What attitude will you get from your husband and even-your children?" (83' This leads one to the conclusion that however important the newly-won maternity rights are in defining the arena of women's issues in the union movement, the fundamental problems involved in freeing women workers to participate more fully in labour struggles are deep seated.
We would argue however, that i t is fundamentally in the interests of the working class as a whole, to combat sexism in the household.
Without an understanding and acceptance of women's right to be treated equally with men, and an acceptance of jOint responsibility for housekeeping and child care, the working class will remain deeply divided. The sharing of domestic labour more equitably between all household members is one solution. Another, is the shifting of a large part of the household burden out of the indi~idual famil~with the socialisation of domestic labour through the provision of communal laundry services, dining halls and nurseries. (84) Both solutions warrant further debate since changes are urgently needed.
However, unless the problem is addressed by and within working class
,
organisations, the possibility of success is limited.' The problem
• within the workplace was identified during the Fosatu Education Workshop. A report on the workshop reads,
"Ms Magubane drew attention to two crucial realities about women workers in industry: Firstly, that; women have been drawn into the industrial workforce.in significant numbers only recently, and at levels of skill and wages much lower than those of men, which meant that they could be used against male. workers. Secondly, the
particular problems women workers suffer from were identified. The important point was made that although male and female workers are clearly from the same class, their experience of their position as part of the working class differs". (85)
The critical factor lies here; that the sexual division of labour divides the working class in South Africa and thus contributes to maintaining its subordination as a whole.'
to mediate this tension, how capital exploits this tension, and how this tension is experienced by the women themselves in our study.
One dimension of this tension surfaces around the issue of child care. Therefore, the neglect of child care in South Africa has significant implications. Child care may be viewed as an 'indexical issue': as a crucial indicator of the level of organisation among women; of the standard of living of the working class, and of the state's concern with the reproduction of labour power. Marx wrote,
" The maintenance and reproduction of the working class is, and must ever be, 'a necessary condition to the reproduction of capital". (86) The neglect of child care in South Africa must be located in terms of the state's lack of concern with the conditions under which African labour power is reproduced generally. The neglect of state experiditure on child care is thus linked to a whole series of state policies such as the neglect of housing, education, health, pensions and welfare services generally for the African working class.
We see the need to politicise the whole question of 'motherhood'.
It follows that c~ild care should be conceptualised in political kerms to generate demands on the state for more adequate child care provisions and demands on capital for maternity rights and benefits.
The urgency of the task ahead is that the working class, through their trade unions and community organisations, will have to take the initiative in the struggle to achieve this. A distinction needs to be drawn here between short and long-term goals. "As a short term
• •
demand, the provision of sufficient child care facilities is an important one which can free women from the home and open the way for women's involvement in political struggle.
. .
It is a means ofuniting women to organise around a common problem, challenge authority, and learn the value of collective action, but for i t to have a long- term political significance, i t must be demonstrated how i t is connected to the rest of society and the mainstream political struggle." (87)
Mainstream political struggles in South Africa have frequently articulated a demand for child care provision. For examp:l.e, the Federation of South African Women (FSAW) formed in 1954, drafted a women's charter setting out 'What women demand' for the Congress of the People in 1955. The demands included nurseries and child welfare
37 / ..••
centres. The demand for paid maternity leave for working mothers was incorporated into the Freedom Charter adopted by the Congress of the People meeting in 1955. (88)
As was stated "We are the women who know the joy of having childr,en and the sorrow of losing them. We know the happiness of rearing our children and the sadness caused through illness and ignorance". (89) Walker comments, "This statement, issued in 1955 by the Federation of South African Women/formed part of an appeal for the support of all the women of South Africa. The call for solidarity was not merely rhetorical, nor a cynical political strategem, but flowed out of the recognition that for most women, motherhood is a central and unifying experience in their lives". (90)
While in the short-term demands around the issue of child care may have a unifying potential, we have stressed the class dimension to the experience of motherhood in South Africa. We have argued that among African urban working class women economic necessity generates a fusion of the mother/worker roles; that motherhood involves an emphasis on the satisfaction of basic physical needs -
,
on obtaining the cash income necessary to pay the rent and buy food. Given the low level of African wages and the massive' disorganisation of African family life in comtemporary South Africa, this often involves mothers going back into wage labour as soon after birth as possible.The majority of the women in our study relied for child care either on relatives, particularly grandmothers, or on informal provision in the form of child minders. For most of these women creches are not a viable option because of the shortage of creche places and their short, inflexible operating hours. At present, the range of child care alternatives for African working mothers are extremely narrow.
The need involves widening the choices, in the sense of viable alternatives, open to these women.
In conclusion, the question of motherhood and the issue of child care are wrapped up in a complex tangle of ideological prescriptions.
We have tried to steer our way through these, and have avoided any full discussion of strategies for change. At the same time, we are aware that our report raises large, urgent and complex questions, especially in the context of the increasing numbers of women entering
38 / .•••
wage labour. Clearly, a wide variety of changes are necessary to relieve the tension experienced by many women who are both
mothers and workers. The most obvious of these changes is the need for quality day care, but in addition, our study should have demonstrated the need for maternity leave with pay and without penalty to the worker.
Child care is an issue which takes us beyond the workplace and the household and raises fundamental questions about how our society is structured; i t is an issue which involves shifting the boundaries between the 'private' and the "public' spheres.
At present, child care is a site of struggle built into the problem of daily survival for many African women. It is not a struggle on the larger social terrain involving collective effort, but one often 'conducted by women alone wi thin the hidden, isolated arena of the household; it is often a struggle of desperate dimensions; a struggle of a deeply moving kind.
FOOTNOTES
1. This paper is a summary of a 300 page report of the same title submitted to the Second Carnegie Inquiry into Poverty and Development in South Africa in February, 1984. It should be stressed that this project was conceptualised in exploratory terms. We set out to identify the difficulties experienced by a sample of working women in contemporary South Africa in relation to the care of their pre-school children. Given the limited time and resources at our disposal, we do not claim to have produced anything near a comprehensive definitive account of what is a large and complex social issue. Our report is the outcome of part-time work conducted by the three of us over a twelve month period. The fact that we have worked collectively is significant given the privatized, isolated nature of much social research. Hopefully, the product is a much richer document than any single one of us could have produced alone during this time.
2. Our data was obtained from interviews and questionnaires administered to 885 African women throughout South Africa. These samples were 'drawn from two different 'catchment points': the workplace and the household. Our largest sample involved a total of 835 African women workers employed in the retail trade and the clothing industry. Questionnaires were sent to all the women employed by a large retail organisation in a total of 62 towns throughout South Africa. The remainder of our workplace sample was drawn from the clothing industry, this being the only industry in which African women constitute the majority of the workforce. We
39 ,"
j .••.
chose three different clothing factories in Johannesburg which an official from the Garment Workers Union assured us covered a range of work situations. We administered questionnaires to all their African women workers. These women are referred to as our 'national sample population'. Another sample of 50 African women was drawn from three communities in the Johannesburg area: Soweto, Alexandra and Katlehong. We interviewed these women in depth for two reasons;
firstly, we wanted to obtain a fuller, richer picture of their experience as mothers and as workers, and the options open to them as regards the care of their pre-school children. We wanted to try and ascertain precisely why they had chosen these options and how they felt about them. Thus, the stress in these interviews was on the women's own subjective perceptions and experiences. Secondly, we wanted to explore the relation between child care and women's participation in wage labour. Do pre-school children act as an obstacle or an impetus to African women's employment? What kind of employment options are open to them? How does pregnancy
interfere with their work patterns? Our interest in these questions precluded us restricting our sample to the workplace, to women presently engaged in wage labour. In our report these women are referred to as our 'small Johannesburg sample'. From these two sample populations, we hoped to illustrate the different dimensions of
problems - in both qualitative and quantitative terms - relating to the care of their pre-school children, experienced by African women in different urban communities, 'work sit~ations and household arrangements. The parameters of our research are thus women who belong to theurban African working class which implies the exclusion of the majority of African women in South Africa living in the rural areas. Given the diminishing number of black South Africans who have access to employment and accommodation and rights to be in a 'white' urban area, we have focussed on a 'privileged' section of the African working class.
3. Following labour market segmentation theorists/Barron and Norris argue that women workers conform to all the criteria of secondary market employees. See"R.D. Barron and G.M. 'Norris, 'Sexual divisions and the dual labour market' in D. Barker and S. Allen (eds),
Dependence and Exploitation in Work and Marriage. (London: Lo~gmans, 1976). However, this formulation has been criticized as static, ahistorical and descriptive. See V. Beechey, 'Sociological theories
of women's work' in A. Kuhn and A. Wolpe (eds) Feminism and
Materialism. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 197~; V. Beechey, 'Some notes on female wage labour in capitalist production', Capital
and Class, No 3, 1977. •
4. J. Stellman, Women's work, Women's Health. Myths and Realities.
(New York: Pantheon Books, 1977), p. 13.
5. For a discussion of the particular contradiction this involves see J. Cock, 'Disposable Nannies: domestic servants in the political economy of South Africa', Review of African Political Economy, No 21, September, 1981, pp 63 - 83.
6. Quoted in The Star. 18.4.1983.
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7. Calculated from National Manpower Surveys by M. Favis, Cited by M. Favis, 'Black Women in the South African Economy',
unpublished paper, January, 1983, p.5.
8. For a more detailed account of African women's place in wage labour in South Africa see J. Yawitch, 'Women in Wage Labour', South African Labour Bulletin, vol 9, No 3, December 1983, pp 82-93.
9. Favis, 1983: 7.
10. Favis, 1983: 10.
II. Favis, 1983 : 15.
12. SAIRR, Survey of Race Relations in South Africa 1982 . . Johannesburg: SAIRR, 1983), p. 98.
13. Memorandum submitted by the Industrial Council for Clothing Industry (Transvaal) for the Wage Board Investigation, Johannesburg 1980. Cited by J. Barrett, 'Knitmore': a study in the relationship between sex and class'. Industrial Sociology Honours Dissertation, University of the Witwatersrand, February, 1981, p. 38.
14. The extension and restructuring of the sexual division of labour is also affecting many white women. It is possible that under the pressure of the so-called 'skills shortage' which some believed would lead to a restructuring of the racial division of labour, many white women are engaging in new occupational roles.
The training and employment of white women as bus drivers in
Johannesburg provides an example as does the fact that the majority of crane drivers, lorry drivers and,quality control officers
currently employed at ISCOR are white women.
15. For example "at the end of last year the Johannesburg City Council employed 74 women workers in jobs. traditionally performed by male migrant labourers. The women are recruited from Soweto and form part of the council's new policy to make use of local labour. The Chairman of the Management Committee says that the _ policy will help solve some of the Council's accommodatjon problems for single men in hostels". (Rand Daily Mail. 9,2.1983).
16. P •. Green and A. Hirsch, 'Manufacturing industry in the Ciskei' in DSG/SARS Information Publication No 6, Homeland Tragedy: function and farce. (Johannesburg: DSG/SARS, 1982) pp 41-45.
17. Personal communication from trade union official August, 1983.
18. With the progressive tightening up of influx control and the deteriorating economic situation in the Homelands, for many African women illegal employment in 'white' areas as domestic servants is one of the few strategies of survival open to them. This is substantiated by a recent study which involved interviewing 4,500 households throughout the Transkei in 1982. The study revealed the high number (50,476) of female 'external' migrants (i.e. working outside the Transkei borders). Many of these women (44.39%) were employed in domestic service. Of the total 32,876 were assumed to be 'illegally' in South Africa. P. Wakelin, 'Migrant Labour in Transkei 1983', Institute for Management and Development Studies Statistical Series 2 - 1983. (Umtata: University of Transkei, 1983) p 5-6.
41 I ....
I t
Britain see M.L. Davies, Maternity: letters from working women.
(London: Virago, 1982). For a contemporary British account see A. pollert, Girls, Wives, Factory Lives. (London: Macmillan, 1981).
20. For evidence of this in the South African context see A. Mullins, 'Working Women and the Dual Shift', Industrial Sociology Honours Dissertation, University of the Witwatersrand, 1982, p.45. . 21. Mullins, 1982: 62; Becker, 1983: 58.59
22. Mullins, 1982: 74.
23. Ibid.
24. A. Davis, Women, Race and Class., (London: ',The Women's Press, 1982), p~i31.
'25. D. Malcolm, 'Pre-school child care facilities in Alexandra township: an investigation into the reproduction of labour', Sociology Honours Dissertation, University of the Witwatersrand,
1983, p:57. '
26. Uniformly the wages of the African women in our national sample were extremely low. The largest proportion (68.66%) earned R299 or less a month. A third (33.33%) earned R200_R299 a month, and almost another third (31.34%) earned R300 or ove~
a month., However, the great majority of our sample (98.39%) answered negatively ,when asked, "If you did not have a job, would
·your family have enough money to live on?" The majority of the sample (62.75%) said that no one'else helped to support them or their children.
27. See discussion of protective legislation in Europe pp 58-65
of report. '
28. Maternity benefits paid out under UIF imcreased from R5,Sm ,in 1971 to R22,2m in 1981. (a) ·In 1982, they increased to R29,2m. (b)
(a) SAIRR, Survey of Race Relations in South Africa,1982 (Johannesburg SAIRR, 1983) P 75.
(b) Interview with Department of Manpower official conducted by Marian Cloete, May, 1983.
29. Amongst those excluded are agricultural employees (except in forestry), seasonal workers, pieceworkers, domestic servants employed in private households and people employed on the 'fixed establishments' of the Public Service.
30. M. Cloete, 'Maternity Rights and Benefits' ,Industrial , Sociology III Research Project, University of the Witwatersrand,' 1983, p 24. Also see Section 4: 'The Response of Capital" , Another problem is that women often do not know about UIF even though an amount is deducted from their wages each month for UIF.
31. Study Group on Women in Employment, 'Memorandum on Women in Employment', February 1978, p 42-43. Amongst our management interviews, only one informant from a large retail organisation employing 1,500 workers (78% of which are black women) believed that women workers should have their jobs kept open for them and that maternity leave should be regarded as "analogous to military' service".
42/ ••.•
42
32. Wiehahn Commission Part 5 Chapter 5, Women in Employment, p 95.
33. Republic of South Africa White Paper on Part 5 of the Report of the Commission of Inquiry into labour legislation p 44-45 point 5.15.
34. Ibid.
35. See Section 5: 'Types of child care arrangements'. The continuing improvement of pre-primary schooling for a small elite at the expense of basic child care facilities for the majority is another example of this process.
36. Mullins, 1982: 29.
37. Thirty interviews were conducted with different employers in the Johannesburg area where women form a significant proportion of the workforce. The interviews were loosely structured and the information given often labelled as "highly confidential" which of course, we have taken pains to respect. We attempted to cover all sectors where women workers are concentrated and a widely divergent scale of operations. Representatives of management interviewed ranged from a clothing factory employing 500 workers (79% of whom were women) to a large group of companies employing 226,000 workers
(20% of whom were women) .
38. This confirms the findings of Westmore and Townsend's study of the situation of African women workers in the textile industry in Durban in 1975. J. Westmore and P. Townsend, 'The African women workers in the textile industry in Durban', South African Labour Bulletin, vol 2, No 4 (undated) pp 18-32.
39. Cloete, 1983: 83.
40. A significant number (18) of the women interviewed in depth in our small Johannesburg sample believe that many women are fired from their jobs because of pregnancy. One woman commented.
"Bosses get fed up with pregnant women". This is an issue where"
union membership may provide some protection. A laundry worker who "had forgotten" the name-of her union said, "I have noticed that since we joined the union, they no longer fire pregnant women".
4l.
For example, in Britain, APEX (Association of Professional, Executive, Clerical and Computer Staff) maintain that "the provision of nursery facilities should be the responsi- bility of local authorities. However, until there is adequate provision, the union Will, subject to certain safeguards, present claims to employers for workplace nurseries". APEX, Workplace attitudes to maternity and nursery facilities: a case study.
(London: APEX, undated) p. 5.
42. Information on creches was obtained from interviews and questionnaires which were administered to supervisors at a sample of creches in Soweto and Alexandra. A few workplace creches were Visited, and some white creches for comp~r~tive data. Information on creches was also obtained from other/studies official documents.
Some key informants in the childcare field both in private welfare agencies and state departments were interviewed. Newspaper articles were gathered and other material such as conference papers. Twenty
43 / . . . .