A feminist perspective in family therapy

Abstract

There is no therapy, including family therapy, that can adequately reflect the range of human experience and conditions without including a feminist perspective. Yet a feminist perspective can never be monolithic or homogeneous as it will reflect the diversity of the complex social relations it addresses. Feminist family therapists have enlarged the theory of family functioning to include gender as a significant, if not fundamental, ingredient in the construction of family structures and interpersonal transactions. This challenges the idea that the family as a system is governed by its own internal regulatory mechanism within which all interpersonal transactions can be understood. Women are at both ends of service delivery systems, as consumers and as providers. As gatekeepers of the family, it is women who are largely responsible for seeking the services attendant to the general welfare of the family. The literature and research that have been generated out of women's movement has direct bearing on the practice of family therapy.