The purpose of this piece is to address the idea of “structurelessness” as the only form of organization within the women’s liberation movement. While it started out as a healthy counter to the rigid structure of mainstream society, the ideology has become just as inflexible and limiting. Freeman is trying to examine why structurelessness doesn’t work. There will still be informal structure in a structureless group, and without formal structures there is more room for “strong or the lucky to establish unquestioned hegemony over others.” It’s just a way of masking power, not stopping it from forming. This is when groups of elites spring up, and they can take advantage of the informal nature of structurelessness and gain power without healthy competition. Also, without formal structure, there are no official spokespeople or ambassadors to the public for the movement. This means that people outside the movement will select women within it to hold up as spokeswomen, and the movement has lost control of its public image. There are no shortages of problems with this “structureless” movement and how it functions. Freeman ends the piece with seven principles of democratic structure. She is saying we must keep these principles in mind moving forward and start putting them in place if the movement is to succeed. The “structurelessness” cannot continue because it is ineffective at best and doing damage the movement at worst.
I really liked the seven principles of democratic structuring Freeman added at the end of the piece because I really like having a plan and an outline for how to proceed. I feel like a lot of feminist writing I have encountered has been purely theoretical and doesn’t have much of a plan for real-world application, so seeing actual suggestions for how to proceed was exciting. I thought the piece was eye opening to the ways power can be taken and taken advantage of even in groups that claim to not have positions of power within them. It’s really interesting to keep an eye on.
I think the class discussion could focus on how we feel about structure within the movement or “structurelessness.” What good could structure do? Could it also do harm? What are the consequences of each? Are we sacrificing something important by adding structure? We could also ask how would we implement structure in a structureless group? What are the logistics of that?