Women's Rights through Femenism

During the latter half of the twentieth century, early feminist social and political struggles and endeavors had certainly advanced the democratic rights and freedoms of women in Europe and North America, but they had done so in the western philosophical tradition of the liberal humanism. Humanism basically referred to the idea that all human beings are the same; that they share the same values and importance; and should, in theory, have the same basic human rights. For European feminist thinkers however, liberal humanist thought had traditionally defined or explained women as 'Other', or inferior to the universal humanist subject or 'Man'. The political task of early, so-called 'first- and second-generation' feminism thus focuses on goals such as the women's franchise, equal pay, reproductive rights, and equality in the work place.