Gender roles have been studied and developed
for quite over a period, especially in most developing countries. An articled,
entitled “Intrahousehold Bargaining
Among Women Workers in Thailand's
Northern Region Industrial Estate” by Dr. Gullinee Mutakalin, Faculty of Economics from Chulalongkorn University, Thailand, specifically evaluate the effects of
women’s participation in Export Processing Zones (EPZs) on women’s bargaining
power by using Thailand’s Northern Region Industrial Estate (NRIE) as a case
study. The result shows that the relocation of production of certain kinds of
manufactured products from the developed countries to the developing countries
such as Thailand leads to rapid incorporation of women into the labor market.
This integration certainly affects women workers’ intrahousehold bargaining
power. It certainly showed that NRIE work has both negative and positive
impacts on women workers’ bargaining power vis-à-vis their husbands as well as
hired women workers.
On the
one hand, NRIE work provides an opportunity for qualified women to enter into
formal employment. It helps
increase the contribution of NRIE women workers to total household income with
their mainstay provider position. Therefore, NRIE
women workers have strong fallback positions vis-à-vis their husbands. This existing evidence
strongly challenges the common assumption that export factory women workers
homogeneously suffer from insecurity and lower wages. On
the contrary, hired women workers have weak fallback positions vis-à-vis their
husbands considering their secondary provider positions.
The
result shows that the relocation of production of certain kinds of manufactured
products from the developed countries to the developing countries such as
Thailand leads to rapid incorporation of women into the labor market. This
integration certainly affects women workers’ intrahousehold bargaining power.
It certainly showed that NRIE work has both negative and positive impacts on
women workers’ bargaining power vis-à-vis their husbands as well as hired women
workers.
On the
one hand, NRIE work provides an opportunity for qualified women to enter into
formal employment. It helps
increase the contribution of NRIE women workers to total household income with
their mainstay provider position. Therefore, NRIE
women workers have strong fallback positions vis-à-vis their husbands. This existing evidence
strongly challenges the common assumption that export factory women workers
homogeneously suffer from insecurity and lower wages. On
the contrary, hired women workers have weak fallback positions vis-à-vis their
husbands considering their secondary provider positions.
NRIE women workers are poor compared to women workers in
developed countries and the professional Thai women workers. But they are
relatively well-off compared to most of their counterparts in the villages
including hired women workers. As a result, NRIE employment decomposes
women’s subordination due to their contribution to household income. This
economic contribution should create a material base that increases NRIE women’s
bargaining power within households.
In
addition, this result also reiterates the
worsening rural conditions in rural areas in terms of land availability,
employment as well as earning opportunities in the unreliable agricultural
sector, which are the main problem facing most rural households including women workers’ households. Thai economic
development policies for many decades have been streamlined toward a more urban
and export orientation while discouraging the agriculture and rural sector.
The
economic development process not only changes the structure of the Thai
economy, but it has significant consequences for a skewed distribution of
economic activities via rising national income disparities.
The results of
this study help elaborate this explanation, particularly the unreliability of
the agricultural sector and employment, while pushing most rural people into
informal employment. Therefore, NRIE women
workers are included in formal employment, which brings sources of foreign
exchange to Thailand. But this economic development model at the same time is
built on the back of women while deteriorates other members of households. As a result, the struggle for a qualitatively different
development model, which alters the socioeconomic context that women are
positioned in, is required if we would like to increase women’s bargaining
power.
However,
NRIE employment does not change various aspects of household decision making to
any degree even though some NRIE women workers may have more say in
household decision making compared to hired women workers. In this study, it is clear that NRIE employment does not
alter housework allocation and the sexual division of labor in households. This
subservience is related to matrilineality and matrifocality, which combine
age-gender hierarchies in most NRIE women workers’ households. NRIE employment improves the economic status of women
workers and their households but it makes little change to gender egalitarian
direction in their households. Therefore,
NRIE work intensifies women’s subordination as related to household decision
making and housework allocation.
For this reason, more specific policies, which help by
increasing women’s bargaining power, need to be considered, for example,
programs or policies which support comparable worth among females and males;
programs or policies which help by relieving women’s double days; programs or
policies which generate support directly in the area that women take
responsibility for such as the area linked with household welfare or
well-being; programs or policies which create egalitarian social value and
gender relations atmosphere in society and the household, etc.
In
sum, the results of this study showed that a household
is not a black box with harmonious interests but it contains a dynamic of
various dimensions of controlling, managing, and a decision making process. This
study also asserts that women’s participation in NRIE can intensify and
decompose the existing forms of gender subordination while recompose new forms
of gender subordination at the same time. While NIRE women workers are
relatively well-off compared to hired women workers, they are
more subservient under an age hierarchy in households due to the strong
influence of matrilineality and matrifocality.
For
more detailed information about this article, please upload full paper from http://www.econ.nida.ac.th/components/com_booklibrary/ebooks/Pages%20from%20ner9-1-2558-47-71.pdf