Open
letter to: Scottish Women’s Rural Institutes
from
the Global Women's Strike 6 September
2006
About
the term "Housewife"
We
have seen that you will be debating the use of the term “housewife” at
your conference starting today, and are delighted that this underlines the
importance of the housewife to society, which many of us have struggled to
establish over years. As we
have noted before, it is women in Scotland who have again raised crucial
economic and social issues!
In
an airing of this debate on Any
Answers (Radio 4, I July 2006), callers unanimously supported
keeping the term “housewife” (transcript attached).
A mother of a six-month-old objected that housewives are now
considered “superfluous” and are “being pushed back into work so
quickly”. Another caller
also criticised the government’s drive to get women into waged work, and
described the devastating consequences of the demise of the housewife:
Edited
quote:
“…it
was Mrs Thatcher who had to bring down the industries and encourage women
to go out to work because that would then bring down the wage ... society
is poorer for it, every aspect of it ... Not only do housewives look after
their immediate family, they look after the neighbours, they look after
their relatives, not only looking after, speaking to them, old people
wouldn’t be as lonely in their homes … [The] Women’s Institute …
should raise the profile of the housewife … if [the government] actually
gave [housewives] money, you would find a great saving in your prisons, in
your hospitals…[and]
other aspects of the community…”
Pressures
on carers within the family, whether or not we call ourselves housewives,
are great. The incomes of
many families are falling; rural industries and farming are devalued and
face bankruptcy; redundancies, insecure and casual employment are becoming
the norm; cuts in welfare benefits and privatisation of public services
are deepening; while the military budget goes up.
Women’s workload is increased as we try to compensate for fewer
resources and increased stress with a double or triple working day.
We’re trying as best we can to meet the need for more caring work
at home, and often intensifying our community and justice work – be it
to keep a local hospital open, defend those we care for under attack, or
oppose wars which our loved ones may be sent to fight.
But nobody seems to notice how much work we do and how many
benefit.
We
are deeply conscious of how endangered we are by the devaluing of the most
basic work of society, while waged work outside the home is glorified.
We are left with less time to invest in our children, denying
infants their right to be breastfed, depriving teenagers of our time when
they most need a mature, loving presence.
Vulnerable people in the community are neglected; care in the
family and community is replaced with uncaring institutions, single
mothers are attacked for “not working”; traumatised asylum seekers
(many rape survivors) with small children are vilified; and the work of
women and men with disabilities, many of them carers as well, is ignored,
they are told they should turn off the TV and work.
Women have asked: “What's
to happen to those who need care if we're all out at work?”
Many
of us have learnt that the term “feminist” has often stood for a
denial that this work
is necessary or desirable. And
however we view ourselves most
women can only get very low waged jobs out of the home which usually also
require looking after people and other housewives’ skills.
As caring work in the home gains greater recognition, it will be
easier to win pay equity
The
consequences of undermining women’s survival work are even more profound
in countries of the South where the majority of the world’s housewives
live, and where women’s and children’s survival seems not to be an
economic or moral priority. Their lives are seen to be worth less than
those of us in the North. In
the South women’s first caring work is often as subsistence farmers, for
example, growing 80% of the food consumed in Africa.
Droughts and floods caused by global warming make that job harder
all the time. Women
who are doing the caring work everywhere, albeit in very different
circumstances.
Some
Radio 4 callers pinpointed the problem – it wasn’t the title that
mattered so much as the devastating fact that women do so much that goes
unrecognised, undervalued and unpaid.
A woman
from Sutherland said: “Housewives have low status because we have no
economic power.” It
certainly looks and feels like that, but we have shown that we do have
power as housewives.
The
Wages for Housework Campaign has campaigned internationally to make
women’s unwaged work visible since 1972 and since 2000 it has co-ordinated
the Global Women’s Strike. The
Strike’s central demand is: “Payment
for all caring work - in wages, pensions, land & other resources. What
is more valuable than raising children & caring for others? Invest in
life & welfare, not military budgets or prisons.”
The
enclosed journal summarises our history (more at www.globalwomenstrike.net).
In
1995 at the UN World Conference on Women in Beijing, with the support of
over 1,200 NGOs worldwide, we won the decision by governments to measure
and value in national accounts unwaged work in the home, on the land and
in the community, including simultaneous activity.
It was a turning point globally. Trinidad & Tobago put it into
law in 1996, Spain in 1998, Catalunya in 2005; and many countries have
implemented this decision in the courts and in other ways.
The
most
spectacular achievement is Article 88 of the 1999 Venezuelan constitution:
"… The State recognises work in
the home as an economic activity that creates added value and produces
social welfare and wealth. Housewives
are entitled to Social Security in accordance with the law."
Now
the government,
as part of the redistribution of the country’s oil wealth to end poverty
and in recognition of the unwaged work done in the home by women has
agreed to pay a housewife's income of about £100 a month, equivalent to
80% of the minimum wage.
There
have been other gains this year. Housewives
in Argentina won pensions in recognition of their years of unwaged
contributions and are exempt from paying into the pension scheme.
In Chile, the new President is proud to call herself a housewife
and is prioritising pension reform to benefit housewives.
In Brazil, the
Housewives’ Retirement Bill guarantees a pension to women who do not
have their own income, have a low income or work at home.
Latin America is clearly taking the lead!
All
this shows that the status of housewife, the unwaged carer, is changing,
North and South. As
carers get recognition for our work and for the fact that without us
everything stops, we can see women reclaiming that word and its derogatory
association with dependency, and powerlessness is disappearing.
This
movement of “just housewives” to change priorities and put caring of
all kinds first is very powerful. To
value carers is to value those we care for.
We want
men to be trained and expected to do caring work too, so that – often
for the first time – they become aware of the needs and wishes and
personalities of their own children.
And here we would like to introduce you to Payday, a network of men
which co-ordinates men’s participation in the Strike and which also
wants society to Invest in Caring Not Killing (see
www.refusingtokill.net).
So
you can see that for us a truly civilising caring society is where each
individual cares and each individual counts.
Attacking those of us who are housewives attacks the caring that we
spearhead. We hope your
debate goes well and that these considerations will be useful in your
efforts to maintain the visibility of this most crucial survival work, and
those who do it.
Yours
for investing in caring not killing.
Selma
James, Solveig Francis, Anna Thorburn
Global
Women’s Strike
cc:
Jean Alexander, Secretary SWRI, Angus Federation, Forfar
Fay
Mansell, Chair, National Federation of Women’s Institutes
Marie Rennie, Peebles, c/o Radio 4, Any Answers
Lynn Jackson, Cheshire, c/o Radio 4, Any Answers
PS:
We enclose a copy of “Creating A Caring Economy”, an interview with
the President of the Women’s Development Bank of Venezuela, which
provides funds to housewives enabling them to combine income generation
projects with community organising. Would
you consider reviewing it for your magazine?
Housewives
discussion on Any Answers, Radio 4, 1 July 2006
Nick Clarke (NC) is the presenter.
Jane
Latham, Sudbury in Derbyshire: I do approve of the term, […] but in my case I don’t I’m a
farmer’s wife. It’s a
proper job.
NC:
Is housewife obsolete in all cases?
JL:
No … a point is that this was brought up by the rural WI in Scotland not
England and Wales.
Diedre
Martin, Bridport: I
would like to suggest we are called house-managers, should apply equally
to men if they take it up. I’ve
always called myself a house manager.
Jane
Farrell, Norfolk, (older woman in red socks): Housewife is a good word. … I’m not a
housewife, but I don’t care. … I was quite surprised with the WI doubting it was useful to them, I’ve
never heard of anyone who was married etc who ever wants to make a new
word so to speak. … We’re fine as we are.
Lynn
Jackson, Cheshire (nearly full transcript): I don’t think there’s a problem with
the name as much as the position, it feels these days that housewives are
being portrayed as not necessary, whatever we’re called we are superfluous, the way we are are being pushed back into
work so quickly, breastfeeding recommendations are now only 6 months,
maternity benefit also only 6 months.
We don’t get a chance to actually get used to being at home.
NC:
in a sense there is an official endorsement that being a housewife is not
a proper thing to be
LJ:
Yes, if we are we’re being ignored and if you are going back to work
you’re following the guidelines. I have now being at home for 6 months with a little boy now and I do feel
now that I am being ignored, I have a pram and I’m being ignored. …. I
was an IT manager for 15 years, and I am now having to say I was a
business manager.
NC:
Is there a better term that could be used?
LJ:
I am quite happy with housewife. I
like house-manager. Its not
the name that’s important, whatever I’m called I am the one who stays
at home who doesn’t work any more.
Email
from Cath Sutherland: The issue was discussed by panelists as if just a matter of people’s
attitudes. Housewives have low status because we have no economic power.
…. The ability to work part time is
important to maintaining some economic power, part time should be accepted
as normal right across the spectrum inlcuding the very top jobs.
Marie
Rennie, Peebles [Full transcription]
Hello,
good afternoon. I would like
to ask what the Women’s Institute has ever done for housewives, or
whatever you’d like to call them. First
of all you get married and you have a husband and you are that man’s
wife and then you have a child, you’re a housewife.
And then you grow through that family, and I think housewives are
the cornerstone of our society. I
think its sad the demise of housewives.
I think it should be looked upon as a profession.
I think it covers so much. Your
hospitals wouldn’t be looking at obese people if you had the housewives. The children would be disciplined. You would have a home for them to come to.
It’s about 36 years that I’ve been a housewife and I remember
at the beginning it was latch-key kids they were termed as, and society
has demised since that and I believe it was Mrs Thatcher who had to bring
down the industries and encourage women to go out to work because that
would then bring down the wage, and that is when the housewives then went
out to work. And I think
society is poorer for it, every aspect of it, and our prisons certainly
wouldn’t be full.
NC:
So you sympathise with the caller who said there is a drive from the
centre, from government to get people back to work.
MR:
Yes I do and I think the the Women’s Institute is perpetrating that.
I don’t think they’ve done me any good.
Not only do housewives look after their immediate family, they look
after the neighbours, they look after their relatives, not only looking
after, speaking to them, old people wouldn’t be as lonely in their
homes, there is so much a housewife does in her career from beginning to
end, that it stabilises society, and I think the Women’s Institute … I
don’t know who they are … I don’t know what they do, so I don’t
what right they’ve got to be saying anything.
I think they should raise the profile of the housewife.
NC:
And how could that be done? Is
there something that could be done by government?
Even if it’s a simple thing like form-filling, or the respect
that’s paid to people when they stay at home, the paternity and
maternity leave and so on, those sorts of things would help would they?
MR:
Well I think if they actually gave them money to support them being
in the home, you would find a great saving as I say in your prisons, in
your hospitals, and your husband even, the support a wife gives to her
husband’s physical and mental well-being, its just endless.
And I think if the government supported them with money they would
find other aspects of the community wouldn’t be taking up so much
resources.
What we've won
All
Women Count |