2 SOCIAL SCIENTIST state intervention in the macro economy, its impact on women's labour and related questions of technical skills and women's unequal access to formal education. In 'Problems for a Contemporary Theory of Gender', taking a position against the substantialist, humanist and universalising assumptions of secularism and democracy, Susie Tharu and Tejaswini Niranjana explore the ambiguities in women's visibility and the deployment of the language of 'feminism' in issues involving caste and religious affiliation. Their essay discusses the anti-Mandal agitation, the murder of dalits in Chunduru, women active in the cause of Hindutva, the representation of women's engagement in the anti-arrack movement in Andhra Pradesh, and the propagation of contraceptives such as the abortifacient pill, hormone implants and injectibles. KUMKUM SANGARI