"As Sarah Hanley has noted, “The maxim 'there are no slaves in France' supported the legal cases of enslaved African women and men who were brought from the colonies into France, filed suits of freedom in French courts, and won.” Hanley 1997, 45. Within the framework of gender studies, Pateman has argued that “most liberal theories would with to argue that there is one relationship, at least, to which consent ought not to be given. A person ought never to consent to be a slave, because this totally negates the individual's freedom and equality and hence, in a self contradiction, denies that the individual is capable of consent.” Pateman 1980, 162-163."