Is Relational Autonomy a Plausible Ideal for Postcolonial Women?

Abstract This paper examines whether relational autonomy can serve as a plausible ideal for postcolonial women despite persistent critiques that autonomy functions as a vehicle of liberal imperialism. It aims to reconstruct relational autonomy in a way that disrupts the epistemic hierarchy between Anglo-European and postcolonial contexts. To this end, it introduces the “axis of imperial imposition,” an analytical dimension that assesses how liberal-imperialist institutions condition the formation of volitional commitments and the exercise of agency in contexts where liberal normative frameworks are encountered through foreign imposition. Through the hypothetical case of “Western-oriented woman,” the paper argues that internalist accounts, which address epistemic hierarchy primarily through individual authenticity, are insufficient for this axis. It instead defends dialogical accounts that shift the focus to dialogical reflexivity and answerability, showing how postcolonial women can retain autonomy through local justificatory dialogue grounded in concrete socio-historical contexts. The paper further argues that self-regard in “creative appropriation”—the competence to reconfigure life-constructing materials from one’s situated knowledge—is necessary for the proper functioning of such dialogue. It concludes that postcolonial women’s autonomy is secured not by passively adopting liberal normative frameworks as universal standards but by actively reconfiguring them through locally grounded justificatory practices.