This article argues that Sandberg’s book and new media campaign, Lean In and LeanIn.org is canned feminism; a feminism that can be embraced by everyone because it is non-threatening to the status quo and ultimately reinforces capitalistic patriarchy. Sandberg is a billionaire who holds immense power in the social media world as the chief operating officer of Facebook. She became VP of Global Sales at Google when it was a start-up company. The organizers of LeanIn.org have created a Facebook page, Tumblr blog, website and have implemented a new initiative for college campuses to encourage young college graduates to “lean in” as well as a Getty Images project that creates a new visual paradigm for the working woman/mother. The power and influence of Sandberg is overwhelming and I argue that she is actually generating a false feminism that embraces white affluent women while ignoring everyone else. Further, that the action of “leaning in” reinforces the stereotypical second wave feminist ideology that women can have it all so long as they work hard enough. This canned feminism actually works against what feminist activists and scholars have done for the past several decades, actively working towards equality, non-discrimination and civil rights for all women.
Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead is Sheryl Sandberg’s recent book, published in 2013 that calls for women to step up, take a “seat at the table”, and “lean in” towards more leadership roles. She argues that the root cause of women not holding as many leadership positions as men is essentially their own fault. Sandberg’s “Lean In” movement began in 2010 with her Ted Talk, where she began the argument with the notion that women were holding themselves back due to insecurity and fear.
In addition to the external barriers erected by society, women are hindered by barriers that exist within us. We hold ourselves back in ways both big and small, by lacking self-confidence, by not raising our hands, and by pulling back when we should be leaning in (…) Compared to our male colleagues, few of us aspire to senior positions. This is not a list of things other women have done. I have made every mistake on this list. At times I still do (Sandberg 8).
There are some key problems with Sandberg’s argument; 1) In the book, she claims that she is Not a Feminist, 2) Yet, she claims that her book is “sort of a feminist manifesto”, 3) She never addresses privilege, patriarchy or capitalism, 4) It is elitist, geared towards college-educated white affluent women in the corporate world, 5) It assumes that we are living in a post-feminist world, and finally, 6) It is pure, unadulterated self-promotion. Sandberg has spent the better part of this year on a public speaking tour that includes an interview on Ted Talks Women, television shows such as The Colbert Report and several college campuses.
There are some problems with Sandberg’s non-profit. For example, because it is new, there is no financial statement to review as of the date of this date. It is shallow, seeking to use media to subvert stereotypes of working women, and it does not address “real” problems of the average American women. Instead, it encourages women to create their own “circles”.
Since Lean In came out last year, it has been widely criticized by feminists for being elitist and for defeating key components of the contemporary feminist agenda. While there is some debate regarding exactly what feminism is, there is consensus among many feminists that at its core, the movement is about equality and basic human rights. Since the mid-eighteen hundreds in America, activists, both male and female, began calling for reform with the Temperance Movement when women began organizing for the prohibition of alcohol as a means to improve the quality of their lives as well as the lives of their children and to create stronger communities. Through powerful communication and rhetorical strategies that served their own interests, these women were successful at generating change in their communities largely due to their ability to speak in a manner that would be heard and accepted not only by other women, but also, by the male leaders who held the majority of the power at the time. These women used the excessive use of alcohol by men and the problems that it wrought in families and communities to generate effective political change. Using Christian rhetoric, dress, fiction and even patriotism, these women made powerful contributions to the progress of American women that eventually led to the right to vote in 1921.
While the earliest feminist movements used moral suasion as a rhetorical strategy to affect change and reform, during the mid-twentieth century, women were still advocating for changes in order to gain more freedom, specifically, power over our own bodies, including affordable and easily available contraception and access to abortion. However, in today’s world, social media has the power to alter and transform culture. Therefore, it is important to look at the ways in which Sandberg is using media to inflict her faux-feminism on the mainstream. Through the use of television, on-line lectures, Facebook, Tumblr, twitter, blogs and now a new project through Getty Images, Sandberg’s rhetoric has been dumbed down and simplified for the masses, employing slogans such as “ban bossy” in an attempt to shift the paradigm. Her strategy is to make feminism less threatening to women who have been afraid to call themselves feminists but, especially to make it more palatable to men, notably white, capitalist men who hold leadership positions. The problem is that she never acknowledges patriarchy or capitalism.
Today, women continue to experience a political and cultural backlash, an attempt by a few but powerful to revoke as many of our rights as possible. When the power of the media can transform our cultural paradigms, Sheryl Sandberg, a billionaire who is at the helm of social media who holds the keys to potentially affect cultural change, is telling women, to “Ban Bossy”, because apparently Sandberg thinks that not calling women or girls “bossy” is going to have a real impact on the lives of women. This shallow and baseless mantra that Sandberg is promoting through her multi-faceted media campaign is rootless and serves no real purpose other than to promote herself.
The Neoliberalization of Feminism
Cathleen Rottenberg argues that Sandberg’s brand of feminism encapsulates the neoliberal ideology of the rise of the individual, that it does not seek to change societal problems that subvert feminine power but, that it tells women that they have to change from within themselves (424). Further, that “the shift in emphasis, from an attempt to alter social pressures towards interiorized affective spaces that require constant self monitoring is precisely the node through which liberal feminism is rendered hollow and transmuted into a mode of neo-liberal government mentality” (425). In effect, it takes society and patriarchy off the hook because according to Sandberg, the real problem, is women themselves. In comparing her to Friedan’s middle class feminist neurosis and existential crisis of mid-century America, Sandberg claims that women today need to just go within, working on their own personal transformation in order to advance in their careers. The text attempts to empower women by offering suggestions such as how to overcome their fears to gain more self-confidence so that they can reach the top of the corporate ladder, because Sandberg’s neoliberal feminism’s goal is solely about obtaining power and wealth.
The real message that Sandberg is promoting is her own brand of neoliberalism that eschews any traditional feminist theory. She quotes from no feminists or leaders of the feminist movement. Instead, she creates her own brand of feminism, one that is easily consumed by a dumbed-down public that can easily absorb her superficial branding using her catch phrases, “lean in”, “ban bossy”, and a new Getty Images campaign that is all surface – pretty pictures of girls and women.
Many feminists have been writing about the Lean In campaign since it began with the Ted Talk. Feminist scholars, as well as activists and writers such as Maureen Down and Susan Faludi have recently published articles that skewered Sandberg and accused her of self-promotion and shallow, glossed-over faux-feminism that promotes no real agenda. Faludi points out that “Before Lean In hit the bookstores, it was already a fully staffed operation, an organization purporting to be “a global community committed to encouraging and supporting women leaning in to their ambitions.” She further notes that on the “Meet the Community” page on LeanIn.Org, “tribute is paid
by Sandberg’s high-powered network of celebrities, corporate executives, and media moguls (many media moguls), among them Oprah Winfrey, New York Times executive editor Jill Abramson, Newsweek and Daily Beast editor in chief Tina Brown, Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington, Cosmopolitan editor in chief Joanna Coles, former Good Morning America co-anchor Willow Bay, former first lady Laura Bush (and both of her daughters), former California first lady and TV host Maria Shriver, U.S. senators Barbara Boxer and Elizabeth Warren, Harvard president Drew Gilpin Faust, Dun & Bradstreet CEO Sara Mathew, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, Coca-Cola marketing executive Wendy Clark, fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg, supermodel Tyra Banks, and actor (and Avon “Global Ambassador”) Reese Witherspoon.
Faludi pressed Sandberg, asking why she was not pushing for real social reform, structural or economic change and the response was vague and there was no real strategies offered. As she continued to press Sandberg for an interview, she was declined several times; her questions were eventually answered by a member of the PR department.
Maureen Dowd argued against Sandberg’s Lean In Campaign for the New York Times, noting,
Sandberg may mean well, and she may be setting up a run for national office. But she doesn’t understand the difference between a social movement and a social network marketing campaign. Just because digital technology makes connecting possible doesn’t mean you’re actually reaching people.
People come to a social movement from the bottom up, not the top down. Sandberg has co-opted the vocabulary and romance of a social movement not to sell a cause, but herself. She says she’s using marketing for the purpose of social idealism. But she’s actually using social idealism for the purpose of marketing.
Sandberg offers nothing of value to women other than a marketplace on social media sites and webpages to read over her “education” material and join the club. When asked repeatedly by audience members or journalists about issues of race, class and gender, Sandberg vaguely acknowledges that these issues exists but shows no interest or willingness to take actions towards supporting women who are not members of the elite, college-educated, affluent white social status. She has wrapped herself in celebrity status, surrounded herself with celebrities, CEO’s, multiple founders of businesses (found on the “team” page of the website) with glossy photos and personal Lean In moments.
By all appearances, Lean In and its co-founders seem to be doing a great job selling neoliberal feminism to a new generation of women who claim to not be feminists. However, there still exists a generation of women who have fought for awareness of serious issues like affordable child care, sexual discrimination, and equal pay. These activists are promoting equality across race, gender and class to establish equal rights for all women. One of the more thoughtful and powerful responses to Sandberg’s book was written by feminist activist bell hooks, who wrote a piece for The Feminist Wire, arguing that Sandberg’s definition of feminism “begins and ends with the notion that it’s all about gender equality within the existing social system” and then systematically, yet beautifully, deconstructs this reasoning while explaining why it goes against basic feminist theory and simply does not work. She explains, “from this perspective, imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy need not be challenged”. Further, hooks argues that Sandberg assumes that white male leaders are going to let women “in” once they “lean in” a bit. Hooks points out that the real issue with this book is the fact that it makes the rest of us feel as if we are just not working hard enough while at the same time not recognizing the fact that not everyone wants to work in corporate America or, has the same access that Sandberg’s white affluence and ivy league education has granted her. Further, that by taking part in the system, according to Sandberg’s advice, women are essentially accepting the fact that the patriarchal corporate system is never going to change, so we should just accept it and learn how to work it.
Sandberg never addresses the fact that she is writing primarily for a white, privileged, affluent audience nor does she acknowledge her own privilege and massive wealth. She never discusses white patriarchy. The rhetorical move to omit these major aspects of feminine oppression creates a “feel good” vibe where everything just depends on your own attitude. Essentially, hooks claims that Sandberg is selling women out to the system that oppresses them.
Hook points out that white men are happy to have more white affluent women at the top with them because these white women are really no threat to the white capitalist patriarchal system. Further, hooks argues that the mass media, being dominated by the white capitalist male, is the system which has hailed Sandberg as being the “new feminist icon” that they want her to be because it works for their agenda in “re-framing feminism”.
As iconic feminist leaders repeatedly question Sheryl Sandberg’s branding of feminism, her practice of the dumbing down of feminism and creating a “sort of feminist manifesto” that does not speak to any real feminist issues, it is important, as hooks argues, to “dig deeper” into Lean In’s real intention. In 2013, Joann Barkin pointed out that mega philanthropic organizations that have been created by large, billion-dollar corporations, ones that are specifically structured “legally and financially to last forever”, are merely a ploy by said corporations and moguls to secure wealth, power and political clout as well as to “clean up the reputations of business moguls who amassed fortunes during the robber baron years” (635). She begins with the largest of these that were first created at the beginning of the twentieth century with the Rockefeller Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation. More recently created is the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation, the Walton Family Foundation and many more.
Barkan points out that the business of big philanthropy is “booming” with data showing that as of March 2013, “there were 66 private, grant-making foundations with assets over $1 billon” (638). One of the many problems with these groups is that they are tax exempt – which means that money that could be being spent on government programs, infrastructure, education and other public programs is being diverted for the purposes of these corporations to manage their wealth, tax free. They have the power and influence to impact our economy, culture and politics in ways that the average American cannot, without any oversight. Further, these non-profit foundations have the means and the power to shape social policy, culture and influence government at the local and national levels.
As of May 4, 2014, Forbes has listed Sandberg’s net worth at $989.9 Million.
As Faludi noted, that Sandberg’s organization was already in place prior to the release of her book, Leanin.org is a brand new 501(c) that only recently launched. I sent questions to the Public Relations department asking for a financial statement, and their response was that they did not have one. This might be true, since the organization is only a few months old. What remains to be seen, is how much of Sandberg’s personal fortune has been diverted to LeanIn.Org and what programs they channel funding to.
As this project continues, it will be interesting to see what type of funding the organization has and how they spend their millions. What is suspect, is that the message in Sandberg’s text is vaguely feminist, espousing a neoliberal ideology that places the responsibility of women’s success solely on their own shoulders, eschewing any societal or socio-political issues. She avoids politically heated feminist issues surrounding gender, race, class and social equality. The organization appears to be a glossy magazine-like culture club that speaks for affluent white women only. Those who do not belong, need not apply.
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