Women in China can hold up half the SkyJune 3rd, 2014BCFL/VDLC Delegation

The status of women in pre-1949 period

(551-479 BC)

• Inferior vs. superior• Inner space vs. outer space• “women without talent is virtuous”

Historically women’s family status and social status were very low “A women must obey her father before

marriage, she must obey her husband after marriage and she should also obey her sons after the death of her husband”

Concubines, child brides, foot-binding

Women’s role in Chinese Revolution Women to be freed from the whole

feudal-patriarchal system and ideology

Mao’s Report on the Peasant Movement in Hunan (February 1927)

Women subject to the political authority, the clan authority, the religious authority and the authority of the husband – ‘four thick ropes’

Women supported the Chinese revolution

Miu Boying, the 1st female member of the CCP, joined the party in 1921

Women’s status in the Socialist period (1949-1978) Legal status

• The Common Program (September 21, 1949), considered the Constitution before 1954.

• The implementation of the new Marriage Law (1950)

• Women were encouraged to participate social production, become full members of the working class

• Lenin was often quoted: “In order to emancipate women thoroughly and to realize real equality between women and men, it is necessary to have public economy to let women participate in joint production and labour, and then women would stand in the same position as men.”

• Mao in the mid-1950s: women “form a vast reserve of labour power which should be tapped in the struggle to build a great socialist country.”

• In the 1960s: “Women and men are the same. What men can do, women can do too.”

• “Women can hold up half the sky”

• The government believe that through employment, women would acquire economic independence and access to social resources which they could use in bargaining to improve their position.

• Founded in March 1949

• Originally named as the All-China Democratic Women's Federation

• 1957, Women’s Federation of the PRC

• 1978, All-China Women’s Federation

• 1995, NGO

The All-China Women’s Federation (ACWF)

Mission: To represent and to safeguard women’s rights and interests, and to promote equality between men and women.

• Women’s liberation in the urban area

• Mobilization of rural women

• Women in the urban area• Broke the old division of labour – women entered

professions formerly hold only by men• Wage distribution according to occupation and equal

pay for equal work• Legal protection of the labour rights and interests

• Legal protection of the labour rights and interests• Regulations on Labour Insurance (1953)• The Regulations on the Protection of Female

Workers (1956)

• Mobilization of rural women• Labour shortage in agriculture• Drew women into full-time productive labour in the

fields as well as in light industries• The socialization of household work

Women’s status after 1978

In 2000, the then Premier Zhu Rongji said: “China will continue to reform state-owned enterprises. Ten years ago, our state-owned enterprises accounted for around 2/3 of the entire national economy, but now they account for only around 1/3 – reorganizing them and then listing them on the securities markets.”

Source: Barry Naughton, The Chinese Economy, Figure 8.2 on page 187, 2007.

Laid-off and Unemployed Workers

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004

Mil

lio

n

Laid-off (Xiagang) Workers

Registered Unemployed

Newly Laid-off During Year

• Age• Most laid-off workers are middle-aged. The proportion of laid-

off workers in the 36-40 age group accounted for 20.1%; that in the 41-45 age group accounted for 13.1%, and that in the 46-50 age group accounted for 13.1%. The total of these three age groups accounted for 52.3%.

• Gender• Women workers experienced a harder time than male workers

and were more highly represented among the unemployed.

• Education• Women were blamed ‘suzhi di (low-human capital

accumulation)’

“Let women return home”

• In the 1980s• “Let women return home” and leave the limited work

opportunities to “the most excellent and most efficient group” – men

• Accompanied by a “periodic employment” system for women

• The end of 2000 and early 2001• Discussions on adopting a “periodic employment” system for

women

• This policy failed to be written into the 10th Five-Year Plan of National Economy and Social Development

• Equal employment opportunities for women

New urban poor

• Once laid-off, these workers quickly become the new urban poor

• Only partially paid or not paid

• Less adequate safety net

• By 2001, between 20 million and 30 million laid-off workers fallen into poverty nationwide, accounting for almost 13% of the urban population.

• Loss of political privilege and social status that once accompanied membership in the category of “worker”

• The whole working-class: income; social insurance

• The Minimum Livelihood Guarantee Project (dibao)

• In 1999, the central government initiated a nationwide social assistance project.

• Targeted vulnerable groups, most of them losing their jobs in the urban areas, including those low- or un-skilled, chronically ill or disabled.

2011 New Year1

The rise of precarious work Domestic service Other service work that requires

femininity, sexuality and deference

• Comparing to the manufacturing workers, the service worker, alienates crucial aspects of her personality, sexuality, friendliness, and deference, in the production of profit (Hochschild, 1983)

• Iron rice bowl—the rice bowl of youth

Workers in manufacturing

• Working conditions• Does working in multinational corporations necessarily mean

better working conditions

• No!

Conclusion Women’s status has been challenged in

some areas Public policy for women