A 'Macro' View on Equal Sharing of Responsibilities Between Women and Men

• Author: V. Esquivel
• Publication Date: Oct 2008

How can macro-economic thinking and policy help to advance the equal sharing of responsibilities between women and men? This paper seeks to suggest that, in relation to care, complex processes of cultural and economic mutual determination are in place with both cultural and economic 'results'. Care is necessary, yet undervalued; not intrinsically gendered as a category, yet women bear a disproportionate share of the costs. The paper argues that micro-level approaches to the re-distribution of care costs may not be viable in developing countries, as they will experience overall 'care deficits' i.e. the total available State and private resources to provide care are insufficient. Macro level thinking and responses can help, if they focus on the absolute levels of well-being that should be achieved in any given society, on the one hand, and on who bears the costs of providing care, on the other. Time-use data reveals how poor macro-economic policies, such as structural adjustment programs, have made gender inequalities in care responsibilities worse. Women have provided a disproportionally high level of unpaid care work that the State has elected it will not. Yet analysis shows that 'efficiency gains' would be made if this high and often hidden cost was actually provided by 'public' infrastructure. The paper defines two broad categories (macro-levels and micro-levels) of policies that could be put in place to fill care deficits and increase gender equality, and approaches for evaluating them. For example:

? The State has a fundamental responsibility to provide minimum care services
? Direct job creation (of decent work), in particular in sectors that reduce unpaid care work burdens, could contribute to fill care deficits and provide income to workers
? Social policies should be designed to contribute to tackle gender inequalities in care burdens, instead of taking them for granted and building on them; and to truly alter the distribution of entitlements and income.

‘Early Marriage’ for Us, ‘Atrocities’ for Her

I’m usually perplexed about the concept of ‘early marriage’ (‘yale edime gabicha’ ) which I have been hearing and using for years. I learned from a young age that this has been categorized as a harmful practice that should be eradicated. And this phrase that we use strike me so much that it doesn’t reveal what happens to that female child. Scholars and legal analysts for long have argued on the use of 'early' and 'child' marriage for long. One point of view is to use the term 'child marriage' as the threshold for adulthood is 18 years (with few exceptions). I personally think we should use the term 'child' instead of 'early' in all circumstances as the word shows that the rights of these children and the obligation of the state and other actors should be based primarily based on child rights instruments/laws. Moreover, the use of 'child marriage' by itself does not show who the main victims are 'the female children'.

However, the issue with such phrasing does not stop there. The word marriage does not depict what happens in such arrangements. For the female children, the space 'female child marriage' is where series of atrocities are committed against them. To mention a few , these female children are victims of criminal/otherwise acts such as  repeated sexual assaults/slavery, child labor, emotional and physical torture, isolation and abandonment, early pregnancy and related health risks. These acts are seen as a great harm as individual acts, but not when they are committed as series of actions within the feel safe word 'marriage' that we have chosen to call it. Let's call it what it is, not what makes us feel better.                   

The Solution to end early marriage?

I read an article about a study made in three  rural areas of China which suggests  that girls marry early whenever  there is a significant  spousal age difference.Moreover, girls in joint family systems marry earlier than girls in conjugal family systems. Do you think we need to work on decreasing  the spousal age difference and changing family systems as a strategy to work against female child marriage in Ethiopia?