Perla Zusman

Globalisation, Feminisation of the Labour Force, and Postproductivist Rural Areas

One of the explicit objectives of The New Role of Women in Social Development is “to examine the problem of the economic and regional restructuring of rural areas in the current context of the globalisation process and the new role of women in rural development” (p 7). Each of the thirteen articles in this book, edited by Maria-Dolors Garcia-Ramon and Mireia Baylina Ferré, may be considered a partial response to the following question: In what way has the globalisation process affected women’s lives and the places in which many of them live and work: the rural areas of the Iberian peninsula? All the articles emphasise the rise of new forms of employment in rural areas, aimed at capturing female workers, which alters women’s daily lives, their relationship with their environment, and their role in the family. The studies in the book, primarily constructed on the basis of qualitative information, analyse the significance of women’s work in activities that mediate between the global and local spheres, particularly the agricultural industry (confections, meat, anchovies), rural tourism, homeworking, and telework. The implantation of many of these activities in Iberian rural areas is intimately linked to their roles in the context of Europe (particularly the agricultural and tourism industries). In all of them, women appear as the protagonists of the possibility of their effectivisation. Certain representations linked to a supposed sexual division of labour, according to which women are assumed to surpass men in certain traits (sensitivity, patience, delicacy, meticulousness, and responsibility), and their presumed unwillingness to accept jobs far from their homes or full-time are arguments adduced to assert their complete suitability for flexible, precarious, or informal employment, with low pay and without social benefits or any type of unionisation. In this way, culturally constructed gender differences are