Caliban and the Witch is a book written by Silvia Federici, an Italian-American feminist scholar. This book explores the history of capitalism from a feminist perspective, focusing on the witch hunts that took place in Europe during the 16th and 17th centuries. Federici argues that these witch hunts were not simply a campaign against so-called witches, but rather a targeted attack on women's power and autonomy. Federici begins by discussing the transition from feudalism to capitalism, arguing that the witch hunts played a crucial role in this transition. She suggests that capitalism required not only the exploitation of labor, but also the control and subjugation of women's bodies. The witch hunts, according to Federici, were a means of exerting this control and disciplining women who did not conform to the prescribed role of the obedient, submissive housewife.
Caliban and the Witch is a reminder that it is the task of feminists and Marxists alike to demand that the sphere of reproduction and continuing forms of colonialism be seen as key sources of value for capitalism and therefore as key sites of struggle against it.
In an ironic twist of fate and clearly inspired by Charmed and Sabrina the Teenage Witch , my friends and I embraced the idea of magic without fear that the charge of witchcraft would lead to our torture and death. The horrifying scale and brutality of the witch hunts is difficult to comprehend, especially given their status as one of the most understudied phenomena in European history p.
The witch hunts, according to Federici, were a means of exerting this control and disciplining women who did not conform to the prescribed role of the obedient, submissive housewife. Federici also emphasizes the intersectionality of the witch hunts, arguing that they targeted not only women, but also other marginalized groups such as the poor, the elderly, and people of color. She suggests that these groups were seen as a threat to the emerging capitalist order, as they did not fit neatly into the categories of workers or property owners.
Feminist Theory Week 2: Sylvia Federici, Caliban and the Witch
This is the second installment of me blogging my way through the course texts for my spring 2018 seminar in feminist theory. Today we read selections of Federici’s Caliban and the Witch.
This is a classic text in feminist theory. It argues two main things:
As Europe transitioned from common ownership to private ownership and enclosed both the European commons and colonial terra nullius (null land, land that’s not owned by an individual as their private property), women became, for men, what the commons had previously been for everyone. “For in pre-capitalist Europe women’s subordination to men had been tempered by the fact that they had access to the commons and other conununal assets, while in the new capitalist regime women themselves became the commons , as their work was defined as a natural resource, laying outside the sphere of market relations” (97;emphasis added). European women, their labor and their bodies, were things that anyone could access without asking women’s consent: “a communal good anyone could appropriate and use at will” (97). If private property is that which cannot be intruded upon without consent, then commons don’t require consent or permission for intruding upon them. (It’s obvious how this idea that men are entitled to women’s labor and bodies without needing to ask women for their consent persists in contemporary Western culture.) As Federici explains, “every woman (other than those privatized by bourgeois men) became a communal good, for once women’s activities were defined as non-work, women’s labor began to appear as a natural resource, available to al, no less than the air we breathe or the water we drink” (97).
So not every woman is a commons. Those married to bourgeois men were their private property. Here we see a hint of how marriage is a private property relation. Unlike enslaved women, who were fully owned by white masters, white wives had to initially consent to become property–that’s what a marriage contract is (“Do you promise to honor and obey….?”) If proletarian European women were a commons, this means that their gender status is slightly different than enslaved women, who were private property; so the racialized gender distinction is a distinction between two types of property relation: commons and private property. Both the commons and private property can be intruded upon without consent: the former by anyone, the latter by its owner.
A few questions:
- How does Federici’s analysis of gender and race as different kinds of property relations work intersectionally? In other words, what about black women? Or, perhaps, was it the case that black women’s status as private property cancelled out their use as a commons, so they weren’t gendered ‘feminine’ in the normal/hegemonic way?
- The idea that sex is biology and gender is social role is common in women’s studies. But Federici argues that gender isn’t a social role related to body type, but a property relation defined by gender status. If we buy her argument here, does this mean that the appeal to bodies was just an attempt to naturalize (i.e., make seem natural) what’s actually a totally artificial property relation that ultimately has little to do with so-called sex organs?
Late 20th and early 21st century neoliberalism–especially the kinds of reform the World Bank and IMF impose on so-called “third world” nations (but which were pioneered in NYC in the 1970s)–are reproducing that exact same process of enclosure in new contexts. For example, Federici claims that the practices of enclosure–and all the forms of white supremacist patriarchal domination and violence that went with them–are “comparable to that which has occurred in our time throughout Africa, Asia, and Latin America, in the countries “structurally adjusted” by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund” (76). These ‘economic’ reforms are also reforms in gender and racial relations, both locally and globally. We are seeing “a new round of primitive accumulation” that takes the form of “regulat[ing[ procreation rates, and, in this case, reduce the size of a population that was deemed too demanding and indisciplined from the viewpoint of its prospected insertion in the global economy” (Preface). Many of the texts we read in this class will address some aspect of this claim, especially the Murphy.
- If neoliberalism is in fact enacting a parallel process of enclosure, how are the gendered logics Federici identifies in early modern Europe translated to contemporary Western culture? For example, was GamerGate and its anti-SJW campaign a kind of contemporary witch hunt? How are women dispossessed of their productive and reproductive labor?
Additional points for consideration:
- Federici points out that Enlightenment “men of Science” who were otherwise absolutely skeptical of mystical stuff like sorcery consistently wrote in favor of killing witches (168). So this means that cultural objections to witchcraft weren’t scientific or religious, but “political” (168). How might this fact help us think about more contemporary uses of “science” to advocate for misogynist practices, such as the infamous Anti-Diversity Manifesto written by a Google employee? What’s the political project behind these contemporary phenomena? How is it related to the political project behind witchcraft, especially given Federici’s parallel btw neoliberalism & the original period of enclosure & primitive accumulation?
- Federici argues that part of capitalism involves “the transformation of female sexuality into work” (192). What does this mean? How is it manifest in 21st century life?
- Federici discusses the historical intertwining of witch hunts performed to newly/becoming white women in Europe and witch hunts and devil worshiping charges performed on non-whites in colonies (198). This suggests that intersectionality is actually a historical phenomenon: patriarchy and white supremacy were built together, in mutually influencing ways. If we take intersectionality as a way to describe the architecture of both the concepts of race and gender and the material/intellectual histories of white supremacist patriarchy, how does this impact how we use intersectionality as a concept, rubric, or analytic to talk about contemporary stuff? Is this understanding I’m proposing via Federici similar to or different from what you take to be the dominant uses of the term today in both academic and non-academic spaces?
- Federici writes that “in the history of capitalism,”going back” was a means of stepping forward, from the viewpoint of establishing the conditions for capital accumulation” (203). Is the public re-emergence of Nazis an instance of such “going back”? How might white supremacist fascists be part of a new type of primitive accumulation/enclosure? What’s getting taken from the public? By whom?
I think Federici makes a compelling argument. Like a lot of big claims, there are gaps in the story left by scant sources with which she, perforce, worked. For such large-scale violence — hundreds of thousands dead across three continents — the witch hunts are not well-understood history, and both the witch hunt and the heretic hunt (two different, if sometimes converging, things) tended to erase the voices of those they persecuted, leaving only the inquisitors’ words. But Federici makes valuable deductive points: most importantly why, all of a sudden, in the 16th century, did a campaign against witches, eighty percent of them women, start with such vociferousness? Medieval Europe knew heretic hunts, brutal ones, but did not consider witches heretics until surprisingly late, well into the “early modern” period as most understand it. Why this sudden turn on healers and midwives? Most studies are either too broad (citing a vague general cultural madness) or too narrow (citing a vague local cultural madness) to really answer that question. That this coincided with the crises that led to the rise of capitalism seems obvious in retrospect, one of the signs of a good theory.
Throughout the book, Federici draws a connection between the persecution of witches and the oppression of women today. She argues that the witch hunts were a form of gender violence, and that similar forms of violence continue to be perpetrated against women in the modern world. One of the main ideas in Caliban and the Witch is that the witch hunts were not simply a historical event, but rather a continuation of the oppression of women under capitalism. Federici suggests that capitalism relies on the subjugation of women's bodies and the division of labor along gender lines. She argues that challenging this oppression requires both a critique of the capitalist system and a recognition of the ways in which it intersects with other forms of oppression..
Reviews for "Capitalism, Gender, and Witchcraft: Insights from Silvia Federici's Caliban and the Witch"
1. John Smith - 1 star
I found "Caliban and the Witch" by Federici to be an extremely difficult and confusing read. The author delves into various historical anecdotes and theories without providing a clear thesis or argument. The book jumps around from topic to topic, making it hard to follow and understand the main points. Additionally, Federici's writing style is extremely dense and academic, which makes it even more inaccessible to the general reader. Overall, I was disappointed with this book and would not recommend it to others.
2. Sarah Johnson - 2 stars
"Caliban and the Witch" was a challenging book to get through. While I appreciate the author's attempt to shed light on the history of capitalism and the witch hunts, I found the book to be overly academic and theoretical. The dense language and complex historical analysis made it difficult for me to fully grasp the main arguments. I believe that the author could have presented the information in a more accessible and engaging manner. Unfortunately, I was left feeling frustrated and confused after reading this book.
3. Michael Thompson - 1 star
I had high expectations for "Caliban and the Witch," but I was sorely disappointed. The book is filled with a mix of dense academic language and personal anecdotes that fail to come together in a coherent manner. The author's argument about the relationship between capitalism and witch hunts is convoluted and lacks convincing evidence. Furthermore, the book is overly repetitive, covering the same ideas and examples multiple times. Overall, I found this book to be a frustrating and unsatisfying read.
4. Emily Davis - 2 stars
While the topic of "Caliban and the Witch" is interesting, I found the book to be overly political and biased. The author seems to have a clear agenda in promoting a feminist perspective and criticizing capitalism, which can be off-putting for readers who do not share the same beliefs. Additionally, the writing style is dry and academic, making it difficult to stay engaged. The book could have benefited from a more balanced and nuanced approach, as it felt more like propaganda than a scholarly analysis.