Federici incorporates the work of ecofeminists who argue that while industrial advancement may increase productivity, it also devastates the planet and creates new demands for reproductive labor required to sustain human life in increasingly damaged ecosystems.

However, library workers may find much of value in chapter 4, “Marx, Feminism, and the Construction of the Commons.” Federici argues that one of the flaws in Marx’s analysis was his belief that industrialization would build the conditions necessary for socialist revolution by increasing productivity and reducing scarcity. These chapters are very much part of a conversation between Federici and other Marxist theorists and may be of less interest to readers with little grounding in this discourse. The central argument here is that true working-class solidarity requires valuing all labor, including reproductive labor.įederici moves from socialist practice into socialist theory in chapters 3 through 5, arguing that classical Marxism is incomplete without the feminist critique that unpaid reproductive labor is central to capitalist exploitation, and thus an important site of working class struggle. In these chapters, Federici connects the patriarchal positioning of women as natural domestic laborers who deserve no wage to low wages in feminized professions, arguing that once women become “used to working for nothing,” it is easy for employers to justify low wages in fields like librarianship, nursing, and teaching (15). The Wages for Housework campaign demands payment for the “real length of the workday,” which extends beyond the time spent directly laboring for a wage into the time spent caring for the bodies, minds, and children of workers (20). Federici argues that this narrative serves the owning class by separating reproductive labor from waged labor, when in fact both are necessary for profit generation. These leftists position domestic work as a natural act of love and care that would occur even without the organizing presence of capitalism in workers’ lives. Federici argues that many leftists depict waged laborers as the protagonists of socialist struggle while marginalizing unwaged laborers such as housewives, to the detriment of both women and the socialist movement. Ultimately, Federici argues that understanding reproductive labor and its gendered nature is necessary for building a strong socialist movement, and an equitable world where everyone can thrive.Ĭhapters 1 and 2 constitute a defense of the Wages for Housework campaign against critique from other socialist activists. In this book, Federici analyzes various forms of reproductive labor to generate new understandings of Marxist theory, and new possibilities for socialist organizers.

1 Like most of her work, Patriarchy of the Wage emphasizes “reproductive labor,” labor that does not directly produce profit for the owning class, but instead reproduces and cares for the laborers whose work creates that profit. Activist and Marxist scholar Silvia Federici is perhaps best known for the Wages for Housework campaign launched in the 1970s, which demanded payment for domestic labor in an attempt to make a critical intervention in the capitalist exploitation of women.

Markx view on wage