Autonomy is one of the core concepts of legal and political thought, yet also one of the least understood. The prevailing theory of liberal individualism characterizes autonomy as independence, yet from a social perspective, this conception is glaringly inadequate. In this brilliantly innovative
work, Jennifer Nedelsky claims that we must rethink our notion of autonomy, rejecting the usual vocabulary of control, boundaries, and individual rights.
If we understand that we are fundamentally in relation to others, she argues, we will recognize that we become autonomous with others
- with parents, teachers, employers, and the state. We should not therefore regard autonomy as merely a conceptual tool for assigning rights, but as a capacity that can be fostered or undermined throughout one's life through the relationships and the societal structures we inhabit. The political
project thus should not only be to protect the individual from the state and keep the state out, but to use law to construct relations with the state that enhance autonomy. Law's Relations includes many concrete legal applications of her theory of relational autonomy, offering new insights into the
debates over due process, judicial review, violence against women, and private versus public law
7. Relinquishing Control: Autonomy, the Bodymind, and the Psyche
I. Introduction
II. Meditations on Embodied Autonomy
III. Psychoanalytic Reflections on Control
IV. Law, Responsibility, and the Challenges of Relational Autonomy
V. Conclusion: Our Embodied Selves
8.
Chapter Eight:
I. Intimate Partner Violence: The Nature of Relational Analysis
A. The Problem: The Pervasiveness of Relations of Violence
B. The Nested Relations That Sustain Violence
C. Restructuring Relations Through Rights and Why Relational Rights Can "Work"
D. Merry:
Rights, the (Painful) Choice of Subjectivity, and the (Contested and Nested) Structures of Gender Identity
E. The Question of Men
II. Restructuring Sexuality: Confronting Unease About a Relational Approach
A. Kennedy: The "Tolerated Residuum", Contested Values, Inherent Uncertain
B. Butler and Halley: Norms, Normalizing, and Deep Sexual Diversity-and the Problem of Transformation Through the State
III. Relational Transformation
A. Openness, Intrusion, and Self-Consciousness
B. (Fiercely) Contested Values
C. Contested Strategies: State Power, "Governance
Feminism," and the Relational Approach
D. Foundational Relations: Restructuring Root Causes vs. Responding to Existing Problems
E. Competing Visions of Sexuality, and the Possibility of Policy Compromise
F. Jones's "To Do List:" Dangerous State Expansion, Repressive "Governance
Feminism," or (Inevitably Contested) Redirection of Existing State Power
IV. Conclusion
Closing Reflections
I. Engaging with the Law
A. The Conceptual and the Institutional Intertwined
B. Democratizing Law/Participation in Norm Creation
II. Collective Power and
Responsibility: The Challenge of Changing Norms
III. Restructuring Relations and the Burkean Challenge
IV. Contested Values
V. Disruption of Categories
A. Rights and Respect for the Relational Individual
B. Implications of Desired Disruptions
There are no Instructor/Student Resources available at this time.
Jennifer Nedelsky is a Professor of Law and Political Science at the University of Toronto.
Making Sense - Margot Northey and Joan McKibbin
The Power and Purpose of International Law - Mary Ellen O'Connell
The Philosophy of International Law - Edited by Samantha Besson and Dr. John Tasioulas
Losing Twice - Emily M. Calhoun
Relational Autonomy - Edited by Catriona Mackenzie and Natalie Stoljar
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