The reproduction of difference: gender and the global division of labour
The new global division of labour is bringing about huge changes in who does what work, how, when and where. But this dynamic new landscape is shaped by some very old forces. The gender division of labour in the home still, directly or indirectly, plays a dominant role in determining the very different experiences of women and men in this new global labour market, although it faces multiple new contradictions and stresses in a context of rising female employment and mass migration: clashes between traditional and modern values; shifting boundaries between work that is paid and unpaid, formal and informal; and a situation where the time pressures on one group of women may only be resolved through the ‘grey’ labour of others, often migrants. Drawing on research in Asia, Africa, Europe and America, this issue explores and analyses some of these dilemmas and describes how women are addressing them in their daily lives, in the process raising new questions for future research.
Contents
The reproduction of difference: gender and the global division of labour
Ursula Huws
The interplay of gender, work and family in Portuguese families
Marisa Matias, Cláudia Andrade and Anne Marie Fontaine
Unpaid work, capital and coercion
Norene Pupo and Ann Duffy
Domestic work in France and Italy: comparative case studies on the contemporary diffusion of informal employment
Elisabetta Pernigotti
The feminised service sector: from micro to macro analysis
Babs Grossman
Trading on gender: the perversity of Asian labour exports as an economic development strategy
Stuart Rosewarne
‘Even though I work, I am not a whore’: women working in Zanzibar
Thembi Mutch
Is a widening gender wage gap necessarily caused by a glass ceiling? a case study from Uganda
Irene van Staveren
Gender, globalisation and empowerment: a study of women who work in Sri Lanka’s Export Processing Zones
Peter Hancock, Sharon Middleton and Jamie Moore
Work organisation, labour & globalisation 