Introduction
Part I: Justice
1:Women and Cultural Universals
2:The Feminist Critique of Liberalism
3:Religion and Women's Human Rights
4:Judging Other Cultures: The Case of Genital Mutilation
5:American Women: Preferences, Feminism, Democracy
6:Equity and Mercy
7:A Defence of Lesbian and Gay Rights
Part II: Sex
8:Objectification
9:Rage and Reason
10:Construction Love, Desire, and Care
11:"Whether from Reason or Prejudice": Taking Money for Bodily Services"
12:Platonic Love and Colorado Law
13:Sex, Truth, and Solitude
14:Sex, Liberty, and Economics
15:The Window: Knowledge of Other Minds in Virginia Woolf's `To The Lighthouse'

Writing with the rigorous argument and generous insight that characterizes all her work, Martha Nussbaum in these essays articulates a distinctive conception of feminism, one rooted in the liberal tradition of political thought but responsive to radical feminist critiques of this tradition.

Growing out of her years of work with an international development agency connected with the United Nations, the book charts a feminism that is deeply concerned with global justice and with the urgent needs of women who live in hunger and illiteracy, or under inherently unequal legal systems. Nussbaum contends that the liberal tradition holds rich resources for addressing these problems provided it transforms itself by responsiveness to feminist arguments concerning the social shaping of preferences and institutions. Nussbaum also takes on the pursuit of social justice in the sexual sphere, dedicating several chapters to the issue of equal rights for lesbians and gay men. Further chapters consider the feminist concept of objectification and argue for the importance of sympathy and mercy within a feminist conception of justice. Clear, timely, and accessible, these essays, extensively revised where previously published, make available to a wide audience the incisive political reflections of one of our most important living philosophers.