LITERATURE REVIEW
2.27 THE ROLE OF THE STATE ON WOMEN’S ISSUES
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responsive to the needs of the communities. Therefore, there is a need to involve women at decentralised level of governance. There are some countries where women have fought for participation by organising themselves.
62 2.28 THE BRIEF HISTORY OF CIVIL SOCIETY
Worldwide, there has been a large number of organisations which have been created by women to assist other women to come up with their own political agenda. These organisations have also dealt with gender audits and have scrutinised and participated in the formulation of government gender policies by working together forming coalitions. All of this has led to women’s participation in democratic processes which has allowed governments to respond to their needs and concerns both in the private and public areas (Hawkesworth, 2006: 104). According to Klenke (1996: 45) women began to fight for their rights in the 1800, however, women’s organisations started to emerge in numbers only a century later. While women were still looking for recognition, they also caused a lot of resistance which led to them being more oppressed and subordinated (Dandavati, 2005: 27).
Highly trained civil rights organisers such as Ella Baker, Rosa Parks and Fannie Lou Hamer helped launch and lead the civil rights movement in the USA (Hawkesworth, 2006:
92).Women’s associations, like other societal groups, have faced a whole range of state strategies to control and limit their autonomy (Tripp, 2000: 8). However in most cases, women’s movement and groups have to face new challenges after the country had become democratic (Dandavati, 2005: 99). Failure to adapt to new realities may result in women’s movement’s disappearance as they may no longer be relevant.
In a new social order women need to safeguard the interest and the development of all citizens irrespective of which ethnic group the people belong to, class and gender (Klenke, 1996: 25). Furthermore, women have to ensure that there is participation of all groups in order to shape personal and joint awareness for women to find common challenges and solutions for all (Dandavati, 2005: 115). The exclusion of women means that the economy and society are denied the benefit of women’s contribution to economic, social, cultural and political developments (Aryan, 2012: 87).
2.28.1 Cultural Challenges in Africa
In many countries such as Uganda, Zimbabwe and Malawi, there have been problems with regard to the development of community organisations and the appearance of women’s groups which seek to tackle gender issues in different areas and levels due to those countries being dominated by only one political party (Goetz and Hassim, 2003: 10-11). In 1986 when Yoweri Museveni’s political party, the National Resistance Movement won the elections,
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women’s group made a noticeable arrival which was an unpredictable shift in Uganda at that time (Tripp, 2000: 1).
In Africa, common and customary law has generally discriminated against women. For example, in some countries women are not allowed to inherit, own or sell land, or to pass their nationality on to their children (van der Gaag, 2004: 87). In most countries in Africa, women are not afraid to drop their dresses in a critical public protest to indicate that they are child bearers and they can retract life. Sometimes when women’s demands are not met, they would march naked to show that they are prepared to die trying (Turner and Brownhill, 2004:
169).
The challenge is that women in Africa depend on the agricultural sector for livelihood (Kamau, 2011). Most women in Africa have chores which include fetching water from the rivers, collecting wood to make fire and are responsible for cultivating the land in order to feed their families through farming (Ramosepele, 2011). Kamau (2011) argues that gender responsive policies require the participation of women in decision-making in order to ensure their rights and priorities are sufficiently addressed in legal frameworks, national and local policies and investment strategies.
In South Africa, after the end of apartheid, a coalition of women’s groups, researchers, women candidates and women’s worker’s union groups presented a charter of women’s rights, as a result the Constitution of South Africa made major provisions that ensured the equality of women in all spheres of life (van der Gaag, 2004: 87).
2.28.2 Americans and the Caribbean
As early as 1766, Philadelphia women circulated a pamphlet entitled, ‘Sentiments of an American Woman’ proclaiming that women were ‘born for liberty’ and ‘refused to be enchained by tyrannic governments’. In Boston in 1776, Abigail Adams expressed similar sentiments to her husbands, John, a prominent member of the Second Continental Congress, which was drafting the Declaration of Independence:
‘I long to hear that you have declared an independency-and by the way, in the Code of Laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power in the hands of Husbands. Remember all men would be tyrants if they could.
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If particular care and attention is not paid to the Ladies, we are determined to foment a Rebelion (sic), and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice, or representation’ (Butterfield, 1963) (Hawkesworth, 2006: 95).
Despite more than 200 years of political effort, women remain backwards when it comes to the achievement of legal, political, or economic equality in the United States (Hawkesworth, 2006: 98). Other scholars focused on structural barriers such as education, occupation, and income that made it more difficult for women to assume positions of political leadership (Hawkesworth, 2006: 100).
Women’s participation in electoral politics has expanded dramatically elsewhere in the region, for example Argentina, Cost Rica, Peru and Mexico, but has grown only slightly in Chile (Franceschet, 2005: 93). Women’s movements in Chile have yet to play a stronger role in mobilizing support for women candidates (Franceschet, 2005: 93). However, women are doing far better in terms of their access to appointed positions in government than in their access to electoral positions (Franceschet, 2005: 85).
2.28.3 Arab States and North Africa
In one Arab State which is Iran in 1952, the National Council of Women decided to sign a petition related to the rights of women including the right to vote. The National Council of Women as an amalgamation of different women’s organisations demanded that women must be liberated financially and politically just like men (Rostami-Povey, 2012: 20/1).
2.28.4 Europe and Asia
Women’s groups recommended, among other things, family friendly working hours, and appropriate use of language, gender-neutral titles, a standard equal opportunities committee, which would be concerned with gender, race and disability, and working practices that would be different from those at Westminster (Chaney, Mackay, and McAllister, 2007). Women and Catholics were not recognised as citizens in Northern Ireland which barred them from participation in politics at all levels (Sales, 1997: 4).
When it comes to India, there was a Joint Women’s Font which became powerful in terms of pressurising the State to consult organised women’s when drafting legislation that would affect women (Martin, 1993: 8). The women’s movement has had a comparatively weak
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history in Turkey. It has been an elite movement in Indonesia. Bangladesh and Pakistan have had more non-elite involvement (Bennet, 2010: 31). In Iran, although women’s participation started around the late 1800s, their mass participation was encouraged by the government in different fields of politics, for example in electoral campaigns and international conferences, (Koolaee, 2012: 139). Today women in Iran enjoy more rights that they do in most countries in the Middle East (Rostami-Povey, 2012: 31).