The Subjection of Women

The book-length essay The Subjection of Women was written in 1869 by John Stuart Mill, an English philosopher known for his progressive, utilitarian ideas. The essay includes four chapters and was published in London by Lonmans, Green, Reader, and Dyer publishers. The Subjection of Women is a persuasive argument, laying out the problem of women’s legal, marital, and societal oppression to show that gender equality is necessary to ensure social justice, improve societal progress, and increase human happiness. This guide uses the Project Gutenberg e-book edition released in 2008.

Mill begins with his thesis statement: The oppression of women prevents societal progress, and the solution is to create laws and policies that promote gender equality. Mill acknowledges that his greatest opposition is not logic or reason, but a “universal opinion” Western culture holds regarding the supposed innate inferiority of women. As Mill states, “In every respect the burthen [sic] is hard on those who attack an almost universal opinion. They must be very fortunate as well as unusually capable if they obtain a hearing at all” (3). Mill recognizes that the key to persuading his opposition rests on his ability to undermine this assumption that patriarchy represents a “natural” hierarchy between the sexes.