On the Question of Women's Liberation

On the Question of Women’s Liberation is an article by Chinese anarchist-feminist He-Yin Zhen (何殷震). The work was published in 1907 to Natural Justice (Tianyi), the official journal of The Society for the Restoration of Women’s Rights.^[1] Among many things, the article elaborates on He-Yin Zhen's views on women’s labor, Confucian tradition, Western and European women’s suffrage movements, prostitution, and the role of men in women’s liberation. Much focus is placed on the nature of liberation and women’s active versus passive participation in the movement.^[2][3]

In this and other writings, He-Yin Zhen conveyed a view of the inequality between men and women as imminently connected to systems of class and racial inequality, requiring a widespread social and economic upheaval and radical restructuring of society.^[4] This involved the abolition of the traditional family structure, private property, the separation of the sexes (nannü youbie), and all hierarchical systems.^[5]

The classification of He-Yin Zhen’s feminism is subject to some scholarly debate. Some propose her feminism is better defined as an organic position rooted in women’s historical and present experiences rather than exclusively anarchist.^[6] Others maintain that He-Yin Zhen’s awareness of the interconnectedness of class, foreign-imperial, and gender-based oppression, as well as her commitment to a fundamental political and economic restructuring of society, places her squarely in an anarcha-feminist ideology.^[7][8][1]