Modern feminism and anti-racism are often discussed as contemporary political movements, but their deepest philosophical roots stretch back to the Enlightenment. Long before the language of identity politics existed, philosophers began advancing a radically different way of thinking about human beings: that every individual possesses inherent rights simply by virtue of being human.
This idea, most clearly articulated by John Locke (1632–1704), challenged centuries of thinking in which people were primarily defined by birth, family, religion, social class, ethnicity, or sex. Locke’s philosophy of natural rights and individual liberty laid much of the intellectual foundation upon which later abolitionists, women’s rights advocates, and liberal reformers would build. Although Locke himself was not free from the contradictions of his era, his philosophical principles became powerful tools used by later generations to attack slavery, sexism, and inherited privilege.
John Locke’s Revolutionary Idea
Before the Enlightenment, society was largely organized around hierarchy.
A person’s place in life was believed to be determined by birth:
- Kings ruled because they were born into royalty.
- Nobles possessed privileges unavailable to common people.
- Women were legally subordinate to men.
- Slavery was widely accepted across Europe and the colonies.
- Religious affiliation would often determine political rights.
Locke challenged this entire worldview.
In his Two Treatises of Government (1689), he argued that every human being possesses natural rights before governments even exist. Governments are legitimate only because individuals consent to them, and their primary purpose is to protect each person’s life, liberty and property.
Political authority therefore comes from individuals—not from race, sex, ancestry, or divine hierarchy. I wasn’t a mater of where this individual came from and what group anymore, but what rights this individual possessed.
That simple change transformed political philosophy.
From Group Identity to Individual Rights
Lockean individualism rejects the idea that people should be judged according to inherited categories.
Every person must instead be evaluated as an independent moral agent capable of reason, responsibility, and self-government.
This principle directly conflicts with systems built upon collective prejudice.
Racism
Racism assumes that a person’s abilities, intelligence, or moral worth can be inferred from ancestry or race.
Individualism rejects this entirely.
If every human possesses the same natural rights and rational capacity, then race cannot determine one’s political or moral status.
The individual—not the racial group—is the unit of moral concern.
Sexism
Traditional sexism similarly assumed that women possessed fixed intellectual or political limitations simply because they were women.
Lockean individualism undermined this assumption.
If rights belong to individuals because they are rational human beings, then women cannot logically be excluded simply because of their sex.
The principle itself contains the seeds of women’s equality, even if Locke never fully developed that conclusion himself.
Feminism as an Extension of Enlightenment Individualism
Many of the earliest feminist thinkers explicitly built upon Enlightenment concepts of universal rights rather than rejecting them.
Mary Wollstonecraft
Perhaps no one illustrates this better than Mary Wollstonecraft, whose A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) argued that women are not naturally inferior to men.
Instead, she claimed women appeared inferior because society denied them education and opportunities to develop their reason.
Her famous argument was not that women constituted a special political class deserving unique privileges.
It was almost the opposite.
She argued that women should be recognized as individuals, capable of reason, virtue, and independent judgment.
Her demand was simple:
Judge women according to their abilities—not according to stereotypes about their sex.
Olympe de Gouges
Across the English Channel, Olympe de Gouges reached similar conclusions.
In her Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen (1791), she argued that if the French Revolution truly believed in universal rights, women had to be included.
She pointed out the inconsistency of proclaiming universal liberty while excluding half the population.
De Gouges also became an outspoken opponent of slavery in the French colonies, linking women’s rights with universal human rights rather than treating them as separate causes.
Anti-Racism and the Individual
The same philosophical logic inspired many early abolitionists. If all individuals possess natural liberty, then no human being can rightfully be owned by another.
This argument became increasingly influential during the eighteenth century.
For the first time in history, organized abolitionist societies emerged:
- Pennsylvania Abolition Society (1784)
- Society for Effecting the Abolition of Slave Trade in Britain (1787)
- Société des Amis des Noirs in France (1788)
Although many activists differed politically, they increasingly appealed to universal human rights rather than inherited social status.
By the nineteenth century, defenders of slavery openly recognized Lockean individualism as one of their greatest intellectual enemies because its principles of natural liberty and consent undermined the moral justification for slavery.
Other Enlightenment Thinkers Who Expanded the Idea
Locke was not alone. Several Enlightenment thinkers developed the philosophy of individual equality further.
Thomas Paine argued that hereditary privilege violated natural rights and insisted that political rights belonged equally to ordinary individuals.
Marquis de Condorcet became one of the earliest major philosophers to advocate equal civil and political rights for women while also opposing slavery.
Adam Smith, although best remembered for economics, emphasized that human beings share a common moral capacity through sympathy and justice.
Immanuel Kant argued that every rational person must always be treated as an end in themselves rather than merely as a means—an ethical principle incompatible with slavery or discrimination.
Each expanded the growing Enlightenment conviction that moral worth belongs to people as individuals rather than as members of social categories.
Why Racism and Sexism Conflict with Individualism
Racism and sexism rest on the same basic philosophical mistake.
They replace judgment of the individual with assumptions about group identity.
They replace character with stereotypes.
Instead of asking who a person is, prejudice treats race or sex as a shortcut for judging personality, intelligence, morality, or ability.
They deny personal agency.
Individualism holds that people are capable of making choices.
Prejudice instead defines people by traits they did not choose.
They replace merit with inherited identity.
An individualist society judges people by achievement, responsibility, and conduct.
Collectivist prejudice judges ancestry or sex before character.
That directly contradicts Enlightenment principles.
The Historical Irony
Enlightenment societies often failed to uphold the ideals they proclaimed.
Locke had ties to colonial enterprises, and many Enlightenment thinkers accepted institutions their own philosophy struggled to defend. These contradictions remain widely debated by historians.
Yet ideas often outlive and surpass their originators.
Once equal natural rights were accepted in principle, later generations could use that standard to expose the injustice of slavery, legal discrimination, and inherited privilege.
Women appealed to those principles.
Abolitionists appealed to them as well.
So did civil rights reformers.
Over time, the philosophy became increasingly difficult to reconcile with racism or sexism.
Individualism as the Common Thread
Modern discussions often portray liberal individualism, feminism, and anti-racism as separate intellectual traditions. Historically, however, many of their earliest advocates drew from the same source: the Enlightenment belief that every human being is a rational individual with inherent dignity and equal moral worth.
This does not mean every later feminist or anti-racist movement has embraced the same philosophical framework, nor that all contemporary approaches emphasize individualism over group identity. Those traditions have diversified considerably. But historically, some of the earliest and most influential arguments for women’s rights and the abolition of slavery rested on a simple proposition inherited from Locke and developed by later thinkers:
No person’s rights should depend on the group into which they were born.
The individual—not race, sex, class, or ancestry—is the fundamental unit of justice.
That idea remains one of Enlightenment’s most enduring contributions to modern political thought.
Sources
- John Locke, Abolitionism, and the Reactionary Enlightenment, Journal of Modern Philosophy
- “I do not wish [women] to have power over men; but over themselves”: Feminism and Abolition through the Works of Mary Wollstonecraft, Hasnu Kwatra, Voces Novae: Chapman University Historical Review, Vol 4, No 1 (2013)
- Olympe de Gouges. Research Guides. Women in the Revolution. Library of Congress
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