Women 's solidarity - and divisions among women Ann Whitehead One of contemporary feminist theory's main contri- butions to the study of women was to rediscover shared gender as a basis for solidarity and common interests, and different gender as a basis for division of interests and ideological dissonance. In elaborating a view of gender relations which would be helpful in investigating empirical Third World situations, we have given a central place to the conflicts of interests between men and women [IDS 1979; Young et al eds 1981]. This brief article derives from the other equally important starting point - that 'women' do not and cannot constitute a homogeneous category,' Clearly they are not 'all the same' in the first sense that the social relations between the genders may vary for the women of any one society. But furthermore women experience significant variation in their situations in those wider areas of political, economic and social subordination and inequality which are not confined to the social relations of gender. These differences imply that it is critical, methodologically, to think through quite carefully the basis for women's solidarity and common interests and to do this in such a way as to allow for the possibility of divisions between women. In investigating any given empirical situation we need to ask what it is that unites, and what it is that divides these women, and what kind or category of women this particular piece of research is concerned with. Women's Solidarity One basis for women's solidarity is the concrete interests which women, as a gender, do share. Male violence and coercive forms of heterosexuality leading to violence, rape and wife-battering and issues surrounding reproduction and mothering (eg abortion, contraception, maternal and child health care, child care provision) provide women with an explicit basis for gender solidarity. Women may also have common interests in relation to patriarchal kinship groups and The short discussion in this paper s taken from a longer unpublished manuscript on 'Conflict and consensus models in the analysis of gender relations'. IDS Bulletin, 1984. vol iS no I. Institute ol Deseloptotent Studies, Sussex 6 the role these play in oppressive forms of the marriage institution (those in which there are marriage payments, no choice of partner, no choice of remaining single, treatment of widows, right to divorce etc). A further basis to women's solidarity may lie in aspects of their relation to the state, eg on issues of franchise, emancipation, property ownership, and legal rights. Nevertheless, although in relation to such matters as these, women, as a category, may well have strong interests in common against men and the state, this does not imply that all women will share these interests equally, nor that in all circumstances they will prioritise them. Divisions between women may be sufficiently strong to offset these potential bases for solidarity, and it is discussion of these that forms the major part of this article. Female Networks and Survival Strategies Women often have a common interest in another sense - they may share the experience of recurring crises. These may be of access to money and labour, as well as those, such as illness or eviction, which threaten their capacity for daily survival. Most studies have shown that poor women, as well as women who are independent child-rearers, maintain significant female networks which function as daily or weekly or annual safety nets [IDS 1981]. However, when thinking about sources of female support, it is essential to make the point that they may be accompanied by some costs. These costs will vary and may be transcended, but they may be summarised as women's capacity to exert social control over each other. My own first research was with a stable rural community in Herefordshire, in which family and kinship networks were significant for many residents, and where women relied on each other very heavily, both in day to day crises, and over a lifetime [Whitehead 1976]. I found that older women, mothers and friends, were highly coercive in relation to young wives. It was this coercion, in addition to that exerted by men, which