Spinoza, Feminism and Privacy: Exploring an Immanent Ethics of Privacy

In this article I explore the usefulness of Spinoza's ethics for feminism by considering ways in which it allows feminists to rethink privacy. I draw upon some of Spinoza's central ideas to address the following question: when should information be classed as private and when should it be communicated? This is a question that is considered by the common law courts. Attempts to find a moral underpinning for such a tortious action against invasions of privacy have tended to draw upon Kant's categorical imperative. In contrast, I want to consider how Spinoza provides an immanent ethics that reconfigures how privacy is understood.