PSA’s Women and Politics Specialist Group’s response to Department for Education’s A Level Politics subject content consultation December 2015

2b) Is the revised AS and A level content in [Politics] appropriate? Please consider whether the content reflects what students need to know in order to progress to undergraduate study

While we welcome the move towards including Political Ideas as a core part of the new curriculum, the exclusion of feminism and the inclusion of only one woman political thinker are deeply troubling.

First, the proposed new curriculum omits both the greatly important social changes that have resulted from women’s movement activism in the past century, and a hugely significant body of literature dealing with gender, politics and political change. With Mary Wollstonecraft the only female ‘key thinker’ named, the document also overlooks a number of extremely influential women thinkers, such as Hannah Arendt, Rosa Luxemburg, Catherine MacKinnon, Nancy Fraser, Kimberle Crenshaw, Anne Phillips, Audre Lorde, Hanna Pitkin, Martha Nussbaum, Carole Pateman, and Susan Moller Okin – to name just a handful. This means not only that women thinkers are being erased, but also that students will be denied the background knowledge required to fully engage with a number of questions raised at undergraduate level concerning the nature of power and ‘the political.’

Feedback we have sought from students suggests that feminism is one of the most engaging parts of the existing curriculum, in particular as it serves to highlight the connections between politics, power and our day-to-day lives. In an environment in which there is widespread concern about political disaffection and disengagement, feminist perspectives encourage awareness of how politics is implicated in one’s everyday experience.

To omit women, gender and feminism from the A-level curriculum is a political act – it is a conscious decision to exclude a substantial body of political thought, to overlook women’s contributions to political life, and to reaffirm gender biases that treat men and their interests as the norm and women and their interests as optional extras. It therefore runs counter to the document’s stated aims and objectives, which stress the need to ‘develop knowledge and an informed understanding of contemporary political structures and issues in their historical context, both within the United Kingdom (UK) and globally’. Contemporary politics structures and their historical context cannot be properly understood while women, gender and feminism are excluded from the curriculum.

3 Is the amount of content for politics AS and A level appropriate and, if not, do you have any suggestions for removing or adding content

The proposed content for politics AS and A-level is limited in comparison to the existing curriculum. The inclusion of feminism in the Political Ideas section is extremely important in its own right, for the reasons outlined above – as is the inclusion of more women thinkers. However, adding a handful of women thinkers will not be sufficient to address the gaps in the proposed curriculum; rather, women and gender need to be ‘mainstreamed’ throughout by including them in existing sections, as such (our additions in italics): Democracy and participation

 ‘levels of participation and non-participation…’ particularly in relation to gender, class and ethnicity  ‘levels of activism…’ particularly in relation to gender, class and ethnicity  ‘the rights and responsibilities of individuals and groups, including…’ the implications of these rights for different groups (particularly in relation to gender and/or sexuality)

Elections and referendums

 ‘…debates about why different systems are used’ and the implications for the representation of women and other social groups  ‘voting behaviour patterns… how and why they have changed’ including a break- down of changes in relation to gender, age, ethnicity and class

Political parties

 ‘the policies of emerging and minority parties…’ including the Women’s Equality Party  Why women are better represented in some parties than others

Pressure groups

 ‘including the suffragists and suffragettes’ and later feminist movements, including working women’s movements and organisations such as the Fawcett Society

The government and politics of the USA could include gender perspectives at various points, including Congress AND Supreme Court  The over-representation of white men, and the implications for policies around welfare, abortion, equal rights, affirmative action etc.

Elections and voting

 The factors that explain women’s underrepresentation in elected office

Pressure groups

 Groups such as the National Organization for Women and founders such as Betty Friedan

Civil rights

 Include the failure to ratify the equal rights amendment to the constitution

Global politics Poverty – include the feminisation of global poverty Human rights – include Women’s Rights as Human Rights

Finally, the Political Ideas section could easily be adapted to include significant women thinkers working within each of the traditions: liberalism, conservatism and socialism could all start:

 ‘The core ideas … particularly as they affect liberal/conservative/socialist views on human nature, gender, etc.

Liberalism

 ‘Differing views … and modern liberalism’, including feminist liberalism  Key thinkers including Carole Pateman, Susan Okin, Martha Nussbaum, Anne Phillips

Conservatism

 Key thinkers including Mary Astell

Socialism

 Key thinkers including Rosa Luxemburg, Clara Zetkin, Alexandra Kollontai, Emma Goldman, Juliet Mitchell, Michelle Barrett, Anne Phillips, Nancy Fraser

5 Do you think that any of the proposals have the potential to have a disproportionate impact, positive or negative, on specific students, in particular those with 'relevant protected characteristics'? (The relevant protected characteristics are disability, gender reassignment, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation.) Please provide evidence to support your response.

Pedagogical research demonstrates that the failure to include diversity in curricula can have profoundly negative effects on students, leading to feelings of disengagement and alienation in students who feel under-represented in the curriculum. The exclusion of women – both as key thinkers and as political actors in their own right – sends the message that women do not and have not made significant achievements in politics and political thought. Thus, the proposed changes have the potential to have a disproportionate negative impact on female students.

6 How could any adverse impact be reduced and how could the subject content of GCSEs and/or A levels be altered to better advance equality of opportunity between persons who share a protected characteristic and those who do not share it? Please provide evidence to support your response.

The best way to reduce any adverse impact on female students would be to mainstream gender throughout the curriculum in the ways we have suggested above. The inclusion of more women thinkers would also be a highly beneficial and welcome change. However, if the changes stop here, there is a risk of sending the message that both women and gender equality issues are optional add- ons in the study of politics, rather than central to political life and the nature of ‘the political’ as we know it.