Citation

Svensson EM. Fem. Leg. Stud. 2010; 18(3): 309-313.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2010, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s10691-010-9162-1

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Trapped in Equality is a comprehensive historical analysis of the development of the concept of equality in Finland during the period of modernisation, which, in the case of Finland, means from the late nineteenth century until today. As the subtitle suggests, the book addresses the subject of women as legal persons in the modernisation of Finnish law, and, as such, could simply be understood as a story about the inclusion of women into the concept of 'legal person'. But it encompasses rather more than this, for its focus is on equality as an ideology characterising and influencing society in general. This has had important implications for the political and legal discourses, though the political more than the legal, and legislation to a greater extent than legal scholarship. Equality is, in the Nordic context, more a matter of politics than of law, even if the rights discourse has grown during the last 10-15 years. The concept of equality expresses a relationship, which although from...

Language: en