Download Attitudes Changing in Central Europe

Gender Attitudes
Outline
 Cultural approaches
 Why are attitudes changing in Central
Europe?
 Micro-level explanations of gender
attitudes
The Modernization
Explanation
(Inglehart & Norris)
 Industrialization brings women into the labor
market
 Educational opportunities rise for women and
they begin to participate in government
 The postindustrial phase brings a shift toward
greater gender equality as women rise in
management and gain political influence
 Transition from survival to self-expression
values (Maslow’s hierarchy of needs?)
The Failure of Modernization
Theory to Explain this Shift
in Central Europe
 High female employed existed already
under the communist regime
 Women had rather equal access to
education already under communist rule
 People did not have to worry about
survival except perhaps in Poland
But not completely wrong
 But it is true that women did not yet rise
in management or politics
 The industrial shift from an industrial to a
knowledge-based economy with a large
service sector was hindered by the
communist regimes
 This does not seem sufficient to explain
the change
Cultural Differences?
 Pfau-Effinger: two countries can have similar
policies, but peple will still use them differently
 In some societies men are more likely to
choose father leaves than in others because
they have different conceptions of the role of
the father
 Duncan: Gendered moral rationalities: what is
morally rational is not always economically
rational, for example, women might refuse
daycare because it goes against their view of
what is “proper”
Hakim’s Preference
Theory
 Individualization process means we
cannot group people of one country
together
 In modern society we have become more
individualistic
 There are different groups in every
country
Hakims 3 Groups
 Caring group: will want to stay at home
regardless of policies (about 20% of the
population)
 Career group: wants to have a career
and is not interested in having children
(about 20% of the population)
 Adaptive group: will choose work or
career depending on incentives
Implications of Preference
Theory
 We cannot achieve gender equality because
men do not want to change roles, only women
 In Sweden, despite policies encouring men to
stay at home, few do so
 Only the adoptive group can be influenced by
policies
 The three groups have competing interests,
while men all have the same interests,
 Thus, men can organize better around their
interests
Criticisms
 Men are stupid, but not as stupid as Hakim thinks, nor
are they as homogeneous
 In Sweden men are beginning to take father leaves to
a much greater extent (now they take over 20% of the
total leave time and almost all fathers go on leave)
 Gender equality is also in the interests of many men.
She just assumes men think the same, but does not
provide evidence
 Surveys show big differences among women in
different countries
 The largest group is adoptive, which means that
policies do in fact matter
Attitudes Changing in
Central Europe
 Slowly beginning to support more gender
equality at the theoretical level
 Great support for more gender equality at
the concrete daily level
 “Feminism” becoming more acceptable
Theoretical level: Support
for Equal Gender Roles
% Disagreeing that men should
work and women should stay home
100
80
60
40
20
0
PL
Cz
Sw
1994
FRG
2002
EUW
Concrete, Daily Level:
Percentage of Women Supporting
Gender Equality (ISSP)
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
CZ94
CZ02
home equality
PL94
PL02
mother-child rel
S94
S02
state support
Women’s organizations
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

In Poland: 133 women's organizations
50 consider themselves to be feminist (38%)
93 support gender equality (70%)
In CR: 49 organizations
6 show some support for feminism (6%)
18 show support for gender equality (37%)
1995 in CR: none openly supported gender
equality, but 2 of 31 came close
Newspaper Articles in the
CR
 In MF there were 15 articles in 2007
using the word “feminism”
 Not negative anymore, but there is a
defensive tone, the need to show
feminists are not radical
 Typical to use the term, “I am a feminist,
but not a radical feminist….”
Why this change?
 The EU gave legitimacy with “gender
mainstreaming”
 Czechs have more experience living and
studying in the West
 The development of domestic gender studies
 Cooperation with Western and international
women’s organizations
 Can we call these openings of the political
opportunity structure?
 Beliefs coming from communist legacy not as
strong as other beliefs?
Microlevel Analysis
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Age
Church
Degree of religiosity
Educational Level
Gender
Age
 Generational difference: younger people
have more post-modern values
 Today’s women have greater career
opportunities
 Younger men are more interested in
spending time with their children
Church and Degree of
Religiosity
 The Catholic Church has traditionally supported the
“nuclear family” and “traditional” roles
 But this traditional family only existed for a very short
time in our history
 In agricultural society women worked, as did children
and the family was extended
 Degree of religiosity is important (not in Wilcox’ article)
because in a country like Poland, almost everyone is
Catholic, but not everyone is as religious
 In the USA evangelical pastors have been very
conservative
 In Poland the degree of religiosity is not significant in
explaining attitudes
Educational Level
 Those with a higher education are more
supportive of gender equality
 Women with higher education want equal
chances
 Men with higher education often chose
partners who are higher educated and
want to have careers
 Educational levels are increasing, as is
support for gender equality
McDonald’s incoherence
theory
in the industrially advanced countries the
conflict between norms supporting high
levels of gender equity in individualoriented social institutions (like education
system and labor market) and sustained
gender inequality in family-oriented social
institutions (in caring and nurturing and
household maintenance) has caused
fertility rates to drop.
Gender differences
 Women obviously have a greater
incentive to support equality
 But in America more men than women
supported ERA
Conclusions
 Attitudes toward gender equality are becoming
more positive
 This is partially due to post-modernization and
to the development of the international
discourse
 All micro factors point to an increase in support
for gender equality (the new generation and
higher educated are more positives as are the
more secular)
 Life is becoming increasingly more difficult for
men who want to oppress women and hate
their children