Analysis Of Jean Jacques Rousseau's The Subjection Of Women

Throughout history, many thinkers have developed their own theory on the nature of women and their subjection as some believe women are inferior to men and others, equal. Jean Jacques Rousseau is famous for many of his theories but Emile allows us to capture his honest beliefs that women are subordinate to men as it is natural. John Stuart Mill has taken a different approach by approving equal rights for women in the popular text The Subjection of Women in which he claims there is no proof women are naturally unequal to men. By discussing the philosophers’ arguments jointly, we are able to find the flaws in one and another's’ theory and proceed to create our own analysis using their writings as evidence.
In Emile, Rousseau uses nature as reasoning …show more content…
He begins his argument by explaining that the subordination of women holds back society and ultimately no sex should have more power or benefits over the other sex (Mill 196). Mill’s first critique of the subjection of women is there was no trial to see if a patriarchal society works better than a society where both sexes are equal. He explains there should have been an experiment where women ruled men, men ruled women and both sexes were equal to have scientific evidence that society would be improved if men were always in power. Mill continues that the original idea of women being subordinate to men comes from theory and so it should only make sense to first test the theory before accepting it (197). He states “...or if there had been a society of men and women in which the women were not under the control of men, something might have been...known about the mental and moral differences...in the nature of each”, explaining that until we see women and men on an equal platform we cannot simply assume women are naturally unequal to men ( Mill 203). He concludes that there was never a discussion among society that we would be better off if women would be under the rule of