The book opens with a more subtle account of the larger debate within feminist theory relating to ideas of difference and traditional notions of equality and equity by questioning the legitimacy of liberal society’s dedication to gender equality while it   grant legal and political recognition to other cultures that discriminate against or abuse their female members. The first part of the book by author, Susan Moller Okin presents the main essay; entitled Is Multiculturalism Bad for Women?  Marta Sutton Weeks Professor of Ethics in Society and Professor of Political Science at Stanford University, demonstrates the inherent tensions between multiculturalism and feminist theory by assessing what the cultural practices of minority groups in Western societies imply for women and girls.  Within the context of a growing influx of immigrants for various parts of the developing world, Okin isolates several cases that highlight the notion of multiculturalism and the concessions in the name of ‘group rights’ that involve the marginalisation of women. One such incident that Okin draws from is the late 1980’s contentious case in France about whether Magrbin girls could attend school wearing the traditional Muslim headscarves (purdah) regarded as proper attire for young women when they reach puberty. Okin writes:

Staunch defenders of secular education lined up with some feminists and far-right nationalists against the practice while the left supported the multiculturalist demands for flexibility and respect for diversity, accusing opponents of racism or cultural imperialism. However, the public was virtually silent about a problem of vastly greater importance to many French Arab and African immigrant women: polygamy.     

During the 1980s, the French government quietly permitted immigrant men to bring multiple wives into the country, to the point where an estimated 200,000 families in Paris are now polygamous.

By offering a conceptualization of her use of feminist and understanding of multiculturalism, Okin brings the principles of liberal theory under a harsh and compromising light in her reproach of all cultures being intrinsically patriarchal.  In order to show the clashes between multiculturalism and gender equality, Okin point out how advocates of special group rights tend to focus on public parts of cultural life and neglected private life.  The problem here is that because most cultural practices, customs and ‘rules’ are predominantly concerned with the private life such as laws of marriage, divorce family property and the like. Thus the advances made in the interest of special group rights are more likely to have a more significant impact for women and girls than for men and boys, whose time and energies are vastly vested in the public life of the society they form part of.  Okin writes:

Occasionally, cultural defenses are cited in explanation of expectable violence among men or the ritual sacrifice of animals. Much more common, however, is the argument that, in the defendant’s cultural group, women are not human beings of equal worth but rather subordinates whose primary function (if not only) function is to serve men sexually and domestically.

As a feminist and liberal political theorist Okin accepts that minority groups should be given special rights and that even outside the context of liberal states, culture should be preserved. However in her attempt of a solution to the issue of overt sex discrimination against women under the flagship of culture she maintains that there is still no clarity in the feminist view that ‘minority group right’ as they have presented thus far are the solution. Therefore a compromise between feminist demands for the equality of women despite culture appears unlikely.