The Importance of

Feminist Theory,
Hermeneutical
Phenomenology,
Human Environment
Systems in
Examining Sociocultural,

Economic, and Political

Conditions
Sociocultural
factors are customs, lifestyles and
values that characterize a society or
group. Cultural aspects include
concepts of beauty, education,
language, law and politics, religion,
social organizations, technology and
material culture, values and attitudes
(Tatad 2016).
Economics
is regarded as a social science
because it uses scientific methods to
build theories that can help explain the
behavior of individuals, groups and
organizations. Economics attempts to
explain economic behavior, which
arises when scarce resources are
exchanged (Economics Online 2020)
Politics
is the activities associated with
the governance of a country or
other area, especially the debate
or conflict among individuals or
parties having or hoping to
achieve power (Oxford 2020).
 Feminist Theory
• Socio-cultural Conditions – Cultural
feminism, the view that there is a "female
nature" or "female essence", attempts to
revalue and redefine attributes ascribed to
femaleness. It is also used to describe
theories that commend innate differences
between women and men (Wikipedia 2020).
 Feminist Theory
• Economic Conditions – Feminist economists
study both paid and unpaid care work. They argue
that traditional analysis of economics often ignores
the value of household unpaid work. Feminist
economists have argued that unpaid domestic work
is as valuable as paid work, so measures of
economic success should include unpaid work.
(Blackwell 2018)
 Feminist Theory
• Political Conditions – Feminist political theory is a
diverse subfield of feminist theory working towards
three main goals: To understand and critique the role of
gender in how political theory is conventionally
construed. To reframe and re-articulate conventional
political theory in light of feminist issues (especially
gender equality). To support political science presuming
and pursuing gender equality. (Wikipedia 2020)
 Hermeneutical Phenomenology

• Socio-cultural Conditions – The interpretive

paradigm and hermeneutic phenomenological
design are the most popular methods used in
international cross-cultural research in
healthcare, nurse education and nursing
practice. Their inherent appeal is that they help
researchers to explore experiences. (Research
Gate 2018)
 Hermeneutical Phenomenology
• Economic Conditions – The methodology
Austrian economists call praxeology can be seen in
turn as exemplary of a hermeneutical approach to
economics. And all three of these methodological
literatures lend support to a common conclusion that
neoclassical economics is badly in need of reform
and that this reform could be described as a
restoration of the interpretive dimension to our
economic discourse. (Lavoie 2011)
Hermeneutical Phenomenology
• Political Conditions – The movement towards practice enables us
to foreground contemporary political practices that may have
otherwise been reduced to mental activity or to the macro-level
processes of sociological analysis. With the emergence of the
concept of practice in social and political theory, new ways of
conceptualizing the relationship between the individual and society
are beginning to come into focus. Dallmayr (1984) suggests that, “it
is possible to discern a subtle shift of attention in contemporary
social and political thought: a shift involving a progressive
deemphasis of epistemology in favor of pragmatic or “practical”
preoccupations”. Here we see that even in political research, the
movement towards practice has encouraged researchers to
challenge the epistemological foundations of their disciplines.
 Human-
Environmen
t Systems
 Socio-cultural Conditions
Beliefs, attitudes, and values related to material possessions and
the relation of humanity and nature are often seen as lying at the
root of environmental degradation. Such attitudes and beliefs
probably have their greatest independent effects over the long-
term, on the time scale of human generations or more. Within
single lifetimes, attitudes and beliefs can have significant influence
on resource-using behavior, even when social structural and
economic variables are held constant. (Paul C. Stern, Oran R. Young,
and Daniel Druckman 1992)
 Economic Conditions
Economic Growth for the first time in human history, economic activity is
so extensive that it produces environmental change at the global level;
the prospect of further economic growth arouses concern about the
quality of the global environment. Economic growth necessarily stresses
the environment, but the amount of stress from a given amount of
economic growth depends, among other things, on the pattern of goods
and services produced, the population and resource base for agricultural
development, forms of national political organization, and development
policies. (Paul C. Stern, Oran R. Young, and Daniel Druckman 1992)
 Political Conditions
The global environment responds to the actions of markets, governments,
and the international political economy. Markets are always imperfect, and
the impact of economic activity on the environment depends on which
imperfect-market method of environmental management is being used.
Governmental structure and policies can also have significant environmental
consequences, both intentional and inadvertent. And the international
political economy, with its global division of labor and wealth, can promote
environmental abuses, particularly in the Third World. The effects depend on
policy at the national level and on the behavior of particular economic
actors. (Paul C. Stern, Oran R. Young, and Daniel Druckman 1992)
Thank you