Part 1 of Essay
( This essay is a response to Benhabib. ) THE CONSTRUCTION OF IDENTITY 1 In order to see some of the strengths and weakness of identity politics as an approach to thinking about education, we need to make a distinction that is implicit, but not explicit, in Seyla Benhabib’s essay. For there are at least two distinct conce ....

Part 2 of Essay
.... Catharine MacKinnon put forth as an exemplar of their views. If she is an advocate of identity politics, it is only in a very specific sense, assuming a reified identity that is decided for women, by men, who “with their foot on women’s throats” do not allow them to speak for themselves. MacKinnon also has a crude, instrumental conception of power, especially in her view of the state as monolithic and fundamentally insensitive to women’s concerns (as she says, “the state is male”3). As a result, her view of ....