Anställda feminister och feministiska arbetsgivare. Ett dilemma för systerskapet

Abstract

The new women's movement of the 1960s and 1970s regarded the flat, non-hierarchical organisational form as an indispensable condition for changing women's consciousness as well as society as a whole. Although it soon became clear for many women that this organisational f o rm had problems of its own (e.g. the informal leaders), the ideal of the non-hierarchical, flat structure still has its appeal, and functions as a source of strength for many groups working in the 1990s. F r om a feminist and cultural theoretical point of view this artide addresses the tensions arising between feminist employees and feminist employers within two organisations within the contemporary Swedish women's movement. The empirical material on which the article is based comes f r om a larger research project that encompassed participant observation of association meetings in the course of a year as well as life-story and group interviews. The investigation shows that one of the main reasons for the tensions between employees and employers is the clash between different interests and types of rationality. These clashes had consequences both for the achievement of the groups' goals and for the internal interaction of the groups. Demands for efficiency within the group and adaptation to institutional demands from financing bodies thus clashed with feminist goals that prescribe non-bureaucratic ways of working as well as equal participation.The actual interaction within the groups was assessed against the ideal of the flat organisation, which often led to disappointment. The artide argues for the need for feminist employees and employers to acknowledge that these two roles encompass specific interests and types of rationality which may sometimes be contradictory. It urges feminists to discuss these issues constructively and to try different and innovative ways of combining different types of rationality without giving up the overarching feminist goal.