Abstract

Buddhism and Marxism may seem unlikely bedfellows, since they come
from such different times and places, and appear to address such different
concerns. But the two have at least this much in common: both say that life,
as we find it, is unsatisfactory; both have a diagnosis of why this is; and
both offer the hope of making it better. In this paper, I argue that aspects of
each complement aspects of the other. In particular, Buddhism provides a
stable ethical base that Marxism always lacked; and Marxism provides a
sophisticated political philosophy, which Buddhism never had. I will explain
those aspects of each of the two on which I wish to draw, and then explain
how they are complementary.
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-the-american-
philosophical-association/article/abs/marxism-and-buddhism-not-such-
strange-bedfellows/DE37FE9561AAB901A31295D662635EEA

https://www.thecitizen.in/index.php/en/NewsDetail/index/14/18594/Buddha
-or-Karl-Marx

https://aeon.co/essays/how-marxism-and-buddhism-complement-
each-other

https://triumphias.com/blog/women-in-the-buddhist-period/

Women in the Buddhist Period:

Relevance: Prelims/Mains: G.S paper I: Indian Society &
Medieval History

The  status  of women  improved  a  little during  the  Buddhist 

period  though  there  was no tremendous change. Some of the
rigidities and restrictions imposed by the caste system were relaxed. 
Buddha  preached equality  and  he  tried to  improve the  cultural, 
educational  and religious statuses of women. During the benevolent
rule of the famous Buddhist kings such as
Chandragupta Maurya, Ashoka, Sri Harsha and others, women
regained a part of their lost freedom and status due to the relatively
broadminded Buddhist philosophy.

Women were not only confined to domestic work but also they could
resort to an educational career if they so desired. In the religious
field women came to occupy a distinctly superior place. Women 
were permitted  to become “Sanyasis”. Many  women took a leading 
role in Buddhist  monastic-life,  women had  their  sangha called  the
Bhikshuni Sangha,  which  was guided by the same rules and
regulations as these of the monks. The sangha opened to them
avenues of cultural activities and social service and ample
opportunities for public life. Their political and economic status
however remained unchanged.

Marxist feminism
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Marxist feminism is a philosophical variant of feminism that incorporates and
extends Marxist theory. Marxist feminism analyzes the ways in which women are exploited
through capitalism and the individual ownership of private property.[1] According to Marxist
feminists, women's liberation can only be achieved by dismantling the capitalist systems in
which they contend much of women's labor is uncompensated. [2] Marxist feminists extend
traditional Marxist analysis by applying it to unpaid domestic labor and sex relations.
Because of its foundation in historical materialism, Marxist feminism is similar to socialist
feminism and, to a greater degree, materialist feminism. The latter two place greater
emphasis on what they consider the "reductionist limitations"[3] of Marxist theory but, as
Martha E. Gimenez[3] notes in her exploration of the differences between Marxist and
materialist feminism, "clear lines of theoretical demarcation between and within these two
umbrella terms are somewhat difficult to establish."

Productive, unproductive, and reproductive labor[edit]

Marx categorized labor into two categories: productive and unproductive.

 Productive labor is labor that creates surplus value, e.g. production of raw
materials and manufacturing products.
 Unproductive labor does not create surplus value and may in fact be subsidized
by it. This can include supervisory duties, bookkeeping, marketing, etc.
Marxist feminist authors in the 1970s, such as Margaret Benston and Peggy Morton,
relied heavily on analysis of productive and unproductive labor in an attempt to shift the
perception of the time that consumption was the purpose of a family, presenting
arguments for a state-paid wage to homemakers, and a cultural perception of the family
as a productive entity. In capitalism, the work of maintaining a family has little material
value, as it produces no marketable products. In Marxism, the maintenance of a family is
productive, as it has a service value, and is used in the same sense as a commodity. [5]
Wages for Housework[edit]
Focusing on exclusion from productive labor as the most important source of female
oppression, some Marxist feminists advocated for the inclusion of domestic work within
the waged capitalist economy. The idea of compensating reproductive labor was present
in the writing of socialists such as Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1898) who argued that
women's oppression stemmed from being forced into the private sphere. [6] Gilman argued
that conditions for women would improve when their work was located, recognized, and
valued in the public sphere.[2]
Perhaps the most influential effort to compensate reproductive labor was the International
Wages for Housework Campaign, an organization launched in Italy in 1972 by members
of the International Feminist Collective. Many of these women, including Selma James,
[7]
 Mariarosa Dalla Costa,[8] Brigitte Galtier, and Silvia Federici[9] published a range of
sources to promote their message in academic and public domains. Despite beginning as
a small group of women in Italy, the Wages for Housework Campaign was successful in
mobilizing on an international level. A Wages for Housework group was founded in
Brooklyn, New York, with the help of Federici.[9] As Heidi Hartmann acknowledges (1981),
the efforts of these movements, though ultimately unsuccessful, generated important
discourse regarding the value of housework and its relation to the economy. [10]
Domestic Slavery[edit]
Many Marxist feminist scholars, in the vein of an analyzing modes of oppression at the
site of production, note the effect that housework has on women in a capitalist system.
In Angela Davis' Women, Race and Class, the concept of housework is to deconstruct
the capitalist construct of gendered labor within the home and to show the ways in which
women are exploited through "domestic slavery". [11] To address this, Davis concludes that
the "socialisation of housework – including meal preparation and child care –
presupposes an end to the profit-motive's reign over the economy." [11] In this manner,
domestic slavery upholds the structural inequities faced by women in all capitalist
economies.
Other Marxist feminist have noted the concept of domestic work for women
internationally and the role it plays in buttressing global patriarchy. In Paresh
Chattopadhyay's response[12] to Custer's Capital Accumulation and Women's Labor in
Asian Economies, Chattopadhyay notes the ways in which Custer analyzes "women's
labor in the garments industry in West Bengal and Bangladesh as well as in
Bangladesh's agricultural sector, labor management methods of the Japanese industrial
bourgeoisie and, finally, the mode of employment of the women laborers in Japanese
industry"[12] in demonstrating the ways in which the domestic sphere exhibits similar
gender-based exploitation of difference. In both works, the gendered division of labor,
specifically within the domestic sphere, is shown to illustrate the methods the capitalist
system exploits women globally.
Responsibility of reproductive labor[edit]
Another solution proposed by Marxist feminists is to liberate women from their forced
connection to reproductive labor. In her critique of traditional Marxist feminist movements
such as the Wages for Housework Campaign, Heidi Hartmann (1981) argues that these
efforts "take as their question the relationship of women to the economic system, rather
than that of women to men, apparently assuming the latter will be explained in their
discussion of the former."[10] Hartmann believes that traditional discourse has ignored the
importance of women's oppression as women, and instead focused on women's
oppression as members of the capitalist system. Similarly, Gayle Rubin, who has written
on a range of subjects including sadomasochism, prostitution, pornography, and lesbian
literature, first rose to prominence through her 1975 essay "The Traffic in Women: Notes
on the 'Political Economy' of Sex",[13] in which she coins the phrase "sex/gender system"
and criticizes Marxism for what she claims is its incomplete analysis of sexism under
capitalism, without dismissing or dismantling Marxist fundamentals in the process.
More recently, many Marxist feminists have shifted their focus to the ways in which
women are now potentially in worse conditions as a result of gaining access to productive
labor. Nancy Folbre proposes that feminist movements begin to focus on women's
subordinate status to men both in the reproductive (private) sphere, as well as in the
workplace (public sphere).[14] In an interview in 2013, Silvia Federici urges feminist
movements to consider the fact that many women are now forced into
productive and reproductive labor, resulting in a double day.[15] Federici argues that the
emancipation of women cannot occur until they are free from the burden of unwaged
labor, which she proposes will involve institutional changes such as closing the wage gap
and implementing child care programs in the workplace. [15] Federici's suggestions are
echoed in a similar interview with Selma James (2012) and have even been touched on
in recent presidential elections.[7]
Affective and emotional labor[edit]
Scholars and sociologists such as Michael Hardt,[16] Antonio Negri,[16] Arlie Russell
Hochschild[17] and Shiloh Whitney[18] discuss a new form of labor that transcends the
traditional spheres of labor and which does not create product, or is byproductive.
[18]
 Affective labor focuses on the blurred lines between personal life and economic life.
Whitney states, "The daily struggle of unemployed persons and the domestic toil of
housewives no less than the waged worker are thus part of the production and
reproduction of social life, and of the biopolitical growth of capital that valorizes
information and subjectivities."[18]
The concept of emotional labor, particularly the emotional labor that is present and
required in pink collar jobs, was introduced by Arlie Russell Hochschild in her book The
Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling (1983)[17] in which she considers
the affective labor of the profession as flight attendants smile, exchange pleasantries and
banter with customers.