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a r t i c l e
i n f o
s y n o p s i s
Immigration controls serve a crucial symbolic function of delineating the nation and the
people, the boundaries of Us and Them and state legitimacy is, through immigration policy,
linked to ideas of nation building and preservation (Honig, 2003). Labor migration policy is not
simply an instrumental response to the needs of employers but highly symbolic and politically
contested terrain that assumes intense public significance. This is particularly evident in the
case of domestic workers, who are embedded in the family, the heart of the nation. This paper
explores the ways in which migration policies on domestic work not only produce a
subordinated workforce, but reflect and construct ideas about family, work, and Britishness,
with a particular focus on two visa types: domestic worker accompanying an employer and au
pair visas.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
In 2002 Wimmer and Glick Schiller famously alerted us to
methodological nationalism, the assumption that the
nation/state/society is the natural social and political form
of the modern world. They argued that mainstream social
science was infused with methodological nationalism, and
that the study of migration in particular had been limited by
this. The significance of the study of transnational communities lay in this epistemic move away from methodological
nationalism rather than in the identifying of new objects of
observation (Wimmer & Glick Schiller, 2002). They were
absolutely right to identify the importance of de-naturalizing
the nation state, and to point out the ways in which
intellectual work and research participates in the construction of the categories of state, nation, migrant and citizen. In
this paper, I want to consider the implications of this for
research on migrant domestic workers, but I also want to
argue that resisting methodological nationalism doesn't
mean we should not take the nation seriously. On the
contrary, we must acknowledge its importance in order to
see beyond it.
Nationalism is integrally related to the projects of race
and gender, which all are permanently under construction.
0277-5395/$ see front matter 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2014.01.005
10
even before the post World War 1 decline, and poorer houses
increasingly had no paid workers at all. These families would
no more consider exchanging their children with the
households of those providing servants than British families
would consider their sons and daughters going to work as
domestic workers for, say, Indian families in India. Importantly however, this kind of commodified relation is
classified as work. Employers must demonstrate evidence
of written terms and conditions of employment, must agree
to provide a separate bedroom for their worker, or, if they
are not to live in, that the worker will have access to
adequate accommodation. Those who had entered under the
previous regime were to be regularized as they had become
illegal through no fault of their own. The latter is an interesting
description as it does intimate the state construction of
irregularity at the same time as circumscribing it strongly
implying that there are others who become illegal through
their own fault. Thus, at the very moment of winning their
campaign, the power of the state to set borders is reinscribed
(Nyers, 2010).
There is a tension revealed in the affirmation that domestic
work is work: is the call for domestic work to be formalized and
regulated as other types of work, or does it call for special
measures? While the call of the workers and the campaigners
was for an end to their invisibility through the recognition of
domestic work as work, in practice the demand was for a
specific regime. At the time of the campaign and visa change,
there were very limited routes of entry for the purpose of
low-skilled work and work permits were available only for
high-skilled jobs. The gendered nature of skill and its reliance
on specific specialisms and measurable achievements makes it
peculiarly unsuitable for capturing the requirements of
domestic labor. Indeed, the roots of the concept of skill are
precisely that it is not the general requirements of reproductive labor and the management thereof (Cockburn &
Ormrod, 1993). However, being cast as low-skilled had its
advantages at that time, since work permits tied workers to
employers. The tying of workers to employers did not and
does not, have the connotations with slavery and forced
labor that it does in the private household, even though
there is evidence that it can have a significant effect on
employment relations, and as Robert Miles has argued, call
into question whether this is really free labor (Miles, 1987;
Anderson, 2010).
The fact that domestic work is not considered high-skilled
meant that, despite it being recognized that they were workers,
they were anomalous workers in that they were permitted to
enter even though they were considered low-skilled, and
consequently were not tied to their employers. However,
because it is considered unskilled, the hard-won right to be
treated as workers came under pressure only ten years later in
2008. The domestic worker visa could not be accommodated
within the new Points-Based Immigration system. Given that
the UK was no longer supposed to be granting visas to
low-skilled non-EU migrants, the domestic worker visa
represented an anomaly. Rather than a working visa, it was
proposed to issue a six-month business visitor visa, which
would not give domestic workers any employment rights and
would tie them to the employer with whom they entered. This
visa would not be renewable and would be issued for the
purpose of enabling employers to train an Eastern European
11
(who would not require a visa) to do the work and replace the
original domestic worker when she returned.
The government had not reckoned with the symbolic
importance of this particular group of migrants. While
accounting for a very small proportion of entrants and even
smaller proportion of long stayers, domestic worker visa
holders continue to have a lot of support from those who
feared a return to modern day slavery. Domestic worker
visa holders and other campaigners protested that the
continuing high rates of abuse and exploitation by first
employers meant that tying them to abusive employers in
this way would mean, in effect, that the UK government was
facilitating trafficking. The Labour government's initial
response was interesting: they claimed that trafficking
prevention measures would be put in place that would
ensure all employers and workers would be interviewed
before entry and at the border, and if the employer was
suspected of maltreating the worker they would be refused
entry. Trafficking and slavery would not be allowed on
British soil. It is not hard to imagine the consequences for a
domestic worker if she and her employing family are
returned to the state from which they came (often not the
state of citizenship of the domestic worker, but the state of
citizenship of the employing family). While this proposal
stops abuse from happening in the UK territory, it is at the
cost for the worker of far greater risk and powerlessness on
the territory of another state. State intervention would not
be neutral and prevent harm, it would actively increase the
risk of harm to a vulnerable person, but it would prevent the
harm from occurring on British territory. The suggested
response to the problem reveals the importance of keeping
Britain a national space of liberal freedoms, while simultaneously disavowing interest in human rights outside of
British territory, even when the British state has had an
active role in creating vulnerability. It very explicitly ties
rights to the presence of the territory, even if this presence is
not legally endorsed.
The new Coalition government reopened the debate, in
their pursuit of reduced net migration. They reinvigorated
some of Labour's original proposals, and announced that from
April 2012 domestic workers accompanying their employers
would only be eligible for a six-month non-renewable visa.
They would not be able to change employer and would have to
leave the UK with their employer. They would be given visas as
workers, but, like Romanian and Bulgarian accession card
holders, this did not mean that they would be paid minimum
wage, as the UK Border Agency claimed it is not for us to say
who is entitled to the National Minimum Wage.7 It was
acknowledged by Government Ministers that employment in
private households could be abusive, but the association of this
with the foreignness of households was made explicit. Home
Secretary Teresa May, for example, stated: We recognise that
the ODW routes can at times result in the import of abusive
employer/employee relationships to the UK.8 Whereas previously vulnerability to abuse had been used to demand labor
rights, these two have now been separated, and protection
rather than rights were invoked as the appropriate response:
We do not necessarily believe that a right to change employer
whatever the reason is the only way to provide protection
(Home Office Response to OSCE Country report on the UK,
Justine Currell, 2012). The principle protection for migrant
12
References
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CONICET (National Council of Scientic and Technical Research), Gino Germani Research Institute, Faculty of Social Science, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina
Department of Social Anthropology, Stockholm University, Marie Curie ITN CoHaB (Diasporic Constructions of Home and Belonging), Sweden
a r t i c l e
i n f o
s y n o p s i s
Based on the Spanish case, in this article we explore the connection between migration
policies, family policies, gender regimes and the insertion of Latin American migrant women
into the domestic work sector. Over the first decade of the twenty-first century, Latin America
became the main region of origin of migrants who had settled in Spain, being women the first
link in these migration chains. The main factors that have affected the configuration of this
feminization are linked to migration policies and patterns of migration, the features of the
welfare state, the characteristics of the labor market and the way in which gender organizes
and stratifies migration and domestic work. The achievement of national middle class
women's rights to conciliate their professional and family life through outsourcing domestic
work to non-national women also brings with it a deep inequality in terms of citizenship.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
Over the first decade of the 21st century, Spain became
the primary destination for Latin American immigration, particularly from Ecuador, Colombia, Argentina, Bolivia, Peru and
the Dominican Republic. This growing migration can be mainly
explained through the financial crisis, impoverishment and
degradation of working conditions in their countries of origin,1
but also (and we should emphasize this) through the farreaching social transformation of Spanish society since the
mid-1990s. The analysis of Latin American migration to Spain,
thus, needs to be attentive to the conditions in which this
phenomenon is embedded: accelerated economic growth, the
specificities of the regional labor market, state policies, gender
relations, the welfare regime, the historical bonds between
Spain and Latin American countries, the consolidation of migration networks and increasing importance of family migration
(Gil Araujo, 2008).
14
15
16
Numbers
% of total migrant % of
population
women
UE-27
Europe
Africa
Asia
North America
Central America and Caribbean
South America
Others
Total
2,352,978
247,441
1,096,392
376,285
57,340
222,767
1,163,705
3225
5,520,133
42.6
4.5
19.9
6.8
1
4.0
21.1
0.1
100
48.2
57
38.8
41.2
55.8
61.5
55.9
48.5
17
vs. ten years for other nationalities); (b) there are bilateral
agreements between Spain and these countries on dual
citizenship; and (c) there are also Latin American migrants
who are descendants of Spanish emigrants (mainly Argentina, Cuba, Venezuela and Uruguay).
The growing visibility of this population has been, in part, a
result of state policies, such as the two regularization processes
in 2000 and 2001, and a greater percentage of approvals of
applications submitted by Latin American migrants (Martnez
Bujn, 2003: 17). Moreover, bilateral agreements with Ecuador,
Colombia and the Dominican Republic prioritize hiring workers
from these countries, based on a quota system. Other important
factors have been less strict (in comparison to the USA, for
example) controls of incoming migrants from most Latin
American countries until the early 2000s. In the political
debate, favoring Latin Americans in migration policy has been
justified by claiming that an ethnic affinity (Cook-Martn &
Viladrich, 2009) exists between Latin American and Spanish
people, based on an (imagined) common historical and cultural
(colonial) background (Gil Araujo, 2010b).
Since the mid-1980s, Latin American migrants in Spain
were predominately women, mainly from the Dominican
Republic, and continued to grow until the period between
1992 and 1996. At that time, 62% of Latin American migrants
with resident permits were women. From 2002 to 2006,
the preponderance of women fell to a more moderate 53%,
according to the municipality registry (Actis, 2009). Later, the
processes of family reunification and the demand for Latin
American workers in construction and agriculture generated
a greater balance between the sexes, with major differences
being the countries of origin. The highest degree of feminization among groups are, on the one hand, those initiating their
migration process to Spain from Honduras, Paraguay, Brazil
and Bolivia, along with some already stabilized groups such as
the Dominican Republic, Colombia, Venezuela and Cuba. On the
other hand, Peru, Ecuador, Argentina and Uruguay show more
of a balance between the sexes.
% women
Argentina
Bolivia
Brazil
Colombia
Cuba
Dominican Republic
Ecuador
Paraguay
Peru
Uruguay
Venezuela
94,461
146,723
62,429
276,342
53,393
90,947
406,330
39,984
140,157
33,351
41,614
49.9
60.7
68
56.5
55.1
58.5
51.3
71
52.6
49.5
59.2
18
19
20
in 1999 she migrated back to Spain again and brought her family
(husband and three children) to Barcelona. In the beginning
she worked looking after a child. Later on she was able to start
her own cleaning business with her sister.
And when we were in Ecuador things didn't work out as
we'd planned, and we came back again, I took the decision
to travel again myself, not to Madrid this time but straight
to Barcelona. Well, I was looking, Murcia, Madrid
looking for contacts to have a job and be able to bring
my family because on the second journey I came with the
idea of bringing my family. And well, then, through contacts
I came to Barcelona and when I was in Barcelona I already
had a job, I made the contacts for the apartment and my
husband and three children came.
And you, what were you working at?
I was looking after a child. In domestic service as well. In
Belgium I worked looking after a child, of that lady, that
couple, and I came to Madrid with her here, and I was
there all the time with her. Looking after the child. And
the second time I came too, because there was a bit of
contact between my old bosses, and they got me a job
looking after a child here, in Barcelona. Then after that it
was a lot of hours, from 9 in the morning till 9 in the
evening, and I didn't see my children, so I quit the job and
started to look for a job per hour. And I started working
per hour. And then I started to meet people, to meet more
people, and I started to have a lot of work, and I started to
take people to help me because I couldn't cope and we
had to open a cleaning business between my sister and
me. (Barcelona, 2006)
The historical relations between Spain and Latin America
are also important when it comes to exploring the role of
migratory regulations in the concentration of female workers
from some Latin American countries in domestic work. An
example is the Visa Waiver Agreement for stays of less than
three months, signed at the time of the emigration of Spanish
people to South America. The visa waiver enabled many
migrants from Latin America to come as tourists and stay
longer to work in the informal economy until they could
regularize their status. Since the early 1990s, due to the
growing flows from Latin America, Spain imposed a visa for
several Latin American countries: Peru 1992, the Dominican
Republic 1993, Cuba 1999, Colombia 2001, Ecuador 2003 and
Bolivia 2007. In any case, the majority of Latin American
countries do not need a visa to stay less than three months,
among them Argentina, Brazil, Honduras, Paraguay, Uruguay
and Venezuela. But the last regularization legislation was in
2005. Women who came to Spain after 2005, mainly from
Bolivia and Paraguay, have also mostly found jobs as domestic
workers, but they had to return to their countries of origin in
order to obtain a work and residence permit, therefore many
remain undocumented. That is what Mabel, from Cochabamba,
Bolivia, who arrived in Barcelona in 2006, recounts:
That until a job comes up that can get me a work contract
that would be wonderful. () The requirements mean
[for the papers] going to the country of origin, doing the
21
Conclusions
In this article we have explored the connection between
Spanish migration policies, family policies, gender relations,
the de-nationalization or foreignization of the domestic
work sector and feminization process of Latin American
migration to Spain, as well as the implications in terms of
inequalities based on gender, class, legal status and nationality.
As we have shown, in addition to the limitations on family life
that the grueling pace of domestic work implies (especially in
the case of live-in workers), migration legislation imposes
requirements for housing, earnings and employment that
make official family reunification very difficult for them. These
limitations on the right to family life have deepened family
transnationalism, encouraging various forms of long-distance
motherhood, rarely freely chosen by the women themselves.
Any approach to the particular forms adopted by contemporary SouthNorth migrations must take into account the
broader context of (i) unequal relations between population
groups, countries and regions and (ii) the international, sexual
and racial division of productive and reproductive labor. In the
Spanish case, the political, social and economic changes that
began in the early 1980s generated a higher participation of
women in the labor market. However, this access of women
to the field of production was not accompanied by a sharing
of tasks in the field of reproduction. This was not assumed as a
responsibility of the social state either. On the contrary, all
domestic and care work continued (and still continues) to be
considered a private matter to be managed by families and,
more specifically, by women. Many of these families have
solved the conflict of sharing domestic work by transferring
them to other women, generally migrants, many of whom are
in an irregular situation and come from peripheral countries
that were once colonies within the Spanish Empire. In Spain,
as in other countries in Southern Europe, reproductive labor
has traditionally gone to families, and within them to women.
The connection between the provision of domestic work and
women's international migration is the basis of the current
solution of many European states, which use migration policy
22
2002 and 2003, was a result of the economic and political collapse of Argentina in
December 2001. Between the years 2004 and 2006, the number of Ecuadorians
arriving decreased. They were replaced by migration from Bolivia, which lessened
when the entry visa requirement for the Schengen area came into effect in April
2007 (Gil Araujo, 2008).
2
Migration Policies, Family Transnationalism and Civic Stratication: Latin
American Migration to Spain, funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and
Innovation (20102012). Fundamental rights situation of irregular migrants in
the EU (20092011), funded by the European Union Agency for Fundamental
Rights (FRA); Civic Stratication, Gender and Family Migration Policies in Europe,
supported by the NodeNew Orientations for Democracy in Europe
Research Program, Ministry of Education and Culture, Austria (20062008).
3
The author was one of the founders of Asociacin de Mujeres Dominicanas
en Espaa (AMDE), and so this pioneering textthe rst in Spain with
transnational aspirationsdoes not come from the academic sphere but from
the eld of migrant women associations.
4
Cf. for the case of Peruvian women Escriv Chord, 1999 for the case of
Dominican women Gregorio Gil, 1996 and Cern Ripoll, 1999; for the case of
Ecuadorian women Cortina Nido, 2000.
5
This concept alludes to the existence of family and kinship support
networks to cover care tasks and guarantee the support, cohesion and welfare
of the memberstasks that have been traditionally considered women's duties.
6
Spanish population forecasts indicate a clear increase in the number of
people over 60: 16.6% in 2007, 21% in 2021 (Daz Gornkiel & Orozco, 2009).
7
Data on time spent working in the household show that 93% of women
do household chores and childcare, in contrast to 70% of men. Women spend
5 h a day on these tasks (two more than men) and have less spare time.
However, in recent years, men have been spending more time caring for
children. Age is also an important point of differentiation in terms of time
spent on housework: those under 25 spend just 1 h a day on these tasks
(Daz Gornkiel & Orozco, 2009, based on Encuesta del Empleo del tiempo
20022003, Instituto Nacional de Estadstica).
8
Women have taken 98.4% of maternity leaves and have applied for 66%
of time off to care for dependent family members. Women also account for
95.8% of those who left the work market for family reasons, 96.5% of those
who are not seeking employment for family reasons and 97.2% of those who
claim to work part time on family responsibilities (Daz Gornkiel & Orozco,
2009, based on Statics of Instituto de la Mujer).
9
One regulation that differentiates non-EU migrants' access to the job
market is the reference to the national employment situation (National
Priority). This establishes that insufciency or scarcity of Spanish labor in the
activity or profession and geographical zones in which work is sought will be
taken into account for granting or renewing a work permit. This means that the
refusal of a work permit can be justied if there are applicants who are Spanish
citizens, EU members or legal residents.
10
A new regulation on domestic work was approved in November 2011.
It has been in effect since January 2012. Royal Decree 1620/2011, of 14
November, regulating the special labor relation of service in the family home:
http://www.boe.es/boe/dias/2011/11/17/pdfs/BOE-A-2011-17975.pdf. However,
owing to the high degree of irregularity of Latin American female workers and the
fact that the jobs are mostly in private homes, the effect this change in the law
may have on the working and living conditions of the female migrant workers is
limited.
References
Endnotes
1
23
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Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientcas y Tcnicas (CONICET), Instituto de Ciencias Antropolgicas, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Puan
480, (1406) Ciudad Autnoma de Buenos Aires, Argentina
b
Instituto de Ciencias Antropolgicas, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Puan 480, (1406) Ciudad Autnoma de Buenos Aires, Argentina
a r t i c l e
i n f o
s y n o p s i s
Besides emigration towards developed countries, Latin America has a regional migration dynamics
of its own one in which the presence of women, as well as their employment in domestic service,
has proved decisive. Combining a macro perspective with a case-based socio-anthropological
approach, this paper examines international migration and domestic service at an intra-regional
level. Drawing on statistical information, we first present an outline of the regional migration
context and the insertion of migrant women as domestic workers in destination countries of the
region. The core section of the article centers on the particular case of Argentina, and illuminates the
experience of migrant domestic workers in the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area. The paper closes
with a series of reflections on the operation of gender as an organizing principle of relations and
opportunities involved in international migration.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
In recent decades, a significant increase in international
migration (CEPAL, 2007) chiefly to developed countries
has brought migration into the limelight and to the center of
discussion in numerous forums. The growing share of women
in migration trends conceptualized, at least qualitatively, as
the feminization of migration flows has become a matter
of growing academic interest, and has made apparent the
need to introduce a gender perspective in migration studies.
As a region,1 Latin America has a substantial share in the
migration processes that presently raise concerns among
First World States, as most Latin American countries have
strengthened their role as labor exporters and emigrants'
destinations have diversified beyond the United States, to
European countries particularly Spain, Japan, Canada,
Australia and Israel. There are a considerable number of
Latin Americans living outside their countries of birth: it is
estimated that at least 4% of the region's population lives in
Corresponding author.
0277-5395/$ see front matter 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2014.01.002
25
Total (00)
Argentina
Chile
Costa Rica
Venezuela
Total Latin America
81,194
13,149
15,978
49,863
177,004
29.3%
42.6%
35.5%
28.2%
27.1%
26
27
Table 2
Evolution of Latin American migration to Argentina and evolution of masculinity rates by country of origin. Selected countries, 19912010.
INDEC 1996 and 2010.
Masculinity rate
Country of birth
1980
1991
2001
2010
1980
1991
2001
2010
Bolivia
Brazil
Chile
Paraguay
Uruguay
Peru
Total selected countries
118,141
42,757
215,623
262,799
114,108
8561
753,428
143,569
33,476
244,410
250,450
133,453
15,939
857,636
233,464
34,712
212,429
325,046
117,564
87,546
1,010,761
345,272
41,330
191,147
550,713
116,592
157,514
1,402,568
125.4
85.5
114.6
85.6
95.2
197.9
117
107.3
77.3
99.9
78.7
95.2
146
100.7
101.3
71.8
91.7
73.5
92.5
68.5
83
98.7
72.9
87.1
79.7
90.8
81.9
86.0
Table 3
Women born in neighboring countries residing in BAMA by country of origin
(2001 and 2010) (00 and %).
Argentine National Population Censuses 2001 and 2010.
2001
2010
Country
% residing
in BAMA
Total stock
residing in
Argentina
% residing
in BAMA
Bolivia
Paraguay
Peru
116,002
187,323
52,389
52
75
73
173,779
306,434
86,615
56
76
73
28
Table 4
Socio-demographic characteristics of respondents.
Paraguayan women
Year of birth
Age at childbirth
Number of children
Age at migration
Education
Peruvian women
Year of birth
Age at childbirth
Number of children
Age at migration
Education
Bolivian women
Year of birth
Age at childbirth
Number of children
Age at migration
Education
Case 1
Case 2
Case 3
Case 4
Case 5
Case 6
Average
1978
15
1
23
Incomplete
primary
education
1978
17
2
21
Incomplete
primary
education
1976
18
1
23
Complete
primary
education
1979
19
1
24
Complete
primary
education
1959
24
3
38
Complete
primary
education
1977
17
3
21
Incomplete
primary
education
18
1.8a
25
1968
23
2
29
Complete
college
education
1974
18
1
21
Incomplete
secondary
education
1966
20
1
34
Incomplete
secondary
education
1966
19
5
34
Incomplete
secondary
education
1969
23
3
26
Complete
college
education
1970
21
1
33
Complete
college
education
20
2.1b
29
1971
20
1
22
Complete
secondary
education
1970
17
1
20
Incomplete
primary
education
1963
19
2
33
Incomplete
primary
education
1966
23
2
39
Complete
secondary
education
1972
18
5
21
Complete
secondary
education
1972
18
3
28
Complete
secondary
education
19
2.3c
27
a,b and c. are not final averages because many of these women, especially those of Paraguayan origin, are young enough to bear more children.
29
30
Endnotes
1
Following the UN's terminology, we refer to Latin America and the
Caribbean as a region. The term regional migration here refers to migration
processes taking place from or to Latin American countries. More specically,
we speak of intra-regional migrations for dynamics in which both origin and
destination countries belong to Latin America, while the term extra-regional is
used for processes in which either origin or destination countries lie outside the
Latin American region. The term international migrations implies processes
involving international border-crossing, as opposed to internal or inner
migration.
2
According to the UN denition, a domestic worker is a person
employed part-time or full-time in a household or private residence, in any
of the following duties: cook, servant or waitress, butler, nurse, childminder,
carer for elderly or disabled persons, personal servant, barman or barmaid,
chauffeur, porter, gardener, washerman or washerwoman, guard. (UNFPA,
2006: 51).
3
Statistical data on migration and domestic service have been drawn
from the IMILA Project (Investigacin de la Migracin Internacional en
Latinoamrica) run by Centro Latinoamericano y Caribeo de Demografa
(CELADE), ECLAC's Population Division www.eclac.cl/celade. Parcial interpretations of these data can be found in Martnez Pizarro 2003, 2005, 2008
and 2009; and Ksters, 2008.
4
This section revisits the work conducted by the authors as part of the
project Migracin y trabajo domstico: una aproximacin interdisciplinaria, a
larger study requested by ILO Chile in 2005. Fragments by Courtis and
Pacecca (2008, 2010), and by Ceriani et al. (2009 in Valenzuela and Mora,
2009) are reproduced here.
5
Martnez Pizarro, Jorge (2003) points out that in 1970, over 75% of
migrants in Latin America and the Caribbean were extra-regional, and that
this gure dropped to less than 50% in 2000.
6
UN Population Division: http://esa.un.org/migration/index.asp?panel=1.
7
There is also a share of migrant women hired at more qualied jobs
both in the region and away from it.
8
Although we will not expand on the issue in this paper, specics
such as the historical development of domestic work in different countries,
traditions of household organization, forms and range of access to domestic
services, women's participation in the non-domestic labor market and the
composition and dynamics of the domestic work labor market (for instance,
migrant women still share this niche with internal migrant women in Latin
America) would be worth exploring across contexts in order to grasp
nuances in the work conditions and experiences of international migrant
domestic workers (Chant, 1992, Hondagneu-Sotelo, 2007, Momsen, 1999).
9
The Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area comprises the City of Buenos Aires
and its surrounding boroughs, and concentrates 32% of the total population
of Argentina.
10
The 2001 census reported 700,000 domestic workers: 88.4% of them
were Argentine, whereas 11.6% came from other Latin American countries,
chiey Paraguay, Peru, Chile and Bolivia. 45% of the total domestic workers
resided in the BAMA.
11
It is important to emphasize the decit of public statistical information
about the employment conditions of domestic workers, particularly due to the
high informality levels of this labor group. It is also worth mentioning that, until
2013, domestic work was regulated by a special regime which dated from 1956
(Decree 386) and granted domestic workers fewer rights than to workers in
general. In March 2013, a new law was enacted for domestic workers (Act No.
26844/13) that incorporates rights such as maternity leave and other security
benets. How this new law will affect domestic workers, and international
migrant domestic workers in particular, is yet to be seen.
12
In the Bolivian case, feminization relates both to the increase of
independent female migrants as well as to men moving with their wives.
13
In the 1990s, two combined processes affected migration from neighboring countries, particularly Peru: on the one hand, the collapse of regional
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a r t i c l e
i n f o
s y n o p s i s
In the late twentieth century, thousands of Brazilians left for the United States to make it in
America, inserting Brazilians into the new international labor flows. Brazilian women, like
other Latin American immigrants, became concentrated in housecleaning, a labor market that
is segmented by gender, class and ethnicity. Housecleaning became a female emigration
strategy that allowed women to circulate through the globalized world and insert themselves
in transnational migration. This article analyzes how the configuration of the housecleaning
business and the organization of domestic labor redefined or problematized gender identities.
The data comes from an ethnographic study conducted in Brazil and the New England
region of the United States. As housecleaners in the United States, men and women are
confronted with redefinitions of identities that may or may not imply changes in gender
relations.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
This article demonstrates how Brazilian women insert
themselves into international labor flows, into a labor market
of domestic service, which also includes other immigrant
women. The increased participation of women in migratory
flows has raised significant questions for research and
theories of international migrations, because it reveals that
women are active subjects in the migratory process who
make decisions and provoke changes within family and
gender relations. Moreover, they initiate and undertake their
own migratory projects and do not only accompany their
husbands or sons, as is often portrayed in migratory studies.
Immigrant women are inserted into the domestic services
sector and use informal social networks, the so-called ethnic
enclaves of immigrants, working as caretakers for the elderly,
nannys, part-time cleaning ladies or full-time maids (Anthias,
2000; Assis, 2004, 2007; Fleischer, 2002; Foner, 2000;
Morokvasic, 1984), and in the sex market (Maia, 2009,
Margolis, 1994; Piscitelli, 2007). In this context of feminization of migratory flows, women participate in networks of
care and sex, in a labor market that is segmented by gender,
class and race. Women participate in the transnational flows
0277-5395/$ see front matter 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2014.01.003
34
later than the men, and are confronted with different concerns
than men, they also undertook the adventure of emigrating. In
the process, they wrote their own histories, not only by
accompanying their brothers, boyfriends or husbands, but also
by establishing their own migration routes and networks.
Between the local and the global: Governador Valadares and
Cricima as the starting point of international migration
Brazil, which until the middle of the past century
attracted thousands of immigrants in search of a better life,
has experienced a significant movement of Brazilians heading abroad since the 1980s. Given this movement, the first
academic works classified these emigrants as exiles from the
crisis an allusion to the political exiles of the 1970s who,
to escape the Brazilian economic crisis, were obliged to
migrate, as demonstrated by Sales (1991, 1992), Goza (1992)
and Margolis (1992, 1994). These articles emphasize emigration as an option taken by certain sectors of the Brazilian
middle class to confront the lack of labor opportunities or
opportunity for social mobility generated by the economic
crisis that shook the country in the 1980s the so-called lost
decade.1 The main destinations of this initial flow were the
United States, Paraguay and Japan.
In the case of Brazilians emigrating to the United States, the
studies began by following the route of the migratory flows. The
first studies by Margolis (1989, 1992, 1994), Assis (1995, 1999),
Soares (1995) and Sales (1992, 1995) trace a profile of the
population and pointed to the city of Governador Valadares
(MG) as the starting point for many who reached the Boston
region. We note that in these studies, as in classic migration
studies, little attention is paid to gender issues.
During the 1990s, as demonstrated by the works of Martes
(2000), Ribeiro (1999), Sales (1999a), Reis and Sales (1999),
the flow of Brazilians to the United States remained continuous, making the characteristics of the population in terms of
class, gender and ethnicity more complex, as well as revealing
other starting points for the emigration. The studies reveal that
there was growth in the participation of women and that they
were constructing a niche through their work within domestic
service in the Boston region (Fleischer, 2002; Martes, 2000;
Scudeler, 1999), while men were mainly employed in civil
construction and in the restaurant sector. The studies also try
to problematize the changes in family and gender relations
(Assis, 2003; Debiaggi, 2003; Debiaggi, 2002; Fusco, 2001).
In the 1990s, the city of Cricima emerged as an important
starting point in southern Brazil for emigrants headed to the
United States and Europe. What I would like to highlight is that
during this time migratory networks were constructed and
consolidated in both cities, where one immigrant would
encourage another to emigrate, bringing friends, relatives and
compatriots, as studies by Massey (1997), Massey et al (1987),
Levitt (2001), Gramusck and Pessar (1991) and Hagan (1998)
demonstrate, thus transforming these cities into transnational
communities, as Fusco (2005) and Assis (2004) observe,
establishing transnational ties, and making a significant impact
on the daily life of the cities.
In these Brazilian cities, the most visible impact of
migration is the increase in civil construction and the
opening of small businesses with the resources sent by
emigrants (Siqueira, 2006; Soares, 1995). When they leave,
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
Final considerations
Classic migration studies describe women as merely
accompanying or waiting for their husbands or sons, and
the importance of their contributions to family income was
not taken into consideration. Therefore, such analyses not
only often hid women's participation, but they also failed to
recognize that long-distance migration takes place within a
complex network of social relations, in which women play an
important role.
42
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44
a r t i c l e
i n f o
s y n o p s i s
This paper argues for an understanding of domestic work as affective labor. It engages with the
affective quality of reproductive labor by interrogating the organization of paid and unpaid
domestic work in private households. Thus, while it attends to debates on emotional labor, its
main focus is on the affective dimension of the social.
It does so by focusing on reproductive labor, in particular, domestic work and developing a
feminist critique of affective labor through the analysis of the cultural predication of feelings
associated with and infused in domestic work. In this regard, the cultural predication
prescribing the social meaning attached to domestic work will be explored within the
framework of feminization and coloniality. Thus, domestic work will be discussed as affective
labor surfacing at the juncture of feminization and coloniality. Following this argument, the
article firstly engages with feminist analyses on reproductive labor, feminization and domestic
work. Secondly, it looks at private households and affective labor. Thirdly, it examines the
relationship between paid domestic work and migration regimes from the angle of the
coloniality of labor. Using these insights, the article explores the sensorial corporeality of
racialized affect negotiated in and around domestic work. It concludes by arguing for a
conceptualization of domestic work as affective labor.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
This article's focus is on domestic work as affective labor.
It engages with the affective quality of reproductive labor by
interrogating the organization of paid and unpaid domestic
work in private households. Thus, while it attends to debates
on emotional labor (Carrington, 1999; Hochschild, 1983;
Illouz, 2007), its main focus is on the affective dimension of
the social. As such this article engages with the impact of
feelings and emotions on social relationships and spaces
(Ahmed, 2004; Brennan, 2004; Sedgwick, 2004). Following
Spinoza's (1994) observation that affect drives us to act, the
article explores the twofold character of affect as a texture of
the social and as socially textured. It does so by focusing on
reproductive labor, in particular, domestic work and developing a feminist critique of affective labor through the
analysis of the cultural predication of feelings associated
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2014.03.005
0277-5395/ 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
46
47
48
49
50
programs, as their Latin American degrees were not considered valid or, as they were told, they needed to improve their
language skills. The three-month time frame they received
with their tourist visa was insufficient, leaving them with the
option to return to their countries, to continue onward to
another country, or to go underground. The decision to
remain in the country is also a decision to live without legal
residency status. Being without legal residency means
avoiding places where they could be detected by the police,
which severely restricts their access to the regular labor
market. Obtaining employment in a private household as a
domestic worker represents one of the few options for
making a living.
The private household remains an employment sector that
is precluded from standard labor regulations, which makes the
household shaky ground when it comes to the protection of
workers' rights (ETUC, 2012). This is shown in the working
conditions of domestic workers, which are characterized by
oral contracts, unregulated working hours, as well as unsafe
working conditions. Being without legal residency means
falling through the cracks of official protection schemes
(Dvell, 2005; Maroukis, Iglicka, & Gjmaj, 2011). In this
context, it is not only the universal human rights principle of
the right to a dignified life that is suspended, but also basic civil
rights. Indeed, this process of exclusion produces the undocumented migrant as an exteriority to the civil and legal
national norm.
Coming back to the affective dimension of being subjected
to the logic of inferiorization, the position of exteriority that
undocumented migrants inhabit is not only conveyed through
the low social status and devaluation of their labor, but also
through the affective circuits to which they are exposed and
with which they engage. Negotiations around domestic work
between domestic workers and their employers in private
households occur on both the social and affective levels. While
the social dimension speaks about the legal and labor
conditions attached to this work, the affective dimension
draws our attention to how these conditions are felt and
sensed. Sensing the social, feeling the cultural script imposed
on bodies, spaces and objects refers to the realm of affective
encounters.
Thus, the transmission of affect between the domestic
workers and their employers relies on affective bonds
developed, on the caring tasks performed, and on the spatiality
and relationality within which this work unfolds. As Carmen
tells us, the arrangement of objects can transmit energies that
might have an impact on the person sorting out the space. The
attribution of inferiority and worthlessness can thus be
affectively transmitted through the arrangement of objects
and through those racialized affects which haunt spaces.
Racialized affects
While not directly addressed to a person, affect pervades
spaces and has an impact on people's feelings, bodies and
minds. When a domestic worker faces revulsion, contempt, or
being despised, these feelings can produce reactions of refusal
and revolt. Set in this context, Carmen's feelings towards the
toilet remind us of what Ngai (2007) describes as the
racialization of affect. While Ngai develops this approach
through an analysis of the cultural representation of racialized
51
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reproduction. Basingstoke, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.
Banerjee, Swapna (2004). Men, women, and domestics: Articulating middleclass identity in colonial Bengal. Delhi: Oxford University Press.
Barker, Drucilla., & Feiner, Susan F. (2010). As the world turns: Globalization,
consumption, and the feminization of work. Rethinking Marxism, 22(2),
246252.
Barrett, Michele (1980). Women's oppression today. Problems in Marxist
feminist analysis. London: Verso.
Bedford, Kate., & Rai, Shirin (2010). Feminists theorize international political
economy. Signs, 36(1), 118.
Benera, Lourdes (1979). Reproduction, production and the sexual division
of labour. Cambridge Journal of Economics, 3(3), 203225.
Benera, Lourdes, & Sarasa, Carmen (2011). Crmenes econmicos contra la
humanidad. El Pas, 29.03.2011. Retrieved from. http://elpais.com/
diario/2011/03/29/opinion/1301349604_850215.html (accessed 30
March 2011)
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Conicet/Idaes- Universidad Nacional de San Martn, Parana 145, 5th Floor, Buenos Aires 1017, Argentina
Conicet/Universidad Nacional de General Sarmiento, Juan Mara Gutirrez 1150, Los Polvorines, Provincia de Buenos Aires, 1613, Argentina
a r t i c l e
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In Argentina, domestic work is one of the main occupations for women from low-income sectors.
As in other Latin American societies, it is one of the most paradigmatic forms of contact between
the different social classes. As such, this labor relationship has been analyzed in numerous studies
as a critical location for the reproduction of social differences and inequality. The interpersonal
relationships between employers and workers mobilize categorization criteria and stereotyped
images that reveal wider dynamics regarding the construction of social hierarchies. On the basis of
a qualitative study, the objective of this article is to analyze, in the city of Buenos Aires, the
processes of constructing social hierarchies that are implied by this particular labor relationship.
This analysis seeks to reveal the operations through which employers construct a stereotype of
social inferiority for domestic workers through which they legitimize their dominant position in
the labor relationship, and to examine the tensions and ambiguities of this.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
In Argentina, domestic work is, and has been historically, one
of the main ways in which women participate in the labor
market, particularly women from popular social sectors (Gogna,
1993; Pereyra, 2012). As in other Latin American societies in
which this type of work is widespread, it is one of the most
paradigmatic forms of contact between the working class and
the middle and upper classes. As such, domestic service has
been analyzed in numerous studies as a critical location for the
reproduction of social differences and inequality.
In recent decades, domestic work has been the focus of
renewed attention by social scientists. Although gender inequalities are the starting point for many studies, the importance of migratory flows in the structure of paid domestic labor
throughout different regions has turned migration studies into
one of the most relevant approaches for debating this issue
(Ehrenreich & Hochschild, 2002; Hondagneu-Sotelo, 2007; Lutz,
2002, 2008; Parreas, 2001). These specific migratory flows,
Corresponding author.
0277-5395/$ see front matter 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2014.01.001
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between those involved in this labor relationship. The characteristics of the spaces where domestic workers live (shanty
towns, slums or precarious housing) also constitute, in
employer discourse, significant references to the position of
domestic workers in the social structure.
This stereotyped image of domestic workers that employers construct through their discourse, marked as it is by
precarious social and economic situations, is not just another
reference to the social paths of the women they hire. It is a
social, economic, and symbolic location that is associated
with a series of features that are intrinsic to domestic
workers. The stereotype is also linked to certain predictable
ways of being and behaving that have important effects on
the way employers configure their interactions with their
employees. One of the features that recur most frequently is
domestic workers' low level of formal education:
Because you even get the feeling, when you have a maid,
they're generally ignorant, so it's as if I have a kind of
educational commitment. You know, when you teach
someone how to behave.
(Norma, 45, employer, two children)
Domestic employees' education levels are not mentioned
merely as part of their social paths, but are instead presented
as an essential feature of theirs. That is, rather than referring
to the fact that women who do domestic work for a living
have been unable to go to school, such comments designate a
way of being: ignorant. This intrinsic characteristic is one
more in a long list of features associated with different
aspects that define the individual, like their ways of dressing
and talking, their tastes and what they consume:
With the maid I had at that point, I could buy six packets
of biscuits one day and the next there'd be none.
Something was going on, I said. No, I ate them, she said,
I ate them all. There was a voracity about her, you
know? [] What I mean is that it's a problem because
their origins mean that when they see so much food they
become desperate for certain things.
(Julia, 36, employer, two children)
In the discourses of the employers interviewed, these
characteristics gradually outline the social inferiority ascribed
to domestic workers, and thus play a central role in the
legitimization of the subordinated position of workers within
the labor relationship established through domestic service. In
line with Goffman's analysis, these features seem to construct,
from the employers' point of view, a front for the workers that
situates them within the interaction. This front is made up of the
features that are identified with the performer: As part of
personal front we may include: insignia of office or rank;
clothing; sex, age, and racial characteristics; size and looks;
postures; speech patterns; facial expressions; bodily gestures;
and the like. In general terms, front includes both appearance
and manner of the individual: the former tells about the
individual's social status, the latter about the interaction role
the performer will expect to play (Goffman, 2009: 24).
As Goffman points out, it is to be expected that appearance
and manner confirm one another; that is, that the differences in
social status between performers are expressed to a certain
degree through the differences in the roles played by each in the
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3
This refers to the National Program of Migratory Document Normalization for nationals of Mercosur member and associate states, which
includes immigrants from Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay,
Peru, Uruguay, and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. The program is
known as Patria Grande, which translates roughly as the greater homeland.
For an analysis of the program, see Gallinati (2008) and Pacecca and Courtis
(2008).
4
This working experience corresponds to 2005 and 2006. In the latter
year, the minimum wage earned by live-in domestic workers was 650 pesos.
5
The origins of these stereotypes can be traced back to the social
transformations of the twentieth century in Argentina, specically those
affecting the conformation of the middle classes. Various studies have
explored these changes and the transformation of the models of domesticity
associated with them, including Adamovsky (2009), Pite (2011), Prez
(2012) and Crdenas (1986).
6
There is extensive literature concerning the concept of emotional
labor. Developed by the sociologist Arlie Hochschild, this concept facilitates
the analysis of certain occupations that require the worker to produce an
emotional state in another person through the manipulation and control of
their emotions (1983). Although Hochschild did not develop this concept in
connection to domestic work, it has been widely used in this eld of study.
References
Adamovsky, Ezequiel (2009). Historia de la clase media: Apogeo y decadencia
de una ilusin, 19192003. Buenos Aires: Planeta.
Anderson, Bridget (2000). Doing the dirty work? The global politics of domestic
labour. London and New York: Zed Books.
Avila, Bethania (2008). Algumas questes tericas e polticas sobre emprego
domstico. In Bethania Avila, Milena Prado, Tereza Souza, & Vera Soares
y Vernica Ferreira (Eds.), Reflexes feministas sobre informalidade e
trabalho domstico (pp. 6371). Recife: SOS CORPO.
Bourdieu, Pierre (1993). The weight of the world. Stanford: University of
California Press.
Briones, Claudia (2008). Formaciones de alteridad: Contextos globales,
procesos nacionales y provinciales. In Claudia Briones (Ed.), Cartografas
Argentinas. Polticas indigenistas y formaciones provinciales de alteridad
(pp. 938). Buenos Aires: Antropofagia.
Brites, Jurema (2001). Afeto, desigualdade e rebeldia: Bastidores do servio
domstico. Tese de Doutorado, Programa de Ps-Graduao em Antropologia
Social. Porto Alegre: UFRGS.
Brites, Jurema (2007). Afeto e desigualdade: Gnero, gerao e classe entre
empregadas domsticas e seus empregadores. Cadernos Pagu, 29, 91109.
Crdenas, Isabel (1986). Ramona y el robo: El servicio domstico en barrios
prestigiosos de Buenos Aires (18951985). Buenos Aires: Ediciones Bsqueda.
Chaney, Elsa, & Garca Castro, Mary (Eds.). (1993). Muchacha, cachifa, criada,
empleada, empregadinha, sirvienta yms nada. Caracas: Editorial Nueva
Sociedad.
Contartese, Daniel (2010). Caracterizacin del servicio domstico en la
Argentina. Buenos Aires: Subsecretara de Programacin Tcnica y
Estudios Laborales del Ministerio de Trabajo, Empleo y Seguridad Social.
Ehrenreich, Barbara, & Hochschild, Arlie Russell (2002). Global woman: Nannies,
maids, and sex workers in the new economy. New York: Metropolitan Books.
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In this paper I intend to present an ethnographic description of the movement of things,
people, and affection in the context of domestic service in Brazil. Looking at everyday
interactions, I explore the sociological dimensions (family organization, gender relations, and
class structure) and the symbolic constructions (concepts of motherhood, childcare,
reciprocity, care, and affection) as well as the political and infra-political dimensions
(domination, subordination, and rebellion) of domestic service in order to better understand
the elements at play in the Brazilian context.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
Domestic work1 provides a good starting point for an
analysis of Brazil. It has existed since the early years of
Brazilian society and was based on the exploitation of slave
labor during the colonial period. Although the country's
constitution now recognizes domestic work as a profession,
and domestic workers enjoy the same rights as other
workers, the sector is still predominantly composed of
women who are poor, mostly Black and have little schooling.
My aim in this paper is to unravel the social configurations
that contribute to maintaining domestic work as a space of
the reproduction of inequalities.
Employing ethnographic research methods, I describe, on
the one hand, the differences in the daily organization of
workers' families and employers' families, suggesting that a
stratified complementarity makes domestic work functional
for both parties. On the other hand, taking the feelings
expressed by the people I researched, I would suggest that
the inequalities reproduced in the course of domestic service
are sustained largely through affective ambiguities. I draw a
connection between the accusations of theft against domestic
workers and the possibility of extra-wage payments common
in these situations, because both are agreements that occur
behind the scenes. I investigate these elements in terms of
the transmission of a certain heritage in which things and
values circulate, serving to maintain the relations between
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0277-5395/ 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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Subtle distance
The question I would like to pose is: if there is such
intimacy and affection between children and their domestic
workers, how do these children grow up to be adults who
reproduce such rigid hierarchies? At what point do their
worlds separate from one another?
The employers I investigated do not, as a rule, treat their
employees rudely. Children apprehend the social distance
between themselves and the domestic workers through
other channels subliminal information, their parents'
words, and the organization of domestic space.
The maid's room, the maid's bathroom, and the
maid's quarters7 are segregated areas where the respect
middle-class children are taught regarding other people's
possessions disappears. The spaces reserved for domestic
workers in employers' homes do not respect the workers'
individuality. They can be full of rubbish, brooms, buckets,
and anything else that is useless or should remain out of
sight, so as not to disturb the beauty and order of the home.
Another ambiguous dimension is the domestic worker's
body. This woman can hold a baby in her arms, prepare the
meals for the family, clean the house, and wash the clothes,
and though it is not frequent, in some cases, she may even
have to sexually satisfy her male boss.8 But it is out of place
for her to sit on the living room sofa, lie on her employers'
bed, dine at the table with them, or use their bathrooms. In
these cases the domestic worker's body pollutes because it
is not performing servile activities and could strain the
hierarchical order of the home.
Heritage transmission
A walk through the rooms of the domestic workers' homes
generally reveals a huge amount of furniture and appliances
that previously belonged to their employers: old clothes,
furniture, mattresses, windows, and toys. Many scholars have
noted this kind of donation, referring to it as a form of
exploitation used by employers to supplement or replace part
of the wage paid to the employee (Chaney & Castro, 1993). On
the other hand, I propose looking at this exchange of goods
and services an exchange that goes along with most paid
domestic work as a sort of patrimonial heritage. This
perspective has the advantage of understanding the process
as something that goes beyond the narrow sense of money
relations to include the idea of a communication system in
which, besides material things, social meanings are transmitted
(Douglas & Isherwood, 1996). To treat this transit of assets as
patrimonial heritage (Neves, 1982) signifies that something
besides material things is being exchanged in this relationship
(Mauss, 1967). Objects do not exist autonomously. As
material, physical and immediately concrete support of
production and reproduction of social life, they should be
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References
Aris, Philippe (1981). Histria Social da Criana e da Famlia. Rio de Janeiro:
Zahar.
Azeredo, Sandra (1989). Relaes entre empregadas e patroas: reflexes
sobre o feminismo em pases multirraciais. In Albertina Costa, & C.
Bruschini (Eds.), Rebeldia e Submisso. Estudo sobre a condio feminina
(pp. 195220). So Paulo: Vrtice.
Berqu, Elza, & Oliveira, Marcelle Colares (1992). Casamento em Tempos de
Crise. Campinas, 9(2), 138154.
Brah, Avtar (1996). Cartographies of diaspora: Contesting identities. London/
New York: Routledge.
Brites, Jurema (2000). Afeto, Desigualdade e Rebeldia: bastidores do servio
domstico. Tese de Doutorado. Porto Alegre: UFRGS/PPGAS.
Brites, Jurema, & Picano, Felice (2013). O emprego domstico em nmeros,
tenses e contradies: alguns achados de pesquisas. 37 Encontro
Anual da ANPOCS, guas de Lindia. Online: http://www.anpocs.org/
portal/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_view&gid=8638&
Itemid=429
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The paper uses the concept of intersectionality to explore the central role played by the categories of
race, class and gender in the biographies of female domestic workers in Brazil. While showing how
these categories are implicated in the inequalities and subalternization experienced by these
actors, the paper also reveals how female domestic workers have appropriated them to promote
themselves politically as a professional class. Adopting a historical viewpoint, the second part of the
paper shows the formation of a public agenda for female domestic workers' unions and their
negotiation with class-based, feminist and black movements in Brazil. It concludes by showing that
unionized domestic workers have developed an original form of feminism that combines aspects
taken from all these movements.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
Domestic labor in Brazil is a symbol of gender, class and
race inequalities, as the majority of the domestic workers in
Brazil are black lower-class women. According to a recent
census, 7.2 million people are professional domestic workers,
93% of whom are female; 61.6% of those females are black
and 38.4% are white. The over-representation of black female
domestic workers can get even more evident: 12% of white
women with a job are domestic workers; the rates increase to
21% for black women (IPEA, 2011).
The existence of a domestic labor force means that there are
high-income families with the means to pay another person's
wages. On the other hand, it means a service that compensates
the lack of basic public service (daycare, for instance). Because of
that, families with a higher income are able to overcome the lack
of some public services by privatizing them, by hiring private
services. Such economic inequalities are connected to both
gender and race naturalization. Domestic labor is naturally seen
as a woman's job and, as such, not worthy of a fair pay, as it
supposedly does not involve special skills. On the other hand,
due to Brazil's colonial history, domestic labor is also seen as the
black woman's natural place.
One of the most evident consequences of those families'
private solutions for the lack of public services is the fragile
state regulation concerning female domestic workers and their
0277-5395/$ see front matter 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2014.01.004
concept is helpful in understanding the interwoven relationships of diverse axes of power, the most important of which are
race, class and gender, in the production of both subjugation and
political agency. This approach is effective for comprehending
domestic labor in Brazil, as it takes us beyond discourses that
isolate individual markers of difference by dynamically joining
them. We focus on how the axes of gender, race and class power
act in that face-to-face relationship which disempowers the
female domestic worker. On the other hand, we explore how
those same axes of gender, race and class power acted as a tool
for empowerment and democratic mobilization through the
domestic workers' political organizations. Concerning the latter,
such axes of power are mobilized from exchanges among the
domestic workers' political organizations and the feminist and
the black movements, as well as their syndicates. As a result of
this exchange, the female domestic workers have succeeded in
some aspects concerning their profession's regulations.
This article is divided in five parts. The first part describes
our research methodologies. The following part shows the
theories about the concept of intersectionality. It is good to
highlight that such concept may refer to either disempowerment or empowerment. The third and fourth parts use
empirical data and the concept of intersectionality to explain
how the axes of gender, race and class power interact, on the
one hand, to trigger disempowerment in the female domestic
workers' workplace and, on the other hand, to trigger political
mobilization through their unions. Finally, the last part brings
our final considerations.
Methodology: Listening to domestic workers' voices
Based on the main role of the concept of intersectionality, this
article aims to study how gender, race and class dimensions
work in the private sphere, and how it causes disempowerment
and inequality; and, as far as the public sphere is concerned, how
they result in empowerment and democratic mobilization.
The data on which this research is based on was collected
in two different periods, all from unionized domestic workers. In
2006, as part of a research for my doctorate study, I carried
out semi-structured interviews with twenty-three unionized
workers from five out of approximately forty existent unions in
Brazil. Those unions were based in Campinas (So Paulo state),
So Paulo (So Paulo state), Salvador (Bahia state), Recife
(Pernambuco state) and Rio de Janeiro (Rio de Janeiro state). I
also interviewed the leaders of the Domestic Workers National
Federation and did some research in the files of each one of those
unions, as well as in documents and resolutions of the domestic
workers' national congresses.1 During my research, I traced the
history of the Santos Domestic Workers Association, which was
the first political association of female domestic workers in
Brazil, founded in 1936. In 2011, I interviewed five domestic
workers of the unions of the New Iguau district (Rio de Janeiro
state) and the Franca district (So Paulo state). Those seven
unions, especially the five from my 2006 research, have been
in charge of the organization of the domestic workers' national
congresses. They are considered the core of the domestic
workers' movement not only because of that, but also because
they give to us a historical glimpse into the domestic workers'
political organizations (Bernardino-Costa, 2007, 2011).
The interviews were carried out in each one of the abovementioned unions and they took 90 min in average. All
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their boss' wife, since they are both from different classes
and races. Similarly, Carla and Madalene come from poor,
rural backgrounds, which explain why they became domestic
workers. Finally, their racial origin black women adds up to
the chain of vulnerabilities, completing the process of naturalization that subjected them, as children, to sexual abuse and, as a
consequence, not worthy of wage. Therefore, the concept of
intersectionality shows us the interaction among the various
axes of power. That enables us to analyze the origins of disempowerment, inequalities and domination. Now, the concept
of intersectionality is different from the idea of double and triple
discrimination. In this given case, there is a dynamic process in
which each one of the axes of power applies their own
energy, and those energies are not nullified by one another. All
considered, Madalene and Carla are subjects of the discrimination, disempowerment and oppression caused by the dynamic
energy of each of the analyzed dimensions, all of which act
equally. The explanatory potential of intersectionality is also
significant, as it builds an inter-relationship among a macrocontext affected by a racist, sexist and class-biased speech, and
the domestic workers' life dynamics.
The intensity of the subjugation is directly proportional to
the fact that these domestic workers are describing a period
of their lives when they were still children. Female domestic
workers gradually become subjects in their workplace as
they acquire experience and reach adulthood. They develop
various strategies to reduce their workload, such as performing
tasks slowly, not cleaning the entire house every day, but just
some areas, and negotiating with their employers (Brah, 2006).
However, one of the decisive factors in domestic workers
becoming subjects again is ceasing to live and sleep in
their employers' house. This independence enables them to
re-establish control over their work time and take days off
work for whatever reasons. Some of the reasons for this change
include: (a) recent urban changes in Brazilian cities in which
the maid's quarters have disappeared from the new architectural designs for middle-class residences; (b) a public campaign
by some domestic workers' unions to combat the idea that they
are the family's daughters and simultaneously encourage the
women to find their own home to live in.
For domestic workers, having their own home opens up a
new world, much in the same way as participating in union
activities, since it allows them to build relations based on
solidarity among equals, breaking with the values imposed by
their employers. As we shall see below, the unions comprise a
social space in which the markers of race, class and gender are
seen positively rather than negatively, variables that interact
with each other to empower, building solidarity between
female domestic workers and other social actors that enables
political mobilization. Therefore, unlike the face-to-face relationship between domestic workers and their employers, the
union becomes a place for the construction of a collective
identity, in which the intersectionality among the axes of
gender, race and class power moves towards a democratic
mobilization and the domestic workers' empowerment.
Intersectionality between class, race and gender in the
female domestic workers' unions
Becoming involved in the political activities of a trade
union is a watershed in domestic workers' lives. Unions are
of Rio de Janeiro. The following year, the JOC also organized the
First Regional Congress of Female Domestic Workers in the city
of Recife, which brought together workers from the states of
Cear, Rio Grande do Norte, Paraba and Pernambuco (Soares,
2002).
It is important to note that as a labor organization, Young
Christian Workers supported workers as a universal and
homogeneous category. Female domestic workers were not
included in the organization's official campaign agenda
though, due to their specific condition, including the lack of
any legal recognition, while the majority of workers in Brazil
already possessed some rights since the 1930s. Despite their
specificity relative to other professional categories, there were
groups of domestic workers at the meetings of Young Christian
Workers. Odete Maria Conceio, one of the founders of the
Professional Association of Female Domestic Workers of Rio de
Janeiro in the 1960s, reported an incompatibility between
domestic workers and the working class, when the latter was
thought of as a homogeneous group. As soon as the domestic
workers recognized their differences vis--vis other workers,
they set out to establish their own associations in order
to take measures concerning issues specific to them: a
professional category not yet recognized by the State, therefore
without rights, formed by black women from the poor working
class.
While the domestic workers' movement gained ground
through dialog with the Catholic Church, Laudelina de Campos
Melo, living in Campinas, So Paulo, founded the Association of
Campinas in the early 1960s. However, instead of the Catholic
Church playing the main role, in Campinas we note a strong
coalition between the black movement, especially Black Experimental Theatre and the Association.
In the 1960s, the female domestic workers' movement
spread across the country as the result of interactions between
the Catholic Church (with its emphasis on the working class
cause), the black movement and the trade unions. Different
female domestic workers' groups and associations allied with
their partners in distinct ways. During this phase of the
domestic workers movement, the class-based interpretation
of the condition of female domestic workers prevailed at the
national level.
This is also the impression we get of the movement on
reading the resolutions produced during the National Congresses
of the 1960s and 1970s. It does not mean that gender and race
issues were absent, but rather that the political mobilization of
domestic workers was centered on being recognized as part of
the working class and consequently winning the same rights as
other workers. Domestic workers were finally recognized by
Brazilian legislation for the first time in 1972, when they
obtained the right to register their employment, take twenty
days' vacation per year and receive basic welfare coverage. This
law represented the successful outcome of the female
domestic workers' struggle and the movement's primary
aim of achieving recognition of these working women as
members of the working class.
It is important to note that although class struggle had been
the recurring theme of much of the domestic worker movement's activism, such as the campaign for domestic employees
to have their own home, racialcolonialist issues were also
present. For example, domestic workers frequently compared
the maid's room in the employer's house to slaves' quarters, the
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This article examines the different iterations of masculinity represented by different characters in
Larsson's Millennium trilogy. By examining especially the case of Mikael Blomkvist, and his relationship
to Lisbeth Salander, the article describes the promises and perils of a profeminist masculinity.
[2014] Michael Kimmel. Published by Elsevier Limited. All rights reserved.
Introduction
Voracious readers have been devouring Stieg Larsson's
Millennium trilogy the world over. They're fast paced,
intricately-detailed, and fun to read. A huge draw is punky,
scrawny, tattooed hacker-sleuth Lisbeth Salander. Readers are
probably familiar with the story surrounding Larsson's creation
of such an uncompromising take-no-prisoners feminist hero in
Lisbeth. She's indifferent to fashion, to the feminine mystique;
she's technically competent (a computer hacker); she's familiar
with violence and unafraid to use it in a retaliatory fashion. She
may be the least feminine hero in contemporary fiction, and one
of the most feminist.
Many readers will recognize Salander as an expression of
Larsson's long-held feminist views. He claimed that he was
personally disgusted by sexual violence. As a teenager, he watched
as several of his friends raped a 15 year-old girl he knew also
named Lisbeth. Larsson reportedly never forgave himself for standing
by and allowing it to happen. He eventually became a lifelong
campaigner against violence against women. (Indeed, I met him
once, in 2002, while working with the Swedish Minister of Gender
Equality on a project to reduce men's violence against women.)
From the early 1970s until his death in 2004, Larsson was
unswervingly identified as a feminist. For example, in late
Please note that these words were not written by some crazed
radical feminist male-hating harridans of the fevered popular
imagination, but by the most popular novelist in the Western
hemisphere at the moment who also happens to be a man.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2013.12.007
0277-5395 [2014] Michael Kimmel. Published by Elsevier Limited. All rights reserved.
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eager for a fling (how ethical can a guy be?). And while he
doesn't care to join in a three-way sexual liaison with Erika
Berger and her bisexual husband, he isn't homophobic; he is
portrayed as perfectly comfortable relating with gay men
such as his colleague Christer Malm.
But there are some gray areas in Blomkvist's pro-feminist
behaviors as well. His relationship with family seems merely
functional and mostly remote. He's a rather indifferent
father to an adolescent daughter he doesn't seem to know
well or see very often. And his relationships with other
women are equally functional and hardly enveloped in
gauzy sentimentalism or breathless passion. While he is an
attentive lover, his relationships with both Lisbeth and
Berger are primarily as friend and colleague. He respects,
admires, and clearly cares about them, but he doesn't seem
to get too sexually excited or emotionally attached. Their
relationships are casual and pleasant, the sex sensible but
hardly passionate. Indeed the only memorably passionate
sex in the entire trilogy is between Lisbeth and Miriam Wu.
And it's passionate largely for Mimmi.
So, while Larsson makes sure to tell us that Blomkvist is a
good lover the women have orgasms, and everyone seems
satisfied sexual passion never drives the narrative. None of
the good guys ever do anything for erotic love. Friendship
and revenge are animating passions, never sexual desire.
Indeed, one could argue that there is a certain desexualizing
of the new Swedish masculinity embodied by Blomkvist. Is
this necessary? Can pro-feminist masculinities embrace a
sexual desire that is neither predatory nor violent?
One reading of Larsson suggests the answer might be
found in the writings of some radical second wave feminists.
For them, normative cultural depictions of men's sexuality
reinforced heterosexuality as predatory, violent, and oppressive to women. Erections signified domination; intercourse a violation or occupation. Under patriarchy, women's
heterosexual desire was collaboration; lesbian sex could be
liberating only if it in no way resembled heterosexuality and
remained non-penetrative. Men's sexuality could be politically unproblematic only if it was denuded of what men had
come to understand constituted desire: aggressive, energetic, possessive. In such a post-patriarchal feminist universe,
gender equality in sex required that mens sex come to
resemble stereotypical feminine sex.
Not so among contemporary third wave feminists. One might
even say that in their pursuit of sexual pleasure as a feminist act,
third wave feminists have embraced a more masculinized
sexuality more agentic and more pleasure-seeking as opposed
to pain-avoiding. The encounter between Lisbeth, the epigrammatic third wave feminist, and Mikael, the embodiment of
an ambivalent second-wave pro-feminism, encapsulates this
dilemma. The constant misinterpretations and vacillations
between being lovers, friends and enemies, capture the
contradictions of this particular historical moment, and, I believe,
provide part of the pleasure of reading the trilogy. But then
Larsson resolves this tension temporarily and in a direction
that leaves this reader, at least, unsatisfied.
Initially, Mikael misreads Lisbeth's love for him a love
that takes her over 1000 pages of distance and even enmity
to get over. In Dragon Tattoo, Lisbeth is on her way to deliver
a Christmas gift she bought for Mikael, when she sees him
with Berger on the street:
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Feminists have long criticized how provocations narrative of a woman asking for it functions
as a legal abuse excuse for violent men and confirms their rationalizations and justifications for
violence. This article aims to challenge a particular aspect of provocation in Swedish criminal
lawnamely, a tendency to individualize and subjectivize culpability in a way that suggests
that the individual male perpetrator's specific understanding of his violence should be the
perspective from which to understand and judge his violence. Criminal legal culpability is
approached as an important aspect in the relationships between gender, power, and violence,
and the author argues that the notion of culpability should be changed in two respects.
The tendency to regard emotions as factual should be replaced by an evaluative view on
emotions and men's responsibility for their emotional responses to women should be judged by
acknowledging how values and reasons intersect with power relations.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
In this article, I want to challenge how provocation and
violent men's culpability for their violence against female
partners or former partners are dealt with in the Swedish
criminal law. Criminal legal doctrines of provocation long
have been criticized in Anglo-American feminist legal studies
(Edwards, 2004; Howe, 2002, 2004; Ramsey, 2010; Tyson,
2013). This criticism is directed at the provocations narrative
of a woman asking for it, which functions as a cultural and
legal abuse excuse for violent men and confirms violent
men's rationalizations and justifications of their violence
against women.1 Moreover, defence laws, both provocation
and self-defence, have been criticized for failing to reflect and
respond to the circumstances in which female domestic
violence victims kill their male abusive partners. Because of
this criticism and public debate, often fuelled by particular cases,
legal reforms regarding provocation have been carried through
in Anglo-American jurisdictions. Provocation as a partial defence
that reduces the crime of murder to manslaughter has been
abolished in three Australian states.2 The provocation defence
has also been abolished in New Zealand (Crimes Amendment
Bill 2009). In these jurisdictions, provocation is to be considered
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wsif.2013.12.005
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women in heterosexual relationships is contextualized. Because provocation instead is relevant as a mitigating circumstance at the sentencing stage, however, excuses for male
anger and violence against women still can influence case law.
Further, there is some evidence that provocation-type arguments might still be successful in the guise of other offences
such as manslaughter by an unlawful and dangerous act
(Tyson, 2013).
With this feminist knowledge in mind, my main line of
argument is not related to how the law on provocation should
be changed or whether provocation should be abolished. Abolishing provocation as a defence and a mitigating circumstance
or changing it in order to respond to the feminist critique
without simultaneously changing the notion of culpability will
probably lead provocation-type arguments to find new ways
into the Swedish criminal legal discourse. As mentioned in
the section on the analytical framework, I do not primarily view
law as simple tool for change. Instead, I consider the law on
provocation and the notion of culpability as a site for struggle
where dominant discourses that are oppressive for abused
women can be challenged. By arguing that the notion of culpability should be changed, I wish to take on a particular
feminist legal method by disrupting the process of gender
construction in law and introducing different accounts that
might be less limiting for women (Hunter et al., 2010).
In my view, the notion of culpability (at least in relation to
provocation) should be changed in two respects. First, the
tendency to regard emotions as factual should be replaced by
an evaluative view on emotions. This should be in line with
how current criminal legal doctrine justifies why provocation
should mitigate blame (i.e., contradictory ethical reasons), but
it seems as if this notion is forgotten repeatedly, especially in
legal practice. Second, men's responsibility for their emotional
responses to women must be judged by acknowledging how
values and reasons intersect with power relations.
An evaluative conception does not regard emotions as
merely physical bodily sensations. Emotions, such as anger,
are instead seen from a constructionist point of view as being
constituted by thought and reason. This is because thoughts
are needed in order to identify and define a specific emotion
and separate it from others (Lupton, 1998; Nussbaum, 2004).
According to Kahan and Nussbaum,
A person experiences anger when she perceives that
another has slighted her in a signicant way. This perception presupposes conventions that specify from whom
a person may legitimately demand respect (from her
social subordinates; from her peers; from certain members of her family; from all members of the community)
and what forms of behaviour count as disrespectful
(insulting words; the failure to include the person in some
important activity; an inappropriate sexual overture).
For this reason, anger can be viewed as a mechanism by
which a person defends her status in the community and
the social norms on which her status depends. (Kahan &
Nussbaum, 1996:347348)
Social norms and conventions are thus necessary components in dealing with anger and provocation, for individuals
as well as for those who are to judge them. Even if the normative part of provocation was abolished, social norms would still
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because of a sexual advance from the victim. In the article, the author poses
the question when it should and when it should not be justied for a court to
dismiss a perpetrators own opinion regarding the reasons for killing another
person (Trskman, 199596). Regarding homosexual advance defence in
common law jurisdictions, see, e.g., Tyson, 2013.
7
RH 2003:64, p. 312.
8
NJA 2005 s. 712, p. 725.
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Men's violence
Narratives of men attending anti-violence programmes in Sweden
Kerstin Edin a,b,c,, Bo Nilsson a,d
a
b
c
d
Ume Centre for Gender Studies, Ume University, SE-901 87 Ume, Sweden
Epidemiology and Global Health, Department of Public Health and Clinical Medicine, Ume University, SE-901 87 Ume, Sweden
Department of Nursing, Ume University, SE-901 87 Ume, Sweden
Department of Culture and Media Studies, Ume University, SE-901 87 Ume, Sweden
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The efficacy of batterer-intervention programmes for men has frequently been questioned,
inviting additional research and development. Men inclined to violence have multifaceted
problems but are frequently squeezed into one-size-fits-all programmes with high ambitions
for change that often show little evidence of effectiveness. Some research even indicates that
any changes in men's violent behaviour might result from factors not at all linked to the
programmes.
For this study, ten interviews were carried out with men who had attended anti-violence
programmes within the Swedish Probation Service. The overall aim was to analyse gendered
identity constructions in the narratives of men attending the programmes how men
articulate the course of violent events and in what way they talk about themselves and the
programmes.
According to our results, men defended themselves by making excuses, explanations and
victim positions. Furthermore, the men's gendered identity constructions collided with the
programmes' ambitions of changing men's conceptions and behaviour.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
Men's violence against women has, again and again, been
described as a major social and public health problem (Walby &
Allen, 2004) and also as a human rights crime (Hearn & McKie,
2010). The perpetrator is almost always a current or previous
intimate partner; this seems to be the case internationally and
also holds for Sweden, where this study was carried out
(Renzetti, Edleson, & Bergen, 2001). Preventing and bringing
intimate partner violence (IPV) to an end require the understanding of complex causal connections that are explained
mostly in terms of personal, societal and socio-cultural factors
impregnated by gender and power structures (Firestone, Harris,
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images of other masculinities (and femininities) are subordinated and marginalized. More recently, the idea of a
hegemonic masculinity as a singular characteristic has been
disapproved of, and the importance of analyses in terms of
hegemonic masculinities has been emphasized (Connell &
Messerschmidt, 2005; see also Coles, 2009; Wetherell &
Edley, 1999). Moreover, criticism has been directed towards
a non-reflexive use of the concept without local, regional,
national or global considerations (Connell & Messerschmidt,
2005; Lusher & Robins, 2009). Others have been critical of
hegemonic masculinity being treated as a set of properties or
fixed character types, and have emphasized the need to view
hegemonic masculinity as dominant as well as a changing
interactive process in which marginalized masculinities
play an important role (Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005;
Demetriou, 2001; Hirose & Kay, 2010). In this article, notions
of hegemonic masculinities will be used in an analysis of how
men account for their violence and, in the narratives, reconstruct dominant identities and how these identities relate to
the programmes ambition of changing men's conceptions
and behaviour.
Ethics
The study was approved by the local Ethics Committee at
the Faculty of Medicine, Ume University, Sweden.
Subjects and setting
The starting point for this paper is qualitative research
interviews with ten men participating in similar anti-violence
programmes at three different institutions within the Swedish
Probation Service. The agenda for these programmes included a
minimum of 20 obligatory group sessions but some men could
be mandated to attend further sessions. All the participants
presented themselves as if they had already attended a majority
of the sessions (two men mentioned attending 20 sessions and
one 13). Eight men had been reported for violence against their
female partners (and were court-mandated into the programme), while two had admitted themselves voluntarily as
they had become aware of aggression and violent behaviour in
their relationships. We assume that they had all used violence
in one way or another, but we did not assume anything either
way in this regard, nor did we search for any evidence in
criminal or similar records. The men had a mean age of around
40 years (2960) and all but one were Swedish born. The men's
level of education varied, and they had different employment
positions, from as a blue-collar worker to chief executive officer.
In a write-up from the Swedish National Board of Health and
Welfare (Socialstyrelsen, 2001), the programmes (attended
by the interviewed men) presented themselves as having a
drop-out rate of about 30%, a low number when compared to
large international reviews where the estimated drop-out rate
is commonly reported as around 50% (cf. Daly, Power, &
Gondolf, 2001). They also described the programmes as inspired by Manscentrum in Sweden (Eliasson, 2000) and by
Alternatives to Violence (ATV) in Norway (Rkil, 2002) and as
similar to Duluth-inspired programmes (Pence & Paymar,
1993). The focus of the programmes was to stop the violence by
working on the men's conceptions of masculinity and making
them take unreserved responsibility for their violent behaviour
(Socialstyrelsen, 2001; and see also Edin et al., 2009, 2008; Edin,
Hgberg, Dahlgren, & Lalos, 2009).
Interviews and analyses
All the interviews were carried out by the first author
(KEE): the first three in 2003 and the remaining seven in
2007. The interview themes had proceeded from a broad
project focusing on IPV and pregnancy (Edin, 2006). The
questions were open-ended and dealt with the men's
background, experiences of intimate relationships, pregnancy and parenthood, their current situation and the programme. The interviews lasted about two hours and most of
them turned out to be detailed life stories. Eight interviews
were recorded and transcribed verbatim, while, for ethical
and methodological reasons, handwritten notes were the
source of information for the remaining two. Fictional names
are used for the quotations.
First, the entire narratives were coded into categories and
themes and comparisons were made to look for similarities and
divergences in what the men said, but also in what they did not
say. With inspiration from Bamberg (2004), we then analysed
the narratives at three levels, making it possible to study: i) how
they comprise arguments, characters and positions, ii) how the
men talk and explain the violence, and finally, iii) how, through
different narratives, arguments and explanations, they (re)
construct masculine identities. Thus, an advantage with this
model is that it makes the different steps of the analytical
process visible to the reader. Another advantage is that
narratives can be studied as a result of individual agency
(level 1), as interactively created (level 2) and as discursively
produced (level 3). See also the introductory level presentations in each of the three sections below.
Results
1. Changing narrativeschanging characters
The first analytical level deals with construction of intent
and central characters/positions in the stories, how these
are (re)created and in what way these changed during the
interviews and in relation to the purpose of what is told.
We will, moreover, put forward narrative themes and
genres from the interviews. The gendered identity aspects
of the stories are dealt with further on.
Most of the interviewees described how their relationship
with their partner was good initially. They were happy
and did a lot of enjoyable things together, as is shown in
some of their comments: So in fact it has been a super
relationship (John); It was very good at the beginning.
We had a really good relationship (Simon); and We
thought we were the perfect, happy family couple then
(Kevin).
Besides being a good partner, a wife/girlfriend can also be
presented as a fantastic woman/person. This was exemplified when John described how he and his wife had had
really rough times, but nevertheless they had never raised
their voices or quarrelled:
Yes, I can only say that I think she is a wonderful
person. I would, yes, up to a month ago, I would have
done anything to make us become a couple again.
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more common that the processes are complex and characterised by constant considerations and negotiations. The
interviewees admit that they are perpetrators, but at the
same time describe themselves as something other than a
typical perpetrator; as Simon said, It is not me standing
there. Then the processes of identification and disidentification intertwine.
(Dis)identication negotiations with the
anti-violence programme
How are the treatment sessions visible as narratives in the
interviews and how are these part of the interviewees' identity
production? An important aspect of this identity construction is
the men's different ways of showing their disidentification with
the programmes' aims and intentions. On an empirical level,
this disidentification can be identified in the interviewees'
critiques and rejections of the programme.
Some of the interviewees disagreed with having to
participate in the programme at all, because they thought it
was unjust that more violent and worse offenders than them
escaped both punishment and treatment on the programme:
And then you think, there must be things that are much
worse and how the others are even being violent right
now. (Allan)
Others were openly critical towards the programme:
I mean, there are just because one of us has battered,
that does not mean that everyone in the group has done
the same thing, irrespective of whether you have been
convicted or not. Obviously, if one person ignores a red
light, not everyone needs to ignore a red light It's kind
of I don't get the point sometimes. And I have told them
all the time that I have not hit her. I have not done that
and that and that. (Adam)
Adam's critique is rooted in his construction of a victim
position. He not only presents himself as a victim of wrong
accusations, but he also disidentifies with a position as an
abuser. This disidentification has similarities with Wood's
(2004) concept dissociations, which refers to how abusive
men attempt to disconnect themselves from the violence and
the identity of real abusers.
This was also the case when the interviewees were critical
of the collective nature of the programme. They thought that
it was built on generalisations and that all of the participants
were treated in the same way, as if they had all been jealous
and were perpetrators who had hit women. Both Adam and
Kevin emphasized that the accusations of violence were
wrong, and Kevin said that he had never been jealous and
also thought that he was in the wrong place:
I did not recognize anything of what they were talking
about.That programme was a complete waste of time
for me, I think.
The interviewees also viewed the programme as being
part of their punishment (cf. Miller, Gregory, & Iovanni,
2005). They had to attend the sessions and they were longing
for the time when they were over. In the interview with
102
Yes, these are better than none at all. Then you have got
some things to think about too. So then when you come
home, after you have been here, you also reflect a bit. So you,
you've been here once a week but you think about it a little
every day, to some extent. (Simon)
This example is in some ways typical of the interviews
and the interviewees' identity production. Stories about the
treatment programmes are not stories about dramatic
changes in behaviour or revelations, but rather they are
examples of how the interviewees navigate between different discourses and demands.
According to a general therapeutic discourse, the participants in the programme have to take responsibility, admit to
being real villains and accept the position as an offender
before they can become better people (cf. Schrock & Padavic,
2007). This is a common way of thinking in therapy in
general, and it reflects the former discussion of the confession mode. A change of behaviour is dependent on the
person's understanding and interpretation of the event as
something not acceptable (cf. Ludwig, 1985). Thus, the
identity as a perpetrator has to be established and the
individual has to accept this before any change can occur and
he can be reformed and allowed to return to society. The
interviewees seem to be aware of this, which also is a
possible explanation for their occasionally positive descriptions of the programme in a positive manner they talked
the talk (cf. Schrock & Padavic, 2007).
However, they often explicitly disagreed with the programme's content, and these tendencies towards disidentification are in some ways self-evident: no one would like to
be defined as an abuser. However, the disidentification can
also be understood by making references to gender. A man
who abuses women (and children) is not a real man in
relation to general gender discourses; he does not have
enough self-control and he does not live up to the demands
of a breadwinner (Gerzon, 1982) a real man is a provider
who takes care of and is responsible for the family. Such
demands are (indirectly) reproduced in the interview
narratives, for example when the men deny or try to explain
the deviant behaviour that they have been accused of. As was
illustrated earlier, they use different narratives, excuses and
ideas about a strange self and being out of character in their
narratives. In this way they seem to minimize or neutralize
the severity of the behaviour, disidentify with the position as
an abuser and (try to) re-establish a respectable masculine
identity. Normally, they represent a chivalric manhood,
care about women and never abuse them (cf. Wood, 2004).
Thus, by disidentifications and allusions to a strange self and
being out of character, they can confirm their morality and
also avoid the need to develop explicit plans for reforming
their lives (cf. Presser, 2008).
Discussion
Violence and (changing) gendered identity constructions
This paper is about the narratives of men attending three
similar anti-violence programmes within the Probation
Service in Sweden. We aim to understand their gendered
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Wetherell, Margaret, & Edley, Nigel (1999). Negotiating hegemonic masculinity: Imaginary positions and psycho-discursive practices. Feminism
and Psychology, 9(3), 335356.
Willis, Paul (1977). Learning to labour. How working class kids get working
class jobs. Farnborough: Saxon House.
Wood, Julia T. (2004). Monsters and victims: Male felons' accounts of
intimate partner violence. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships,
21(5), 555576.
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Over the last decade, political initiatives against so-called honour-related violence have been
undertaken in several Western countries, as well as in the UN. Swedish policy initiatives are
relatively ambitious, and have primarily targeted young women as victims, one aim being to
make it possible for them to speak up. In this article the overarching concern is to explore how
victim stories are used in Swedish policy initiatives. Drawing upon discourse theory and
post-colonial feminism, the aim is to challenge the ideal of speech as emancipation and to
elaborate the connections between speech, silence and power. The article shows that, despite
efforts by policy-makers to include these young women, and not to reproduce stereotypes, the
possibility of speaking is formulated within a certain nationalist discursive terrain. The victims
are primarily called upon to speak as non-Swedish representatives. Paradoxically, the
inclusion of young women into policy discourse has led to a particular exclusion and thereby
produced new silences.
2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
By the end of the 20th century, single cases of violence
against young ethnicised/racialised women were making the
national news headlines all across Western Europe. The violence
was labelled honour related and articulated as exotic, new and
difficult to understand. Following the publicity about honour
killings, political initiatives have been undertaken in several
countries as well as in the UN to combat honour-related violence
and forced marriages. Denmark, for example (and to a lesser
extent the UK and Norway) has launched initiatives against
forced marriage as part of their immigration policies and could
be accused of using them as part of an agenda of restrictions
upon family reunification (Bredal, 2005; Dustin & Phillips, 2008),
whereas in Sweden the problem has mainly been constructed
as a matter of honour-related violence to be tackled within
immigrant integration and gender-equality policies. Interestingly, it seems as though the issue of honour-related violence has
received more attention in the Nordic countries than in many
other Western countries, at least judging from the media
coverage (Keskinen, 2009: 268) and, in terms of policy material
and the amount of money spent, the Swedish state has dealt with
the issue by far the most extensively. One reason for the Nordic
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108
109
Authentic stories
Stories of violence, honour and forced marriages have been
circulating for some time now in Western European public
spacesnot least by way of bestselling novels or dramadocumentaries such as the novel Marie de force by MarieThrse Cuny, which describes the life of French-Moroccan Leila
who is married against her will, or the best-selling book Desert
flower (which also was made into a film) by Waris Dirie and
Cathleen Miller, which tells the authentic story of a girl in
Somalia and deals with genital mutilation. Consequently, we
have become familiar with reports of the oppression of women
in some country far awaypreferably in North Africa or the
Middle East. The stories are often marketed as individual,
authentic narratives and an imaginary Western reader is
assumed to lack knowledge and insight into the strangeness of
these unknown societies and cultures (Karlsson, 2006). The lack
of knowledge on the part of Swedish society is also a central
theme in the policy field of honour-related violence. Utterances
such as this type of violence is new to Sweden are common.
For example, one central theme in policy documents concerns
the idea that Swedish society lacks fundamental knowledge
and that Sweden has been unaware of the problem of
honour-related violence. The sense of not knowing, of not
being able to explain or control the situation causes problems
for Swedish policy-makers and fuels the search for a knowable
and easily representable victim, with a coherent narrative. Thus,
as a consequence of this lack of knowledge, a need for authentic
110
111
112
113
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Dustin, Moira, & Phillips, Anne (2008). Whose agenda is it? Abuses of
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av behovet av insatser fr flickor och unga kvinnor som riskerar att
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survey and analysis of the need of initiatives for girls and young women
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by a close relative].
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[National consultative support].
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girl and a minority]. Malm: Terrafem.
Department of Public Health and Clinical Medicine, Epidemiology and Global Health, Sweden
Ume Centre for Gender Studies, Ume University, Sweden
Department of Clinical Sciences, Social Medicine and Global Health, Lund University, Sweden
a r t i c l e
i n f o
s y n o p s i s
This paper discusses current Swedish international development policies on gender and
violence. It deals with the relationship between development policies, global health,
promotion of gender equality, and violence against women in a global perspective. The focus
is on intimate partner violence and the highly promoted gender mainstreaming policy.
Theoretically, our point of departure lies within a feminist notion of gender relations, power
structures, and male hierarchies that constrain and subordinate women and girls and which
expose them to gendered violence. We claim that stronger links need to be created between
local activist groups in low and middle income countries and the international development
agencies. It is important to initiate and formalize a NorthSouth dialogue between such
groups, as well as enhancing SouthSouth dialogue and cooperation.
2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
This paper deals with the relationship between international development policies, especially the latest Swedish
development policy, global health, promotion of gender
equality, and violence against women in a global perspective.
We want to take a closer look at the strategies, the history,
and the goals for development policy and their links to
preventing violence against women, promoting gender
equality, and global health. We argue that results from
gender research on violence against women and feminist
notions of gender inequalities need to be taken into account
in development policies regarding gendered violence. We
also argue that stronger links need to be created between
local activist and/or feminist groups in low and middle
income countries and the development agencies. It is
important to initiate and formalize a NorthSouth dialogue
between such groups, as well as enhancing SouthSouth
Corresponding author at: Ume Centre for Gender Studies, Ume University,
SE-901 87 Ume, Sweden.
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116
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120
which might not benefit women and girls. In addition, there was
no guarantee that gender mainstreaming meant including
women; instead, mainstreaming gender often meant malestreaming, i.e. men in power defined the core issues so that
women's prioritised needs and rights were obscured or left out
(Moser, 2005; Mukhopadhyay, 2004).
In a recent self-evaluation of gender mainstreaming
policies, conducted by Swedish development agency Sida,
the evaluators stress that it is still important to create
incentives for gender mainstreaming, not only internally
inside Sida, but also externally among program partners
(Sida, 2010:1). They state that gender analyses are often
conducted, especially at the beginning of program activity.
There is, however, a concern that Sida has been poorer in
maintaining the same incentives later on in the work
process of program interventions. It is concluded that
gender is largely absent in program monitoring and
evaluation. There is thus a risk that gender issues are
concealed and that this hinders the internal learning
process among Sida staff for further advancement of the
development policy. However, Sida does exercise and
emphasize a strategy of dialogue, which would certainly
benefit women if they are approached as collaborating
agents in their own right.
There is also conceptual confusion as to the use of the
concept of gender in development debates (Warren, 2007).
This is the case also in current Swedish policies on IPV and
development programs. It is of concern that Sida still uses the
old concept of gender role in its recent policy for development collaboration (Sida, 2010). We would have appreciated a
more up-to-date and theoretically driven use of conceptual
frameworks presented in gender research so that the terminology in development policies could be based on contemporary gender/feminist theory. Drawing on old sex role theory, as
presented in a rather structural-functionalist notion, to describe and analyse gender inequalities of today is not only
misleading, but will also obscure analysis (Connell, 2007;
Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005).
The need for cultural sensitivity in development policies is
obvious, but often this is neglected. Usually the issue of
violence against women is dealt with separately, which in
turn increases the risk of being rendered invisible and not
part of general interventions to improve women's lives and
health. Also, health research on violence against women is at
risk of falling into this pitfall of neglect, even though gender
researchers on IPV often claim cultural sensitivity as a key
aspect of the outcomes of research. One example where
cultural sensitivity is in focus is the WHO multi-country
study of 2005, which emphasizes the importance of adapting
questionnaires to the specific cultural understanding of
gender and violence (WHO, 2005). The issue is about giving
women a voice and about always having in mind whose voice
is doing the talking.
It is also important to include local feminist groups and
activists from the Global South in the dialogue. In many
countries of the Global South, which are now targets for
development collaboration, there is an existing body of
feminist activists, which have long traditions of activism and
engagement in policy making. These NGOs form an important
counterpart to development agencies of the Global North that
can contextualise and sensitise the problems with IPV and give
121
122
WHO (2012). Violence against women. Intimate partner and sexual violence
against women. Fact sheet No. 239 (http://www.who.int/mediacentre/
factsheets/fs239/en/)
World Economic Forum (2011). The Global Gender Gap Report 2011: Rankings
and Scores. http://www3.weforum.org/docs/GGGR11/GGGR11_RankingsScores.pdf (Geneva, Switzerland)
a r t i c l e
i n f o
s y n o p s i s
The challenge that my paper deals with is the complexities of gender and violence within
international refugee law, taking women exposed to male partner violence as a starting point.
The focus is the definition of refugee in the United Nations Refugee Convention and the
requirement that the persecution must be based on specific grounds, the nexus requirement.
My analysis shows that the Convention is grounded in an essentialist understanding of the
subject and that the preservation of its structure and integrity also means preserving the
power structures in society. The argumentation suggests that it is time to abolish the nexus
requirement and the limitation of the grounds, but my conclusion is rather that we must
continue to work with our frame of thought focusing on the refugee situation and the
discursive constitution of the subject in time and space.
2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Introduction
My paper deals with the challenges posed by the complexities of gender and violence within international refugee law,
taking women exposed to male partner violence as a starting
point. The focus of my challenge is the definition of refugee in
the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees (1951) and
the requirement that the persecution must be based on specific
grounds, the nexus requirement. The definition covers only
persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership
of a particular social group or political opinion. In many states,
such as Sweden, women are recognized as constituting a
particular social group, making this a ground of particular
interest in my analysis. In the case of male partner violence it is
also this ground that is often invoked. In this instance it must be
shown that the violence stems from her membership of a
particular social group. In this way, the persecution (violence)
and the ground for persecution (being a woman and thus part
of a particular social group) are separated as being
non-constitutive of each other. My paper challenges this
separation between the subject and the persecution. It is
challenged in the light of studies revealing that women and
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127
128
129
together with the conclusions that the UNHCR supports, provides guidance for
application.
2
For more recent international literature on intersectionality, see e.g.
Grabham, Krishnadas & Herman (2009), Lutz, Herrera Vivar & Supik (2011),
McCall (2005), and Yuval-Davis (2006).
3
Compare the term principle of keeping apart [isrhllandets princip],
introduced by the historian Yvonne Hirdman in her theory about the gender
system. The principle of keeping apart means that the relationship between
men and women is dichotomized. In symbiosis with this principle is the
principle of the male primacy norm. This means that qualities which are
perceived as masculine are valued more highly than features and tasks that
fall within the female sphere, leading to a hierarchization (Hirdman, 2001).
Compare also with the term logic of detachment [avskiljandets logik],
introduced by the legal scholar Eva-Maria Svensson, referring to the
separation between law and society that traditional legal scholarship builds
upon (Svensson, 1997).
4
In the Act, the term sex is used, referring to biological as well as social
sex. See prop. 2005/06:6, p. 34. In the English translation of the Swedish Act
the term sex is translated as gender. See Chapter 4, Section 1 of the Aliens
Act, SFS 2005:716, available in English at http://www.sweden.gov.se/sb/d/
5805/a/66122.
5
Similar results can be found in recent research from other countries.
See e.g. Freedman (2010). See also Kneebone (2005, p. 24).
6
The UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women has
criticized Sweden in this respect and has stated that this interpretation
of the law, which would introduce a double persecution requirement,
diverges from the UNHCR gender guidelines (see HRC, 2007, 6 February).
7
I use the word universal to capture discursive structures and
hegemony, i.e. I lay no claim to universalism. Instead I believe that time and
place are central categories in analysing and denaturalizing socially and
historically created inequalities, such as men's violence against women (see also
de Los Reyes & Grndahl, 2007, particularly on pp. 14; de los Reyes, 2007 on pp.
101 ff., as well as discussion by Mouffe, 2005, particularly on pp. 83 ff. and 120 ff.
and Butler, 1992, p. 8). For a discussion of challenges that an intersectional
analysis grounded in a structural framework provide for understanding the role
of culture in domestic violence, see Sokoloff & Dupont (2005), particularly on p.
58.
8
This was i.e. an issue for the Human Rights Days that were held in
Stockholm in November 2011. Program available at http://www.mrdagarna.
nu/index.php/en/programme/fullstaendig-programlista.
9
Migrants also contribute to our welfare in terms of brain-draining
or social dumping. Migrant women e.g. are often recruited into
women-specic jobs that are unprotected and low paid. See a
discussion by Jean dCuhna at http://www.saynotoviolence.org/aroundworld/news/ve-questions-jean-d-cunha, and de los Reyes & Mulinari,
2005, in re-print 2010, on pp. 85 and 102 ff. See also Calleman (2011).
10
See also Nilsson (2005, 2007b), as well as Laclau (1996, p. 59),
according to which the impossibility of a universal ground does not
eliminate its need: it just transforms the ground into an empty place which
can be partially lled in a variety of ways (the strategies of this lling is what
politics is about). See also discussion by Laclau (ib.) about the death of the
subject, universalism and particularism, particularly on pp. 29 f.
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SOU (2004:31). Flyktingskap och knsrelaterad frfljelse [Government
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Endnotes
United Nations Ofcial Documents
1
Convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide, New York.
(1948, 9 December). (78 UNTS 277).
130
Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, Geneva. (1951, 28 July). (189 UNTS
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International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, New York. (1966, 16
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Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees, New York. (1967, 31 January). (606
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Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment
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(HCR/GIP/02/01).
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