We know feminism is a modern influential concept. It has influenced almost al the sphere of human life. Pertinently there has been developed a branch named feminist view of jurisprudence. However the feminist view of jurisprudence is not matured enough. As a field of legal arena, feminist jurisprudence began in 1960s. Feminist jurisprudence is a philosophy of law based on the political, economic, and social equality of sexes. It now holds a significant place in US law and legal thought and influences many debates on sexual and domestic violence, inequality in the workplaces and genderbased discrimination. Through various approaches, feminists have identified gendered components and gendered implications of seemingly neutral laws and practices. Laws affecting employment, divorce, reproductive rights, rape, domestic violence, and sexual harassment have all benefited from the analysis and insight of feminist jurisprudence.

Feminists believe that history was written from a male point of view. Male-dominated history does not reflect women's role in making history and structuring society. History has created a shameful bias in the concepts of human nature, gender potential, and social arrangements. The feminist says the language, logic, and structure of the law are male created and reinforce male values only. The male oriented law takes all the initiatives to deprive the women and perpetuate patriarchal power. Feminists do not belief that the biological make-up of men and women is so different that certain behavior can be attributed on the basis of sex. According to feminists gender is created socially, not biologically. Sex determines such matters as physical appearance and reproductive capacity, but not psychological, moral, or social traits.

Feminists believe in common commitments to equality between men and

women. However feminist jurisprudence is not uniform till now. There are three schools of thought within feminist jurisprudence, traditional or liberal feminism, cultural feminism and radical or dominant feminism. Traditional, or liberal, feminism asserts that women are just as rational as men are. That's why they should have equal opportunity to make their own choices. Liberal feminists challenge the assumption of male authority. They want to erase gender-based distinctions recognised by law so that woman can compete in the workplace.

Another school of feminist legal thought is cultural feminists. They focus on the differences between men and women and celebrate those differences. Following the research of psychologist Carol Gilligan, this group of thinkers asserts that women and men are different in their nature. The cultural feminists think women emphasise the importance of relationships, contexts, and reconciliation of conflicting interpersonal positions, on the other hand men emphasise abstract principles of rights and logic. The objective of this school is to give equal recognition to women's moral voice of caring and communal values.

Like the liberal feminist school of thought, radical or dominant feminism focuses on inequality. Radical feminists think that men, as a class, have dominated women as a class, creating gender inequality. According to them gender is a question of power. Radical feminists urge us to abandon traditional approaches that take maleness as their reference point. They argue that sexual equality must be constructed on the basis of woman's difference from man and not should be a mere accommodation of that difference.

Every branch of knowledge has some outstanding important characteristics and some flaws also. This is same about feminist view of jurisprudence. Arif Khan

Dept of Law, Dhaka University