Uvodnik
Why »The Rural Woman Today«?
Sažetak
Historians link the first
development of agriculture with
the work of the woman. But the
degree of the woman's participation
and her independence in agriculture
varied in different phases of
economic development and the
development of agriculture itself.
In Yugoslav agriculture today
the woman (still, but less than one
decade ago) makes up the majority
of the labour force. Both in
privately owned and socialized
agriculture she is the substitute
labour force for the deagrarianized
man. She takes over work
demanding a lower level of
qualification and providing a
lower income and no social
position, work that the man
deserted. Her low level of general
and voccational education leaves
the farm woman with no
alternative other than an
occupation in agriculture; thus, her
work in agriculture is not the
result of her free choice, but of
social and economic necessity.
The increase of the absolute
number of women in agriculture,
both socialized and privately
owned, and perhaps even more
the slower rate of moving out of
agriculture among women, has
resulted in the so-called process
of feminization of the Yugoslav
agricultural labour force. This
process is not ephemeral and must
be studied in the wider social
content; it can thus serve as a
favourable analytical indicator of
change in the production and
self-management position of the
rural and farm woman.
Starting from the relative equality
of the woman in the production,
economic and political sphere as a
reality of the civilized world,
self-managed socialism should
develop true equality between man
and woman. The basic political
attitudes towards that question are clear and decisive, and the
basic Party strategy in the whole
post-War period (and much
earlier also) has been consistent.
However, there has been a certain
lag in the realization of that
policy, as a result of
contradictions between general
principles and attitudes on one
side, and actual social processes
and the individual and social
possibilities on the other. The
Yugoslav society and subjective
political forces consciously
influenced primary microsystems.
They continue to influence the
social and individual consciousness,
about the need to change the
relationship between the sexes not
only in the work process but also in
other spheres of human existence,
in harmony with the values of
socialist self-management. But it
does not necessarily follow that
all the changes that took place in
the relationships between women
and men were as planned. We
must also be conscious that the
contradictions in individual
behaviour, in the approach to real
life and work of men and women,
are only a manifestation of
existing social contradictions.
Rapid post-War industrialization,
sudden economic development, the
socialization of agriculture and the
development of the socialized
sector had consequences that show
them to have been deep
macrosocial changes in the
Yugoslav society. Their manyfold
influence on the rural family and
household structure opens up
many questions about the woman’s
position in the family and in the
local and wider social community.
Historical differences between the
town and the village are most
expressively reflected in the
working (production) and
self-management position of the
rural, and especially the farm
woman. Because of migratory
processes (more selective in sex
than in age), the participation of farm vomen in the active labour
force grows. But their economic,
social and cultural standard does
not grow in proportion to their
contribution to total production.
This is partly the result of
traditional peasant isolation,
backwardness and a lower
standard of living in the village.
But it is also a consequence of the
unequal distribution of the
infrastructure, schools and health
organizations. Leaving the
reproduction of the population, its
education and schooling over
predominantly, or even exclusively,
to the possibilities of the individual
family and the economic power
of the household/farm results in
an even greater gap between
developed and undeveloped
communities, between the town
and the village, between those
occupied in agriculture and those
occupied outside it, between the
position of the Yugoslav woman
and man.
In the socialist society, thus, the
role and the position of the woman
(still) depends on the social
stratum she belongs to. Thus a
comparison between the position
of the Yugoslav village and town
woman today, and especially
between the position of the farm
woman and the woman who
does not work on a farm, shows
that differences in their position
increase in a certain phase of
social development. Society invests
directly in the position of the
town woman and the woman of
non-agricultural occupations, but
an advancement in the position
of the rural and farm woman is
but a side result of an
advancement in the position and
work of the woman in general.
There are thus differences in life
situations, which are a result
of economic, social, cultural etc.
differentiation the socialist society
inherits and/or retains, and in
certain stages of development
even deepens. It is a fact that the true process
of the woman's liberation and her
social emancipation is complex
and contradictory. It was our
intention in this thematic double
issue to indicate some results of
the influence of macro-social
changes on the position and
changeing role of the rural and
farm woman. Establishing,
analysing and setting up the
problems of certain aspects of the
woman’s position in the rural
family and the family farm, we
want to show the present
moment in the social position of
the rural and farm woman in
Yugoslavia's system of socialist
self-management. As each new stage
in the development of the
Yugoslav society opens up new
questions — new social answers
must be found for them. The following pages are a
contribution to the discovery of new solutions.
Ključne riječi
Hrčak ID:
119328
URI
Datum izdavanja:
4.6.1979.
Posjeta: 855 *