The Enduring Power of the Feminist Revolution

My old friend Eli Zaretsky, the author of Capitalism, the Family, and Personal Life, has often told me that of all the movements of the Sixties, the feminist revolution has had the most intense psychological impact on American life and politics. The point is debatable-certainly the revolution in civil rights has stirred the country-but if you look at American politics of the last fifty years and at the social conflicts that have divided us, changes in women's status and opinions, and the reaction these have engendered among men, have played an enormous, and sometimes, unacknowledged role.