Govind Kelkar

Gender Relations and Technological Change in Asia

In the post-colonial world of the last 50 years in Asia, one broad conclusion can be stated: overall women have advanced in search of more equal gender relations in most of the continent. The challenges to patriarchy are increasing and patriarchy is weakening. This article examines how advances in information technologies have the potential to change the organization of work in Asia, especially in the areas of gender relations and cultural ceilings. Our major questions are: how are women affecting and have been affected by these wide-ranging technological advances? How do we understand the ongoing contradiction of development policy - being efficient and productive as well as pursuing social and gender equality and sustainable human development? While the new information technologies in manufacturing, services and communications hold great promise for dissolving old bases of discrimination, the potential of these technologies for decentralized and more humane development, with participatory political structures, has yet to be realized because of continuing patriarchal relations and the domination of accumulation over development goals.

IT Industry and Women's Agency: Explorations in Bangalore and Delhi, India

This article examines womens agency in the Information Technology (IT) industry and is based on field research in two cities in India: Bangalore and Delhi. We looked at both the software industry and IT-enabled services, particularly through the perceptions of women and men workers and managers within the IT industry. While a large number of women continue to work in gendered homes and work sites, balancing work and domestic responsibilities with little help from the men, they do, however, carry on an ongoing struggle to challenge embedded patriarchal relations within the family and in the industry. Conceding that there are socially sanctioned gender inequalities in the market, women prefer to work outside the home in an attempt to improve their social position and construct greater scope to enhance their agency, than be subject to family-based dependency and coercion.

Wood Energy: The Role of Women's Unvalued Labor

Gender issues have been introduced into energy policy considerations as the first round of efforts to mitigate the rural energy crisis (involving noncommercial fuels like wood) with improved technology, such as improved stoves, failed because the specific needs of the users (women) were ignored. Models of household energy use continue to consider the household a unit possessing certain aggregate resources. These models continue to be applied to both rural and urban areas despite the fact that a gender analysis of labor availability in rural households may be necessary to understand the production and consumption of wood fuel and the fact that urban and rural wood fuel use patterns vary considerably. Studies show that the collection, processing, and use of wood fuel is largely a task of women and children who have fewer possible opportunities than men of earning income with their available time. Rural households that collect their own fuel will not have an incentive to invest in an improved stove or more efficient commercial fuels if the time saved by the women from such an investment would not result in more income to the household. Thus, while income plays an important role in sparking a transition from biomass fuels in urban areas, it fails to play such a role in rural areas. Thus, attempts to increase fuel efficiency or fuel switching should focus on increasing womens income-earning opportunities outside of the homestead. Studies of leisure also indicate that sustained underinvestment in womens labor-saving devices also reflects a bias towards male rather than female leisure. A transition up the energy ladder is desirable not only to save womens time and improve the environment but also to improve the health of women and children and calls for village-level solutions.

Gender Relations in Forest Societies in Asia

Based on fieldwork in several indigenous societies in South and Southeast Asia, this arti cle explores the change in gender relations from a matrilineal and/or egalitarian system to one where male domination is present as the norm. We looked at changes in gender rela tions in forest societies in four situations: (a) colonial and state rule over forest communi ties and the takeover of forests; (b) historical and contemporary revolts of forest-dwelling women and men to re-establish community control over forests; (c) the response of national states to these autonomy movements by shifting to devolution as a policy; and (d) the current situation, where womens inclusion in local forest management is becom ing more a policy norm. However, these norms of womens inclusion, though still limited in space, have also come about through a process of struggle by women.

The Woodfuel Crisis: the Need for Gender Analysis

Increasingly, woodfuel and other biomass sources have become inaccessible to women due to large-scale degradation of the environment and the inability to sustain rural energy sources. There are two major features of such an energy crisis. Women in poor, rural households are affected more than others, leading to their increased labor in collecting woodfuel from longer distances. Also, there is a diversion of organic materials, like cow dung, dry leaves, and crop residues, from other uses, such as fertilizing fields, leading to eventual scarcity, with possible adverse consequences on agricultural fertility.

Poverty and Local Linkages in the Tourism Value Chain: A Study of Upland Economies in China and India

The paper deals with the role of tourism in reducing poverty in upland economies. Taking cases from China and India, it explores the local segments of the tourism value chain, or the local linkages of tourism. In assessing the impact on poverty it looks at both the local share of tourist expenditure and the size of the tourism sector. Local benefits are looked at from the points of view of both women and men as service providers. The paper brings out the important role of tourism as a form of non-farm employment in reducing poverty in upland economies.

A Political Economy Analysis of Crisis Response: Reflections on India and Thailand

In response to economic downturns, two key questions arise. The first regards the nature of the response, whether stimulus, trade restrictions or otherwise. If it is accepted that stimulus measures are needed, the second question is, what determines towards whom they are directed? Along with a brief discussion of the first question, this chapter seeks to answer the second question, comparing mainly the experiences of India in the 2007/08 global crisis with those of Thailand in the 1997/98 Asian crisis.

Women's roundtable discussion on the economic, social and political impacts of the Southeast Asian financial crisis.

This article summarizes the main issues revealed at a womens roundtable discussion on the Economic, Social, and Political Impacts of the Southeast Asian Financial Crisis. The discussion was organized by the Development Alternatives of Women for the New Era (DAWN) and was held during April 12-14, 1998, in Manila, the Philippines. The aim was to explore the effects of the financial crisis and its management by states and multilateral agencies on womens political, economic, cultural, and social status; and to reach regional understanding of new issues for the womens movement in Asia and to identify areas of advocacy. Participants included women scholars and activists from Southeast, East, and South Asia; Africa; the Caribbean; Latin America; and the Pacific. Participants came from a wide variety of backgrounds. Nine issues were emphasized. For example, some predicted the currency devaluation before July 1997. The financial crisis is linked with globalization. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is the primary institution for addressing the financial crisis. IMF conditions on inflation rates and budget surpluses are recessionary and government budget oriented. The crisis has exposed cronyism and corruption within capitalism. Patriarchal values have reemerged as Asian values. Women have lost jobs and income, while the cost of living continues to increase. Prostitution has become more acceptable as legitimate work. Womens human rights are not legally protected. State ideology assumes domestic and sex roles. Issues in each region are identified. 14 key issues pertain to all regions.