In The Patriarchs: How Men Came to Rule, Angela Saini explores the origins of patriarchy, debunking biological determinism and highlighting the role of nation building, social norms, and violence in embedding gender inequality into societies. Saini’s well-argued, comprehensive history of patriarchal power structures is essential reading for sociologists, historians and gender studies researchers as well as more general readers, writes Nicoleta Ciubotariu.
In The Patriarchs: How Men Came to Rule, Angela Saini delves into a question that resonates deeply with readers interested in gender studies, history, and social structures – how did patriarchy come to be? Understanding its origins is crucial for those who seek to challenge and dismantle it. Saini argues that the balance of power towards men has destabilised and that in order to maintain it, men find ways to reassert and reconstruct it as societies develop. This book provides a comprehensive exploration of history, spanning millennia and many societies (a timeline and a map can be found on pages x-xiii) to uncover the roots of patriarchal systems (or multiple patriarchies, as it is highlighted in the book) and their enduring influence in our present times.
Understanding [patriarchy’s] origins is crucial for those who seek to challenge and dismantle it.
Saini is an award-winning journalist and writer with a penchant for digging through history to understand how systems of oppression came to be. She brings her extensive history research to bear in The Patriarchs. Her previous works, including Superior: The Return of Race Science and Inferior: How Science Got Women Wrong, demonstrate her expertise in dissecting the origins of societal biases and prejudices.
The Patriarchs sheds light on misconceptions and challenges previous theories, such as Steven Goldberg’s argument that patriarchy is inevitable because it is rooted in biology. Saini adeptly challenges the idea that women’s oppression started to appear in the agricultural societies of the past due to natural differences between men and women, which relegated one group to submission and one to domination. She uses the discoveries at the Neolithic and Chalcolithic southern Anatolia, Catalhoyuk to show that while the agricultural revolution began in 10,000 BCE, the communities in Catalhoyuk were still very much gender-blind in 7400 BCE.
Looking at Mesopotamia in 2100 BCE, Saini shows as the state developed over hundreds of years, women’s lives and rights became more and more constricted by gender codes and laws.
Instead, she argues, it was the emergence of states and empires that demanded their citizens to defend and fight for their precarious inception and growth. Looking at Mesopotamia in 2100 BCE, Saini shows as the state developed over hundreds of years, women’s lives and rights became more and more constricted by gender codes and laws. While initially being able to own property and work, in time, wives and daughters had to be designed as legal men to bypass laws and be able to inherit. Nation- and empire-building also required the production of citizens, which led states to want to control births and, thus, women. As Saini states, “…we can see [women’s oppression] in the historical record around the same time the earliest states and empires began to grow, as they tried to expand their populations and maintain armies to defend themselves. The elites […] needed young women to have as many children as possible, and for the young men they raised to be willing warriors” (7). Therefore, gender inequality has at its roots narratives of power and attempts to gain control over other people rather than stemming from inescapable biology.
Gender inequality has at its roots narratives of power and attempts to gain control over other people rather than stemming from inescapable biology.
Yet, this does not explain how gender inequality and patriarchal systems persisted through the centuries. Saini argues that it happened slowly, “through constant considered effort, sometimes using violence or the threat of it, but more often by layer upon layer of social norms, laws, and edicts” (131). It took sustained labour to convince people of women’s inferiority, and gender norms had to be introduced and policed through honour, shame and loyalty. Chapter Five, aptly named “Restriction”, illustrates some of the ways in which women’s participation, choices and actions were restricted and controlled through time and how these narratives propagated.
One striking example of this is the exploration of gender expectations of sexual purity and chastity imposed on girls from Ancient Greece onwards, whose families pressured them to marry very young (around 13 or 14 years old). They would often be married off to men ten or fifteen years older. This fed the stereotypes still present in modern times that men are rational and logical. Women were seen as emotional and foolish instead of acknowledging a huge age and life experience gap. These beliefs continue to affect women’s participation in society and their choices; their persistence is highlighted by recent statistics around leadership roles, pay gaps, and their participation in STEM and sport.
[Girls] would often be married off to men ten or fifteen years older. This fed the stereotypes still present in modern times that men are rational and logical.
In the next chapter, “Alienation”, the author unpicks some of the darkest issues that have resulted from and been consolidated through patriarchies. Domestic abuse (perpetrated not only by the partner but also by others in the family) and rape, forced marriage, bride kidnapping, captive taking, prostitution, sexual bondage/slavery, unpaid and unrecognised domestic labour and female genital mutilation are among the themes analysed in this chapter. Saini shows that violence against women is both a cause and a consequence of patriarchy, of the imbalance of power between genders.
Saini argues these happen because of the patrilineal and patrilocality aspects of patriarchy, which require young women to give up their family home and move in with their in-laws upon marriage. This often leaves the woman destitute, vulnerable, and dependent on the goodwill of others who are in control of her fate. Saini discusses that in some traditions, the father gifts the groom a whip to illustrate the change of ownership. Further, the expression “rule of thumb” comes from the acceptable width of the instrument men could use to beat their wives.
[In] matrilineal, matrilocal societies, where men move in with the women’s families, where often women are more supported and have access to more resources, which can be seen in physical attributes, eg, they are taller.
To further prove the point, she contrasts this to matrilineal, matrilocal societies, where men move in with the women’s families, where often women are more supported and have access to more resources, which can be seen in physical attributes, eg, they are taller. These arguments are supported by UN statistics which emphasise that heterosexual relationships wherein men believe they hold a dominant position over women and practice behaviours intended to control women’s bodies, autonomy and contact with others are strongly correlated with a higher risk of intimate partner violence.
Another interesting idea explored in this chapter is the complicity of women in maintaining patriarchy. The illustrations that bring this point to life range from the mistress of the house choosing the least-desirable food (eating the fat of the pate or the burnt toast), to mothers-in-law orchestrating the murder of their daughters-in-law to maintain the family’s honour, to Boko-Haram kidnapped girls who decided to stay as kidnappers’ wives as they had power over other slaves, which they would otherwise lose. This highlights the intersectionality of age (women becoming more powerful with age) and status (bearing sons, becoming mothers-in-law) to show the different power dynamics women are involved in and sometimes seek.
Saini connects this to an earlier discussion relating to the reductive idea that goddess-worshipping societies were peaceful and conquered by a violent, war-thirsty minority. She artfully weaves together threads of arguments that help to dispel myths such as the notion that women cannot be power-hungry or that they accepted submission because of nature. Women, like other people, are not a homogenous group but individuals with their own objectives, ambitions and beliefs that make them different from one another.
Saini takes the reader on a journey through history to uncover […] multiple patriarchies that have had to be constructed, reconstructed and reinforced through laws, but more importantly, through traditions, myths and stereotypes
Throughout the course of the book, Saini takes the reader on a journey through history to uncover the origins of patriarchy. Rather than going straight to the destination, this journey uncovers multiple patriarchies that have had to be constructed, reconstructed and reinforced through laws, but more importantly, through traditions, myths and stereotypes. Women’s submission is neither natural nor genetically prone. Instead, oppression is consolidated through gender norms, isolation and violence. This book is an excellent read for feminists, sociologists, historians, and students of, or readers interested in, politics, social sciences, gender studies, history, and social structures.
- This review first appeared at LSE Review of Books.
- Image credit: Daniel Avram on Shutterstock.
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- Note: This article gives the views of the reviewer, and not the position of USAPP – American Politics and Policy, nor of the London School of Economics.
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