Concept of sexual division of labour

In the previous post we learned about Patriarchy This post defines the idea of sexual division of labour and examines how it affects both men and women in the home and on the job. Additionally, it explores the social and historical background of the sexual division of labour as well as the various viewpoints that shape it.

Introduction
Origins of Sexual Division of Labour
Theoretical Frameworks

Economic and Sociological Functionalism
Liberalism
Marxist and Marxist Feminist Analysis
Radical Feminist Analysis
Dual-systems Theory

Social and Sectoral Division of Labour
Domestic Division of Labour
Conclusion

Introduction

The sexual division of labour is a topic that has been brought to the forefront by feminism and the expanding patriarchal debate since it is through the division of labour between men and women in various fields that the former's social and economic supremacy in all class systems is highlighted. Both Marxist and non-Marxist economic theories have come under fire from feminists for failing to appropriately highlight the gendered labour patterns that have characterised capitalism production since the Industrial Revolution. In contrast to feudalism, the control of women's labour power is structured differently under the capitalist mode of production (Clusters 1997: 22). According to feminists, state policies frequently create and strengthen the sexual division of labour, which is consciously upheld by contemporary corporations, remains unfair and oppressive to women (ibid.).

Origins of Sexual Division of Labour

Considered to be the most natural characteristic of human civilization, the division of labour between men and women appears to be founded on the biological division of labour in reproduction. There is nothing inherently natural about the division of labour in society, other from the biological division of labour, which stipulates that only women may bear and raise children. In actuality, the gendered division of labour in the larger society and economy is based on the social construction of the biological fact that women may have children and provide nursing care (D.N and G.K 1989). Even in the early stages of foraging, the division of labour was anything but natural. The truth is that because it was accepted as a societal norm, it gained legal authority. Division of labour becomes a "natural" force because it is not voluntary (p. 1949). The creation of the differentiation between men and women or the social division of labour is therefore not a matter of neutrality. Division of labour, which was established within the family, also applies to the social realm. According to Rosaldo and Ortner (1974), women are barred from political and social life among the tribes of Jharkhand, which reflects a characteristic of the social division of labour into "public" and "private" realms.

The sexual division of labour cannot be attributed to any generalised male sexism; rather, it is a result of the capitalist mode of production, which is solely concerned with those portions of the human body that may be utilised directly as tools of labour or that can be employed as an addition to a machine (Mies 1998). Although the idea of sexual division of labour may appear to imply that men and women simply assign themselves to separate jobs, this glosses over the fact that men's tasks are really recognised as productive and human, as opposed to women's tasks, which are seen as being dictated by their nature. This idea also hides the fact that male and female labourers have a dominance-and-exploitation-based relationship (ibid, p. 46). Therefore, according to Mies (1981), it is important to be clear when discussing the social roots of the division of labour that we are referring to an uneven, hierarchical, and exploitative relationship rather than merely the simple assignment of duties to equal partners.

The three primary empirical aspects of gender relations that distinguish paid work in various economic sectors are: Why do women typically earn less than men? Why do women choose lower paying jobs? Why do men and women perform different jobs? The fundamental idea of the sexual division of labour between men and women in the public realm as well as the private sphere of the household provides the solution to these important problems. Existing explanations of gender disparities in the workforce can be categorised into four primary schools of thought: liberalism, Marxist and Marxist feminist analysis, economic and sociological functionalism, and dual systems theory.

Theoretical Frameworks

Economic and Sociological Functionalism

Functionalist analysts contend that because men and women allocate their time differently in households, women get paid less than men despite having less education, less work experience, and more skills. People are compensated in accordance with their value or worth to their employer, according to the human capital theory. They believe that because of how women are positioned inside the family, they have less human capital than men (Walby 1990: 29). According to this hypothesis, women who take on the position of the homemaker spend less time working for pay than men do, which causes them to develop less human capital and earn less money overall (ibid, p. 30). Many aspects of human capital theory have been criticised, particularly how it examines gender dynamics in paid employment. According to Treiman and Hartman, sex-based employment segregation is the primary cause of income disparities. Because it is predicated on the idea of a perfect labour market in which employers compensate employees fairly, the Human Capital Theory has a significant theoretical flaw. This presumption is similar to the functionalist theories of social stratification, which hold that the highest-paying positions on the market are also the ones with the highest skill requirements. Additionally, this notion has come under fire from a number of sources (ibid, p. 31).

Liberalism

Liberal theorists have concentrated on minute differences between men's and women's positions at work. Many of these thinkers see cultural differences between men and women as the main reason why women experience disadvantages at work. The disadvantages that women experience in the workplace are documented by Kanter (1977), who also outlines the primary mechanisms at play. She contends that organisational structures and societal influences cause women to have less success than men in advancing to the top levels of these institutions. She demonstrates how the management ethic is largely masculine and how gender-specific employment positions restrict members of the other sex from occupying them. She not only discusses culture in general but also the daily interactions in networks dominated by men, which act to keep women from gaining the knowledge and contacts necessary for business success. Her analysis has, however, drawn a great deal of criticism. In other words, her study already assumes that gender inequity exists within the larger society. She avoids addressing the fundamental reasons for the unequal division of labour in the public and private sectors, why women are responsible for the majority of the household work, and why males make up the majority of the paid workforce (ibid, cf. Walby 1990).

Marxist and Marxist Feminist Analysis

Marxist and Marxist feminist theorists have examined how capitalism relations affect the structure of employment for women in the workforce. They contend that capital-labor relations have a crucial role in determining the lower pay and lower labour force participation of women. The evolving interaction between the household and the market is emphasised by Braverman (1974). He contends that the household's increased usage of market purchases has reduced the quantity of housework. Women are now able to work for pay as a result. He claims that as a result, their rates of labour force involvement increase. Men's rates of labour force participation decline concurrently if they leave skilled jobs, go without a job, or decide to retire early. His theory has, however, also drawn criticism from a variety of sources. Time budgets over the course of the year have revealed that housewives' time commitment to household duties has not decreased as much as Braverman claimed (cf. Walby 1990: 34).

Braverman also popularised the idea that women served as the labour reserve army who entered the workforce as capitalism advanced. Marx argued that a reserve's purpose was to limit employees' ability to bargain their pay and working conditions during periods of heightened demand for labour. According to Beechey (1977, 1978), who adopted Marx's theory, women made up a flexible reserve that could be introduced to the market when labour was in high demand during boom times and laid off during periods of economic downturn. She made the case that married women could fall under this heading. In relation to the British experience, Bruegel (1979) claimed that part-timers constitute a labour reserve. Additionally, there is some evidence from the era of the world wars, when women were hired to work in the weapons factories for the duration of the conflict and fired at the conclusion (Braybon 1981, cf. Walby 1990). There are some theoretical and empirical issues with this hypothesis, according to academics. The idea is silent on how women would be fired before men in situations where it would be best for the company. Additionally, actual data also refutes this notion. During the Great Depression, women did not leave paid employment in higher numbers than men did. In fact, Walby (1989) concluded that despite a minor decline during the severe recession, the number of women in paid employment in Britain grew overall during the 1980s (p. 36).

According to Humphries (1977), the battle of the working class for a family wage against the opposition of capital is what led to women's exclusion from the labour market. She views women as full-time housewives, thus she sees their exclusion from the labour force as a benefit for the working class rather than a setback for women. Many academics, like Barrett and McIntosh (1980), have harshly criticised her theory for failing to take into account the difficulties encountered by women. Additionally, they contend that the idea of a "family wage" has only ever existed in theory. Many men who make the so-called family pay do not provide for their families, but many women who do not even get the family wage do so on behalf of their offspring and other family members (Walby 1990: 37).

Radical Feminist Analysis

Radical feminists have largely concentrated their empirical work on sexuality and violence, and have written relatively little about women in paid jobs. They have contributed significantly to our knowledge of issues like sexual harassment. According to MacKinnon (1979), sexual harassment is legally defined as sexual discrimination. She contends that sexuality is essential to comprehending feminist analysis and that women's sexuality to males defines them. Her analysis has a flaw in that it fails to explain why women work in specific occupations and why they are paid less than males. On the other side, Stanko (1988) discusses the importance of sexual harassment for occupational segregation. Therefore, sexual harassment is a tactic employed to uphold gender discrimination in the workplace.

Dual-systems Theory

In an effort to comprehend gender relations, dual-systems theory combines class analysis with patriarchy theorization. It emphasises capitalism and patriarchy as two systems that are crucial to comprehending gender relations in society. According to Hartman (1979), patriarchal relations in paid employment cannot just be described in terms of capitalism because they predate capitalism. Job segregation by sex is a key component of her view of gender relations in the workplace. She believes that men can keep women at a disadvantage by keeping them out of better paying positions. Men are significantly more organised than women when it comes to joining trade unions, which largely exclude women, therefore they are able to accomplish this. Men can marry women on favourable terms who will take care of the children and the household when they have better-paying careers. Men earn the so-called "family pay" because they have access to greater career possibilities, while women who are financially dependent on their husbands are unable to reject.

Social and Sectoral Division of Labour

The "social" and "sectoral" division of labour between the sexes can be broadly distinguished. The social division of labour between men and women refers to the reality that, in society, women are expected to perform domestic duties like cleaning, cooking, and childrearing, while males are excused from any such responsibilities. On the other hand, sectoral division of labour refers to the reality that a hierarchical division of labour between men and women is preserved and perpetuated within particular sectors of a given economy, such as the agricultural or industrial sector. The latter changes over time in response to the need to maintain male authority and privilege over women, in contrast to the former, which is universal in nature and is fixed (Clusters 1997). For instance, Clusters (1997) illustrates how the traditional division of labour between men and women is changing as a result of modernisation in the chapter on rural women's labour in Bangladeshi agriculture. While sexism in the past compelled women to perform domestic and household processing activities, poverty in the 1970s compelled women from low-income families to look for paid employment on the job market. Due to the persisting wage inequality, this did not result in the emancipation of village women, but it undoubtedly brought about a sea change in women's employment (p. 365-366).

Feminist scholars also point to men's exclusive control of technological production tools as a way to maintain male domination and the gendered division of labour. The sexual division of labour in the cultivation of three field crops—millet, paddy, and tobacco—in Andhra Pradesh was highlighted by Maria Mies. She makes the case that, in contrast to males, women rarely labour in agriculture using tools or equipment; instead, men conduct most agricultural tasks using tractors and other draught animals. The distinction between skilled, semi-skilled, and unskilled tasks has served as the foundation for the sexual division of labour, in addition to the division of labour between tasks performed at home and those performed outside the home, and between manual labour and operations carried out with the aid of technology. According to Clusters (1997), who was speaking about the manufacture of clothing in Bangladeshi factories, women's employment are classified as less skilled or unskilled labour whereas the majority of male jobs are considered to be skilled jobs.

In his work Die Frau Und Der Sozialismus, August Bebel expanded on the idea of women as breadwinners. He used numerous polls in this book to demonstrate how women frequently looked for industrial work out of pure need because their husbands' incomes were insufficient to support the family. Over 50% of the women interviewed by Berlin labour inspectors believed that their husbands' income was too low to make ends meet (cf. Clusters 1997, p. 64). The cause of women's generally low pay in paid employment was the subject of another hotly contested issue. The proletarian women's movement emerged and expanded quickly as a result of the fact that women were always paid the "hunger wage" and consistently fell into the lowest pay bracket in paid employment (ibid, p. 65). The patriarchal system that dominated gender relations in paid work and sustained sex-based job segregation provided the explanation for why women's labour was so inexpensive.

Domestic Division of Labour

The division of labour between family members that is required to maintain the household or domestic residence is referred to as the domestic or household division of labour. The concepts of sexual division of labour or gendered division of labour were historically and still are used in many western industrialised societies to acknowledge the pronounced differences between men and women in undertaking the responsibilities for tasks necessary for maintaining the family household. The traditional domestic division of labour is one in which women are in charge of managing household and care duties inside the home, such as cleaning, cooking, shopping, and caring for children and the elderly, and men are primarily responsible for working outside the home in exchange for a wage. Because it is done at "home," as opposed to outside it, women's job is unpaid and hence viewed as being less productive than that of males.

Academic discussions and theories have brought attention to the issues with the "unpaid" nature of domestic labour, which is typically done by women. In scholarly discussions, the idea of the home division of labour gained prominence in the 1970s. Feminists have argued, using Marxist theory, that domestic work performed by women should also be viewed as a form of productive activity similar to men's waged labour. The status of women in the home is related to their standing in the labour market. Similar to how the labour market continues the hierarchical division of labour in the home, the domestic division of labour works to weaken women's standing in the workforce. According to Hartman (2002), the reason why women have a poor status in the workforce is due to the sex-based employment segregation (p. 97).

Conclusion

The purpose of this blog was to explore various theoretical viewpoints on the sexual division of labour while also attempting to explain its history and social context. There have been attempts to clarify and emphasise that the sexual division of labour involves more than just assigning different tasks to men and women; rather, it involves a deeply ingrained issue of equating women's work with something that is dictated by nature and that is beneath it in the hierarchy. Thus, the idea of a separation between human labour and natural activity is created. According to this theory, men's labour is considered to be rational, productive, and human, whereas women's work is viewed as unproductive and a natural activity that is determined by biology.

Numerous schools of thought, including liberalism, Marxism, Marxist-Feminist analysis, and dual systems theory, have provided various justifications for the current sexual division of labour in the workplace. Functional analysts contend that gender disparities in the workforce are caused by women's lower skill levels and less experience in the labour market, which disadvantages them. According to the liberal school of thought, women's low standing in the workforce is a result of cultural differences between men and women. Marxist feminists and Marxists have examined the trend of