Caribbean Transnationalism As A Gendered Process

1. Caribbean Transnationalism As A Gendered Process • By Christine G. T. Ho

2. Objectives 1.Locate gender within capitalist relations of production by examining the role of Caribbean women as workers and mothers 2. Relationship of family and political economy, Caribbean family units are constantly being reshaped by changing needs of global capitalism 3. Human costs entailed in transnationalism 4. Relation of transnationalism to global capitalism

3. Reasons for Migration • Expand life choices • Shortage of Schools • Declining living standards • The Caribbean governments support this migration because it acts as a safety valve for surplus labor • Postcolonial Caribbean Government emphasizes capital rather than human resources in development plans

4. Emigration is also an expression of the relationship between transnationalism and global capitalism in the region

5. A Paradigm Shift in Global CapitalismTechnological innovationsEconomic Restructuring (IMF, World Bank)Relocation to cheaper labor markets • Consequences of “downsizing” • Rising unemployment • Casualization • Before – fixed salaries, relative job security, fringe benefits • Now – temporary workers, loss of benefits, eroded salaries

6. Results: migration of all social classes in search of a better life However, the impact of Global Capitalism not only varies from class to class but differs according to gender. Transnationalism

7. Migration Patterns Caribbean Elite • Migrate as entire families • Settle permanently • Migrate independently • Practice circular migration • Pave way for eventual migration of others Working Class Women

8. Women in the Caribbean as Mothers • Caribbean family structure • Matrifocal– “mother-centered” patterns of relationships within the household, whether or not a husband /father is present • Mother-child bond cherished above all others • Viewed as the most enduring • Children as “Old Age Insurance” for elderly women • Not to be confused with Matriarchy – female headed households

9. Child Care • Caribbean cultural ideal: child care is a collective responsibility • Usually falls to groups of females, some are fictive kin • Is common for children to be moved between households and live with kin that are not their biological parents • Whoever is in the best position to accept responsibility for a child does so

10. Nuclear Family Assumption • Based on the “normative” nuclear household structure • Monogamous marriage • Egalitarian conjugal relations • Assumed to be universal • Caribbean • Brittle conjugal relationship • Low frequency of early legal marriage • High illegitimacy rates • Matrifocality • Child dispersal

11. Flaws to Nuclear Assumption • Nuclear family is not needed for child rearing or financial support of women and children – capitalist construction • Projects Eurocentric ideals on Caribbean society • Obscures complex linkages between the family and the wider political economy • Most studies attribute their unorthodox structure to poverty

12. Poverty Thesis • Too simple and disregards the shared cultural imperatives in the middle and upper class • Reserves legal marriage to status equals and non-legal unions for partners in lower classes • Lower class men usually do not marry right away because they lack the financial resources and do not share the same ideas about sexual relations and legal marriage • Upper & middle class men marry women of equal status while simultaneously having “outside” sexual relations with women of lower class status • Polygamous relations are practiced across cultures and result in illegitimate children from all social classes of men • A Christian moral code is placed on the lower class

13. Caribbean Solution • Matrifocality allows for women to be supported by their children under the capitalistic economic system. • Caribbean kinship sanctions “segregated” gender roles, where men and women lead almost separate lives. • Leads to a lack of support by men as they are not expected to support emotionally or help physically with the domestic sphere. • Women have a double work load and rely on support from other women and kin.

14. Social Feminists • As long as an ideology of gender inequality persists, gender relations will remain unequal • Patriarchy can only be destroyed by a psychocultural revolution

15. Women in the Caribbean as Workers and as Mothers • Gender Paradox • Low earning power in men – not expected to be sole bread winner • By denying women male financial support and protection, the capitalist system also demands economic independence and responsibility for their families • Yet their wages, usually in the informal economy, are not enough to make ends meet, so women must appeal to men to make ends meet • Women strive to be economically independent but are still dependent on their men

16. Caribbean • Caribbean men are usually not paid a family wage • Women have not been excluded from the work force • More than 88% of Caribbean women have no more than primary school education and therefore not competitive in the job market • Women maintain double workload with low income jobs and domestic work which has been devalued by capitalism • Women have resorted to having many relationships with men (lovers, children, husbands) to have people to help them in order to survive

17. Safa’s (1995) Comparative Study Puerto Rico – Higher rate of unemployment for men forced women into the work force into low wage and menial work Dominican Republic – due to failing sugar industries, the country shifted to export manufacturing. Women have been major contributors of household income though they work under poorly paid and difficult conditions Cuba – promoted gender equality by offering social services and through the Family code of 1975 which states that couples are to share in domestic and financial responsibilities. However, even though guaranteed equal pay for equal work, there is occupational segregation

18. Ho’s conclusion • Paid employment for women has both positive and negative consequences. • At times it produces greater economic independence, but at others it creates a double work burden. • The economic independence of women may be a necessary but not sufficient condition for gender equality either locally or globally. • Because of global capitalism Caribbean women have used kinship groups to assist in migration and in an effort to reach a higher class position.

19. The Human Cost of Gendered Transnationalism • Caribbean family units are constantly being reconfigured to suit the changing needs of global capitalism as it continually destroys forms of its own existence • Because they lack child care support in the destination country, the working class women who migrates from the Caribbean leave children behind with kin • Greatest toll of Caribbean transnationalism is marriage breakdown (90%)