2006 PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS Great Divides: The Cultural, Cognitive, and Social Bases of the Global Subordination of Women

Cynthia Fuchs Epstein Graduate Center, City University of New York

Categorization based on sex is the most basic social divide. It is the organizational basis of most major institutions, including the division of labor in the home, the workforce, politics, and religion. Globally, women’s gendered roles are regarded as subordinate to men’s. The gender divide enforces women’s roles in reproduction and support activities and limits their autonomy, it limits their participation in decision making and highly-rewarded roles, and it puts women at risk. Social, cultural, and psychological mechanisms support the process. Differentiation varies with the stability of groups and the success of social movements. Gender analyses tend to be ghettoized; so it is recommended that all sociologists consider gender issues in their studies to better understand the major institutions and social relation- ships in society.

he world is made up of great divides— social boundaries as well (Gerson and Peiss Tdivides of nations, wealth, race, religion, 1985; Lamont and Molnar 2002). Today, as in education, class, gender, and sexuality—all con- the past, these constructs not only order social structs created by human agency. The concep- existence, but they also hold the capacity to create serious inequalities, generate conflicts, tual boundaries that define these categories are and promote human suffering. In this address, always symbolic and may create physical and I argue that the boundary based on sex creates the most fundamental social divide—a divide

Direct correspondence to Cynthia Fuchs Epstein, Department of Sociology, Graduate Center, City rial help over many incarnations of this paper and to University of New York, 365 Fifth Avenue, New Kathleen Gerson, Jerry Jacobs, Brigid O’Farrell, York, NY 10016 ([email protected]). I thank Valentine Moghadam, Carol Sanger, and Hella Mitra Rastegar for superb research assistance. I am Winston for helpful comments on versions of the grateful also to Howard Epstein for dedicated edito- address to the ASA.

AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW, 2007, VOL. 72 (February:1–22) 2—–AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW that should be a root issue in all sociological who share common traits. In this manner, social analysis if scholars are to adequately under- scientists are no different from the lay public, stand the social dynamics of society and the who, in their everyday activities and thinking, influential role of stratification. The work of act as if categories are reliable indicators of many sociologists contributes to this claim, commonalities in a population. although I can only refer to some of them in the The consequences of such categorization may context of a single article. be positive or negative for those in a given cat- The conceptual boundaries that determine egory. For example, people of color face far social categories are facing deconstruction more suspicion from the police than do whites, throughout our profession. Once thought stable and favored male professors benefit from the and real in the sense that they are descriptive of evaluation that they are smart and knowledge- biological or inherited traits, social categories able while comparatively, favored female pro- such as race and ethnicity are contested today fessors tend to be evaluated as nice (Basow by a number of scholars (Barth 1969; Brubaker 1995). Yet, unlike the basis on which social 2004; Duster 2006; Telles 2004). Indeed, soci- groups may be defined, categories include indi- ologists are questioning the underlying reason- viduals who may never know one another or ing behind categorical distinctions, noting their have any interaction with each other. However, arbitrariness, and further, the ways in which they may all share selected physical traits or rela- they tend to be “essentializing and naturalizing” tionships. Skin color, hair texture, genitals, place (Brubaker 2004:9).1 Yet, not many of these crit- of birth, and genealogy are among the deter- ical theorists have included gender in this kind minants of categories. of analysis.2 Where they have, such work tends I consider gender to be the most basic and to be relegated to, if not ghettoized within, the prevalent category in social life throughout the field of “gender studies.”3 world, and in this address, I explore the life Of course, the categories of race, ethnicity, consequences that follow from this designation and gender are real in the sense that—as W. I. for the female half of humanity. Gender is, of Thomas put it in his oft-quoted observation— course, based on biological sex, as determined “if men [sic] define situations as real, they are by the identification of an individual at birth as real in their consequences” (cited in Merton female or male by a look at their genitals. This [1949] 1963:421). Categorization on the basis first glance sets up the most basic divide in all of observable characteristics often serves as a societies—it determines an individual’s quali- mobilizing strategy for action against (or for) ty of life, position on the social hierarchy, and people assigned to the category and may even chance at survival. The glance marks individu- force them into a grouplike state (Bourdieu als for life and is privileged over their unique 1991; Brubaker 2004). Alternatively, catego- intelligence, aptitudes, or desires. Of course, rization may create conformity to a stereotype— persons who are transgendered, transsexual, or in the process known as “the self-fulfilling hermaphrodites4 do not fit this dichotomous prophecy” (Merton [1949] 1963). But it is one separation, but there is little recognition of cat- thing for individuals to engage in categorical egories based on sex other than male and female thinking, and another for social scientists to in almost every society (Butler 1990; Lorber accept a category with its baggage of assump- 1994, 1996). tions. Today, many social scientists use popular understandings of race, ethnicity, and gender as if they were descriptive of inherent or acquired SEX DIVISION AND stable traits, and they treat them as established SUBORDINATION variables that describe clusters of individuals The sexual divide is the most persistent and arguably the deepest divide in the world today. Of course, it is only one of many great divides. Boundaries mark the territories of human rela- 1 Brubaker also cites the contributions of Rothbart and Taylor 1992; Hirshfield 1996; and Gil-White 1999 to this perspective. 2 Duster (2006) does include gender. 4 I have used these commonly used terms, but 3 For example, see Epstein 1988; Lorber 1994; alternative words such as “trans” and “intersex” are Connell 1987; Ridgeway 2006; Bussey and Bandura deemed more appropriate by some scholars and advo- 1999; Tavris 1992. cates. WOMEN’S SUBORDINATION IN GLOBAL CONTEXT—–3 tions. They are created by “cultural entrepre- Cultural meanings are also attached to the cat- neurs”5 who translate the concepts into prac- egories of female and male, which include attri- tice—rulers behind the closed doors of palaces butions of character and competence (Epstein and executive offices; judges in courtrooms; 1988, see Ridgeway 2006 for a review). These priests, rabbis, and mullahs; leaders and mem- situate individuals assigned to each category bers of unions and clubs; and teachers, parents, in particular social and symbolic roles. There is and the people in the street. The great divides some overlap in the roles to which females and of society are enforced by persuasion, barter, males are assigned, but in all societies sex sta- custom, force, and the threat of force (Epstein tus is the major determinant—it is the master 1985). The extent to which boundaries are per- status that determines the acquisition of most meable and individuals can escape categoriza- other statuses. tion, and thus, their assignment to particular Of course, biological sex does prescribe social roles and statuses, is a function of a soci- humans’ reproductive roles (e.g., child bearer, ety’s or an institution’s stability and capacity to inseminator). But there is no biological neces- change. The ways in which boundaries may be sity for a woman to become a mother, even transgressed make up the story of social change though only women can become biological and its limits. They are the basis for human mothers, and a man may or may not choose to freedom. become a biological father. Therefore, we can Of all the socially created divides, the gen- conclude that all social statuses and the roles der divide is the most basic and the one most attached to them are socially prescribed. Further, resistant to social change. As I have suggested norms prescribe (or proscribe) detailed behav- before (Epstein 1985, 1988, 1991b, 1992), ior fixed to all social roles. And, because statuses dichotomous categories, such as those that dis- are universally ranked, the statuses women are tinguish between blacks and whites; free persons permitted to acquire usually are subordinate to and slaves; and men and women, are always men’s statuses. Furthermore, women’s roles are invidious. This dichotomous categorization is universally paired with roles assigned to men, also particularly powerful in maintaining the advantage of the privileged category. With in the family, in the workplace, and in the poli- regard to the sex divide, the male sex is every- ty. Virtually no statuses are stand-alone positions where privileged—sometimes the gap is wide, in society; all are dependent on reciprocal activ- sometimes narrow. Some individuals and small ities of those who hold complementary status- clusters of women may succeed in bypassing the es. These too are socially ranked and usually negative consequences of categorization, and in follow the invidious distinctions that “male” some cases they may even do better education- and “female” evoke. Almost no statuses are free ally or financially than the men in their group. from gender-typing. Among women, those from a privileged class, These observations lead me to proposals that race, or nationality may do better than others. I believe are essential for comprehensive soci- But worldwide, in every society, women as a cat- ological analysis today, and to call for the elim- egory are subordinated to men. ination of the boundary that has separated I further suggest that the divide of biological so-called gender studies from mainstream soci- sex constitutes a marker around which all major ology.6 institutions of society are organized. All socie- Given the ubiquitous nature of sex-typing of tal institutions assign roles based on the bio- social statuses, and social and symbolic behav- logical sex of their members. The divisions of ior, I propose that the dynamics of gender seg- labor in the family, local and global labor forces, regation be recognized as a primary issue for political entities, most religious systems, and sociological analysis and attention be paid to the nation-states are all organized according to the mechanisms and processes of sex differentiation sexual divide. and their roles in group formation, group main-

5 I offer this concept following Becker (1963) who 6 A number of sociologists have specifically called writes of “moral entrepreneurs;” Brubacker (2004) for a greater integration of feminist theory and stud- who writes of “ethnopolitical entrepreneurs;” and ies within the mainstream of American sociology Fine (1996) who writes of “reputational entrepre- (e.g., Chafetz 1984, 1997; Laslett 1996; Stacey and neurs.” Thorne 1985). 4—–AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW tenance, and stratification.7 I further suggest invidious distinctions made between males and that females.9 Everywhere, women’s subordination •Females’and males’actual and symbolic roles in the is basic to maintaining the social cohesion and social structure are a seedbed for group formation stratification systems of ruling and governing and group boundary-maintenance. groups—male groups—on national and local •All societies and large institutions are rooted in the levels, in the family, and in all other major insti- differentiation and subordination of females. tutions. Most dramatically, this process is at •The more group solidarities are in question in a work today in the parts of the world where con- society, the stronger the differentiation between trol of females’behavior, dress, and use of pub- males and females and the more severe is women’s lic space have been made representations of subjugation. orthodoxies in confrontation with modernism, The enforcement of the distinction is achieved urbanism, and secular society. But even in the through cultural and ideological means that jus- most egalitarian societies, such as the United tify the differentiation. This is despite the fact States, women’s autonomy over their bodies,10 that, unlike every other dichotomous category their time, and their ability to decide their des- of people, females and males are necessarily tinies is constantly at risk when it intrudes on bound together, sharing the same domiciles and male power. most often the same racial and social class sta- The gender divide is not determined by bio- tuses. Analyses of these relationships are diffi- logical forces. No society or subgroup leaves cult given the ways in which they are integrated social sorting to natural processes. It is through with each other and the extent to which they are social and cultural mechanisms and their impact basic in all institutions. on cognitive processes that social sorting by There is, of course, variation in societies and the subgroups within them, and a continuum sex occurs and is kept in place—by the exercise exists in the severity of female subordination. of force and the threat of force, by law, by per- Indeed, subordination is not a static process and suasion, and by embedded cultural schemas it varies from almost complete to very little. The that are internalized by individuals in all soci- process is dynamic in shape and degree. Women eties. Everywhere, local cultures support invid- gain or lose equality depending on many ele- ments—the state of an economy, the identity politics of groups or nations, the election of 9 Martin (2004) and Lorber (1994) both consider conservative or liberal governments, the need for gender to be a social institution. women’s labor in the public and private sec- 10 The most obvious example is the right to have tors, the extent of their education, the color of an abortion, which through Roe v. Wade (1973) with- 8 their skin, the power of fundamentalist reli- drew from the states the power to prohibit abortions gious leaders in their societies, and their abili- during the first six months of pregnancy. In 1989, ty to collaborate in social movements. But even Webster v. Reproductive Health Services gave some in the most egalitarian of societies, the invidi- of that power back. Since that time, President Bush ous divide is always a lurking presence and it can and other legislators proposed a constitutional amend- easily become salient. ment banning abortions, giving fetuses more legal It is important to note that women’s inequal- rights than women. This remains a deeply contested ity is not simply another case of social inequal- issue in American politics (Kaminer 1990). The ity, a view I have held in the past (Epstein 1970). National Women’s Law Center has expressed concern I am convinced that societies and strategic sub- that the current Supreme Court cannot be counted on groups within them, such as political and work to preserve women’s “hard-won legal gains, especially institutions, maintain their boundaries—their in the areas of constitutional rights to privacy and very social organization—through the use of equal protection” (2006). In many other places in the world women are not protected by their governments. In 2005, the World Health Organization found that domestic and sexual violence is widespread. Amnesty 7 I am not the first to make this plea (e.g., see Acker International reports tens of thousands of women 1973; Blumberg 1978; Chafetz 1997). are subjected to domestic violence, giving as exam- 8 There is, of course, a growing body of scholar- ples Republic of Georgia and Bangladesh where, ship on women of color. See for example, Baca Zinn when women go to the authorities after being stran- and Dill (1996); Collins (1998); and Hondagneu- gled, beaten, or stabbed, they are told to reconcile with Sotelo (2003). their husbands (Lew and Moawad 2006). WOMEN’S SUBORDINATION IN GLOBAL CONTEXT—–5 ious distinctions by sex. As Jerome Bruner attack on Talcott Parsons’s (1954) perspective on (1990) points out in his thoughtful book, Acts the functions of the nuclear family and his obser- of Meaning, normatively oriented institutions— vation that women’s role assignment in the home the law, educational institutions, and family had exceedingly positive functional signifi- structures—serve to enforce folk psychology, cance in that it prevented competition with their and folk psychology in turn serves to justify husbands (p. 191).12 She also attacked Freud’s such enforcement. In this address, I shall explore ([1905] 1975) theories that women’s biology is some spheres in which the process of sex dif- their destiny, that their feelings of inferiority are ferentiation and the invidious comparisons due to “penis envy,” and his contention “that the between the sexes are especially salient. woman has no penis often produces in the male a lasting depreciation of the other sex” (Freud THE POSITION OF WOMEN IN THE 1938:595, footnote 1). UNITED STATES AND IN THE Friedan contributed to both the knowledge PROFESSION OF SOCIOLOGY base of the social sciences and to the status of women. I believe she did more than any other It is fitting that my presidential address to the person in modern times to change popular per- 101st meeting of the American Sociological ceptions of women and their place in the world. Association should begin with an analytic eye While not the first to identify the dimensions of on our profession. I became the ninth woman women’s inequality,13 Friedan put theory into president in the ASA’s 101 years of existence. practice, building on the attention she received The first woman president, Dorothy Swaine when The Feminine Mystique was published. At Thomas, was elected in 1952, the second, Mirra a moment made ripe by the sensibilities of the Komarovsky, almost 20 years later—two women civil rights movement and the growing partici- presidents in the first seven decades of the exis- pation of women in the labor force, she took up tence of the association. Seven others have been a challenge posed to her by Pauli Murray, the 11 chosen in the 23 years since. African American lawyer and civil rights We nine women are symbolic of the positive activist, to create “an NAACP for women.”14 changes in the position of women in the United With the encouragement and participation of a States. Our case is situated at the high end of the small but highly motivated group of women in continuum of women’s access to equality. government, union offices, and professional Similarly, our profession has devoted much life—white women, African American women, research attention to women’s position in soci- and women from Latin-American backgrounds ety, though the findings of scholars on the sub- (a fact that has gone unnoticed far too long)— ject are often not integrated with the profession’s and with the participation of the third woman major theoretical and empirical foci. Many rad- ASA president, Alice Rossi, Friedan founded the ical voices in the discipline refer to “gender National Organization for Women in 1966. issues” only ritualistically. This is so even though Working through NOW, Friedan set out to pro- sociological research on gender is one of the major examples of “public sociology” of the past 40 years. When I was a sociology graduate student at 12 It is curious that his further observation that the Columbia University in the 1960s, there were relationship was also “an important source of strain” no women on the sociology faculty, as was the (p. 191) has rarely been acknowledged, although case at most major universities. The entire bib- Friedan did note this in The Feminine Mystique. liography on women in the workplace, assem- 13 These include (but of course, the list is incom- bled for my thesis (1968) on women’s exclusion plete) John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor, Mary from the legal profession, was exhausted in a Wollstonecraft, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia few pages. However, it included Betty Friedan’s Mott, Sojourner Truth, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, ([1963] 1983) The Feminine Mystique, with its Emmeline Pankhurst, W.E.B. DuBois, Emma Goldman, and in the years just preceding Friedan’s book, Simone de Beauvoir (1949), to whom she ded- icated The Feminine Mystique, and Mirra 11 Information from ASA: http://www.asanet.org/ Komarovsky (1946; [1953] 2004). governance/pastpres.html. The current president, 14 I interviewed Friedan in 1999 about the origins Frances Fox Piven, brings the number of women of NOW for an article I was writing for Dissent presidents to 10 in 102 years. (Epstein 1999a). 6—–AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW vide political support for implementation of and of our colleagues in related disciplines has Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which persuaded legislators and judges in many coun- prohibited discrimination on the basis of sex as tries to acknowledge the inequalities and harsh well as race, color, religion, and national origin. treatment girls and women face. Pierre Sané, the The changes accomplished by the organiza- Assistant Secretary General of UNESCO, has tional work of Friedan, and a number of other noted the synergy between social research and 15 16 activists and scholars, were nothing short of human rights activities, and he stresses in inter- a social revolution. It is a revolution of interest national meetings18 that women’s rights must be to sociologists not only for its creation of regarded as human rights and enforced by law. women’s rights in employment and education Let us remember that the “woman question” but because it became a natural field experiment as a serious point of inquiry for the social sci- establishing that there was no natural order of ences is relatively new. In the past, wisdom on things relegating women to “women’s work” this subject came primarily from armchair ide- and men to “men’s work.” Yet, like most revo- ologists, philosophers, legislators, judges, and lutions it was limited in its accomplishment of 19 its stated goals and its principles are constant- religious leaders. With few exceptions, these ly under attack. theorists asserted that women’s subordinate But the revolution did motivate research. position was for good reason—divine design, or There has been an explosion of scholarship on for those not religiously inclined, nature man- the extent of sex divides on macro and micro dated it. Today, a new species of theorists hold levels. Social scientists have documented in to this ideology—fundamentalist leaders in hundreds of thousands of pages of research the many nations, churches and religious sects in existence and consequences of subtle and overt particular—but also scholars, some in the discrimination against women of all strata and United States, in fields such as sociobiology and nationalities and the institutionalization of sex- evolutionary psychology (e.g., Alexander 1979; ism. Barash 1977; Trivers 1972; Wilson 1975). This The number of studies of the differentiation was perhaps predictable, if my thesis is correct, of women’s and girls’situations in social life has because women had started to intrude into male grown exponentially in the 40 years since the ideological and physical turf in the academy beginning of the second wave of the women’s and elsewhere in society, upsetting the prac- movement. This work has pointed to women’s tices of male affiliation. The prejudices that and girls’ vulnerabilities in the home and the pass as everyday common sense also support workplace; their lower pay and lesser ability to this ideology, often with backing from sophis- accumulate wealth; their exploitation in times ticated individuals responsible for making poli- of war and other group conflicts; and the con- cies that affect girls and women.20 They have ditions under which an ethos of hyper- been joined by some well-meaning women masculinity17 in nations and subgroups controls women’s lives. Some of the work of sociologists social scientists—a few possessing iconic

15 One was Gloria Steinem, who worked with and Collinson (1990); and Collinson and Hearn Friedan to establish the National Women’s Political (1994). Caucus. Steinem became a notable public speaker on 18 The most recent was The International Forum on behalf of women’s rights and established the nation- the Social Science-Policy Nexus in Buenos Aires al magazine MS., which reports on serious women’s February 20 to 24, 2006. issues. 19 For example, John Stuart Mill (1869) The 16 Friedan recruited me as well in the formation of Subjection of Women. the New York City Chapter of NOW in 1966. Through 20 A pinpointed policy was enacted recently. her auspices I presented a paper on the negative Seeking to override a 1972 federal law barring sex social consequences for women of segregated help- discrimination in education (Title IX of the Civil wanted ads in newspapers at hearings of the EEOC Rights Act of 1964), the Bush administration is giv- in 1967 on Guidelines for Title VII of the Civil Rights ing public school districts new latitude to expand Act and to establish guidelines for the Office of the number of single-sex classes and single-sex Federal Contract Compliance in 1968. schools (Schemo 2006). My own review of studies 17 For work on men see especially the work of on the impact of segregated education shows no ben- Kimmel (1996); Connell (1987); Collinson, Knights, efits (Epstein 1997; Epstein and Gambs 2001). WOMEN’S SUBORDINATION IN GLOBAL CONTEXT—–7 status21—who have affirmed stereotypes about alerted us to the selective destruction of female females’nature on the basis of poor or no data.22 fetuses. It is estimated that in China and India alone, 10,000,000 females were aborted between 1978 and 1998 (Rao 2006). Also hidden are FEMALE SUBORDINATION IN the child brides who live as servants in alien GLOBAL CONTEXT environments and who, should their husbands The “woman question” is not just one among die, are abandoned to live in poverty and isola- many raised by injustice, subordination, and tion. And there are the millions of girls and differentiation. It is basic. The denigration and women lured or forced into sex work. In the segregation of women is a major mechanism in Western world, only the occasional newspaper reinforcing male bonds, protecting the institu- article brings to view the fact that African tions that favor them, and providing the basic women face a 1 in 20 chance of dying during work required for societies to function. To ignore pregnancy (half a million die each year).24 The this great social divide is to ignore a missing link persistent segregation of the workplace, in even in social analysis. the most sophisticated societies, in which girls I will not illustrate my thesis about the per- and women labor in sex-labeled jobs that are sistence of the worldwide subordination of the tedious, mind-numbing, and highly supervised, female sex with pictures, graphs, or charts. is out of view. Unseen too are the countless Instead I call on readers’imaginations to picture beatings, slights, and defamations women and some of the phenomena that illustrate my the- girls endure from men, including intimates, sis. Imagine most women’s lifetimes of every- every day all over the world. day drudgery in households and factories; of struggles for survival without access to decent INSISTENCE AND PERSISTENCE ON jobs. Imagine the horror of mass rapes by armed “NATURAL DIFFERENCES” men in ethnic conflicts, and of rapes that occur inside the home by men who regard sexual These patterns are largely explained in the world access as their right.23 Imagine also women’s as consequences stemming from natural caus- isolation and confinement behind walls and es or God’s will. Here, I limit analysis mainly veils in many societies. Some examples are to the view of natural causation as the master harder to imagine—for example, the 100 mil- narrative—the narrative that attributes role divi- lion women missing in the world, first brought sion of the sexes to biology. Some believe that to our attention by the economist Amartya Sen early socialization cements the distinction. It is (1990), who alerted us to the bizarre sex ratios clear that strong religious beliefs in the natural in South Asia, West Asia, and China. He point- subordination of women determine the role ed to the abandonment and systematic under- women must play in societies. nourishment of girls and women and to the poor Biological explanation is the master narrative medical care they receive in comparison to holding that men and women are naturally dif- males. International human rights groups have ferent and have different intelligences, physical abilities, and emotional traits. This view asserts that men are naturally suited to dominance and women are naturally submissive. The narrative 21 Here I refer to a number of “standpoint” theo- rists such as Belenky et al. (1986), Smith (1990), holds that women’s different intellect or emo- Hartstock (1998), and of course Carol Gilligan (1982) tional makeup is inconsistent with the capaci- whose initial study showing a difference in boys’ ty to work at prestigious jobs, be effective and girls’ moral values and moral development was based on eight girls and eight boys in a local school and 27 women considering whether to have an abor- 24 Perhaps the best known eye into this world is that tion. See also Helen Fisher (1982), an evolutionary of Nicholas Kristof, the New York Times writer, whose anthropologist. These views typically assert that Op Ed articles chronicle the horrors faced by women women are naturally more caring, more accommo- in Africa and the inaction of Western societies to dating, and averse to conflict. redress them (for example, the United States cut off 22 See my analysis of this literature in Epstein funding to the United Nations Population Fund, an (1988). agency that has led the effort to reduce maternal 23 For more horrors see Parrot and Cummings deaths, because of false allegations it supports abor- (2006). tion) (Kristof 2006). 8—–AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW scholars, and lead others. Popularized accounts be published in scholarly publications. The of gender difference have generated large fol- Stanford University cognitive psychologist lowings.25 Barbara Tversky (personal communication) But the set of assumptions about basic dif- notes that when she has sought to publish the ferences are discredited by a body of reliable results of experiments on a variety of spatial research. Although there seems to be an indus- tasks that show no gender differences, journal try of scholarship identifying sex differences, it editors have demanded that she and her collab- is important to note that scholarship showing orators take them out because they are null find- only tiny or fluctuating differences, or none at ings. Even so, we can conclude that under all, is rarely picked up by the popular press. conditions of equality, girls and women per- Most media reports (e.g., Brooks 2006, Tierney form and achieve at test levels that are the same 2006) invariably focus on sex differences, fol- as or similar to males—and, in many cases, lowing the lead of many journals that report they perform better.27 tiny differences in distributions of males and The American Psychological Association has females as significant findings (Epstein 1991a, reported officially that males and females are 1999b). Further, the media rarely reports the fact more alike than different when tested on most that a good proportion of the studies showing psychological variables. The APA’s finding is any differences are based on small numbers of based on Janet Hyde’s 2005 analysis of 46 meta- college students persuaded to engage in exper- analyses conducted recently in the United States. iments conducted in college laboratories and not They conclude that gender roles and social con- in real world situations. Or, in the case of stud- text lead to the few differences. Further, they ies indicating the hormonal relationship between report that sex differences, though believed to men’s aggression and women’s presumed lack be immutable, fluctuate with age and location.28 of it, a number of studies are based on the behav- Women manifest similar aggressive feelings ior of laboratory animals. Other studies compare although their expression of them is obliged to test scores of students in college, rarely report- take different forms (Frodi, Macaulay, and ing variables such as the class, race, and eth- Thome 1977). A 2006 report from the National nicity of the population being studied. Even in Academy of Sciences found that after an exhaus- these settings, the systematic research of social tive review of the scientific literature, including scientists has proved that males and females show almost no difference or shifting minor differences in measures of cognitive abilities (Hyde 2005) and emotions.26 And there may be 27 A 2006 New York Times report shows that women more evidence for similarity than even the are getting more B.A.s than are men in the United scholarly public has access to, because when States. However, in the highest income families, men studies find no differences, the results might not age 24 and below attend college as much as, or slight- ly more than their sisters, according to the American Council on Education. The article also reports that women are obtaining a disproportionate number of 25 The works of John Gray (1992), the author of honors at elite institutions such as Harvard, the Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus and spin- University of Wisconsin, UCLA, and some smaller off titles have sold over 30 million copies in the schools such as Florida Atlanta University (Lewin United States. See also Deborah Tannen’s (1990) 2006a). A comparison of female and male math You Just Don’t Understand on the presumed inabil- scores varies with the test given. Females score some- ity of men and women to understand each other on what lower on the SAT-M but differences do not exist various dimensions, repudiated by the work of the lin- on the American College Test (ACT) or on untimed guistic scholar Elizabeth Aries (1996). versions of the SAT-M (Bailey n.d.). 26 There has been a recent flurry over reported 28 Girls even perform identically in math until differences in male and female brains (cf. Brizendine high school when they are channeled on different 2006; Bell et al. 2006) and reports of a 3 to 4 per- tracks. In Great Britain, they do better than males, as centage difference in IQ. The brain studies are usu- noted in the ASA statement contesting the remarks ally based on very small samples and the IQ studies of then Harvard President Lawrence Summers ques- on standardized tests in which the differences report- tioning the ability of females to engage in mathe- ed are at the very end of large distributions that matics and scientific research (American Sociological essentially confirm male/female similarities (see Association 2005; see also Boaler and Sengupta- Epstein 1988 for a further analysis). Irving 2006). WOMEN’S SUBORDINATION IN GLOBAL CONTEXT—–9 studies of brain structure and function, it could and today it is 77 percent (Goldin 2006). The find no evidence of any significant biological opening of elite colleges and universities to factors causing the underrepresentation of women students after the 1960s led progres- women in science and mathematics.29 sively to their increased participation in employ- Sociologists too have found women’s aspira- ment in the professions and other top jobs. This tions are linked to their opportunities (Kaufman was the direct result of a concerted effort to and Richardson 1982). I observe that like men, use the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to force the women want love, work, and recognition. opening of these sectors. Ruth Bader Ginsburg So, given similar traits, do women prefer and her associates in the Women’s Rights Project dead-end and limited opportunity jobs; do they of the ACLU fought and won important battles wish to work without pay in the home or to be in the Supreme Court and Judge Constance always subject to the authority of men? In the Baker Motley, the first African American past, some economists thought so. The Nobel woman to become a federal judge, ruled that Laureate Gary Becker (1981) proposed that large law firms had to recruit women on the women make rational choices to work in the same basis as men to comply with the equal home to free their husbands for paid labor. A treatment promised by the Civil Rights Act. number of other scholars follow the rational- Yet even as the ideology of equality became choice model to explain women’s poorer posi- widespread and brought significant changes, tion in the labor force. Not only has the model the worldwide status of women remained sub- proven faulty (England 1989, 1994), but histo- ordinate to that of men. Stable governments ry has proven such ideas wrong. The truth is that and a new prosperity led to something of a rev- men have prevented the incursions of women olution in women’s statuses in the United States into their spheres except when they needed and other countries in the West, notably in women’s labor power, such as in wartime, prov- Canada with its new charter prohibiting dis- ing that women were indeed a reserve army of crimination. There was also an increase in labor. As I found in my own research, when women’s employment in the paid labor force in windows of opportunity presented themselves, the 15 countries of the European Union, includ- women fought to join the paid labor force at ing those countries that traditionally were least every level, from manual craft work to the elite likely to provide jobs for women, although the professions. Men resisted, seeking to preserve statistics do not reveal the quality of the jobs the boundaries of their work domains—from (Norris 2006). And, of course, women’s move- craft unionists to the top strata of medical, legal, ments have been instrumental in making poor and legislative practice (Chafe 1972; Epstein conditions visible. In countries of the Middle 1970, [1981] 1993; Frank 1980; Honey 1984; East, the East, and the Global South, women are Kessler-Harris 1982; Lorber 1975, 1984; beginning to have representation in political Milkman 1987; O’Farrell 1999; Rupp 1978). spheres, the professions, and commerce, Social and economic changes in other parts although their percentage remains quite small. of the West, and in other parts of the world, Women’s lot rises or falls as a result of regime provide natural field experiments to confirm changes and economic changes and is always at this data from the United States. In the West, severe risk.30 But nowhere are substantial num- where women have always been employed in the bers of women in political control; nowhere do unpaid, family workforce, a revolution in women have the opportunity to carry out nation- women’s interest and participation in the paid al agendas giving women truly equal rights.31 workplace spiraled after the First World War. In the United States, from 1930 to 1970 the par- ticipation of married women ages 35 to 44 in the labor force moved from 10 percent to 46 percent 30 Hartmann, Lovell, and Werschkul (2004) show how, in the recession of March to November 2001, there was sustained job loss for women for the first time in 40 years. The economic downturn affected 29 The panel blamed environments that favor men, women’s employment, labor force participation, and continuous questioning of women’s abilities and wages 43 months after the start of the recession. commitment to an academic career, and a system 31 In Scandinavian countries, women have achieved that claims to reward based on merit but instead the most political representation: Finland (37.5 per- rewards traits that are socially less acceptable for cent of parliament seats), Norway (36.4 percent of women to possess (Fogg 2006). parliament seats), Sweden (45.3 percent of parliament 10—–AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW

Structural gains, accompanied by cultural ly witnessed) women hauling rocks and stones gains, have been considerable in many places. in building sites in India and other places. Most governments have signed on to commit- Throughout the world, where water is a scarce ments to women’s rights, although they are commodity it is women who carry heavy buck- almost meaningless in many regimes that egre- ets and vessels of water, usually on foot and over giously defy them in practice. And, of course, long distances, because this has been designat- in many societies women have fewer rights than ed as a woman’s job and men regard it as a dis- do men and find themselves worse off than they grace to help them. Apparently, in much of the were a generation ago.32 world, the guiding principle of essentialism In no society have women had clear access to labels as women’s jobs those that are not phys- the best jobs in the workplace, nor have they ically easier, necessarily, but rather those that are anywhere achieved economic parity with men. avoided by men, pay little, and are under the As Charles and Grusky (2004) document in supervision of men. their recent book, Occupational Ghettos: The Of course, women have moved into some Worldwide Segregation of Women and Men, sex male-labeled jobs. As I noted in my book on the segregation in employment persists all over the consequences of sex boundaries, Deceptive world, including in the United States and Distinctions (1988), the amazing decades of Canada. Women workers earn less than men the 1970s and ’80s showed that women could even in the most gender-egalitarian societies. do work—men’s work—that no one, including Charles and Grusky suggest that the disadvan- themselves, thought they could and they devel- tage in employment is partly because women are oped interests no one thought they had, and clustered in “women’s jobs”—jobs in the low- numbers of men welcomed them, or at least paid service economy or white-collar jobs that tolerated them. do not offer autonomy. These are typically occu- My research shows that women may cross pational ghettos worldwide. While Charles and gender barriers into the elite professions that Grusky observe that women are crowded into retain their male definition, such as medicine the nonmanual sector, women increasingly do and law (Epstein [1981] 1993), when there is work in the globalized manufacturing econo- legal support giving them access to training and equal recruitment in combination with a short- my—for example, in assembly line production age of personnel. Women made their most dra- that supplies the world with components for matic gains during a time of rapid economic computers or in the clothing sweatshops in growth in the Western world. Chinatowns in the United States and around I first started research on women in the legal the world (Bose and Acosta-Belén 1995; profession in the 1960s, when women consti- Zimmerman, Litt, and Bose 2006; see also Bao tuted only 3 percent of practitioners (Epstein 2001; Lee 1998; Salzinger 2003). [1981] 1993). When I last assessed their Many women in newly industrializing coun- achievements (Epstein 2001), women composed tries experienced a benefit from employment about 30 percent of practicing lawyers and about created by transnational corporations in the half of all law students. The same striking 1980s and ’90s. They received income and inde- changes were happening in medicine (they are pendence from their families, but they remained now almost half of all medical students in sex-segregated, low-wage work, subject to [Magrane, Lang, and Alexander 2005]), and cutbacks when corporations sought cheaper women were moving into legal and medical labor markets. As to their suitability for heavy specialties once thought to be beyond their inter- labor, it is common to see (as I have personal- ests or aptitudes, such as corporate law and sur- gery. Yet, even with such advances they face multiple glass ceilings (Epstein et al. 1995). seats), and Denmark (38 percent of parliament seats) Only small percentages have attained high (U.N. Common Database 2004; Dahlerup n.d.). Of rank.33 And it should come as no surprise that course, women in some societies still do not have the right to vote, and in a few, like Kuwait, where they have just gotten the vote, it is unclear whether they have been able to exercise it independently. 33 The current figure for women partners in large 32 This is the case in Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Gaza, and law firms (those with more than 250 lawyers) in the Lebanon as fundamentalist groups have gained power, United States is 17 percent, although women are even in those regimes that are formally secular. one-half of the recruits in these firms (National WOMEN’S SUBORDINATION IN GLOBAL CONTEXT—–11

men of high rank,34 the popular media (Belkin crimination (Epstein et al. 1999, Williams 2000). 2003), and right-wing commentators (Brooks In the United States this may lead to the loss of 2006; Tierney, 2006) insist that it is women’s a promotion or a job. In other places in the own choice to limit their aspirations and even world, the consequences are even more dire.36 to drop out of the labor force. But this has not In the current “best of all worlds,” ideologies been women’s pattern. Most educated women of difference and, to use Charles Tilly’s (1998) have continuous work histories. It is true, how- concept, “exploitation and opportunity hoard- ever, that many women’s ambitions to reach the ing” by men in control keep the top stratum of very top of their professions are undermined. law and other professions virtually sex segre- For one thing, they generally face male hostil- gated. Gatekeepers today don’t necessarily limit ity when they cross conventional boundaries entry, as that would place them in violation of and perform “men’s work.”35 For another, they sex discrimination laws in the United States or face inhospitable environments in male-domi- put them in an uncomfortable position, given nated work settings in which coworkers not modern Western ideologies of equality. But only are wary of women’s ability but visibly powerful men move only a small percentage of disapprove of their presumed neglect of their the able women they hire (often hired in equal families. Women generally face unrelieved bur- numbers with men) upward on the path toward dens of care work in the United States, with few leadership and decision making, especially in social supports (Coser 1974; Gornick 2003; professions and occupations experiencing slow growth. Most rationalize, with the approval of Williams 2000). And they face norms that this conventional wisdom, that women’s own deci- work demands their personal attention—a sions determine their poor potential for achiev- female’s attention. ing power. Even in the most egalitarian societies, a myr- Inequality in the workplace is created and iad of subtle prejudices and practices are used reinforced by inequality in education. by men in gatekeeping positions to limit Newspaper headlines reported that more women women’s access to the better, male-labeled jobs than men get B.A.s in the United States today and ladders of success, for example, partnership (Lewin 2006a), “leaving men in the dust.” But tracks in large law firms (Epstein et al. 1995). a report a few days later noted that the increase Alternative routes for women, “Mommy tracks” is due to older women going back to school, and have been institutionalized—touted as a bene- that women’s degrees are in traditional women’s fit—but usually result in stalled careers fields (Lewin 2006b). (Bergmann and Helburn 2002). Husbands who But women’s performance and acceptance wish to limit their own work hours to assist in the world of higher education in the United working wives usually encounter severe dis- States is the good news! Consider the rest of the crimination as well. Individual men who are world. In many countries girls are denied any seen as undermining the system of male advan- education. Consider, for example, the case of tage find themselves disciplined and face dis- Afghanistan, where the Taliban still are attempt- ing to resume power. In July 2006, they issued warnings to parents that girls going to school Association for Law Placement cited in O’Brien may get acid thrown in their faces or be mur- 2006; Nicholson 2006). dered (Coghlan 2006). 34 A national survey of 1,500 professors (as yet Consider that in Southern Asia 23.5 million unpublished) at all kinds of institutions in the United girls do not attend school and in Central and States conducted by Neil Gross of Harvard and Solon West Africa virtually half of all girls are also Simmons of George Mason University shows that excluded (Villalobos 2006). While poverty con- most professors don’t agree that discrimination— intentional or otherwise—is the main reason that men hold so many more positions than do women in the sciences (Jaschik 2006). 36 For example, when the magazine publisher Ali 35 In studies of jobs dominated by men that are seen Mohaqeq returned to Afghanistan in 2004 after a as requiring traits that distinguish men as superior to long exile he was imprisoned for raising questions women in intellect or strength, it is reported that about women’s rights in the new “democracy.” Afghan men’s pride is punctured if women perform them courts claimed his offense was to contravene the (see Chetkovich 1997 on firefighters; Collinson, teachings of Islam by printing essays that questioned Knights, and Collinson 1990 on managers). legal discrimination against women (Witte 2005). 12—–AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW tributes to poor educational opportunities for MECHANISMS CREATING “OTHERNESS” boys as well as girls in many parts of the world, To some extent, women are subject to the girls’ restrictions are far greater. Some funda- process of social speciation—a term that Kai mentalist societies permit women to get a high- Erikson (1996) introduced (modifying the con- er education, but this is to prepare them for cept of pseudospeciation offered by Erik work in segregated conditions where they serve Erikson) to refer to the fact that humans divide other women. into various groups who regard themselves as The sex segregation of labor as measured by “the foremost species” and then feel that others sophisticated sociologists and economists does ought to be kept in their place by “conquest or not even acknowledge women’s labor outside the the force of harsh custom” (Erikson 1996:52). wage-earning structure. Women and girls labor Harsh customs and conquest certainly ensure the behind the walls of their homes, producing subordination of girls and women. I shall con- goods that provide income for their families, sider some of these below. income they have no control over. Thus, millions of girls and women are not even counted in the KIN STRUCTURES. In many societies brides labor force, although they perform essential are required to leave their birth homes and enter work in the economy (Bose, Feldberg, and as virtual strangers into the homes of their hus- 37 Sokoloff 1987). bands and their husbands’ kin. Because of the In addition, females can be regarded as a practice of patrilocality they usually have few commodity themselves. They are computed as or no resources—human or monetary. Marrying a means of barter in tribal families that give their very young, they enter these families with the girls (often before puberty) to men outside their lowest rank and no social supports. About one tribe or clan who want wives to produce chil- in seven girls in the developing world gets mar- dren and goods. Men also trade their daughters ried before her 15th birthday according to the to men of other tribes as a form of compensa- Population Council, an international research tion for the killing of a member of another tribe group (Bearak 2006). Local and international or other reasons.38 Harmony is re-equilibrated attempts to prevent this practice have been large- through the bodies of females. ly unsuccessful.40 There is much more to report about the roles In exploring the actual and symbolic segre- and position of women in the labor force world- gation of women I have been inspired by the wide—my life’s work—but there are other work of Mounira Charrad in her 2001 prize-win- spheres in which females everywhere are mired ning book States and Women’s Rights: The in subordinate roles. Chief among them are the Making of Postcolonial Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco. The work of Val Moghadam (2003) family and the social and cultural structures and Roger Friedland (2002) also informs this that keep women both segregated and in a state of symbolic and actual “otherness,” undermin- ing their autonomy and dignity. Nearly every- where, women are regarded as “others.”39 40 Struggles between human rights activists in and out of government and fundamentalist regimes have shifted upward and downward on such matters as rais- ing the age of marriage of girls. For example, attempts 37 Women have been unpaid workers on family by Afghanistan’s King Abanullah in the 1920s to farms or in small businesses, taking in boarders, and raise the age of marriage and institute education for doing factory outwork (see Bose et al. 1987 for the girls enraged the patriarchal tribes who thwarted his United States; Bose and Acosta-Belén 1995 for Latin regime. Fifty years later a socialist government enact- America; and Hsiung 1996 for Taiwan). ed legislation to change family law to encourage 38 There are numerous references on the Web to the women’s employment, education, and choice of use of women given in marriage to another tribe or spouse. The regime failed in the early 1990s due to group in the reports of Amnesty International, for internal rivalries and a hostile international climate example in Papua New Guinea, Afghanistan, Paki- (Moghadam 2003:270) and the Taliban took power. stan, and Fiji. In the early 1990s they exiled women to their homes, 39 The characterization of women as “other” was denied them access to education and opportunities to most notably made by Simone de Beauvoir ([1949] work for pay, and even denied them the right to look 1993) in her book, The Second Sex. out of their windows. WOMEN’S SUBORDINATION IN GLOBAL CONTEXT—–13

analysis. Writing of the relative status of than the bonds between men. Thus, everywhere women, Charrad points to the iron grip of patri- the affiliations made possible by love are con- lineal kin groups in North African societies. She tained in various ways. notes how Islamic family law has legitimized In societies in which marriage is embedded the extended male-centered patrilineage that in a larger kin structure beyond the nuclear fam- serves as the foundation of kin-based solidar- ily, the practices and rules of domicile and the ities within tribal groups so that state politics conventions around it have the potential to and tribal politics converge. This supports the undermine the possibility of a truly affective patriarchal power not only of husbands, but marital tie, one that could integrate women in also of all male kin over women so that the clan the society. A couple may face a wall of sepa- defines its boundaries through a family law ration—apartheid in the home in separate parts that rests on the exploitation of women. Her of the compound or house. Or, they may be study shows how Islamic family law (Sharia) community-bound or home-bound in funda- provides a meaningful symbol of national unity mentalist religious groups within larger secular in the countries of the Maghreb. This has societies such as the United States (e.g., the changed in Tunisia, but it remains the case for Jewish Satmar community in New York [where other societies—Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, women are not permitted to drive] [Winston Kuwait, Afghanistan, southeastern Turkey, parts 2005] or some Christian fundamentalist com- of Iran, and southern Egypt. As Moghadam munities where women are required to home- (2003) points out, the gender dimension of the school their children). Afghan conflict is prototypical of other con- I shall now focus on some other symbolic flicts today. During periods of strife, segrega- uses of sex distinctions that facilitate the sub- tion and subordination of women becomes a ordination of women. sign of cultural identity. We see it clearly in the ideologies of Hamas and Hezbollah, Iran, HONOR. Females are designated as carriers of Chechnya, and other Islamic groups and soci- honor in many societies. Their “virtue” is a eties, and in the ideologies of fundamentalist symbolic marker of men’s group boundaries. As Christian and Jewish groups. Representations we know from Mary Douglas (1966) and oth- of women are deployed during processes of ers, we can think about any social practice in revolution and state building to preserve group terms of purity and danger. In many societies, boundaries within larger societies with com- females are the designated carriers of boundary peting ideologies, and when power is being distinctions. Their conformity to norms is reconstituted, linking women either to mod- regarded as the representation of the dignity of ernization and progress or to cultural rejuve- the group, while males typically have much nation and religious orthodoxy. greater latitude to engage in deviant behavior. Few social scientists have paid attention to the To achieve and maintain female purity, women’s role of kin structures and their accompanying behavior is closely monitored and restricted. conceptual structures in the minds of players in As Friedland (2002) writes, religious national- national and international politics, but I believe ists direct “their attention to the bodies of this negligence persists at our peril as we expe- women—covering, separating and regulating” rience conflicts between kin-based collectivities (p. 396) them, in order “to masculinize the pub- in the world. lic sphere, to contain the erotic energies of het- Of course, human sexuality has much to do erosexuality within the family seeking to with the cultural sex divide. The fact that men masculinize collective representations, to make desire women sexually, and that women also the state male, a virile collective subject, the desire men, means that they are destined to live public status of women’s bodies is a critical site together no matter what the culture and family and source for religious nationalist political structures in which they live. And sexuality mobilization” (p. 401). could, and can, create equality through bonds of The idea that girls must remain virgins until connection and affection. As William Goode they marry or their entire family will suffer dis- (1959) points out in an important but perhaps honor is used as a mechanism for women’s seg- forgotten paper, “The Theoretical Importance of regation and subordination all over the world. Love,” love is a universal emotion. As such it It is also used as justification for the murder of threatens social structures because the ties many young women by male family members between men and women could be stronger claiming to cleanse the girls’ supposed dishon- 14—–AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW or from the family.41 In particular, we see this places, are regarded as defiled and are shunned, at play in parts of the Middle East and among as are the babies born of such rapes. some Muslim communities in the diaspora. When a woman strays from her prescribed CLOTHING AS A SYMBOLIC TOOL FOR DIFFEREN- roles, seeks autonomy, or is believed to have had TIATION. The chador and veil are tools men use sex with a man outside of marriage, killing her to symbolize and maintain women’s honor. is regarded as a reasonable response by her very Although men, with some exceptions,42 wear own relatives, often a father or brother. In Iraq, Western dress in much of the world, women’s at last count, since the beginning of the present clothing is used to symbolize their cultures’ war, there have been 2,000 honor killings confrontations with modernity, in addition to (Tarabay 2006), and United Nations officials clothing’s symbolic roles. Presumably worn to estimate 5,000 worldwide (BBC 2003). In the assure modesty and to protect women’s honor, summer of 2006, the New York Times reported the clothing prescribed, even cultural relativists that in Turkey, a society becoming more reli- must admit, serves to restrict women’s mobili- giously conservative, girls regarded as errant ty. Hot and uncomfortable, women cannot per- because they moved out of the control of their form tasks that require speed and mobility, and parents or chose a boyfriend, thus casting dis- it prevents women from using motorbikes and honor on the family, are put in situations in bicycles, the basic means of transportation in which they are expected and pressured to com- poor societies. Distinctive clothing is not mit suicide. Suicide spares a family the obliga- restricted to the Third World. Fundamentalist tion to murder her and face prosecution groups in Europe and the United States also (Bilefsky 2006). Elsewhere, such murders are mandate clothing restrictions for women.43 barely noted by the police. Of course, clothing is used to differentiate Female circumcision is also intended to pre- women and men in all societies. In the past, serve women’s honor. In many areas of the Western women’s clothing was also restrictive African continent, girls are subjected to genital (e.g., long skirts and corsets) and today, as cutting as a prelude to marriage and as a tech- women have moved toward greater equality, nique to keep them from having pleasure dur- women and men are permitted to wear similar ing sex, which, it is reasoned, may lead them to garb (such as jeans and t-shirts). Of course, an independent choice of mate. fashion prescribes more sexually evocative (thus Conferring on women the symbolism of sex- distinctive) clothing for women than it does for ual purity as a basis of honor contributes to men. their vulnerability. In today’s genocidal war- fare, the mass rape of women by marauding TIME AND SPACE. How can we speak of the forces is not just due to the sexual availability otherness and subordination of women without of conquered women. Rape is used as a mech- noting the power of the variables of time and anism of degradation. If the men involved in the Bosnian and Darfur massacres regarded rape as an atrocity and a dishonor to their cause, it could not have been used so successfully as a 42 In demonstrations in societies led by religious tool of war. Further, we know that the Bosnian leaders, men typically wear Western style shirts and and Sudanese rape victims, like women who trousers although their leaders typically choose cler- have been raped in Pakistan, India, and other ics’ robes and turbans. Leaders of countries outside the “Western” orbit often choose distinctive dress— robes, beards, open neck shirts, and other costumes for ceremonial occasions or to make political state- 41 A United Nations (2002) report found that there ments. were legislative provisions “allowing for partial or 43 Hella Winston (personal communication, complete defense” in the case of an honor killing in: September 30, 2006) told me that in the orthodox Argentina, Bangladesh, Ecuador, Egypt, Guatemala, Jewish community of New Square in New York State, Iran, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Peru, Syria, Turkey, a recent edict by the Rabbi reminded women they Venezuela, and the Palestinian National Authority (of were to wear modest dress, specifying that “sleeves course law does not equal practice). For example, in must be to the end of the bone, and [to] not wear nar- Pakistan and Jordan honor killings are outlawed but row clothing or short clothing.” They were not to they occur nevertheless. ride bikes or speak loudly. WOMEN’S SUBORDINATION IN GLOBAL CONTEXT—–15

space in the analysis? In every society the norms and girls persist no matter how societies change governing the use of time and space are gen- in other ways? How does half the world’s pop- dered (Epstein and Kalleberg 2004). People ulation manage to hold and retain power over the internalize feelings about the proper use of time other half? And what are we to make of the and space as a result of the normative structure. women who comply? Worldwide, the boundaries of time and space are The answers lie in many of the practices I constructed to offer men freedom and to restrict have described and they remain persuasive with women’s choices. In most of the world, women a global perspective. I propose an even more rise earlier than do men and start food prepa- basic explanation for the persistence of inequal- ration; they eat at times men don’t. Further, sex ity, and often a reversion to inequality, when segregation of work in and outside the home equality seems to be possible or near attain- means a couple’s primary contact may be in the ment. In Deceptive Distinctions (1988) I pro- bedroom. If women intrude on men’s space they posed the theory that the division of labor in may violate a taboo and be punished for it. society assigns women the most important sur- Similarly, men who enter into women’s spaces vival tasks—reproduction and gathering and do so only at designated times and places. The preparation of food. All over the world, women taboo elements undermine the possibility of do much of the reproductive work, ensuring the easy interaction, the opportunity to forge friend- continuity of society. They do this both in phys- ships, to connect, and to create similar compe- ical terms and in symbolic terms. Physically, tencies. In the Western world, working different they do so through childbirth and child care. shifts is common (Presser 2003), which also They do much of the daily work any social results in segregation of men and women. group needs for survival. For example, half of There are rules in every society, some by law the world’s food, and up to 80 percent in devel- and others by custom, that specify when and oping countries, is produced by women (Food where women may go, and whether they can and Agriculture Organization of the United make these journeys alone or must appear with Nations n.d.; Women’s World Summit a male relative. Some segregation is to protect Foundation 2006). They also prepare the food men from women’s temptations (e.g., Saudi at home, work in the supermarkets, behind the Arabia, Iran, the Satmar sect in Monsey, NY) counters, and on the conveyor belts that pack- and some to protect women from men’s sexual age it. In their homes and in schools, they pro- advances (e.g., Mexico, Tokyo, Mumbai). But duce most preschool and primary school the consequence is that men overwhelmingly are education. They take care of the elderly and allotted more space and territorialize public infirm. They socialize their children in the social space. skills that make interpersonal communication A common variable in the time prescription possible. They are the support staffs for men. for women is surveillance; women are con- This is a good deal—no, a great deal—for the strained to operate within what I am calling men. role zones. In these, their time is accounted for Controlling women’s labor and behavior is a and prescribed. They have less free time. In our mechanism for male governance and territori- own Western society, women note that the first ality. Men’s authority is held jealously. Men thing to go when they attempt to work and have legitimate their behavior through ideological children is “free time.” Free time is typically and theological constructs that justify their dom- enjoyed by the powerful, and it gives them the ination. Further, social institutions reinforce opportunity to engage in the politics of social this.44 life. Most people who work at a subsistence I shall review the mechanisms: level, refugees, and those who labor in jobs not We know about the use and threat of force protected by the authority of the dominant (Goode 1972).45 We know as well about the group, don’t have free time either. Slave own- ers own the time of their slaves. 44 Where religious laws govern such areas of civic A THEORY OF FEMALE life as family relations, inheritance, and punishment SUBORDINATION for crimes, for example, they invariably institution- alize women’s subordinate status. All of this leads me to ask a basic sociological 45 As one of many possible examples: when hun- question. Why does the subordination of women dreds of women gathered in downtown Tehran on July 16—–AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW role of law and justice systems that do not legitimacy and inevitability of their subjection, accord women the same rights to protection, and even to defend it, as we have seen lately in property, wealth, or even education enjoyed by some academic discourses. men. We know that men control and own guns The mindscapes that legitimate women’s seg- and the means of transport, and they often lock regation are the cognitive translations of ide- women out of membership and leadership of ologies that range the spectrum from radical trade unions, political parties, religious institu- fundamentalism to difference feminism; all are tions, and other powerful organizations. We grounded in cultural-religious or pseudoscien- know too that huge numbers of men feel justi- tific views that women have different emotions, fied in threatening and punishing females who brains, aptitudes, ways of thinking, conversing, deviate from male-mandated rules in public and and imagining. Such mindsets are legitimated private spaces. That’s the strong-arm stuff. every day in conventional understandings But everywhere, in the West as well as in the expressed from the media, pulpits, boardrooms, rest of the world, women’s segregation and sub- and in departments of universities. Psychologists jugation is also done culturally and through call them schemas (Brewer and Nakamura cognitive mechanisms that reinforce existing 1984)—culturally set definitions that people divisions of rights and labor and award men internalize. Gender operates as a cultural “super- authority over women. Internalized cultural schema” (Roos and Gatta 2006) that shapes schemas reinforce men’s views that their behav- interaction and cues stereotypes (Ridgeway ior is legitimate and persuade women that their 1997). Schemas that define femaleness and lot is just. The media highlight the idea that maleness are basic to all societies. Schemas women and men think differently and natural- also define insiders and outsiders and provide ly gravitate to their social roles.46 This is more definitions of justice and equality. than just “pluralistic ignorance” (Merton [1948] In popular speech, philosophical musings, 1963). Bourdieu ([1979] 1984) reminds us that cultural expressions, and the banter of everyday dominated groups often contribute to their own conversation, people tend to accept the notion subordination because of perceptions shaped of difference. They accept its inevitability and by the conditions of their existence—the dom- are persuaded of the legitimacy of segregation, inant system made of binary oppositions. Using actual or symbolic. Thus, acceptance of differ- Eviatar Zerubavel’s (1997) term, “mindscapes” ence perspectives—the idea that women often set the stage for household authorities and heads have little to offer to the group, may result in of clans, tribes, and communities to separate and rules that forbid women from speaking in the segregate women in the belief that the practice company of men (in a society governed by the is inevitable and right. Such mindscapes also Taliban) or may result in senior academics’ persuade the females in their midst to accept the selective deafness to the contributions of a female colleague in a university committee room. 31, 2006 to protest institutionalized sex discrimina- tion in Iran (in areas such as divorce, child custody, employment rights, age of adulthood, and court pro- CONCLUSION ceedings where a woman’s testimony is viewed as half In conclusion I want to reiterate certain obser- of a man’s), 100 male and female police beat them. vations: Reports also noted a tightening of the dress code Intrinsic qualities are attributed to women and segregation on buses and in some public areas that have little or nothing to do with their actu- such as parks, sidewalks, and elevators. Another al characteristics or behavior. Because those demonstration on March 8, 2006 was dispersed as attributions are linked to assigned roles their police dumped garbage on the heads of participants (Stevens 2006). legitimation is an ongoing project. Changing 46 The recent book by Louann Brizendine (2006), these ideas would create possibilities for chang- which asserts that the female and male brains are ing the status quo and threaten the social insti- completely different, offering such breezy accounts tutions in which men have the greatest stake and as “woman is weather, constantly changing and hard in which some women believe they benefit. to predict” and “man is mountain,” has been on the Is women’s situation different from that of top 10 on the Amazon.com book list and led to her men who, by fortune, color of skin, or accident prominent placement on ABC’s 20/20 and morning of birth also suffer from exploitation by the talk shows. Thanks to Troy Duster for passing this on. powerful? I am claiming yes, because they carry WOMEN’S SUBORDINATION IN GLOBAL CONTEXT—–17

not only the hardships—sometimes relative In his review of cognitive sociological dynam- hardships—but the ideological and cognitive ics, DiMaggio (1997) reminds us of Merton’s overlay that defines their subordination as legit- notion of “pluralistic ignorance,” which is at imate and normal. Sex and gender are the organ- work when people act with reference to shared izing markers in all societies. In no country, collective opinions that are empirically incor- political group, or community are men defined rect. There would not be a firm basis for the sub- as lesser human beings than their female coun- ordinate condition of females were there not a terparts. But almost everywhere women are so widespread belief, rooted in folk culture, in defined. their essential difference from males in ability Why is this acceptable? And why does it per- and emotion. This has been proven time and sist? time again in research in the “real” world of So many resources are directed to legitimat- work and family institutions (e.g., Epstein et al. ing females’lower place in society. So few men 1995) and laboratory observations (Berger, inside the power structure are interested in invit- Cohen, and Zelditch 1966; Frodi et al. 1977; ing them in. And so many women and girls Ridgeway and Smith-Lovin 1999). accept the Orwellian notion that restriction is We know full well that there are stories and freedom, that suffering is pleasure, that silence master social narratives accepted by untold mil- is power.47 lions of people that have no basis in what social Of course this is not a static condition, nor, scientists would regard as evidence. The best I hope, an inevitable one. Women in the Western examples are the basic texts of the world’s great world, and in various sectors of the rest of the religions. But there are also societywide beliefs world, have certainly moved upward in the con- of other kinds. Belief systems are powerful. tinuum toward equality. Thirty-five years ago I And beliefs that are unprovable or proven untrue noted how women in the legal profession in the often capture the greatest number of believers. United States were excluded from the informal Sometimes, they are simply the best stories. networks that made inclusion and mobility pos- We in the social sciences have opened the sible. Now, noticeable numbers have ventured gates to a better understanding of the process- over the barriers. Similarly, there has been a es by which subordinated groups suffer because large increase in the numbers of women who the use of categories such as race and ethnici- have entered the sciences,48 business, medi- ty rank human beings so as to subordinate, cine, and veterinary medicine (Cox and Alm exclude, and exploit them (Tilly 1998). 2005). This has changed relatively swiftly. However, relatively few extend this insight to the Women didn’t develop larger brains—nor did category of gender or sex. The sexual divide so their reasoning jump from left brain to right defines social life, and so many people in the brain or the reverse. Nor did they leave Venus world have a stake in upholding it, that it is the for Mars. Rather, they learned that they could most resistant of all categories to change. Today, not be barred from higher education and they Hall and Lamont (forthcoming; Lamont 2005) could get appropriate jobs when they graduat- are proposing that the most productive soci- ed. The problem is no longer one of qualifica- eties are those with porous boundaries between tions or entry but of promotion and inclusion categories of people. Perhaps there is an impor- into the informal networks leading to the top. tant incentive in a wider understanding of this But the obstacles are great. idea. Small groups of men may prosper by sti- fling women’s potential, but prosperous nations benefit from women’s full participation and productivity in societies. Societies might achieve 47 For example, a recent poll cited in the New York still more if the gates were truly open. Times (June 8, 2006) indicates that a majority of women in Muslim countries do not regard them- Sociologists historically have been commit- selves as unequal (Andrews 2006). Of course, this ted to social change to achieve greater equali- attitude is widespread throughout the world, includ- ty in the world, in both public and private lives. ing Western societies. But in this address I challenge our profession to 48 Comparing percentages of women attaining take this responsibility in our scholarship and doctorates in the sciences from 1970–71 to our professional lives; to observe, to reveal, 2001–2002 the increases were: Engineering .2–17.3; and to strike down the conceptual and cultural Physics 2.9–15.5; Computer Science 2.3–22.8; walls that justify inequality on the basis of sex Mathematics 7.6–29. in all of society’s institutions—to transgress 18—–AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW this ever-present boundary—for the sake of Bearak, Barry. 2006. “The Bride Price.” New York knowledge and justice. Times Magazine, July 9, p. 45. Beauvoir, Simone de. [1949] 1993. The Second Sex. Cynthia Fuchs Epstein is Distinguished Professor New York: Alfred A. Knopf. of Sociology at the Graduate Center, City University Becker, Gary. 1981. A Treatise on the Family. of New York. 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