and capitalist relations. Exploring the impact of the state on patterns of employment and unemployment completes a book rich in theoretical and empirical analysis. Patriarchy at Work will be recognized as a major contribution to feminist thought and the social sciences.