Feminism in its early years unsettled power, disrupted economies, and demanded visibility that demanded redistribution. Difficult questions, such as who benefits from women’s labour and who controls women’s bodies, were thrown to society, for which they were considered to be accountable.
Feminism today has switched towards the side where it is wrapped up in pretty packaging, tote bags that highlight caption-worthy slogans that can be worn and are purchasable, and are mostly on the performative end. What began as a movement of collective liberation has been marketed and reshaped into a commodity that, under the purview of capitalism, can be sold back to consumers at a premium. This transformation was not something that occurred overnight.
Feminism Before the Market Got Hold of It
The early feminist movements were explicitly anti-capitalist in nature. If not more, at the very least, they were highly suspicious of the existing world order built on unpaid and often gendered labour. These movements were also very critical of the already existing structural inequality as well. The feminist wars were fought for the implementation of better labour protections, women attaining their reproductive autonomy, and equal access to education and political representation.
The earlier feminist movements were therefore much more than mere symbols of personal success. The movements could be seen as tools for collective survival. The demands made by these protest movements threatened not just capitalism but the underlying dangers of control it possessed. The movements were symbols of resistance that exposed their reliance on women’s invisible work. The tendency of capitalism to concentrate wealth and power in the hands of a few was also highlighted.
From Systemic Justice to Personal Success
The earlier movements of feminism were too sharp for the patriarchal world order to sustain, and hence felt as a threat at many times. To neutralise this threat, capitalism learnt how to repackage the threat. As a result, there was a shift from systemic critique of the movements to checking in on individual aspiration.
Feminism, which long stood for dismantling the oppressive power structures, was no longer aspirational. The dismantling of unjust systems became more and more an individualised choice, and one who could navigate it successfully could do it within their reach if they chose to in small actions. This is also when we witnessed the rise of neoliberal feminism. The neoliberals learnt how to embody in the “girlboss” narrative.
The above-mentioned encouraged women to lean in, work harder, and break glass ceilings, but without questioning. The ones who built those ceilings were not to be questioned, and it was not a concern as to who would clean up the glass if, at all, it shattered. Structural barriers were thus reframed as personal challenges, and inequality was recast as a lack of confidence rather than a lack of justice. Thus, what we saw was success being framed as individual hustle, not collective uplift. Thus, not being able to question the authorities was seen as getting personalised instead of politicised.
Empowerment for Sale
The 21st-century version of feminism has learnt to thrive in the marketplace. Empowerment has become somewhat of a commodity which one can buy. Be it clothing lines that proclaim equality, corporate campaigns that celebrate women leaders, and brands that promise liberation through consumption, the circle is an endless loop.
The real truth is that behind the faces of these multimillionaire brands, the products' supply chains exploit women workers, particularly in the Global South. Feminist messaging is used to sell products made in conditions that feminism originally sought to abolish. Representation is celebrated while redistribution is quietly ignored.
Yet feminism was never meant to make us more efficient workers within an unjust system. It was meant to make the system itself unrecognisable. Reclaiming feminism requires a return to its collective roots in labour movements, community organising, and political solidarity. It means centring care work, fighting for fair wages and safe working conditions, and recognising that liberation cannot be achieved in isolation. It asks us to move beyond representation and towards redistribution, beyond visibility and towards accountability.
Who Gets Left Behind?
The cost of this commodified feminism is most visible in who gets left behind. Market-friendly feminism tends to centre women who are already closest to power, upper-class, urban, able-bodied, and often upper-caste or racially privileged. The struggles of domestic workers, informal labourers, migrant women, disabled women, and queer and trans communities are either marginalised or rendered invisible. When feminism becomes a brand, it loses its ability to hold space for complexity, contradiction, and discomfort. It becomes easier to showcase diversity in advertisements than to address important issues such as wage theft, caste-based labour hierarchies, or the feminisation of poverty.
Social Media Feminism and the Performance Trap
Social media has further accelerated this shift of commercializing feminism. Platforms reward visibility, relatability, and aesthetic coherence often at the expense of depth and accountability. Feminist politics are increasingly performed rather than practised. Activism becomes content, outrage becomes cyclical, and personal branding often overshadows collective action.
While digital spaces have undeniably amplified women’s voices, they have also created pressure to package one’s politics in palatable, shareable ways. The result is a feminism that prioritises virality over impact and affirmation over disruption.
The Cost of Capitalist Feminism
There is also an emotional cost. Capitalist feminism insists that women must constantly improve themselves, be productive, resilient, healed, and grateful. Burnout is reframed as a personal failure rather than a structural outcome. Wellness culture steps in to offer self-care as a solution to systemic exhaustion, asking women to meditate their way out of exploitation instead of demanding institutional care. The language of empowerment is used to justify overwork, precarity, and the erosion of social safety nets.
Reclaiming Feminism Beyond the Market
To reclaim the feminist movement beyond the market its important to return to solidarity, unions, and community organising. Centring care work, labour rights, and economic justice is another way to do so. Feminism needs to be seen as a practice, not as a mere campaign or a byproduct of social media trends and consumerism.
Conclusion
Real feminism is not comfortable. It cannot be neatly branded or easily consumed. It demands that we question profit, power, and privilege even when doing so is inconvenient. In a world eager to sell us empowerment, choosing resistance is a radical act. Liberation, after all, was never meant to be for sale.
