ABSTRACT
Not surprisingly, feminist international ethics has engaged in debates which characterize international ethics more broadly. Indeed, feminists, like other critical theorists in the field, have reacted strongly against the idea of ‘ethics’ as a systematic set of principles that can be applied to issues or dilemmas in international relations in order to render the latter, say, less driven by power and interests and more inclined to ‘moral’ behaviour. Many feminists within the field are committed to non-traditional or post-positivist methodologies, and are hence suspicious of the idea that any theory could be non-normative or value-free. Of course, from this perspective, it becomes very difficult to distinguish feminist international ethics from other kinds of feminist theory and research in the field. The apparently normative nature of all feminist thought may be tied to the very nature of feminism, as both a set of ideas – alternative lenses through which to view the social world, and a set of practices – including a broad and diverse social movement aimed at challenging the oppression and exclusion generated by gendered rules, norms, institutions and structures.
