WOMEN AND POWER

[p. [1]] | [Page Image] Kathleen Drayton, Trinidad & Tobago Politics is about the control of power, and the political process is the mode by which power is acquired and used at different moments in historical time. Power is exercised in and by the State by those who man the State apparatus, and it is also exercised by human beings in the many and varied forms of social relationships. For reasons which would seem to lie more in the domain of culture, than of sexual difference, power in the public sphere, as well as in the area of human relations, is exercised by men. In the progress of humanity through different kinds of social organization it used to be believed that socialism would 'liberate' women; or, to put it differently, enable women to share power with men. We now know that the solution is not so simple. Following the 20th century experiences in the U.S.S.R., Europe, China, and in our own hemisphere, Cuba,[note] we recognise that although a revolution may change the political, social and economic structure of society it does not by itself abolish the oppression of women. In other words, changes in the super structure of the society do not automatically change the material oppression of women, or, radically, alter the sexual division of labour. Mao-Tse-Tung recognised this A man in China is usually subjected to the domination of three systems of authority (political authority, clan authority and religious authority) ... As for women, in addition to being dominated by these three systems of authority, they are also dominated by the man (the authority of the husband). These four authorities: - political, clan, religious and masculine [p. 2] | [Page Image] are the embodiment of the whole feudal-patriarchial ideology and system, and are the four thick ropes binding the Chinese people, particularly the peasants. (Mao-Tse-Tung: 1927: pp. 44-46) It is also the rationale of the Cuban Family Code (1977). Out of two revolutionary societies comes the implicit admission that while women, like men, may be oppressed by race and class the major oppression of women is by men, and by the social institution of the family. In both capitalist and socialist societies, the family continues to be important to the material survival of society. Writing about China, Delia Davin shows how the State, which was a revolutionary state, encouraged women to stay home to look after families. She says that in 1955:

under the slogans 'Housework is Glorious Too' and 'Let's be Pretty', a positive cult of the housewife was fostered, women were urged to seek fulfilment through raising a socialist family, and the pages of women's magazines were filled with recipes and dress patterns. The reaction of the 1960s, perhaps to avoid rousing the indignation of women cadres again, was less overtly anti-career woman, but still laid great stress on the joys of marriage and motherhood. (Davin: 1976: p. 301) The sexist division of labour in China continues. In a very recent article in the New York Times on "Re-educating China's 'Naughty Girls'", Beyers writes of a girls' reform type school for girls, 15-21 years old, who according to the principal had "disgraced themselves". "They either slept with naughty boys, ran away from home or were caught stealing." What is interesting here, is firstly, the evidence of control over female sexuality which is [p. 3] | [Page Image] still being exercised and secondly, the vocational training the girls receive. "We teach the children to sew." (Beyers: 1982:34) In both capitalist and socialist societies, it is women who perform the major tasks of social reproduction. By social reproduction I mean not only child-bearing and childrearing and child care, but all those managerial and other skills that constitute housekeeping. It is falsely assumed that it is "cash" earned outside that 'keeps' the home and maintains the family. This type of false consciousness creates demands that "women be integrated into the development process." The fact is that women have always played a major role in the development process of societies, but in the construction of social reality the material economic value of women's work within society is invisible. Women's contribution to development, and to capital accumulation is likewise invisible. The women's movement in the 20th century has grown in response to the need to reconstruct social reality. To refer to the women's movement as the women's liberation movement seems to me to put a wrong and strident emphasis on some lesser objectives of the movement, and to mask the major objective which is the transformation of human relationships and human society. It is illogical conceive of a just society for women alone. If society is to be more humane and just, all people must be involved and changed. Women's fight against sexism is not a struggle for female domination of society. In our Caribbean societies we suffer oppressions of class, race and sex. Man experience the first two but women are victims of all. This is not to say that all women are equally oppressed. Some women clearly suffer more serious and direct forms of oppression than others. Feminism, the women's movement, then is a movement against oppression within society, but, it takes, as its premise that the oppression of women is a special problem. While it has to be seen as part of wider [p. 4] | [Page Image]

forms of social domination in societies it also has to be isolated and analysed more seriously than was done by Engels, for example in the Origin of the Family Private Property and the State (1891) or by Lenin, who in a speech for Women's Day, talked of liberating women from "domestic slavery ... from their stupefying and humiliating subjugation to the eternal drudgery of the kitchen and the nursery ... to take part in socially productive labour." (Lenin: 1920 & 1938) Lenin himself didn't recognise the social value of work done in the home without which socially productive labour would be seriously hindered. While sexual oppression has to be combatted there may be some points in historical time in the societies when class, race or religious oppression may be more serious. At these times women may need to join in the struggle against these before taking up "women's issues". Feminism and the women's movement then is about the transformation of societies and about the reconstruction of social reality. It is therefore political in nature. Feminism as a conscious political movement is bourgeois in origin. This is why a great many women and men believe that changing the laws will give women equality. And a great many attempts "to give women equality" begin and end with law reform. The law is, however, itself a product of the economic and social system. In effect changing the law does not change the society, it simply seeks to accommodate women's demands within a social structure that exists and is dominated by man. Barbados and Cuba can point to progressive legislation in the form of Family Codes, but the law cannot and does not create equality. Mitchell in a discussion on the concept of equality argues that [p. 5] | [Page Image] under capitalism 'equality can only refer to equality under the law. Because it cannot take into account the fundamental inequities of the class society in which it is based, the law itself must treat men as a generalizable and abstract category, it must ignore not only their individual differences, their different needs and abilities, but the absolute differences in their social and economic position. (Mitchell: 1976:384) This argument can be applied to the problematic of the law in socialist societies as well, since in the transformation to socialism many inequalities remain in societies. The reform of laws is essential. It is important to have "equality before the law" but as Mitchell points out, the law 'which enshrines principles of freedom and equality' can often mask social inequalities. Although the women's movement is bourgecis in origin and in the Caribbean and Capitalist societies it has bourgeois leadership, it exists because of the political

struggles of women at all stages in history. Women struggled against the institution of slavery itself by physical struggle by activities which decreases production, and in many cases by controlling their fertility.[note]

In the post emancipation development of Caribbean societies working class women have played an important role in Trade Unions and political movements and much of this remains to be documented. This year in Barbados women waged a historic battle, both with their employers in garment factories and with their Union, the B.W.U., the most powerful Union in Barbados, to gain decent wages and working [p. 6] | [Page Image] conditions.[note] The struggle was a dramatic one and became a major public and political issue. The women who went to strike, and publicised their demands compelled the Union, with its predominantly male leadership, to take them and their demands seriously. The women won their fight because their action in calling in a rival and militant, but small, Union threatened to disrupt the whole society. The story of this struggle needs to be written for the historical record, but also, as a case study in the way capitalism uses female labour to make profits greater than they could make with male labour. And of course to record the contribution of women to the garment industry and thus to capital accumulation within the society.[note] It is this experience of action and struggle that shapes the consciousness of working class, and perhaps to a lesser extent, bourgeois women. Bourgeois women too have an experience of struggle, but it is of a different kind. The bourgeois woman's struggle is against discrimination in favour of men who have the same qualifications for a job. Bourgeois women's consciousness and awareness of discrimination in the Caribbean was perhaps sharpened by marriage.[note]

Until recent times marriage removed many rights from women. Married women could not own property in some countries, they could not be the guardians of their children and they could not be employed in Government or in some areas of the Private Sector. Married women were also the victims in the double standard of sexual morality. Marriage subordinated wives to husbands. The bourgeois woman's first hand experience of sexual discrimination began to be combined with education. Education not only sharpened awareness of inequality but provided bourgeois women with intellectual and theoretical tools to begin naming and analysing their situation. Only after describing and naming a problem can the search for its solutions begin. [p. 7] | [Page Image]

The women's movement in the Caribbean, except in Cuba and revolutionary Grenada, is fragmented, but in most territories where women are active in their demands for women's rights it seems to me that the class barrier has been partially bridged. This may be different from the experience of developed countries. But the people I know who are active on women's issues recognise a common cause among all women, working class and bourgeois. Being active on women's issues also leads to awareness of class and class division. The reasons why at this moment in historical time in the Caribbean conscious bourgeois women feel united in struggle with working-class women evolve from complex inter-relationship of education with the other structures of the society. The modernisation of society has created more jobs and paradoxicallly more unemployment, a better economic position for many women who can aspire to professional jobs, and a worse economic condition for a majority of working women. Barrow (1982:52 - 54) working with Barbadian working class women and Brodber (1982:18:19:29) with older Afro-Jamaican women found that one effect of urbanisation and a consumer economy is that women have been made more economically dependent on men. Brodber argues convincingly that older women were dependent on men for emotional and intellectual support but, not for economic support. Barrow argues that this growing economic dependence of women on men is related to the need for 'cash'. "Finding the support now more that ever", she argues "means finding cash." (Barrow: 1982:7) As modernisation created more jobs, more education had to be provided since education prepared the work force by teaching some intellectual skills and by inculcating ruling class values and attitudes to work and to property. Education increased, as the State needed more administrators, teachers and other cadres of worker. The increase in education benefitted girls, and provided [p. 8] | [Page Image] some, with access to some jobs formerly allocated only to men, but still of course nor to the positions of power and authority. The brakes placed on women's access to power exist in employment practices but they exist as well in the constructs of male and female role of gender, that both sexes accept. The construct of role is transmitted through the family and through the education system. (6) In the 19th century two education systems were set up in the Caribbean, an elementary system for the poor so that "property should not perish in the Colonies (Sterling, 1834). The secondary system was set up for the middle classes and in particular for a small number of boys and its objective was the development of the individual to his fullest potential. We imported this education system as well as the prevailing ideologies of the imperial power into the West Indian islands. Nowhere was this so striking as in education. In 19th century England the growth of capitalism in England deepened the sexist division of labour and created or added to a stereotype of women. Capitalism created wealth so that middle class women did not have to work and

indeed the status of a man and of a family was reflected by a man's ability to keep his wife at home. Women were deprived of paid employment and confined in homes to operate in a special and distinct and "more natural" sphere. Around women a whole stereotype of so-called feminine qualities developed: faithfulness, purity, obedience, passivity, docility, domestic management skills. (Burstyn: 1980: 30-46). Men were to be independent, aggressive and "heads" of women. "Active mastery" behaviour was expected of men. Thus girls who gained a middle class education learned not only different school subjects initially from boys, but different ways of behaving and responding. Girls learned that society had different expectations of them than of boys. This social construct of role is passed on through text-books and other curriculm materials, and by teachers in their different expectations of and relationships to boys and girls. [p. 9] | [Page Image] Views of male and female - gender - role play a large part in influencing occupational choices. Women's role in the family shapes perceptions by women of careers they can undertake. Massiah (1982) and Mohammad (1982), both found a high correlation between education and occupation in Barbados and Trinidad. Powell found in her study of women in families that 'women perceive themselves in traditional female roles, but the large majority are involved in activities traditionally assigned to the male' (Powell: 1982:31) and concluded that the "areas of sex-role learning needs attention." Marriage was never the form of most West Indian Unions although 19th century ideology taught, in complete contradiction to the social reality, that marriage was the norm. Massiah (1982) has identified four categories of Union. Married, Common Law, Visiting, Single but Powell found that "very few women were genuinely single." And Massiah states that "Women are strongly marriage-oriented" (Massiah: 1982:30). Part of the reason women want to marry is that many perceive marriage as a form of economic security. Marriage in most cases subordinates women to men, especially where the woman is not economically independent. Marriage is a shaky union where the man is not himself economically independent! Education as a major instrument of social control teaches values, and through its examination system fulfills the political functions of allocating people to the scarce resources in the society. Bourgeois women, and some men are excluded via the education system from many jobs of power and authority as the education system keeps demanding more and more qualifications for the same job. This discrimination experienced by women in the public area combined with experiences of discrimination in personal and sexual relationships creates the consciousness and the militancy to recognise the need to join with working class women in the struggle. [p. 10] | [Page Image] The Women's Movement is fundamentally revolutionary in character. Where it is weak is in its structures and organization. Women have experiences of organisations, but not of

ones through which they gain power. In part, the socializing function of education is one factor limiting ways women function in organisations. In a valuable study on Women in Organizations, Roberta Clarke looked at Political Parties and Church Organisations in Antigua, Barbados and St. Vincent. She found that except for one political party in Antigua, the A.C.L.M., membership in Women's "Arms" was smaller than women's membership in the party. These groups activities comprised fund-raising for the party and social welfare activities such as visiting orphanages and visiting the sick. Respondents felt strongly that women's "arms" were most instrumental in succesful campaigning of the main parties. The absence of women at high levels was explained by the lack of confidence and general distrust of the female ability on the part of other females. One strange finding was that the St. Vincent's Women's Arm of the Labour Party ran an airport restaurant which was found to be serviced by males and which ploughed its profits back into the St. Vincent Labour Party (Clarke: 1982:15-18). She illustrates women's acceptance of a supportive role with one respondent's statement "We will always be an arm." In contrast to other parties she found that the ACLM of Antigua, despite low female membership, "had managed to involve itself in activities where women are the chief beneficiaries and have great potential for female development. (Clarke: Ibid: p. 19) The ACLM runs a co-op farm, a training and a Peoples' Consumer Co-op., comprised of women who manage a grocery. She found that in all the islands the aims of Church organizations which include more women than political organizations [p. 11] | [Page Image] were similar, firstly there was a concern for human life, for women's spiritual development and for the promotion of unity among Church women. She cites Steady (1976) that Protestant Women's Associations in Sierra Leone have three functions: 1. They support the Church financially 2. They contribute to the main-stream of male dominated clergy by providing alternative tasks for women leaders and 3. They help maintain the double standard of morality in terms of marital life "where the onus of maintaining sexual chastity before and after marriage falls on the woman alone. She found that compared to other women's organizations, church groups were better organised. Also that the majority of women are not members of organizations and that (my emphasis) an "important proportion of women do not perceive that groups to which they belong are concerned with women's problems p. 29. Although many did not belong to organisations and had a poor view of how they functioned women never-the-less felt

that it was important to be a member of an organization. Perhaps the realisation of what needs to be done and of an incipient understanding of how organizations can function to achieve positive goals exists. How women function in political and other organizations in other territories needs to be explored. In Guyana for example, the P.P.P. has had a Women's Group, the ruling P.N.C. has the Women's Revolutionary Socialist Movement (WRSM) and in the smaller W.P.A. women are integrated with men in the leadership of the party. How women function within these organizations and what power and authority they have in wider party decisions is worth exploring. [p. 12] | [Page Image] Trinidad, my own country, has a long history of militant working women from the end of the 19th century and women were important and influential in the strike of 1919 and in the Negro Welfare Association (NWA) (Rennie: 1974: 21: 46: 67) which helped Butler rise to power. Rhoda Reddock has written on the Garment Industry in Trinidad. At present the law is being reformed and women are active at many levels in many types of organizations, though none to my knowledge are in leadership roles. I have deliberately not generalised about Jamaica or Grenada since women representatives of political organizations are among us with first hand and up to date information. Women need structures and organisations in the first place as support groups but they need them as well to organise within and against the structures of male power. Some Caribbean governments have bowed to Women's demands and have ser up Women's Bureaux, or, Departments of Women's Affairs, and Caricom has created a Women's Desk. But Women in these posts are part of the hierarchical bureaucratic structure under male decision-markers. This may impede the important work they can do in putting women in touch with each other and in pushing forward Women In Development issues and programmes. I think too, it is fair to say, that these departments function with no clear ideological directions. Their work is pragmatic. Our societies are dominated by hierarchical bureaucratic structures which we need to organise to challenge. The structures embed patterns of dominance and impersonal chains or networks of command. The central burenucracy is a model for other systems in the society. Bureaucracies shape human relationships and they are fundamentally undemocratic and anti-woman. In the transformation of societies new models of less centralised structures need to [p. 13] | [Page Image]

be devised. The women's movement in our region needs to seek power by knowledge of our situations in the Caribbean via research, by raising consciousness and by political action. Our problems are local, but they are also transcultural. I want to end with a quotation which seems relevant: Women as a group traditionally have been powerless. While some women, at times, have been able to overcome resistance and gain what they want, such instances of women exercising power are isolated and individual. This is power for women in a very limited - and insignificant sense. Lacking collective power, having no support for her position in custom practice or law, the woman struggling for what she wants is unable to assure that any gain she achieves will stick. For we lack political power, the ability to alter power relationships in the public sector which embody and support sexism (Rothschild: 1976:23) or to put it more succintly "Let the power fall on I". [p. 14] | [Page Image]