Why 'having it all' still means 'doing it all'

What we need now is a return to feminism's original demands, writes Natasho Campo.

In May 1984, Refractory Girl, a feminist history journal, ran a mock advertisement for a woman seeking work. It stated that she was "skilled in juggling family and work commitments", could "work under any conditions" with "multiple distractions from children, lovers and family", was "used to working long hours with minimal sleep" and performed well in "stressful situations".

The advertisement was on the back cover of a special issue of the journal, which dealt with the Hawke Labor government's "Accord". The editors argued that the Accord gave minimal recognition to the particular problems women faced, and that until the Government tackled the sexual division of labour in the home and workplace, women who wanted to combine a career with motherhood, like the woman in the advertisement, would be run ragged.

The feminist argument has always been premised on the belief that until societal structures changed, "having it all" would always mean "doing it all", which is why Melbourne academic Leslie Cannold's research, reported on this and other pages of The Age in recent days, is a welcome addition to the work/family debate.

Cannold redirects the finger of blame, not at feminists who are endlessly but wrongly blamed for women's woes, but at government policies and workplace practices, which are the real source of the difficulties many women face when they try to combine a career with motherhood.

However, what is troubling about Cannold's argument is the suggestion that her proposals for a reduced working week and getting men to take more responsibility in the home are new and require new strategies. Also troubling is the implication that "having it all" was a feminist goal.

Giving women access to the male world of politics and business, and simultaneously asserting women's right to combine work with family, were indeed feminist aspirations.

However, because it drew on Marxist theory, the focus of women's activism in the early 1970s was not just women's integration into the workforce, but replacing capitalism with a socialist society where the division between public and private would be overcome and men and women would share in raising children and in paid labour.

Women's liberationists such as Anne Curthoys argued that women's liberation had to be synonymous with the liberation of mankind generally because role division according to sex harmed both sexes by locking men into the workplace and women into the home.

"As long as men cannot be freed from the continuity and long hours of work while they are fathers of young children," Curthoys argued, "women in a large scale will find it hard to be free."

Even in the 1980s, when feminism supposedly took a materialistic and individualistic turn, some feminists continued to fight for structural change. In 1986, Marilyn Lake argued that true "equal opportunity" would only be achieved when the structures of the workplace were rearranged to give men, as well as women, the opportunity to raise their own children.

The core feminist strategy, Lake argued, must be the reduction of the standard working week, as only this would allow women and men to combine paid work with childrearing without either sex having to bear a double or triple load.

Arguing for shorter working hours and getting fathers involved in child care and housework are precisely what feminists have been arguing for decades, and just because they failed does not mean they should be forgotten, or their insights swept aside.

While I have heeded Cannold's "rallying cry" that "having it all" is a political not a "female" issue, I believe it is important to remember that feminists have always fought for a better world for all of us: men and children as well as women.

In an era where declining birth rates are again putting motherhood firmly on the political agenda, the experiences and insights from Australia's feminist heritage are more important than ever. What we need now, as Cannold's research so poignantly shows, is not a critique or disavowal of feminism but a return to its original demands.

Natasha Campo is a PhD candidate at La Trobe University. Her thesis is on the way feminism is being remembered by this generation of women.