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of the representatives of the first wave of feminism were as fol- as queer theory , postcolonial theory , poststructuralism , or
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lows: the right to vote, the right to education, including the right environmentalism .
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to study at universities, and the right to enter the labour market. The social movements of first- and second-wave feminism (the lat-

Discrimination against women in the sphere of public life was ter especially) led to the emergence of the feminist school of law in
pointed out and then functioning belief that a woman’s only des- Europe, the USA, and internationally in the 1960s-70s. The third

tiny was marriage was challenged. The movement of second-wave wave, in turn, influenced the further development of feminist ju-

feminism beginning in the 1960s already had other goals, it sought risprudence and the emergence of new feminist theories of law.

to awaken consciousness and accelerate changes in the status of The essence of feminist jurisprudence is to formulate a feminist

women, fighting for equal rights for women and men, not only in critique of law, its contents and their interpretation within le-

terms of suffrage, but also in terms of labour. It sought to „liber- gal practice and doctrine. In other words, it seeks to understand
ate” women from traditional subordination, a dependency derived the law as another element of the patriarchal system. As noted
from the view that a woman’s social role was a servile one. Activ- by numerous theorists of feminist jurisprudence , the law has
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ists of second-wave feminism were disillusioned with previous ef- been presented over the years as universal, gender-neutral and ob-
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forts at gender equality, which mainly focused on formal and legal jective, as if it were to come „from nowhere”. In reality, as fem-
guarantees. For them, despite expectations, legal changes have not inist theory points out, the law is always enacted and practised

entailed absolute gender equality. from a place where gender difference is one of the relevant factors
Second-wave feminism was thus committed to breaking down ste- determining its contextuality and bias. Awareness about the role
reotypes and sought social, cultural or moral change, and even of the law in the social exclusion of women, e.g., by limiting access
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proclaimed the need to feminise the world . The third wave of to reproductive health care or in the lack of an effective regulation
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feminism , called by some researchers and scholars „post-femi- of violence against women, has become a particular point of focus
nism” was based in part on a critique of the postulates of the sec- for a feminist practice of the law.
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ond wave, and in part, was the result of the emergence in social The gender factor has influenced and continues to influence
discourse of a current emphasising the importance of numerous the shaping of the law in a way that discriminates against women,
other criteria of differentiation in the functioning of societies, who are notoriously excluded from the law, which primarily con-
such as skin colour, ethnicity, religious belief or economic status. siders an exclusively male perspective. Given the above, feminist

Thus, in the third wave of feminism, it is also important, when theories, firstly, postulate the need to expose all of the law’s op-
discussing feminist theory, to refer to various social theories, such pressive aspects that discriminate based on gender, and secondly,
postulate the need for changes so that the law begins to take
into account the perspective of women and begins to recognise
21 M. Wollstonecraft, Crying out for women’s rights, Warsaw 2011; J.S. Mill, On re-
prezaentative government. The subjection of women, Krakow 1995; H. Taylor,
Liberation of women, 1849; B. Friedan, The mystique of womanhood, Warsaw 27 As cited by J. Plata (Sex, gender or „what gender are you?”, Aequalitas, 2012,
2012; E. Stanton, History of woman suffrage, 1881-1922; see also studies on first- No. 1, pp. 1 ff.), „queer is a „reclaimed” term. A word of Germanic origin, already
-wave feminism: A. Graff, More than context – the race question and feminism used in English with a pejorative tinge since the 14th century (in the sense of
in the United States, in Gender: contexts, ed. by M. Radkiewicz, Krakow 2004; „suspicious” or „bizarre”), it came to be used as a vulgar and offensive term for
M. Marilley, Woman Suffrage and the Origins of Liberal Feminism in the United homosexuals. However, the 1990s saw an unexpected ennoblement of the term,
States, 1820–1920, Harvard; E. Majewska, Feminism as a Social Philosophy, War- which began to encompass the theoretical reflexation of the construction of
saw 2009, p. 23. Cambridge, 1996; G. Strnad, American Third Wave Feminism – non-normative sexual orientations in culture”. J. Plata also points out that „But-
Change and Continuity, Political Review 2011, No. 2. ler, in analysing the basic category of gender, reflects on how gender is produced
22 Ang. First Wave Feminism. and reproduced and what its possibilities are. In the queer theory he puts for-
23 The creator of the definition of a stereotype in the social sciences was W. Lip- ward, later also referred to as social theory of difference or queer theory, he gives
pmann (W. Lippmann, in: http://wps.pearsoncustom.com/wps/media/ob- a distinction between biological sex (sex) and cultural gender (gender), linking it
jects/2429/2487430/pdfs/lippmann.pdf, access date:12.2.2018). W. Lippmann to an equally revolutionary theory of gender performativity.”; see also J. Butler,
referred to stereotypes as „pictures in our heads”, which „resemble templates with Uwikłani w płeć, Warsaw 2008; J. Butler, Sex and Gender in Beauvoir’s Second
the help of which we try to simplify the often ambiguous information reaching us Sex, Yale French Studies 1986, No. 72; on querr theory in Poland see J. Koch-
from our environment”. The author believed that people tend to perceive people anowski, Płeć, seksualność i kondycja postkolonialna. Querr studies and the Polish
or objects „as similar (i.e. having common attributes) on the basis of their shared case, pp. 70–85, in Gender in Polish society, ed. by K. Slany, J. Struzik, K. Wojnicka,
characteristics”, which makes it easier to learn about the surrounding world and, Kraków 2011.
as it were, to organise knowledge about it. Consequently, due to the simplifica- 28 M. Nowicka, Is postcolonial theory feminine? The birth, development and twilight
tions made, these images can lead to a distortion of reality. of postcolonialism, Sociological Review 2010, No. 59, item 3, pp. 109–130.
24 G. Strnad, Third-wave American feminism – change and continuity, Political Re- 29 A. Burzyńska, Poststructuralism, deconstruction, feminism, gender, minority dis-
view 2011, No. 2, pp. 22 ff. courses and what next?, Spaces of Theory, Poznań 2002, No. 1, pp. 65–86.
25 The third wave manifesto is considered to be the text of J. Baumgardner, A. Rich- 30 W. Tyburski, The emergence and development of ecological philosophy, Problemy
ards, Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism and the Future, New York 2000 and Ekorozwoju 2006, No. 1, pp. 7‒15.
2010. 31 See all papers in Research Handbook on Feminist Jurisprudence, 2019.
26 S. Gamble, Postfeminism, in The Routledge Companion to Feminism and Post- 32 See T. Nagel, The view from nowhere, Oxford 1986, and J. Bator, Feminism, post-
feminism, London-New York 1999, pp. 42–44. modernism, psychoanalysis, Gdańsk 2001, p. 35.
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