Redirecting Feminist Critiques of Science

Applying the insights of Donna Haraway (1989 , 1991 ) and Helen Longino (1989 , 1990 ), this paper reviews Sandra Harding's (1986a) tripartite model of feminist critiques of science—empiricist, standpoint, and postmodern—and argues that it is based on misunderstandings of the relationship between scientific inquiry, objectivity, and values. An alternative view of scientific inquiry makes it possible to see feminist scientists as postmodern and postmodern feminists as having standpoints.