Women in Latin America and the Caribbean - Cepal

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disincentive to their recruitment; 32 nor are services provided for reproductive work, while in the most
completely unprotected kinds of employment working women are penalized for “breaking the rules” by
having a child. Motherhood has thus gone from being an occupational right for women to a personal
matter which worsens the position of working women in some countries, particularly with the withdrawal
of State social services (Pautassi, Faur and Gherardi, 2004). In others, recently elected governments have
given a new impetus to social services whose effects on working women and society will need to be
assessed.
This serious asymmetry between constitutions that give a large place to gender equality and the
harsh reality of women’s working lives is found even as large numbers of women enter the labour market.
This influx is not a temporary development associated with crises or one that can be reversed by family
welfare policies, it is an ongoing process that has increased the conflicts between productive and
reproductive work and the cultural tensions between female autonomy and dependence. This new
situation requires comprehensive policies and a “re-engineering of time” (Darcy d’Oliveira, 2003), since
it cannot be resolved simply through individual contracts and monetary relationships (Elson, 1992).
C. SOCIAL REPRODUCTION WORK IN THE CONSTITUTIONAL AND LEGAL
ENVIRONMENT OF THE REGION’S COUNTRIES
Only two countries, the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and Ecuador, make specific reference to the
value of social reproduction work in their constitutions (see box II.2). In Colombia, according to the
Presidential Council for Women’s Equity, the Constitutional Court has argued for the value of unpaid
domestic work on the basis of certain constitutional provisions, such as those establishing that “the law
may determine that family property is inalienable and unattachable. Family relationships are based on
equality of rights and duties between the couple and on mutual respect between all its members”
(article 42) and that “women and men have equal rights and opportunities. Women may not be subject to
discrimination of any kind. During pregnancy and after childbirth, women shall receive special assistance
and protection from the State and shall be entitled to a State food allowance if they should then be
unemployed or unsupported. The State shall provide special support to women heads of household”
(article 43). 33
Other countries have been making significant legislative efforts to recognize the contribution
made by women to development and the economy through unpaid work and, consequently, to grant them
some benefits in relation to this. An example is Jamaica which, in 2004, adopted the Family Property
(Rights of Spouses) Act recognizing the contribution made by spouses in the form of domestic work and
childcare and stipulating that there should be no presumption that a monetary contribution was of greater
value than a non-monetary one. 34 In 2001, the Supreme Court of Belize stipulated in the Supreme Court of
Judicature Act (91 148A) that the value of unpaid domestic work, including the raising of children, should
be taken into account in the division of property when a marriage or legal union was terminated. Trinidad
and Tobago passed the Counting Women’s Unremunerated Work Bill in 1996, but this has not yet been
32
33
34
See Abramo and Todaro (2002) for an analysis of male and female employment costs.
Response by the Government of Colombia to the survey on unpaid work and political participation sent out by
the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) to the countries of the region
(September 2006).
Information provided by the representative of the Government of Jamaica at the virtual forum in preparation for
the tenth session of the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean, February 2007.