Or where should a feminist public administrator fall?

Last class was about the divide/debate between empiricism (the idea that facts are facts) and relativism (there are no facts, things are relative). While it seems that most (75%) public administration scholars fall into the empiricism camp, I can definitely identify with the relativism camp.

And this ability to see both sides in a way that most of my classmates couldn’t can certainly help me, but is also trips me up.

I credit all my years learning from other feminists for this. See, an empiricist would say that because we need to count, we need to make things as simple as possible. That many of the things that makes life complex should be smoothed out as possible. This can best be seen in that most government forms that ask for people to choose between female and male. As a feminist activist I know why we should be asking at bare minimum a third box - transgender. Yet I also see why for calculation sake we should maintain a simplistic binary. It makes the math easier. But it erases part of the story we are trying to understand and document.

Empiricists also believe that fact is fact, no debating it. Relativists see the gray areas of the “facts.” Perfect example is the debate over mammograms. If science does say that having a mammogram under 40 risks a false-positive more often than it saves lives, we should agree and move on. But a lot of people know women or know a friend of a friend who was saved by a mammogram before her 40th birthday. How do we as administrators (the 75% of us who lean towards empiricism) work with the public who are far more prone towards relativism?

I have the heart of a relativist, but the mind of an empiricist.

As for mammograms, I fall in the middle. Especially with health care decisions, science is the guide, but providers and patients make the call.

But for trying to figure out how different policies impact different communities, I still fall towards relativism and wanting to represent as many as possible. Feminist theory falls more towards relativism as well.

Part of my journey towards this PhD is going to be finding a balance between my heart and my mind. Figuring out when to take the easier road and the more complex, longer road.

I can already foresee that trying to be an activist researcher is going to be tough. It won’t be hard staying in touch with the activist community, but it will be tough to connect my research tactics with my activist tactics. I hope that my community will be patient with me and supportive in their critiques. Yet, I know that the further I go into this academic world, that there are activists who will do all they can do tear me down. I just need to keep their critiques in mind and personal attacks aside.