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Women’s employment in the textile manufacturing sectors of Bangladesh and Morocco elderly parents. Before joining garments, she had done various kinds of odd jobs, including baby-sitting and sewing work at home. Her husband, who had worked as a driver’s assistant on a truck, had been the primary breadwinner of the household. Prior to her husband’s departure, she had not seriously considered working in garments, being quite busy with her part-time odd jobs and the work of taking care of her young sons. She also mentioned that she had always thought that getting and doing garment work was much easier for young unmarried girls than for a mature married woman like herself. All of these considerations were, however, pushed aside when the household fell into dire financial straits with the departure of her husband. Within this group of respondents, the role and attitudes of household members towards the women’s entry into garment work reflected the conditions of poverty and crisis in the household. Not surprisingly, there was virtually no household opposition to the women’s entry into garment work. In fact, on the contrary, several women spoke of being pressured by family members into taking a garment job, which if possible they would have preferred not to do. Given their limited economic resources, it was clearly in the interest of the sending family households to encourage the women’s entry into garment work, since the resulting income was important to household survival. However, household members often interpreted or understood the women’s garment work in ways that differed from the explanation of family survival offered by the woman herself. These differences highlight the contested character of understandings of the women’s garment work within the household. For example, one comment I often heard from male household heads was that the women’s income was supplemental to the survival of the household rather than essential to it. Also advanced was the idea that garment work was in the personal interest of the women rather than a benefit for the household as a whole. Thus with respect to single women, household members could emphasize that garment work enhanced the marriageability of the woman. Potential marriage partners would be attracted to her proven ability to generate income and perhaps even to the dowry that she had accumulated through her garment job. In a variety of ways, these interpretations could serve to reduce the significance of the status of the woman as an important incomeearner in the household. As I have argued elsewhere (Kibria, 1995), the effects of women’s income earning on family power relations are deeply affected by the meanings that are given to the income. 160
Becoming a garment worker 2. “I entered garments to improve my family’s condition and prospects.” For a relatively small number of the women workers, entry into garment work was explained as a move that had been undertaken to enhance the economic situation of their sending family households. In their accounts of how they had come to work in garments, these women emphasized that it had been a matter of choice rather than necessity; they and their families could and in fact did survive quite well without their income. All of these women were residing with their sending family households. In contrast to the first group described above, none of the sending family households in this group were headed by women. Several of the households owned small businesses, while others contained multiple wage-earners or members in skilled and technical occupations (e.g. tailor, driver, typist/clerk). The pay of the woman was spent on luxury expenditures or, more frequently, on investments designed to enhance the family’s surplus income or financial security. Particularly common was the earmarking of income for the current or future needs of children or younger siblings. Many of the women indicated that their money would be spent to educate family members, or to set them up in business, send them abroad, or get them married. Once again, a variety of household income management practices operated here. In some cases, the woman spent or invested the money herself, while in others, the pay was handled by another household member. For the women who explained their employment in the framework of “family betterment”, accounts of how they had entered garment work almost invariably contained reference to a moment of altruistic realization. That is, the worker came to recognize that the “sacrifice” of working in garments was one that would enable the household to improve its socioeconomic situation. Kin, friends and neighbours played a crucial role in bringing her attention to the financial benefits of garment work. While the themes of altruism and sacrifice were prominent in the accounts of these women, there were other, less visible but important elements as well. Tulshi, a garment worker in her late teens, talked of how she had come to the decision to work in garments because of her desire to help her father expand his business. But her motivations for entering garment work also included a desire to expand her range of experience, and to gain a sense of financial independence. In the following, we also get a sense of how the social image of women garment workers may hold certain attractions for young women, representing a certain measure of social independence. 161
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Women’s Employment in the Textile
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This United Nations Research Instit
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Acknowledgements Many people have b
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notwithstanding the inertia of the
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Carol Miller is a policy analyst on
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xii VII. Contribution of different
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Introduction 1 Introduction 1 Shahr
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Introduction Table 1: Basic indicat
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Introduction women have been tradit
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Introduction The chapters on Bangla
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Introduction occurs, on average, at
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Introduction women workers related
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Introduction in low-income countrie
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Introduction by repaying their “d
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Introduction participate in labour
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Introduction their bargaining power
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Introduction processing zones hypot
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Introduction IV. The case studies T
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Introduction experience in garment
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Introduction V. Conclusion Although
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Introduction improved technology. T
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Introduction References Afsar, R. (
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Introduction Household Power Relati
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Wage discrimination by gender in Mo
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Gender dimensions of labour migrati
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Gender dimensions of labour migrati
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Table 1: Total number of male and f
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