Beyond father and Ford, after feminism and fashion

摘要

Linda McDowell's (1991) work on post-Fordism has now inspired two generations of feminist economic geographers from around the world. 'Life without Father and Ford' came out just before I started my doctorate and was the article that prompted me to reconsider how to approach the questions of women and restructuring I was beginning to explore in my research. At the time, I was trying to make sense of the dramatic reform programme that had reshaped the economic landscape in my home country of New Zealand during the 1980s, and like Linda, I had become increasingly convinced that I was witnessing some form of 'sea change' moment (Harvey, 1989). My initial aim was to 'put women in', showing the gendered consequences of deregulation, marketisation and privatisation.