Call for Papers

Gender, Families and Labour: Reflections on the Asian Experiences
ICAS-IIAS panel Berlin, Germany, 9-12 August 2001

Studies on labour movements, migration and labour relations have often focused on unions, workplaces or policies regulating labour as units of analyses with clearly defined boundaries. Despite the contribution of feminist scholarship and household studies, studies on Asian labour whether men or women, are still often looking at communities where workers live and the families of which they are members, separately from the public sphere. 'Workplace' and 'home' are often seen as dichotomies that generate different dynamics and therefore need different tools of analysis. In the last two decades it has been shown how closely interlinked these two spheres are. The family and community are crucial in workers' networks and survival.
In the past some scholars contended that decisions to work are usually made not by individuals but by families. 'Family strategies' were considered to define the timing, the kind of work and the allocation of income of individual workers. Family linkages often provide both the financial and the cultural capital which make employment possible. On the other hand workers' autonomy and independence are also often undermined by family relations and obligations. It is to these tensions that we would like to focus on. Since the political involvement of workers, men and women, are usually considered to occur only out of the home, we should look more at the kind of solidarities, alliances, tensions that people build through their family relations and networks should be considered more carefully. Women and men play different roles in these networks. To what extent do these inhibit or facilitate the emergence of collective or individual action to challenge existing power structures?

Research questions:
How do kinship systems influence the way workers are recruited, absorbed into the labour market and shape the kinds of networks they form and identities they adopt? From the side of the workers what kind of tensions do these family links create? How does the gendered nature of these kin-based relations affect the workers' position at the place of work? How does the redefinition of familial relations and gender ideologies at the place of work affect the family relations and structures at home? We would welcome case studies and also theoretical reflections on the basis of comparative and/or historical data.
Titles and abstracts to be sent in before 20 April 2001

Organized by CLARA.
Contact Persons: Dr. Ratna Saptari or Prof. Marcel van der Linden
International Institute of Social History Cruquiusweg 31 1019 AT Amsterdam
tel. +31-20-66.858.66 fax. +31-20-66.541.81

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