Alderson, P; (2019) Sustainable prosperity for all? Blog for CUSP – Centre for Understanding Sustainable Properity

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Abstract

Equally distributed prosperity depends on equal respect for all. Women’s legal right to own property was not recognised in Britain until 1882 when, slowly, women began to be recognised as real people and were no longer dismissed as unreliable dependents. From the 1960s onwards, the campaign for women’s rights was advanced by two useful words. First, ‘sexism’ succinctly identified the root of the problem of discrimination against women. It transferred the blame for women’s inferior status, and their seeming lower ability and intelligence when compared with men, away from women themselves and onto powerful social structures of prejudice. Gradually these sexist structures are being identified and dismantled, and women have growing opportunities to show that they can be at least equal to men. The second useful word, ‘feminism’, turned what might have been a weak negative term about disadvantaged inferior women into the name for a powerful positive movement. Similar words linked to former weakness and shame have been transformed into slogans of strength and triumph, such as Black Pride and Gay Pride to fight racism and homophobia. However, a third of the people in the world are still ignored or excluded from many economics, politics and social justice agendas. This third involves more than half the people in Uganda, where the median age is 15 years. Work on transnational solidarity for social justice and prosperity needs to consider everyone aged <19 years, besides intergenerational justice between older richer nations and younger poorer ones.

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