Barkely and I agree that sexism exists and may be promoted under the
banner of
"family values." I am beginning to sound like Dan Quayle:). The initial
question had to do with unemployment figures and its relationship to
social institutions in East Asia. The fact that women are asked to quit
the labor market (after they get married) is seen as sexism. I have no
problem with this statement. The problem is that by imposing democratic
principles on non-democratic structures we do not get
gender-sensitive social arrangements.
Example: Constitutionally speaking the Indian government has far more
liberal-democratic principles than even the US, and especially with
respect to women, minorities, and other disadvantged social groups.
But what is the result? Limited emancipation of women and minorities,
mainly in urban areas and organized sectors. Both infanticide and
brideburning are heinous social acts but their reasons are far more
complex than "sexism" would imply. Modernity continues to be
superimposed on non-western, precapitalist practices: ultrasound
tests facilitate infanticide for the well-off, brideburning is the
result of dowry demands, often in terms of consumer durables. These
practices are also quite regional, at least in India, and certainly a
product of bourgeois revolution. More positively, this revolution has
allowed women to enter more traditional male-dominated fields such as
medicine, engineering, etc.
All said and done, sexism is unacceptable but we cannot wish it away.
But women in many non-western societies (not countries) have
traditionally enjoyed relatively acceptable status, as in Kerala (an Indian
state for example known for its social development success at very low levels
of income due to its matrilineal social arrangement, among other
things). I am skeptical that the west necessarily has more to say than
the east about gender and family relations. History is not progress and
it is not the end of history, at least not yet.
Anthony D'Costa
U of Washington
On Tue, 8 Mar 1994 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> I deliberately selected Japan as my example as it does
> not have such extended family economic relations. Although
> families play a profound role in traditional societies, I do
> not think we should therefore say nothing about relations
> between the sexes in them. In every society the suppression of
> women is carried out in the name of "family values." In East
> Asia we see such things as female infanticide and bride burning.
> They're sexist and it is abominable.
> Barkley Rosser
> James Madison University
>
>
