Coping with Chaos: Gender and Politics in a Fragmented State

Coping with Chaos Gender and Politics in a Fragmented State Alexandra Hrycak The Kuchma regime used a N the late 1980s and early 1990s, an explosion of I new forms of civic engagement brought tens of thou- divide-and-conquer approach to sands of women into public life in Ukraine. Several very promising federated women’s organizations emerged, groups and individuals uniting thousands of women into a new and vocal public that worked through the independence movement to demanding gender equality. demand path-breaking changes in state policies concern- ing families.1 During the 1990s, hundreds of new women’s organizations were established, many of which benefited from extensive foreign funding and training. Many observers were hopeful that the establishment of new women’s non-governmental organizations—par- ticularly women’s rights NGOs that worked closely with foreign women’s rights advocates—would have a strong political impact. Despite the professionalism of this wave of new women’s rights initiatives, however, women as a group were not able to build on their earlier political advances.2 Rather than forming a mobilized public capable of engaging broader networks of citizens in challenging the authoritarian political system that came into existence under President Leonid Kuchma, orga- nized women’s activism instead entered a period of decline and divisiveness. Disabled by internal conflicts, the women’s movement was powerless to prevent a ALEXANDRA HRYCAK is an associate professor of sociology at Reed College. This article benefited from the support of various organizations gradual reversion to the Soviet political system, which and people. She thanks the International Research and Exchanges Board, excluded women from political influence and confined Reed College, and the Levine Fund for financial support of her field re- women’s issues to subordinate state structures pertain- search in 2001. She also thanks the members and leaders of the women’s organizations in Ukraine who agreed to be interviewed for this project and ing to the family. The conditions that prevented femi- the participants at the panel assessing Leonid Kuchma’s state-building legacy nist-inspired activism and advocacy from achieving its at the 2005 World Congress of the Association for the Study of Nationali- ties. Finally, she thanks the editors of this issue, and in particular Taras intended impact in Ukraine under Kuchma are explored Kuzio, for their comments and encouragement. in the discussion that follows. Problems of Post-Communism, vol. 52, no. 5, September/October 2005, pp. 69–81. © 2005 M.E. Sharpe, Inc. All rights reserved. ISSN 1075–8216 / 2005 $9.50 + 0.00. Hrycak Gender and Politics 69 The Soviet Gender Regime cluded women from decision-making positions, women’s political interests were camouflaged in offi- During the Soviet era, Ukraine was subjected to the cial maternalist rhetoric even after the Soviet Union maternalist gender regime common to state socialist began to reform and opened up issues for debate. Be- countries.3 The Communist Party claimed to have lib- fore the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991, erated women from all forms of gender oppression. General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev acknowledged Despite legal guarantees of gender equality, the social- that a few women’s issues had still to be resolved. How- ist political system perpetuated oppressive traditions that ever, the Soviet leader did not raise the issue of gender treated childbearing and family duties as the primary inequality or even suggest solutions to the host of prac- focus of women’s concern. This maternalist system pro- tical issues, such as chronic shortages of food and other vided working mothers with relatively generous mater- basic goods, that oppressed so many women. Instead, nity leaves and inexpensive childcare and granted he suggested that women needed to commit themselves “Mother Heroine” awards to women who bore ten or more wholeheartedly to their family responsibilities. As more children. Nevertheless, it offered women as a col- Gorbachev put it, “many of our problems . are par- lectivity few opportunities to develop into a meaning- tially caused by the weakening of family ties and a slack ful political force.4 attitude to family responsibilities. This is a paradoxical Women were prevented from developing organiza- result of our sincere and politically justified desire to tional channels that would promote communication, make women equal with men in everything.” It was time, coordination, and commitment among women in posi- he said, to curtail Soviet women’s employment and pub- tions of authority. In the 1930s, the Party abolished its lic activity to “help make it possible for women to re- Women’s Section (Zhinviddil in Ukrainian, Zhenotdel turn to their purely womanly mission.”8 To help women in Russian), the structure that coordinated work with better carry out their duties as wives and mothers, he women Party members. Women’s issues were subse- initiated a revival of the defunct women’s organizations quently delegated to a secondary tier of Soviet state and called Women’s Councils (Zhinochi rady in Ukrainian, Party structures concerned primarily with encouraging but typically referred to by their Russian abbreviation, higher birthrates and providing services to children. Zhensovet). These structures offered few opportunities for Soviet Officials soon claimed that there were thousands of women to develop into a distinct mobilized public Women’s Councils in Ukraine’s workplaces, with a to- united around broadly shared definitions of new po- tal membership of nearly half a million. In reality, how- litical claims. They served instead primarily as trans- ever, these official women’s organizations existed mission belts for official policies that perpetuated primarily on paper and failed to attract a popular fol- norms that held women primarily accountable for fam- lowing.9 Like most official organizations, Women’s ily responsibilities. Councils were widely considered to be ineffectual and Despite state claims that women and men were equal, nepotistic rubber-stamp organizations controlled by women’s advancement, both in the workplace and in Party cronies who lacked any real commitment to in- the Party, continued to be blocked by the discrimina- creasing the political power of the demographic con- tory belief that women were “mothers first, workers stituency they represented or of serving its needs.10 second.” Women were encouraged to work, but were Instead of creating an institutional network of lead- relegated mainly to low wage, dead-end menial jobs or ers capable of responding to political liberalization with traditionally “feminized” occupations concerned with concerted and sustained political action on behalf of children and family welfare.5 As a consequence of gen- women as a group, the official women’s organizations der bias, not only were women workers segregated into and Party structures associated with women’s issues lower-paid, less prestigious jobs, but men held nearly were weak organizations that existed primarily on pa- all the managerial positions even in feminized occupa- per and were concerned only with matters that benefited tional fields.6 Occupational stratification and segrega- the Party power structure. Women’s Councils and simi- tion into lower-prestige economic sectors also hampered lar party structures concerned with women’s issues did advancement to Party leadership. Although women were not create opportunities for women to address the encouraged to join the Communist Party and related disempowering practices that crowded most women into official organizations, men occupied nearly every posi- low-wage or dead-end jobs and compelled women to tion of genuine authority.7 devote much of their time and energy to procuring vari- As a result of long-standing state practices that ex- ous scarce goods and services—most of them “guaran- 70 Problems of Post-Communism September/October 2005 teed” by the state. Instead, they contributed to public to force the state to deal with issues that had routinely perceptions that under Soviet rule, women as a group been ignored by the political establishment: military had no grievances or unmet needs of their own and had hazing, the decline of the Ukrainian language and cul- benefited from generous state policies that had furthered ture, and environmental problems. their advancement. Violence in the Soviet armed forces was a problem that troubled a wide range of ordinary citizens, includ- ing the many thousands of women who formed Sol- Gender and the Politics of Rukh diers’ Mothers Committees in the late 1980s. Women The late 1980s marked the beginning of a period of in- from Rukh helped to strengthen local support for the tense political contestation that increased the Soviet Soldiers’ Mothers Committees proliferating throughout establishment’s vulnerability to new claims. Expand- Ukraine.14 Soldiers’ Mothers and Rukh activists worked ing political opportunities facilitated the emergence of together in western Ukraine and Kyiv to greatly expand the first independent women’s organizations. These or- the group’s activities.15 They conducted the first inde- ganizations reshaped the political realm, publicly chal- pendent investigations into deaths in the Soviet armed lenging Ukraine’s power structure to address issues that forces and successfully used the resulting public sym- had gone unacknowledged during the Soviet era. They pathy to pressure Ukraine’s parliament to recall Ukrai- did so by refashioning official rhetoric to form a nian soldiers serving in other republics and to authorize maternalist collective-action framework that women in the formation of national armed forces. Rukh activists the independence movement used with great success. shielded thousands of deserters and draft-dodgers, es- Once the Soviet system began to relax its use of re- tablished the country’s first shelter for victims of vio- pression, women in Ukraine abandoned the official or- lence, and helped soldiers’ mothers to develop a system ganizations. In western Ukraine and Kyiv, many threw of monitoring and advocacy on behalf of victims of their energies into helping the independence movement military hazing.

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