Tension in the Family: Exploration of Gender Relation in the Family

Tension in the Family: Exploration of Gender Relation in the Family.

A Research Paper presented by:

BILLEN KEBEDE TESISSA

(Ethiopia)

In partial fulfilment of the requirements for obtaining the degree of

MASTERS OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT STUDIES

Specialization:

Women Gender Development
(WGD)

Members of the examining committee:

Dr. Nahada Shahada [Supervisor]

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Dubravka Zarkov [Reader]

The Hague, The Netherlands
November, 2011

Disclaimer:

This document represents part of the author’s study programme while at the Institute of Social Studies. The views stated therein are those of the author and not necessarily those of the Institute.

Inquiries:

Postal address:

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Contents

Contents iii

List of Acronyms v

Abstract vi

Relevance to Development Studies vi

Chapter 1 Introduction 1

1.1 Background 1

1.2. Problem statement 4

1.3. Research Objective 6

1.4. Research Questions 7

1.5. Methods of Generating the Data 7

1.5.1. Samples and Scope of the Research 7

1.5.2. Sources of Data 8

1.5.3. Ethical issues and Partiality 10

1.5.4. The challenges of the data collection processes 11

1.5.5. Limitations 12

1.6. Organization of the paper 13

Chapter 2 Conceptual Frame Work 14

2.1. Gender 14

2.2 Family 16

2.3 The Status of Women 18

2.4 Agency 19

Chapter 3 Background Situations 21

3.1. Understanding family: Individual Perceptions and the social context of the Family 21

3.2. The process of status change: Arbitration of the courses of the education (School re-entry and study) and employment. 25

3.3. Presumption of status change: How these women and men have seen the effects of education and the employment process on the women. 28

Chapter 4 The Tensioned Context 31

4.1. Processes of Change: The Normative, Challenged and Changed Domains of Gender Relations 31

3.1.1. Division of Domestic Work 31

3.3.1. Sexual Relationships 37

4.1.3. Decision making 42

Chapter 5 Conclusion The Structural Change and the Gender Relation of the Family 50

5.1. The Course of Negotiation for Education and Employment 50

5.2. The challenged and the changed domains of gender relation 51

5.3. The Change and Adjustment 52

List of Acronyms

AU…………………………………..…………… African Union

EMoE ………………...... Ethiopian ministry of education

EFDR………………… …Ethiopian Federal Democratic Republic

NGOs ……………………..... None Governmental Organizations

CEDAW …….. Convention on The Elimination of All Forms of

Discrimination Against Women

WID……………………………….…… Women in Development

GAD…………………………………..Gender And Development

Abstract

This research paper explores the features of gender relations in middle-class families in Addis Ababa. The specific family context that the research interested in is the situation in which the female partners of the family have passed through in the course of a significant change in their educational and the associated occupational status after they got married. In relation to the major structural changes that have been happening in Ethiopia for the last 20 years, women’s participation in the formal education and public employment has increased. However, it is argued that these structural changes overlooked the dynamics of the gender relation at the family level. Therefore, by taking education and employment as major variables, this research attempts to explore how the structural change affected the existed gender relation within the family. By carrying out an in-depth interview with members of such families, the research highlighted how the change of status among the female partners challenged and changed the normative gender/power relation with in the ‘private’ arena. Moreover the findings pointed out that due to these changes have created a tension within the family. This is from the fact that gender relation is a socially constructed and also incorporated both femininity and masculinity (Scott, 1988, Connell, 1999); whilst overseen by the society through social norms and values

Relevance to Development Studies

Though this research work does not provide new findings, its contribution in providing the imperative empirical data is undeniable. Moreover from the fact that in the contemporary period of the development initiatives, the empowerment of women has been the major interest of the development agenda of most third world countries. Therefore this study could give the actual qualitative picture of the implications of the development efforts within the ‘private’ arena, which is often neglected by the statistical data. Whilst given the fact that there are few studies which have been made in the issue of family in the study area, it will have a significant contribution for the initiation of other studies.

Keywords

Family, Gender Relation, Women Status

ii

Chapter 1Introduction

1.1  Background

For the past two decades women’s issues and the claim for gender equality have captured the principal attention of those working in the development sector in Ethiopia. Article 35 of the 1994 Ethiopian Constitution The Ethiopian National Policy on Women were key documents that played a prominent role in emphasizing the call for gender equality and women’s participation in the public arena[1]. Moreover, the hegemonic nature of the Constitution- laid the ground for many policies to maneuver. And the development of these policies was the initial step for the structural changes that have been made. Of these policies, the development of the education policy which was amended in 1994 played the foremost role in bringing women to the public arena (EMoE, 2009). Besides this, the newly amended labour law (377/2004) has made contributions to the enhancement of women employment in the formal sector and also enabled them to earn equal pay regardless of the difference in gender. Most of these policy documents also went in line with other policy documents that are produced at national, regional, continental and international levels[2]. However there are also considerable changes in many other policies specific to facilitating women’s participation and empowerment, but they are not of interest to the objective of this paper.

When one considers the history of Ethiopia from education point of view, it will not be difficult notice that this is a time of considerable growth and development more than any other point in the nation’s history. According to Zeleke (1985), the “feudalists system” which lasts until 1974 was blamed for leaving very little room for women in education. But considerable improvements were noticed during the Derge regime that followed the ouster of Emperor Haileselassie from power in 1974. The Derge regime which stayed in power until 1991 is acknowledged for its campaigns fighting illiteracy. This is because combating illiteracy was one of the major education policies of this socialist regime. According to the data indicated by Literacy pamphlet (1984) in (ibid.) the percentage of literate individuals who are above 10 years grew from 13% in 1974 to 62.4% in 1983. Nevertheless, it is pertinent to state that the overall contribution of this education (literacy) program in developing knowledge or skill capacity of individuals was insignificant. In general there were a lot of challenges for most people to access this limited opportunity. Moreover this limited opportunity was even more limited for women due to their role in the household which emphasizes their staying at home, early marriage, lack of finance and other social and cultural (Tefferi and Endeshaw, 2006)[3].

However, at the present time the number of female students has increased at all levels. For instance, at the level of higher education, it was less than 37% in 1994, but by 2006 it has increased to over 42% (EMoE, 2009). Their participation in vocational training also showed a significant improvement from 16% in 1994 to 47.45% in 2006 (ibid). Here it has to be noted that not only the number of female students but also the total number of the student population in the country showed a huge increment in the past few years (ibid). The different interventions the government has made so far include the expansion of opportunities through evening and summer programs at different levels to provide more possibilities for adult education[4]. According to EMoE (2001), the number of female students graduating having diplomas and degrees from evening and summer programs is growing faster than male students; that is from 18.5% in 1996/97 to 20.5% in 2000/01. The recent proliferation of the private colleges in the country can also be sited as another important factor in creating enormous prospects for women. During the past 20 years, more than 50 private colleges and universities have been established. It also indicated that in Addis Ababa alone more than 10,699 female students are currently attending these institutions in both regular end extension programs[5]. The fact that these private universities and colleges are more available in the study area makes it an ideal place to investigate the possible connotations and implications associated with the increasing number of educated and employed women from the Ethiopian point of view. So this research work is conducted keeping in mind that those women who are married and living in the urban areas have relatively utilized the opportunity of accessing education than those living in relatively rural and semi urban areas; but should be noted that this group of urban women that form the sample group for this research didn’t get educational opportunities during their school age period.

On the other hand, recent legal provisions such as The Labour proclamation No 42/93 specify that ‘women shall not be discriminated against employment and equal Payment on the basis of their sex’ (Ethiopia labour law, 1993). These policies with the efforts of all actors are playing a great role in facilitating the involvement of women in the productive sector besides using ‘quota systems’ and assertiveness programs created more opportunities for women[6].

These initiatives created better opportunities in the enhancement of women’s role in becoming economically active citizens, mainly because of their improved educational status. As some reports show women’s employment rate in the formal sector has reached 45%[7]. Moreover With the aim of the increasing the participation of women on equal basis with men, privileged positions (both at governmental and nongovernmental organizations), precedence and special attention are given to the women. Moreover, there have been various measures taken by different actors in a bid to increase the involvement of women in productive sector (Getahun, Nega, Digle, 1999). And using such opportunities a higher number of women are coming to the formal sectors taking different managerial and administrative posts (ibid.).

This research aims to explore gender relations in the family. Specifically addressed will be families in which the female partner of the family experienced significant changes in her position as a result of her improved educational and occupational statuses. The attempt is to provide the empirical evidence on how the status change affects the normative gender relations that exist in the family institution. The pragmatic evidences for this research work are derived from case studies of twelve families. In the case of two families both the female and male partners participated in the in-depth interviews while in seven of them only the female partner was involved, and the rest three involved only male partners. In addition, these cases were triangulated by interviewing 6 children of these families and a man who work as a local mediator and councillor of family and marital conflicts.

1.2.  Problem statement

As stated in the previous section, women’s participation in all sectors was being a very prominent discourse of the past 20 years for the current government of Ethiopia. The idea of achieving sustainable development with the participation of these members of the society has been on the agenda of politicians as their major point of discussion. Accordingly, different sectors of the government, International organizations, NGOs, activists and other concerned bodies have been actively engaged in different activities in order to assure equal participation of women in the development process. Increased women participation in education and training through both formal schooling and vocational trainings has been brought up as one of the major opportunities for achieving women’s empowerment[8]. The government seems to agree with the idea that states ‘The more we invest in women the more we get in return’ (Orgill and Heaton, 2005:26). Such investment is believed to bring holistic improvements to the health of the family, the reduction of the number of children and better resource management at household and community levels. In general, it is regarded as a basic instrument in the “achievement of quality of life for all” (Gulhati, 1990:32 cited in ibid).

As also stated earlier, a high number of women are participating both in formal and informal public sector. Moreover, the current Ethiopian government has taken in to consideration women’s issues in the process of policy formulation and implementation. There seems to be a consensus that the development targets in the country cannot be achieved with the continued marginalization of women as a group. For this reason in the last few years much effort, time and money was spent in fully apprehending the big picture of the disadvantaged position of women in the country. Therefore great efforts have been made to address gender inequality in the development process.

In measuring issues like women’s empowerment, emancipation, autonomy and status, education and employment are used as the very basic and common variables in recent times[9]. It is also argued that increasing women’s participation in education is a basic instrument for the improvement of the family (also, ‘husband-wife communication’, (ibid)) in particular and the socioeconomic development of a country in general (Agarwal, 2004). What is more, as is asserted by the development discourses the motto goes, “If you educate a boy, you educate an individual; if you educate a girl, you educate the whole family”. For these reasons, in the development process of many developing countries, women education is argued to be a fundamental ground for any societal development.

Therefore the increments of women’s involvement in education and economic sectors are reported to be the success histories of the contemporary “gender sensitive” development policies. However for this research paper, I focuses on how these changes are perceived and received by the male dominated form of social structure, for the normative gender relation in most families in Ethiopia are maintained by the practice of men serving as the head of the families (Zeleke, 1985). It also attempts to assess the possible implications of such changes in the way they affect the family and the existing social order.