Tony Lawson makes a compelling case that it is only naive realism that feminist social scientists and philosophers need to avoid, not any and all realist arguments. However, he leaves mysterious, on the one hand, why so many feminists have preferred epistemological to ontological arguments and,...

Is there only one basic structure of reality? Can anyone produce culture-free representations of reality? Is the partiality of our representations only a problem or inconvenience rather than also an epistemic resource? Should we think of the goal of sciences as the production of accurate...

The article illustrates how philosophical assumptions affect the theory, practice, and results of poverty analysis, to the potential detriment of women and girls. It links the income/consumption approach to poverty with naturalist normative theory, which developed historically from the moral...

This paper examines the implications of current epistemological debates for the work of feminist economists. Feminist economists must acknowledge (in accordance with recent developments in the study of science) that (a) inquirers can never be certain whether claims about the world are true; (b)...

This paper offers a non-essentialist, normative view of the spatiality of emotions in consumption and production, underscoring issues of difference in everyday life. As people interweave thoughts and feelings across spheres of life, over time, economic and noneconomic logics become blurred,...

This response locates feminist methodological strategies, first, as both “outside” and “inside” familiar processes of the sciences and, second, in relation to a formulation of the democratic ethos.

Amartya Sen's ethical theorizing helps feminists resolve the tensions between the claims of women's particular perspectives and moral objectivity. His concept of "positional objectivity" highlights the epistemological significance of value judgments made from particular social positions, while...

Sandra Harding identifies a set of questions to which, she suggests, she and I would provide contrasting answers. In this short note I wonder if our differences are quite as sharp as Harding supposes.

Tony Lawson (1999) argues that critical realism will facilitate revelatory and emancipatory projects in feminist economics. The strength of Lawson's argument lies in its rejection of social atomism and methodological individualism. Societies are best understood as structurally connected systems...