Liberal, Conservative, and Socialist Ideals vs. Feminism before the 20th Century

Liberal, Conservative, and Socialist Ideals vs. Feminism before the 20th Century

Tales from the beyond, story one: a parent binds his baby girl's feet in China, so it will not grow more than five to six inches because small feet in women are a sign of elegance; story two: a wife is burned alive in India, so she can accompany her husband in death. Are these stories? No, things like this really happened in the past. They are part of the reason that contributed to the birth of the Women's Movement in the 19th century. This movement was also known as the Feminist movement because its foundation came from feminism, an ideology that developed in the 19th century, and whose main goal was to gain equality for women. The goals of the Women's Movement in the 19th century where: to get the vote, to archive equality in property rights, access to education, access to jobs and fair pay, divorce, and children's custody. These ideals had been around for a while, but the 19th century was the perfect time for them to develop. During the 19th century, nations were going through radical changes; countries were adopting new ways of life based mainly of one of three ideologies: liberalism, conservatism, and socialism. The development of one of these ideologies, and the success of feminism in a country went hand in hand, and it is by analyzing the similarities, and differences between feminism, and each of these ideologies that we can see why feminism was most successful in liberal countries.

Moral, political, and social are the three cores of liberalism, and the ideas in each core have a very similar resemblance to the ideas the feminist movement was trying to promote in the 19th century. Liberals believe that individuals had the right to personal liberties, which included the freedom to think, talk, and worship. Feminist believe women had the right to think, to have an opinion different from that of their husband, or fathers. The faith in total freedom, and equality for the individual that liberals, and feminist shared came from their faith in education. Their theory was that if individuals were educated, then they could be trusted to make the right decisions, decisions which would then in return helped make a better society. Adam Smith, writer of "The Wealth of Nations" considered the bible of liberal economics, believed in that theory, he expressed that "each person,.