NCJ Number
103388
Journal
Mediation Quarterly Issue: 14-15 Dated: (Winter 1986-Spring 1987) Pages: 163-175
Date Published
1987
Length
13 pages
Annotation
The feminist perspective raises several important issues and questions for mediators in their work with divorcing couples.
Abstract
Family therapists and divorce mediators both use the family system as their frame of reference. However, they tend to overlook the ways in which gender has shaped the experiences and interactions of family members. Traditional patriarchal inequalities, stereotypes that devalue women, and gender-based divisions of labor have all influenced clinical perspectives. A feminist perspective clarifies aspects of family therapy and mediation that help perpetuate a system of gender-based inequality. The feminist critique raises the issue of the influence on mediation of the mediator's attitudes and experiences. It also focuses on the difficulties that the mediator's efforts at neutrality pose for women. It also raises several issues about family therapy that are important in the process of mediation. Both family therapists and mediators will be more effective in their work when they build the larger social, economic, and political context into theories of family functioning and methodologies based on those theories. They need to consider whether models of practice explicitly include an understanding of women's psychology. 30 references.