Abstract:
One of the most taken for-granted and yet widely disputed concepts in the analysis of political action is that of 'interests'. This paper argues, first, that in the traditional opposition between liberal and structural theories of politics, and the normative assessment of 'interests' each contains, there continues to be a characteristic
tendency to treat 'interests' as though they are 'pre-given' phenomenon. The feminist
political analysis which draws on these traditions remains prey to this tendency.
Second, although more recent post-structuralist approaches to the study of
gender, politics and policy analysis taken up by a number of feminist scholars are
sensitive to the 'constructedness' of 'interests', accounts such as these require further
development if we are to see 'interests' as more than simply discursive phenomenon.
Third, I argue for an account of policy and political analysis in which the
subject of gendered 'interests' is understood in terms of it being a particular 'problem
of government' or 'governmentality'. This approach to the study of 'interests'
seeks to examine both the institutional and the discursive processes through which
the policies, institutions and practices of government problematise gendered 'interests'.
