Feminist foreign policy as ethical foreign policy? A care ethics perspective
| Published date | 01 February 2021 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1755088219828768 |
| Date | 01 February 2021 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1755088219828768
Journal of International Political Theory
2021, Vol. 17(1) 20 –37
© The Author(s) 2019
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DOI: 10.1177/1755088219828768
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Feminist foreign policy as
ethical foreign policy?
A care ethics perspective
Fiona Robinson
Carleton University, Canada
Abstract
This article argues that a liberal cosmopolitan approach to feminist foreign policy reproduces
existing relations of power, including gender power relations and Western liberal modes
of domination. I suggest that a critical feminist ethic of care offers a potentially radical and
transformative account of ethics as a basis for a transnational feminism – one that reveals
and troubles the binary gender norms that constitute the international and which exposes
the ways in which patriarchal orders uphold political hierarchies that obstruct the building
of empathy and repairing of relationship. To illustrate this argument, I address the recent
diplomatic crises faced by Sweden and Canada in their relationships with the Kingdom of
Saudi Arabia. Policymakers and diplomats must aim to build understanding by recognizing
the material and discursive factors that have constructed, over time, the relationships
between Saudi Arabia and Sweden/Canada, as well as the ways in which patriarchal
structures – across the globe and at multiple scales – hinder the possibility of attentive
listening and connection across borders. It is only through the prism of this relationship
– where difference takes on meaning – that the more complex role of Western states in
the contemporary system of transnational militarism is revealed.
Keywords
Care, cosmopolitanism, ethics, feminism, foreign policy, post-colonialism
Introduction
In 2014, Sweden became the first state ever to publicly adopt a feminist foreign policy,
with a stated ambition to become the ‘strongest voice for gender equality and full
employment of human rights for all women and girls’ (Government of Sweden, 2016).
Corresponding author:
Fiona Robinson, Department of Political Science, Carleton University, 1125 Colonel By Drive, Ottawa, ON
K1S 5B6, Canada.
Email: Fiona.Robinson@carleton.ca
828768IPT0010.1177/1755088219828768Journal of International Political TheoryRobinson
research-article2019
Article
Robinson 21
In Canada, the Liberal government of Justin Trudeau has followed this lead, announc-
ing a feminist international assistance policy in 2017 and referring explicitly to their
foreign policy as ‘feminist’ in key foreign policy speeches and documents. As a result,
there has been a spark of academic interest in feminist foreign policy over the past
3 years (Aggestam and Bergman-Rosamond, 2016; Vucetic, 2017). Prior to 2015, there
was certainly significant critical feminist work in the field of International Relations
(IR) specifically addressing gender in foreign policy from feminist perspectives
(Sjolander et al., 2003; Howell, 2005; Tiessen and Carrier, 2015; True, 2016). But it is
only since 2016, responding to developments in the world, that scholars have become
increasingly interested in analysing the meaning and implications of foreign policy
that is explicitly named ‘feminist’.1
A key article on the theory and practice of feminist foreign policy is Karin Aggestam
and Annika Bergman-Rosamond’s (2016) ‘Swedish Feminist Foreign Policy in the
Making: Ethics, Politics and Gender’ (2016: 323). In that article, the authors argue that
inherent in the idea of a feminist foreign policy is a normative reorientation that is guided
by an ethically informed framework based on broad cosmopolitan norms of global jus-
tice and peace (Aggestam and Bergman-Rosamond, 2016: 323). The authors draw upon
the ‘solidarist’ branch of the English School (ES) of international theory, which takes a
‘cosmopolitanism justice’ approach to international ethics. I argue that liberal cosmo-
politan reproduces existing relations of power, including gender power relations and
Western liberal modes of domination. While this cosmopolitanism is consonant with the
ethical discourse that underwrites and constitutes existing feminist foreign policy, it will
serve ultimately to undercut, rather than facilitate, feminist goals. By contrast, I suggest
that a critical feminist ethic of care offers a potentially radical and transformative account
of ethics as a basis for a transnational feminism – one that reveals and troubles the binary
gender norms that constitute the international and which reveals the ways in which patri-
archal orders uphold political hierarchies that obstruct the building of empathy and
repairing of relationship. I argue that a feminist foreign policy can be a critical, ethical
alternative to realpolitik (including ‘hyper-masculine nationalism’), but not if it defines
itself as a return to the neo-liberal, interventionist governmentalities of post–Cold War
liberal internationalism.2
The article begins by tracing the development of feminist foreign policy in Sweden
and in Canada, focusing specifically on the diplomatic crises with Saudi Arabia faced
by both countries. It then addresses the discursive positioning of ‘feminist’ public and
foreign policy as ‘ethical’ and the implications of this for both feminism and ethics.
This section also unpacks the notion of ‘ethical foreign policy’ and considers the rela-
tionship between this and feminism. Despite its widespread dismissal by foreign pol-
icy realists as ‘idealistic’, ‘ethical foreign policy’ has been an enduring idea in both
academic literature and policy discourse for decades. I argue that the dominant under-
standings of ‘ethical foreign policy’ reproduce the binary and adversarial logics of
‘realism’ versus ‘idealism’, ‘universal’ versus ‘particular’ and ‘inside’ versus ‘out-
side’ (Walker, 1992). In equating ‘the ethical’ with the cosmopolitan ‘outside’, so-
called ‘ethical foreign policy’ reifies and reproduces a world order that is upheld
through a constellation of power relations, where global capitalism intertwines with
patriarchy, racist logics and neo-colonialism. I suggest that this account of ‘the
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