Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State & Society - recent issues

Gender, Class, and Varieties of Capitalism

Mandel, H., Shalev, M. — 2009-06-08

The "Varieties of Capitalism" (VoC) perspective is innovative and challenging for the comparative study of gender stratification. However, the project of "gendering the VoC" has some serious shortcomings. While the economic functionalism of VoC theory is in principle gender-neutral, it is in fact implicitly predicated on a man's world. A key proposition of the model, that social protection contributes to the functioning of labor markets is not applicable to women. Moreover, the model's blindness to political forces that are critical to women's employment limits its ability to explain cross-country variations in a major dimension of gender stratification. The VoC perspective is more valuable in explaining differences in women's insertion into the job structure. However, its insights into the effects of skills regimes on women's employment opportunities can be enhanced by attending to the intersection between class and gender. Skill specificity, the critical causal mechanism identified by VoC theorists, has different implications for women in different class positions.

Gender, Inequality, and Capitalism: The "Varieties of Capitalism" and Women

Estevez-Abe, M. — 2009-06-08

How Gendering the Varieties of Capitalism Requires a Wider Lens

Rubery, J. — 2009-06-08

Varieties of Patriarchal Capitalism

Folbre, N. — 2009-06-08

This paper joins Mandel and Shalev in calling for more attention to gender dynamics within the Varieties of Capitalism (VoC) literature. However it urges readers to recognize the contribution of social reproduction to production, and to question whether the term "capitalism" accurately captures the most important features of the social formation that we live in.

Is Gender Inequality Greater at Lower or Higher Educational Levels? Common Patterns in the Netherlands, Sweden, and the United States

2009-06-08

We compare how gender inequality varies by educational level in the Netherlands, Sweden, and the United States, representing three different welfare regimes: the conservative, the social democratic, and the liberal. With few exceptions, gender inequality in labor force participation, work hours, occupational segregation, and housework are less severe as education goes up in all three countries, with the root cause being the high employment levels of well-educated women. Despite a common pattern across nations, we note that the educational gradient on gender equality in employment is weaker in Sweden. De-familialization policies in Sweden no doubt increase gender equality at the bottom by pulling less-educated women into the work force. One form of gender equality, wages, however, does not increase with education. In the United States, educational differences in the gender gap in wages are trivial; in Sweden and the Netherlands, the gender wage gap is greatest for the highly educated because of higher returns to education for men than women in these nations.

A Nordic Nirvana? Gender, Citizenship, and Social Justice in the Nordic Welfare States

Lister, R. — 2009-06-08

The Nordic model has emerged as some kind of exemplar in much center-left political debate. This overview article starts with a brief account of this political positioning and of the values underpinning the Nordic model. The main focus, however, is the extent to which the Nordic welfare states have been successful in promoting a women-friendly, gender-inclusive model of citizenship, taking account of the differences between the Nordic countries. It offers both a "half-full" and a "half-empty" analysis and ends with the challenge posed to the Nordic model by growing ethnic diversity.

Governance Reforms and Rural Women in India: What Types of Women Citizens are Produced by the Will to Empower?

Everett, J. — 2009-06-08

In 1993, the Government of India reserved one-third of the seats in rural councils (panchayats) for women, and along with NGOs, set up programs to empower rural women. We examine the usefulness of a Foucauldian governmentality framework in analyzing how women participants in panchayati raj institutions in Pune District, India, have been produced and the ways in which they respond. We conclude that the emphasis of a strong Foucauldian perspective on structure at the expense of agency obscures the complexity of women's responses. In contrast, a weak Foucauldian perspective is able to recognize that in some cases these incorporation processes create assertive, reformist, and resourceful citizens.

The Politics of Women's Economic Independence

Huber, E., Stephens, J. D., Bradley, D., Moller, S., Nielsen, F. — 2009-03-03

We identify the political conditions that shape the economic position of married/cohabiting women and of the economically most vulnerable group of women—single mothers. Specifically, we examine the determinants of reductions in single mothers' poverty rate due to taxes and transfers, and women's wages relative to spouses'/ partners' wages. The Luxembourg Income Study archive yields an unbalanced panel with 71 observations on 15 countries. The principal determinants of poverty reduction due to taxes and transfers are left government, constitutional veto points, and welfare generosity. The relative wage of women in couples is a function mainly of female labor force participation, part time work among women, and women's mobilization. In explaining the causal pathways to these outcomes, we highlight the interrelationships of welfare state, care, and labor market policies.

Making the Implicit Explicit: Gender Influences on Social Spending in Twelve Industrialized Democracies, 1980-99

Bolzendahl, C. — 2009-03-03

Despite the theoretical relevance of gender influences and a body of gender and feminist literature demonstrating the importance of changing gender relations on social policy, quantitative analyses have been slow to incorporate their impact. Thus, little is known about the importance of gender-specific measures in comparison to more established influences, or about the relative impact of the differing potential gendered pressures themselves. To address this gap, I theorize gender-relevant measures in economic, family, and political arenas, and appraise them alongside established influences. Though influences from each sphere emerge as consequential, the effects are not equal. Results across twenty years and twelve industrialized democracies show that women's legislative presence has the strongest overall effect, but spending outcomes are the most generous when all gender influences work in conjunction. Implications of these results for extending welfare state theory and research are discussed.

Gender and Occupation in Market Economies: Change and Restructuring Since the 1980s

Webb, J. — 2009-03-03

This paper compares employment restructuring, gender, and occupational change in Japan, Sweden, the UK, and the USA, since the 1980s. Its analytical framework is derived from feminist debates about the relative influence of political–economic skill regimes and cultural ideologies of gender on occupational sex segregation. In each country, the shift towards services has further concentrated men's dominance of employment in extractive and transformative industries. Pre-existing patterns of occupational segregation between the sexes have not however been universally reinforced. A degree of occupational upgrading has facilitated women's movement into a growing range of professional and managerial occupations, but the extent of economic opportunity for women is not a simple function of labor market economics. The social–democratic, egalitarian values and policies of Sweden, for example, seem to have offered greater economic benefits to women than the more individualized, liberalized labor market policies of the UK. In conclusion, it is argued that gender and markets are mutually constitutive; their evolution is not pre-given but subject to political choices informed by history and culture.

Work-Life Balance: A Case of Technical Disempowerment?

McManus, R. — 2009-03-03

Work–life balance (WLB) is an emblematic strategy to achieve well-being for Third Way governments around the world and an exercise in nurturing self-actualizing and entrepreneurial citizens. By reading a case study of New Zealand's Labour WLB project through a poststructuralist perspective, I demonstrate that Third Way WLB policy projects are technical exercises in ethicalization. These practices serve to de-contextualize and de-politicize the terrain of well-being. This analysis highlights a contradiction in Third Way agendas to address the well-being of the needy because they disempower those they seek to empower.

Racializing the "Social Development" State: Investing in Children in Aotearoa/New Zealand

Elizabeth, V., Larner, W. — 2009-03-03

This paper focuses on the claim that the child is emerging as a key figure of social governance. International studies suggest that as liberal welfare states increasingly draw on social investment discourse, the child—particularly the child-as-worker-in-becoming—has emerged as an iconic figure. This has resulted in the child becoming the central subject of social policies and programs and the focus of new spending priorities. In Aotearoa/New Zealand, however, the figure of the child is much less prominent than elsewhere. Moreover, in the policies and programs of the New Zealand "social development" state, the child is often racialized by virtue of its location within specific family groupings and geographical communities. In turn, this has implications for the positioning of women. As we show, the child/mother who stands to benefit from the "investments" of social development in Aotearoa/New Zealand is actually more likely to be a Pakeha child/mother, whereas the child/mother requiring continued programmatic intervention is more likely to be Maori or Pacific. This finding points to the need for feminist scholars to examine further the complex interpenetration of gender and race/ethnicity in the shaping of contemporary socio-political landscapes.

Introduction: The Veil: Debating Citizenship, Gender and Religious Diversity

Kilic, S., Saharso, S., Sauer, B. — 2008-12-09

Tu felix Austria? The Headscarf and the Politics of 'Non-issues'

Gresch, N., Hadj-Abdou, L., Rosenberger, S., Sauer, B. — 2008-12-09

Austria has one of the most tolerant regulations concerning the expression of religious beliefs and practices in the public realm in Europe. Concerning the headscarf, the Austrian legislation does not know any restrictions on wearing headgear—neither for cultural nor for security reasons – if wearing a veil is clearly related to religious reasons. These liberal legal regulations have even been strengthened during the recent years. In line with this legal framework, public disputes over religious attire worn in public institutions have remained rather modest in Austria compared with other Western liberal democracies. However, the tolerant legal regulations are contrasted with rather palpable racist attitudes within the Austrian population, the recent adoption of restrictive immigration and integration policies and right-wing parties that systematically foster sentiments against immigrants. This paper explores these diverging policy-strategies by focusing on structures and institutions that account for Austria's tolerant approach towards veiling and argues that it is the legacy of Austria's "pluralistically inclusive" state-church relation, which provides special institutional structures and procedures to deal with religious issues as well as the dominant framing that constitute the tolerant context for Muslim practices. By focusing on the current headscarf debates, the paper indicates that this silent compromise is getting fragile due to the re-framing strategies of right-wing parties in the context of an ethno-cultural citizenship regime that describes Muslims in Austria as cultural or ethnic and not as religious others.

The British Veil Wars

Kilic, S. — 2008-12-09

The British Veil Wars maps the space of the British debates on Islamic women's apparel and identifies the political conditions and structures that direct the non regulation of its practice in public institutions, such as schools. The article argues that despite the poignant political dilemmas caused by the 2006 ‘veil debate’ on the niqab (face veil) statutory regulation against its practice was not foreshadowed and the reasons most succinctly identified against its non - regulation is due to not only Britain's citizenship regime but also because of the church and state establishment as well as Article 9 of the European Commission of Human Rights. The article leads to reflections about the process by which the veil became constructed as a response to the political imperatives and failures of British multiculturalism.

Contentious Citizenship: Policies and Debates on the Veil in the Netherlands

Saharso, S., Lettinga, D. — 2008-12-09

In this contribution, we present an analysis of the regulations and public debates regarding the veil in the Netherlands between 1999 and 2006, thereby exploring the idea that the framing and regulating of veiling reflect national traditions of citizenship. In line with our hypothesis that the legacy of pillarization makes religious identity claims highly legitimate in the Netherlands, we found regulations to be accommodating. In the Dutch legal debate, the veil was mainly discussed in terms of neutrality. Sustaining our hypothesis was also the relatively large presence of Muslim(a)s in the public debate and public opinion being in favor of accommodation. Yet, when the claim for recognition concerned headscarves in the police force and judiciary or the Islamic face-cover (niqab and burqa) the Dutch reacted more divided. A shift has occurred over the years, in that gender equality frames have come to resonate more successfully in the public debate, and with a stronger association of the veil with concerns about social cohesion, integration, and the moral limits of public behavior. Our findings suggest that the Dutch multicultural citizenship tradition is under pressure and contingent on power relations between political parties and political events on a national and international level. To account for this gradual shift over time we suggest a historicizing theory of citizenship models.

Citizenship and Intersectionality: German Feminist Debates about Headscarf and Antidiscrimination Laws

Rottmann, S. B., Ferree, M. M. — 2008-12-09

As European nations grapple with when and how to extend inclusive citizenship to their Muslim minorities, the parameters of Muslim women's citizenship have jumped to the forefront of feminist concern. Much of the debate internationally has revolved around veiling, but we argue that this is only one element of how ethnic, religious, and other differences among women are addressed. In this paper, we choose two cases which highlight political choices surrounding intersectionality for German feminists: headscarf laws and antidiscrimination laws. Both laws are inherently intersectional, with significant and differential impact on Muslim women, but German feminists have engaged in these two issues quite differently. The so-called headscarf debate has drawn intense feminist involvement but changes in antidiscrimination law are rarely discussed in feminist media. We attempt to explain this difference by focusing on how solidarity-across-difference is understood: as a strategic alliance around multiple axes of difference or as using the state as an ally to help "other" women address their special needs.

Veiling and Headscarf-Skepticism in Turkey

Saktanber, A., Corbacioglu, G. — 2008-12-09

This paper is an attempt to analyze the transformation of the Islamic headscarf from being a private question of piety to a public question of freedom of religious expression. It argues that such a transformation constitutes not only the foundations of the emergence of the headscarf issue but also what we call headscarf-skepticism. The long-lasting headscarf issue has reached a point of deadlock once again due to the reactions of the secular sections of society to the recent efforts of the government to lift the headscarf ban. Different uses and meanings of the Islamic headscarf have reached an increased complexity since the foundation of the republic. It is argued that this complexity is due first to the elements of the history of the Turkish Republic, second to the emergence of new state–society relations, and third to the accelerated developments in the conflict between Islamists and secularists.

Questioning Women's Movement 'Strategies': Australian Activism on Work and Care

Andrew, M. — 2008-12-09