Introduction

The concepts of Feminist Identity and Feminist Economics converge with that of Social Management, mostly via Emancipation. The article aims to present the convergences between Feminist Economics and Feminist Identity Development on the one hand and Social Management on the other. It is argued that Feminist Economics and Social Management converge when addressing Emancipation at the macro level. Similarly, Feminist Identity Development and Social Management converge when addressing Emancipation at the micro level, mainly the individual and her interpersonal relationships at the public sphere.

This task becomes relevant due to the possibilities of appropriating feminist concepts that can be operational and constitute a viable path for the implementation of Social Management. This can happen in the same way that feminists learned from the civil rights movement, a pioneer in the struggle for the rights of people of African descent.

As a way of presenting feminist themes with application in the academic context, two theories will be presented mainly: Feminist Identity Development and Feminist Economy. These two theories, consequently, represent efforts by the academic context to absorb the demands and practices of feminism as a Social Movement, using the methods employed scholarly.

In the case of Feminist Identity Development (FID), at the micro level, it measures how much a woman is aware of the female oppression present in society (^{Downing & Roush, 1985}). When walking through the stages of the FID, women move from a level of passive acceptance (PA) to the level of Synthesis (S), in which they value the positive aspects of being a woman and integrate these aspects in a unique way, according to their personal attributes, in a positive and realistic self-concept. Then, she can develop an active commitment (CA) to social movements that aim at female emancipation.

At a macro level, the Feminist Economy (FE) denounces our current economic system, which feeds on gender inequality and reproduces it (^{Orozco & Calderón, 2018}). According to the authors, FE proposes new practices of producing, exchanging, consuming and human care towards a different economy, with a focus on life. These practices are in tune with those of peasant and peripheral women, as well as networks of solidarity and social economy, food sovereignty and mutual care.

On the other hand, Social Management has been presenting itself as a promising field in terms of popular participation. The concept can still be considered polysemic. Even so, we opted for the perspective adopted by ^{Tenório (2016)} when presenting Social Management as a participatory management process in which decision-making is done collectively, with authority shared by all involved in the process. The author also points out that Social Management is one in which decision-making is carried out without coercion, listening to everyone’s voice and privileging the social relationships involved in the process. In this way, we will present it in terms of convergences between the different streams: participation (^{Cançado, Silva Jr. & Cançado, 2018}). The objective of this work is to bring the concepts of Feminist Identity and Feminist Economics closer to that of Social Management.

This text is divided into five sections in addition to this introduction. In the first section, the theory of feminist identity development is presented together with other theories focusing on the analysis of the individual. In the second section, the theory of Feminist Economics is presented together with other theories of analysis with a collective focus. In the third, the main contributions of Social Management are presented. It is important to note that Social Management is in this paper considered as a Brazilian concept with a focus on management practices in organizations in general. In the fourth section, the convergences between feminist theories and Social Management are presented. In the fifth and last section, possible contributions to the academic environment and society in general are presented based on the aforementioned convergences.

Feminist theories focusing on the individual

According to ^{Hooks (2014)}, feminism is a movement with the objective of eliminating sexism, sexist exploitation and oppression. In line with this movement, several academic trends were developed with the objective of meeting the demands caused by misogynist oppression. In these currents, according to ^{Rago (1998)}, there is a search for alternative references, rejecting the dichotomy between reason and passion, between knowledge and feeling. In this way, subjectivity and engagement are included as valid means of producing knowledge, reconstructing the relations between theory and practice.

More broadly, ^{Grosz (1986)} points out as a contribution of feminist theory the expansion of the concept of reason to include attributes such as experience, the body and the life history. These traits are seen by the author as necessary for the functioning of reason, but made invisible throughout history because they are considered linked to the female universe.

In terms of History as a field of knowledge, ^{Haraway (1988)} and ^{Harding (2004)} consider that feminism contributed by adding multiple perspectives originating in oppressed groups, constituting the Standpoint Theory. These points of view enrich History in an intersectional way, bringing perspectives from women and other gender minorities to phenomena told hegemonically from the male, white, elitist and heterosexual point of view.

As an example of a theory that meets individual feminist demands, there is the Feminist Identity Development Model for Women (^{Downing & Roush, 1985}), in which characteristics of different female stages of empowerment are outlined in the light of feminism. These characteristics can be used to map the development of feminist thinking in groups and also to guide women through feminist therapy approach (^{Rederstorff & Levendosky, 2007}). There are authors (e.g., ^{Mcnamara & Rickard, 1989}), however, who consider these characteristics as constituents of different moments in female life, not necessarily representing evolutionary stages towards empowerment.

^{Downing and Roush (1985)} consider that there are five stages in terms of female empowerment. In the first, called Passive Acceptance, the woman denies the existence of discrimination by gender and does not question the social order. In stage two, Revelation, events that occurred in the woman’s life act as a trigger for the perception of inequities. These events are usually divorces, sexual abuse or situations of injustice and harassment in the workplace. In stage three, Immersion-Emanation, the woman develops links with reference groups and cultural symbols by affinity to gender themes. In stage four, Synthesis, women develop their own feminist identity. In the fifth stage, Active Engagement, there is a search for the integration and realization of the knowledge obtained during the other stages into the daily routine and participating in processes of social change. As an inspiration, this model was based on ^{Cross Jr.’s Model of Black Identity Development (1971)}.

There are other models used to assess the degree of development of feminist identity (^{Bargad & Hyde, 1991}; ^{Fisher et al., 2000}; ^{Moradi, Subich & Phillips, 2002}). However, these function as successive improvements to the original model proposed by ^{Downing and Roush (1985)}. Furthermore, the development of these characteristics is not necessarily linked to individual self-denomination as a feminist. ^{Quinn and Radtke (2006)}, for example, found that several women with an affinity for feminist principles do not declare themselves under this label, due to social pressures from their community and family. In these cases, these authors realized that the interviewees employed a lifestyle feminism, in which professional, personal and consumer choices were concentrated around feminist themes, as seen in stage three of the ^{Downing and Roush model (1985)}. ^{Frederick and Stewart (2018)}, on the other hand, found that traumatic events associated with gender-based violence and discrimination led their interviewees to public self-identification as feminists.

According to ^{Agronick and Duncan (1998)}, support for the feminist movement is associated with high levels of ambition, autonomy and assertiveness. These supporters, in general, choose life trajectories different from the traditional, in search of professional success. ^{Backus and Mahalik (2011)}, in turn, found that women with strong feminist self-identification have higher reported subjective well-being, self-esteem, self-efficacy, self-confidence, academic development and ability to deal with discrimination. In addition, in terms of body self-image, these interviewees had less reports of dissatisfaction with their own bodies and bulimia.

In the case of women who raised their children in the 1950s and 1960s, ^{Agronick and Duncan (1998)} observed that there was an influence of the feminist movement in their life trajectories, when choosing to go back pursuing a formal education, asking for a divorce or maintaining a career in the labor market. These women reported having undergone beneficial psychological changes through feminist awareness groups. ^{Peltola et al. (2004)}, in turn, found that women with higher education tend to identify with feminism. In contrast, women in the early stages of the feminist development scale, mostly housewives, tend to negatively assess female paid work (^{Moradi, Subich & Philips, 2002}).

In addition, interest in the feminist movement was positively correlated with psychological characteristics such as flexibility and the ability to improve one’s own status and well-being. In addition, two characteristics of those interested in the movement were found that are desirable in candidates for high-status career women: (1) desire and ability to work independently and (2) ability to understand themselves and others in a complex and multifaceted way. As expected, housewives said they had less interest in the feminist movement.

In affinity with feminist studies, ^{Duncan (1999)} studied the relationship between authoritarian personality and participation in feminist movements. As a starting point, the author defines the authoritarian personality as the strict adherence to conventional roles, obedience to traditional authority and aggressiveness towards people outside the own social group. Previously, ^{Agronick and Duncan (1998)} found, through a statistical study on authoritarian personalities, that women opposed to the feminist movement are prone to authoritarianism, anxiety and avoid risks in general. In contrast, ^{Frederick and Stewart (2018)} reported that women with high scores in the more advanced stages of the Feminist Identity Model have a strong tendency to participate in feminist activism.

^{Duncan (1999)}, on the other hand, observed that women aware of the political context are more likely to be linked to social movements in general. Similarly, ^{Peltola et al. (2004)} argue that feminist women have an affinity for progressive policies. According to the author, this connection is also related to previous traumatic personal experiences with affinity to the chosen social movement. This type of experience, according to the author, generates a group conscience associated with oppression perceived collectively. In addition, ^{Duncan (2006)} found that authoritarian women desire traditional husbands and careers. On the other hand, ^{Moradi, Subich and Phillips (2002)} reported that women associated with the more advanced stages of feminist identity development performed stereotypically male behaviors inside relationships.

In terms of stereotypes associated with feminists, ^{Duncan (2010)} found positive feminist stereotypes associated with intelligence, competence and independence. ^{Anastosopoulos and Desmarais (2015)}, in the same vein, found stereotypes that were strongly associated with the notion of competence and were perceived as cold, distant. In the extreme opposite, there were negative stereotypes of hating men, unattractiveness and anger.

With regard to men, when measuring compliance of men to traditional male roles (^{Parent & Moradi, 2009}; ^{Backus & Mahalik, 2011}), characteristics were found such as: emotional control; win at any cost; frequently changing sexual partners; violence; self-confidence; risk taking; power over women; primacy of work; heterosexual self-presentation and homophobia. These traits correspond to traditional male stereotypes. ^{Backus and Mahalik (2011)}, in this line of reasoning, found a correlation between traditional male behaviors and violence, use of violent and controlling behavior in relationships and perpetration of sexual abuse. Due to this conjunction of behavior, ^{Anastosopoulos and Desmarais (2015)} reported that feminists tend to suffer more moral and sexual harassment than traditional women, mainly provenient from traditional men.

In general, according to ^{Lamas (1986)}, within the issue of traditional gender stereotypes, it is expected on the part of women adherence to natural conditions, such as motherhood. On the other hand, it is expected of men overcoming of nature through technology and intelligence. In this sense, according to the author, women who do not desire motherhood and the domestic work commonly are seen as unnatural, which means not obeying their own nature. On the other hand, acts that involve overcoming nature like those of men who dive to great depths, parachute or use advanced technology are seen as successful, precisely for transgressing nature itself. The author also considers that anthropological studies around the globe have in common the finding of female submission in different cultures, no matter what the typical jobs were performed in each one of them.

After these considerations on the applications of feminism at the individual level, a discussion of feminist theories with a collective focus follows.

Feminist theories with a collective focus

One way to collectively see the contributions of feminism is through the Feminist Economy proposed by ^{Orozco (2005)}. In the author’s view, feminist economics aims to “redefine the androcentric structure that identifies the economy with the monetized, revealing the underlying androcentric biases” (p. 50).

One of the central concepts for this economy is that of Reproductive Work. According to ^{Enríquez (2015)} and ^{Orozco (2019)}, Reproductive Work is work done mostly by women in order to allow the reproduction of the workforce for society. These jobs involve household chores and care for the elderly and children. In general, this work is poorly paid or unpaid, due to the prevailing beliefs in the patriarchy that women are naturally competent for this job and do not need prior qualification for it. Due to the belief that there is no need for qualification, there is an undervaluation of it. However, if all women stopped performing reproductive work, there would be no available labor force for the market.

^{Orozco (2005)} uses the iceberg metaphor to illustrate the proportion of reproductive work that is necessary to make productive work feasible, which in general is paid and generates wealth in a more visible way. Thus, in order to make a small part of visible productive work (tip of the iceberg) viable, a large part of invisible and unpaid reproductive work (submerged part of the iceberg) is necessary. As a consequence, ^{Enríquez (2015)} adds that unpaid reproductive work is transferred as value in productive work, generating accumulation of wealth only for the owners of capital. Thus, ^{Orozco (2010)} considers that, in payback and unjustly, companies give women less chance of progressing in the mercantile structure.

Another issue raised by ^{Orozco (2005)} is the importance of differentiating domestic work in different cultures, instead of privileging the reproductive work experiences of western women. This differentiation, according to ^{Lauretis (1993)}, needs to be combined intersectionally with the analysis of other systems of oppression, such as capitalism, racism and colonialism, in order to understand their institutional character and the specificity of each one. Only then it is possible to analyze their mutual complications and reciprocal contradictions.

In addition to the concern with the valuation of reproductive work, ^{Orozco (2019)} defends the redistribution of wealth instead of the focus on economic growth, as a way to resolve the phenomenon of the feminization of poverty. She also defends the reduction of consumption, due to the finitude of the available natural resources and the valuation of native women who defend seeds without genetic modifications. These two lines of action are aligned with the ecofeminism and post-colonial feminism.

According to ^{Martín (2016)}, post-colonial thinking integrates the obligation to reconstruct cultural interpretations from the popular, the local and the subaltern, proposing a deconstruction of colonial thought and actions. Specifically in the case of colonial feminism, the author considers as relevant lines of action: (1) the reappropriation of female sexuality; (2) the understanding of alternative models to the nuclear family; (3) overcoming the stereotyped roles of genre; (4) the reconceptualization of patriarchal hierarchies; (5) the expansion of the female space of action and (6) the female forms of collectivity and spaces of power.

In terms of human development, ^{Orozco (2010)} considers that it occurs when the resources generated by civilization are converted into Social Welfare. In this line of reasoning, ^{Orozco (2019)} defends the state institutions necessary for Social Welfare. The author argues that when these institutions are privatized, there is an overload of individuals to provide basic needs, harming women more strongly due to the feminization of poverty. This phenomenon, in turn, comes from the lack of educational and health policies on reproductive rights and lack of public policies of parental co-responsibility by the State.

As a way to provide reproductive work without overloading women, ^{Orozco (2019)} defends the existence of a network of services essential to the reproduction of life, so that women are able to obtain remuneration for their work, thus leaving the cycle of feminization of poverty. In this cycle, women are not educated or get well-paid work due to the overload of reproductive work, perpetuating subordination relationships in relation to their family.

As a way of operationalizing the concepts of feminist economics proposed by Orozco, one can resort to the human development indicators proposed by the UN, disaggregated by gender or with a specific focus on gender. ^{Denmark and Segovich (2012)} reported that two measures were created in 1995 to measure the development of gender equality by the United Nations: the GDI (Gender Development Index) and the GEM (Gender Empowerment Measure). The GDI is based on the same health, education and income indicators as the HDI, but compares the HDIs within a country disaggregated by gender. The greater the HDI difference between genders in a given country, the lower the GDI. The GEM, on the other hand, is based on the following indicators: the proportion of women in national parliaments; proportion of women in senior economic decision-making positions and female share in the country’s total income.

As seen in the last two sections, it is possible to show a path to Emancipation through feminist theories with an individual or collective focus. In this way, it is considered that there are multiple possibilities of exchange between feminist theories and Social Management.

Social Management

Social Management, initially in Latin America, was proposed by the Inter-American Development Bank in the 1990s (^{Tenório, 2008a}, ^2008b). This proposal understands Social Management as management of social public policies, and is presented in works such as ^{Kliksberg (1994)} and ^{Rico (1999)}. However, ^{Tenório (1998)} and later ^{Fischer (2002)}, ^{França Filho (2003)}, ^{Carrion (2007)} and ^{Cançado (2011)}; expand the scope of the concept to a horizontal management, not necessarily of public policies, but in spaces of collective decision.

The evolution of this field in the country can be found in ^{Mendonça, Gonçalves-Dias and Junqueira (2012)}, ^{Cançado, Silva Jr. and Cançado (2018)} and ^{Menon and Coelho (2019)}. Table 1 presents the synthesis of ^{Menon and Coelho (2019)}.

This new perspective of Social Management is established, then, as a Brazilian (or “Tupiniquim”) perspective, as preferred by Pereira and ^{Cançado (2018)}. Previous research corroborates the affirmation of Social Management (as presented here) as a Brazilian concept, both in Spanish (^{Hernandéz & Cançado, 2017}) and in English (^{Marinho, Cançado & Iwamoto, 2019}). ^{Hernandéz and Cançado (2017)} consider Social Management as a decolonial perspective.

Thus, “Social Management is opposed to Strategic Management¹ insofar as it attempts to replace techno-bureaucratic, monological management, with more participative, dialogical management, in which the decision-making process is exercised through different social subjects” (^{Tenório, 1998, p. 16}). In this decision-making process, the path is a dialogical managerial process through critical discussion and intersubjective appreciation, where decision-making authority is shared among the participants in the action (^{Tenório, 1998}, ²⁰⁰⁵).

In summary, Social Management can be presented as collective decision making, without coercion, based on the intelligibility of language, dialogicity and understanding as a process, transparency as an assumption and Emancipation as the ultimate goal (^{Cançado, Tenório & Pereira, 2011, p. 697}).

From this knowledge base of Social Management, some works begin to advance in the search for empirical application, or even the verification of the existence and intensity of Social Management in spaces for collective deliberation. Some examples are: Civil Society Organizations (^{Persson & Moretto Neto, 2020}), Public Policy Management Councils (^{Magalhães & Souza, 2015}; ^{Mata, Pimentel & Emmendoerfer, 2018}), Territorial collegiates (^{Zani & Tenório, 2011}; ^{Rodrigues, Cançado & Pinheiro, 2020}) and Cooperatives (^{Macedo et al. 2017}). These works point out ways to identify and promote Social Management in these spaces.

Since ^{Cançado (2011)}, ^{Araújo (2012)} and ^{Cançado, Pereira and Tenório (2015)}, other studies advance in a more theoretical approach to Social Management, especially in the Habermasian perspective, such as: ^{Alcântara and Pereira (2017)}, ^{Persson and Moretto Neto (2020)}, ^{Vasconcelos and Irigaray (2019)}, ^{Garcia et al. (2018)} and ^{Yamamoto et al. (2020)}. The works cited point out gaps or reinforce the use of the following concepts as contributions to Social Management: Deliberative Citizenship; World of Life and System; Public Sphere in Habermas.

In the case of the present work, the intention is to bring Social Management closer to feminism, as previously presented. This will be done in the next section.

Convergences between Social Management and Feminism

The centrality of the discussion between the convergences between Social Management and Feminism starts from the premise of the concept of Empowerment and its applicability. When reflecting from a decolonial and feminist perspective, it is necessary to understand that empowerment must be a process of building power by groups deprived of it.

It is in this way that ^{Hooks (2019)} constructs the narrative of feminist theory from the perspective of women from the popular classes and who have always been placed on the margins of conquest by power, be it political, economic or cultural. “Being on the margins is part of a whole, but outside the main body” (^{Hooks, 2019, p. 23}), that is, despite being the majority of the Brazilian population, women from the lower classes, especially black, do not make the collective decision-making processes necessary for the development of society (^{IBGE, 2019}).

Power, therefore, needs to be perceived as something achieved collectively (^{Arendt, 2001}; ^{Hooks, 2019}), so that the decision-making process is carried out from the power granted by the group to which it belongs. What ^{Hooks (2019)} problematizes is that feminist theory and the feminist movement themselves have always been experienced and narrated by white women. The trajectory of these women in power was not always synonymous with reducing inequalities between white and black women and, on the contrary, “historically, white women were the group that, within the white supremacist culture, most directly exercised power over black women, and this, generally, in a more brutal and inhuman way than white male racists did” (^{Hooks, 2019, p. 88}). Observing the current statistics on the presence of women in positions of power or about entry into the labor market is not enough to understand the experience of power by women from the lower classes. This analysis then needs to be carried out in more detail.

From the perspective of race, class, ethnicity and gender, “empowerment begins when they not only recognize the systemic forces that oppress them, but also act to change existing power relationships” (^{Sardenberg, 2006}). When acting in the alteration of this sense, Social Management is shown as a mechanism of collective construction in which the participation of the population becomes effective and concrete. As ^{Tenório (2008a)} points out, Social Management is a process of collective construction in which the reality experienced needs to be questioned and the propositions placed on a level of criticality among those involved, thus extinguishing the permanence of individual opinion in detriment of building collective consensus.

The basis of Social Management is structured on the idea that people who are affected by decisions from any of the decision-making spheres, whether public or private, must be part of this deliberative process (^{Tenório, 2012}). As these spheres go beyond what is defined as a State, the management of demands can also be carried out via society (^{Cançado, Pereira & Tenório, 2013}), such as inside forums, territorial collegiates, municipal councils and social movements.

This local perspective is strengthened by the understanding that “good” local governance must be structured by guaranteeing conditions for democratic and deliberative participation, which also permeates the need to enhance the creation of new competences (^{Carrion, 2007}). This need is fundamental so that the population that has always been on the margins can be effectively positioned at the center. That said, the concept of social management is understood as “collective decision making, without coercion, based on the intelligibility of language, dialogicity and clarified understanding as a process, transparency as an assumption and emancipation as an ultimate end” (^{Cançado, Pereira & Tenório, 2013, p. 132}).

The creation of conditions for the Collective Decision-Making process is the point that we believe to be the most convergent between Social Management and Feminism. It is therefore necessary to build Empowerment as part of a virtuous cycle of learning, participation and reflection on the reality they experience. This experience in Brazil is commonly perceived in the Rural Women’s Movements, such as the March of Daisies, in the Women Working Group of the National Agroecology Articulation or in the extinct Board of Politics for Women inside the Brazilian Ministry of Agrarian Development.

In both experiences they are organized by an action perspective that first recognizes the rural space as a space of life (^{Wanderley, 1999}). From this it is recognized that the lives that lies there need to be part of the management processes involved in their search for the development that is expected to be achieved. Secondly, both experiences organize freirean dialogical education processes², made to contextualize and collaborate with the clarified understanding of the process (^{Butto et al., 2014}). Starting from these organizational practices of women, by means of periodic education processes, spaces for socialization and critical awareness of their realities, these women’s movements collectively build projects, programs and public policies related to them.

The participation of women in spaces for defining municipal public policies is crucial in defining the role of the State with regard to domestic and care work. It is through the public provision of care work in daycare centers, full-time schools, community restaurants and basic health centers, that the majority of work, eminently performed in an unpaid manner by women, becomes socialized. This sharing of tasks allows domestic and care work to be undertaken by the government and allows women to occupy jobs, return to schools, take higher education courses, perform leisure activities, among others (^{Silveira & Tito, 2008}; ^{Faria & Nobre, 2002}). It is the participation of women in these activities that has allowed women from popular classes to have access to places that have always been banned, such as universities and executive positions. In this sense, empowerment becomes the final stage of the collective work process converging between Social Management and Feminism:

The term empowerment refers to a range of activities, from individual assertiveness to collective resistance, protest and mobilization, which question the basis of power relations. In the case of individuals and groups whose access to resources and power are determined by class, caste, ethnicity and gender, empowerment begins when they not only recognize the systemic forces that oppress them, but also act to change existing power relationships. Therefore, empowerment is a process aimed at transforming the nature and direction of systemic forces that marginalize women and other excluded groups in certain contexts. (^{Batliwala, 1994, p. 130})

Seen in this way, empowerment can be understood as the representation at the individual and collective levels of the convergences between Social Management and Feminism. It may be seen as belonging to the final stages of the Feminist Identity Development Model (^{Downing & Roush, 1985}) and as the mean to achieve the social conditions to liberate women for self-realization, as presented by ^{Orozco (2019)}.

In the next section, the final considerations are presented.

Final considerations

More broadly, we see the potential for mutual empowerment among different human rights movements in terms of theories and tactics of mobilization and awareness.

As a suggestion for a research agenda, it is suggested that a Social Management Development Model be developed, so that organizations wishing to use the principles of Social Management to improve their practices and processes in terms of Human Relations, Sustainability and Social Responsibility can be conducted in the direction of improving their Social Management indicators. In this model, in the light of what was proposed by ^{Downing and Roush (1985)} and ^{Cross Jr. (1971)}, it is possible to glimpse an initial stage in which are not seen as problematic management practices that exploit people, do not take into consideration the issues of stakeholders and seek maximum profit without attention to Human Development. In the final stage, there would be organizations that seek to implement practices that operationalize dimensions of Sustainability, Human Relations and Social Responsibility into their daily practices. Also at this stage, organizations would also work in network with other organizations with similar principles, providing internal and external mentoring processes for other entities and managers with similar objectives.

Social Management, as a possibility of a more horizontal and emancipated management finds within feminism, in the perspective described in the text, an approach, a convergence. It is important to highlight that the paths of feminism and Social Management are long and, each in its own way, counter-hegemonic at the current stage of society’s development. However, this convergence (emancipation) is an objective and a process aimed for both. That way, each individual can learn and teach with the other, learning not to patronize or exploit other people in the education process. This is maybe the most relevant contribution of this text.