Feministische Ökonomie

Feminist economics refers to an intellectual stream in economic thought which applies feminist lenses to economics in order to challenge the androcentric biases inherent within it and to produce an economics that is more gender inclusive. A diverse area of inquiry, feminist economics includes critical examinations of economic epistemology and methodology, explorations of areas of traditional economic inquiry that have a particular relevance to women (for example, care work) or phenomena poorly represented by existing models (for example, intra-household bargaining) and, the subsequent use of different forms of data collection, measurement (for example, the GEM as opposed to GDP) and interpretation to produce more gender-aware theories.

Contrary to common conceptions of economics as a positive and objective science, feminist economists call attention to the social-construction of economics, highlighting the ways in which its models and methods reflect masculine preferences. In contrast to the contemporary construction of economics focused on "culturally 'masculine' topics" including "autonomy, abstraction and logic" feminist economics calls economics to include "feminine" topics "such as women and family behavior as well as...connection, concreteness and emotion" and illuminates how the exclusion of these topics is a detriment to the field.

Origins and history

Early on, feminist ethicists, economists, political scientists, and systems scientists argued that women's traditional work (e.g. child-raising, caring for sick elders) and occupations (e.g. nursing, teaching) are systematically undervalued with respect to that of men. For example, Jane Jacobs' thesis of the "Guardian Ethic" and its contrast to the "Trader Ethic" sought to explain what feminist economics claim is the systematic undervaluing of guardianship activity, including the child-protecting, nurturing, and healing tasks that were traditionally assigned to women. Measures such as employment equity were implemented in developed nations in the 1970s to 1990s, but these were not entirely successful in removing wage gaps even in nations with strong equity traditions.

While attention to women’s economic role and economic differences by gender started in the 1960s and there were feminist critiques of received economic theories in the 1970s and 1980s including those presented at the Committee on the Status of Women in the Economics Profession (CSWEP) in 1972,feminist economics took off in earnest with the founding of the International Association for Feminist Economics (IAFFE) and the journal Feminist Economics in 1994.

As in other disciplines, the initial emphasis of feminist economists was to critique the established theory, methodology, and policy approaches. The critique began in microeconomics of the household and labor markets and spread to macroeconomics and international trade, leaving no field in economics untouched. Feminist economists pushed for and produced gender aware theory and analysis, broadened the focus on economics and sought pluralism of methodology and research methods.

Critiques of traditional economics

Although there is no definitive list of the principles of feminist economics feminist economists offer a variety of critiques of standard approaches in economics. For example, prominent feminist economist, Paula England, provides four central challenges to neoclassical economic assumptions that are a common thread in many feminist economic critiques:

1. That interpersonal utility comparisons are impossible
2. That tastes are exogenous and unchanging
3. That actors are selfish
4. That household heads act altruistically

These critiques, however, are not exhaustive as there is a wide diversity of critiques made and viewpoints held by feminist economists.

Economics as a normative science

Many feminists call attention to value judgments in economic analysis. For example, Julie Nelson suggests that "the issues that economists choose to study, the kinds of questions they ask, and the type of analysis undertaken all are a product of a belief system which is influenced by numerous factors, some of them ideological in character." This idea is contrary to the typical conception of economics as a positive science held by many practicioners. For example, Diana Strassmann comments, "All economic statistics are based on an underlying story forming the basis of the definition. In this way, narrative constructions necessarily underlie all definitions of variables and statistics. Therefore, economic research cannot escape being inherently qualitative, regardless of how it is labeled." As a result, feminist economists call for a discipline wide recognition of the value-laden decisions in the discipline.

Critiques of free trade

A central principle of mainstream economics is "trade can make everyone better off" through efficiency gains from specialization and enhanced global efficiency . Many feminist economists may, however, wish to modify this claim. For example, they may highlight that in Africa, specialization in the cultivation of a single cash crop for export in many countries made these countries extremely vulnerable to price fluctuations, weather patterns, and pests. Feminist economists may also consider the specific gendered effects of trade-deicisons. For example, "in countries such as Kenya, men generally controlled the earnings from cash crops while women were still expected to provide food and clothing for the household, their traditional role in the African family, along with labor to produce cash crops. Thus women suffered significantly from the transition away from subsistence food production towards specialization and trade."

Inclusion of non-market activity

Feminist economics call attention to the importance of non-market activities, such as childcare and domestic work, to the development of the economy. This is a central departure from neoclassical analysis where these forms of labor are unaccounted for in economic models. Including such work in economic accounts is deeply gendered in that women disproportionately perform these tasks. Consequently, when they are unaccounted for in economic models, much work done by women goes uncounted, literally devaluing their work in economic models.

A Colombian domestic worker

Power relations in economic models

Feminist economics often assert that power relations exist within the economy, and therefore, must be assessed in economic models in ways that they previously have been overlooked.For example, in "neoclassical texts, the sale of labor is viewed as a mutually beneficial exchange that benefits both parties. No mention is made of the power inequities in the exchange which tend to give the employer power over the employee." These power relations often favor men and there " never any mention made of the particular difficulties that confront women in the workplace." Consequently, feminist economists claim, "Understanding power and patriarchy helps us to analyze how male-dominated economic institutions actually function and why women are often at a disadvantage in the workplace."

Gender and race

Feminist economics argue that gender and race must be considered in economic analysis. Amartya Sen concisely argues that "the systematically inferior position of women inside and outside the household in many societies points to the necessity of treating gender as a force of its own in development analysis." He goes on to highlight that the experiences of men and women, even within the same household, is often drastically different such that examining economics without gender may be misleading.

In terms of other considerations, some feminist economists argue that by explicitly considering gender, race, class, and caste, economic models may be improved. Julie Matthaie describe the importance of gender and racial-ethnic factors to the field of economics in the following passage: "Not only did gender and racial-ethnic differences and inequality precede capitalism, they have been built into it in key ways. In other words, every aspect of our capitalist economy is gendered and racialized; a theory and practice that ignores this is inherently flawed." Feminist economist Eiman Zein-Elabdin takes a different route, highlighting that racial differences should be examined along with gender differences because they have both been historically excluded from economic modeling and therefore fall equally within the theoretical conception of "feminist difference." In light of these issues, in July 2002 the journal Feminist Economics dedicated an issue to issues of "gender, color, caste and class."

Reformation of economic actors

The neoclassical economic model of an actor is known as Homo economicus describes a person who "interacts in society without being influenced by society," because "his mode of interaction is through an ideal market" in which price is the only necessary consideration. In this view, people are painted as rational actors who engage in marginal analysis in order to make many, or all, decisions. Yet, feminist economists argue that humans are more complex than these models suggest, instead calling for "a more holistic vision of an economic actor, which includes group interactions and actions motivated by factors other than greed." Feminist economics claim that such a reformation of the economic actor will provide a better description of the lived experience of both men and women in the market, arguing that mainstream economics overemphasizes the role of individualism, competition and selfishness for all actors. Instead, feminist economists like Nancy Folbre state that cooperation also plays a role in the economy.

The work of George Akerlof and Janet Yellen on efficiency wages as based on fairness provides an example of a feminist economic model of a economic actor. In their work, agents are not hyperrational, isolated monads, but are instead concerted with fairness, capable of experiencing jealousy, and interested in personal connections. They base this work on empirical work by sociologists and psychologists. In sum, they suggest that wages may be influenced by fairness considerations, rather than purely market forces, highlighting that economic actors are not solely engaged in traditional economics decision making processes.

In addition, feminist economists highlight that agency is not available to all people, drawing attention to the problems of those who lack agency, such as children, the sick, and the frail elderly, and the way in which responsibilities for their care can serve to compromise the agency of their caregivers. These modifications are a critical departure from the homo economicus model.

Moreover, feminist economists critique the central focus in neoclassical economics on monetary rewards. Nancy Folbre notes, "legal rules and cultural norms can affect market outcomes in ways distinctly disadvantageous to women." More specifically, this analysis includes considerations of gendered occupational segregation. Feminist research in these areas directly contradicts the neoclassical description of labor markets in which occupations are chosen freely by individuals acting alone. Thus economic relationships and actions are directly affected by gender roles, and a gendered perspective illuminates this aspect of the economy that would otherwise be ignored. Feminist economics includes the study of norms because of their importance to economic issues.... thus the view that material incentives will provide the goods we want and need (consumer sovereignty) does not capture the realities of economic life for many people."

Institutional economics focuses on understanding the role of the evolutionary process and the role of institutions in shaping economic behavior. For feminist economists, it "emphasizes the complexity of human motives and the importance of culture and relations of power."

Interdisciplinary economic methodology

Often economics is conceptualized as "the study of how society manages its scarce resources" and is methodologically limited to mathematical inquiry. These guidelines, traditional economists often argue, are used to assure objectivity and separate economics from "softer" fields including sociology and political science. Feminist economists, however, argue that this conception of economics is a holdover from the early years of the development of modern science and Cartesian philosophy and limits economic analysis.

Economic pedagogy

Feminist economists suggest that both the content and teaching style of economics courses would benefit from notable changes. Some advocate for the inclusion of experimental learning, laboratory sessions, individual research and more chances to "do economics." Others call for a modified relationship between the professor and the students, predicated on increased dialogue. Many feminist economics are urgently interested in this topic because of the way it may shape the demographic compostion of future economists, pointing to arguments that the "classroom climate"- may affect certain students perceptions of ability in certain areas.

Major areas of inquiry

Economic epistemology

Critical to feminist economic critiques is the assertion that "economics, like any science, is socially constructed" and makes an important distinction that masculine bias in economics is primarily a result of gender, not sex. In other words, when feminist economists highlight the biases of mainstream economics, they focus on social beliefs about masculinity that are closely associated with economics including, but not limited to objectivity, separation, logical consistency, individual accomplishment, mathematics, abstraction, and lack of emotion, not on the maleness of the actual practitioners..

Feminist economists call attention to the ways that mainstream economics privilege male-identified, western, and heterosexual interpretations of economic life. More broadly, they incorporate feminist frameworks and feminist theory to show how communities of knowledge inherently signal their expectations regarding appropriate participants in their communities, to the exclusion of non-in-group members. Such criticisms extend to the theories, methodologies and central ares of research of economics.

Economic history

Feminist economics highlight that mainstream economics has been disproportionately constructed by European-descended, heterosexual, middle and upper-middle class men and that this has led to a conception of economics that overlooks the lived experiences of the diversity of the world's people, especially women, children and those in non-traditional family units.

Additionally, feminist economists, claim that the historical bases of economics are inherently exclusionary to women. More specifically, Michele Pujol, points to five historical assumptions about woman that arose in this historical arena, became embedded in the formulation of economics and continue to be used to maintain that women are different from the masculinized norm and exclude them from the market. These include the ideas that:

1. All women are married, or if not yet, they will be and all women will have children.
2. All women are economically dependent on a male relative.
3. All women are (and should be) housewives due to their reproductive capacities.
4. Women are unproductive in the industrial workforce.
5. Women are irrational, unfit economic agents, and cannot be trusted to make the right economic decisions.

Well-being

Many feminist economists argue for a reconception of economics focused less on economic mechanisms and more on the well-being of all people. Many feminist economists argue that economic success cannot only be measured in terms of goods or gross domestic product, but must also be measured by human well-being. Further, feminist economics claim that aggregate income is not sufficient to evaluate economic well-being, but that instead individual entitlements and needs must be taken into account.

For example, Amartya Sen, Sakiko Fukuda-Parr, and other feminist economists contributed to the development of alternatives to GDP, such as the Human Development Index. Other models of value to feminist economists include the labor theory of value, which was most thoroughly developed in Capital by Karl Marx. This model highlights production as a socially contructed human project and redefines wages as a means to earning a living. This refocuses the motivating factors in economic models on human innate desires and needs as opposed to monetary incentives.

Human capabilities approach

Feminist economists Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum created the human capabilities approach, an alternative means to assess economic success rooted in the ideas of welfare economics. Unlike traditional economic measures of success, focused on GDP, utility, income, assets or other monetary measures, the capabilities approach focuses on what individuals are able to do. This approach emphasizes both processes as well as outcomes and draws attentional to cultural, social and material dynamics of well-being. Martha Nussbaum, expanded on the model and, in recent years, the capabilities approach has influenced the creation of new models including the UN's Human Development Index (HDI).

Household bargaining

Central to feminist economic approaches is a retheorizing of "the family" and "the household." In classical economics these units are typically described as amicable and homogeneous. Most notably, Gary Becker and new home economists introduced the study of "the family" to traditional economics. As a result, mainstream economists usually assume the family is a single, altruistic unit and that the inputs (i.e. money) are distributed equally. This model, according to feminist economists however, "endorsed traditional expectations about the sexes" and applies individualistic rational-choice models to explain home behavior. . Feminist economists modify these assumptions to account for exploitative sexual and gender relations, single-parent families, same-sex relationships, familial relations with children and the consequences of reproduction. Specifically, feminist economists move beyond unitary household models and game theory to call attention to the diversity of household experiences.

For exmaple, Bina Agarwal and other feminist economists have critiqued the mainstream model and contributed to a better understanding of intrahousehold bargaining power. Agarwal argues that a lack of power and outside options for women hinders womens' abilities to negotiate within the family unit. Amartya Sen highlights how social norms that devalue women's unpaid work in the household often disadvantages women in intra-household bargaining. Crucially, these feminist economists argue that these claims have important economic outcomes that must be recognized within the economic framework.

Care economy

Feminist economists acknowledge care work, a sub-category of work that includes all tasks that directly involve care processes done in service of others, as central to economic development and human well-being. Feminist economists examine both paid and unpaid care work. Feminist economists argue that traditional analysis of economic systems often fails to take into account the value of the unpaid work being performed by men and women in a domestic setting. Feminist economists have argued that unpaid domestic work is just as valuable as paid work and that measures of economic success should take unpaid work into account when evaluating economic systems. In addition, feminist economists have also drawn attention to issues of power and inequality within families and households. The work of the Equality Studies Department at University College Dublin, and, in particular of Urningin Sara Cantillon has focused on the internal inequalities of domestic economic arrangements which occur even within affluent households.

Additionally, while much care work is performed in the home, care work may also take the form of paid work. As such, feminist economics examine the implications of paid care work, from the increasing involvement of women in the paid sphere, the potentials for exploitation in this arena, to the personal affects on the lives of care workers.

Systemic study of the ways women's work is measured or not measured at all, undertaken by Marilyn Waring (see If Women Counted) and others in the 1980s and 1990s, began to justify different means of determining value - some of which were influential in the theory of social capital and individual capital, which emerged in the late 1990s and, along with ecological economics, influenced modern human development theory. See also the entry on Gender and Social Capital.

Unpaid work

Datei:Kenyan Fish Vendor.jpg

A Kenyan woman sells fish outside. Women in the informal labor market make up a major part of the global economy. Feminist economists seek to include the ramifications of this work in their data, analysis, and policy recommendations. Photo by Martha Chen.

Unpaid work can be separated into multiple categories: domestic work, care work, subsistence work, unpaid market labor and voluntary work. There is no clear consensus on the definitions of these categories; however, broadly, these types of work can be considered as contributing to the reproduction of society.

Domestic work an activity done in the maintenance of the home, and which is usually universally recognizable, such as doing the laundry. Care work is work done by someone who is looking "after a relative or friend who needs support because of age, physical or learning disability, or illness, including mental illness"; this work also includes the raising of children. Another aspect of the definition of care work "calls attention to activities that involve close personal or emotional interaction". Also included in this category is "self-care", in which leisure time and activities may be considered. Subsistence work is work done in order to meet base needs, such as collecting water, which do not have any market values assigned to them; although some of these activities “are categorized as productive activities according to the latest revision of the international System of National Accounts (SNA)…but are poorly measured by most surveys” . Unpaid market work is understood as "the direct contributions of unpaid family members to market work that officially belongs to another member of the household". Voluntary work is usually understood as work done outside of the home, but for little to no remuneration.

Common methods of measurement

Each country measures it's own economic output. The most widespread method is the System of National Accounts (SNA), sponsored mainly by the United Nations (UN), but implemented by various other organizations, such as the European Commission, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and the World Bank. The SNA recognizes that unpaid work is an area of interest, however, "unpaid household services are excluded from [it’s] production boundary". Feminist economists have criticized this system for this exclusion, as it is argued that by leaving out unpaid work, basic and necessary labor is uncounted.

Even accounting measures intended to recognize gender disparities are criticized for ignoring this type of work. Two such examples are the Gender-related Development Index (GDI) and the Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM). It is argued that neither index indicates much about unpaid work . Despite these efforts to better measure gender inequalities, there is a call for a more comprehensive index, which includes participation in unpaid work.

In more recent years, there has been increasing attention to this issue, such as the recognition of the issue within the SNA reports, and a "UN commitment to 'measuring and valuing unpaid work' with specific attention to women's family care giving – reproduction and household activities. This aim was reaffirmed at the 1995 UN Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing".

Proposed methods of measurement

The method most widely used is gathering information on time use, which has "been implemented by at least 20 developing countries and more are underway". Information is collected on how much time men and women spend on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis on certain activities that fall under the categories of unpaid work. Techniques to gather this data include surveys, in-depth interviews , diaries , and participant observation. Proponents of time use diaries believe that this method "generate[s] more detailed information and tend[s] to capture greater variation than predetermined questions". However, others argue that participant observation, "where the researcher spends lengthy periods of time in households helping out and observing the labor process", generates more accurate information, as the researcher can ascertain whether or not those studied are accurately reporting what activities they perform.

Criticisms of measurement methods

Accurate information

The first problem regarding the measurement of unpaid work is the issue of collecting accurate information. This is always a concern in research studies; however, because of the magnitude of this problem in this topic, it is of special concern. "Time-use surveys may reveal relatively little time devoted to unpaid direct care activities [because] the demands of subsistence production in those countries are great", and may not take into account multitasking – for example, a mother may collect wood fuel while a child is in the same location, so the child is in her care (an indirect form of care work). It is usually argued that indirect care should be included, and it is in may time use studies, however, it may not be and as a result studies may undercount the amount of certain types of unpaid work. Surveys have also been criticized for lacking "depth and complexity" as questions cannot be specifically tailored. Participant observation has been criticized for being "so time- consuming that it can only focus on small numbers of households", and so limited information is gathered.

A problem all types of data gathering run into is that the people who participate in these studies may not report accurately, for whatever reasons, perhaps the "people doing domestic labor have [had] no reason to pay close attention to the amount of time tasks take and they [may] often underestimate time spent in familiar activities". Using time as a measure has also been criticized as it may show "the slowest and most inefficient workers…as carrying the greatest workload". In addition, time use in assessing childcare is criticized as "easily obscur[ing] gender differences in workload. Men and women may both put in the same amount of time being responsible for children but as participant observation studies have shown, many men are more likely to 'babysit' their children while doing something for themselves, such as watching TV. Their standards of care may be limited to ensuring the children are not hurt; dirty diapers may be ignored or deliberately left until the mother returns" . Another paradoxical aspect of this problem is that those most burdened may not be able to participate in the studies – "it is usually those women with the heaviest work loads who choose not to participate in these studies". In general, a criticism to be made is the use of time as a general measure and by its use “some of the most demanding aspects of unpaid work [are unexplored] and the premise that time is an appropriate tool for measuring women's unpaid work goes unchallenged” .

Comparability

A second problem noted concerning this topic is the unease of comparability across societies. "Comparisons across countries are currently hampered by differences in activity classification and nomenclature". In-depth surveys may be the only way to get the depth of information desired, but make it difficult to make cross-cultural comparisons . A more specific aspect of this problem is the lack of adequate universal terminology in discussing unpaid work. "Despite increasing recognition that domestic labor is work, existing vocabularies do not easily convey the new appreciations. People still tend to talk about work and home as if they were separate spheres. 'Working mothers' are usually assumed to be in the paid labor force, despite feminist assertions that "every mother is a working mother." There are no readily accepted terms to express different work activities or job titles. Housewife, home manager, homemaker are all problematic and none of them conveys the sense of a women who juggles both domestic labor and paid employment".

Complexity

A third problem is the complexity of domestic labor and the issues of separating unpaid work categories. Time use studies are now taking into account multitasking issues, where activities are separated into primary and secondary activities, however, not all studies do this and even those that do may not take into account “the fact that frequently several tasks are done simultaneously, that tasks overlap, and that the boundaries between work and relationships are often unclear. How does a woman determine her primary activity when she is preparing dinner while putting the laundry away, making coffee for her spouse, having coffee and chatting with him, and attending to the children”. Some activities may not even be considered work, such as playing with a child (this has been categorized as developmental care work), by the caregiver, and so may not be included in the responses to a study . As mentioned before, supervision (indirect care work) may not be "construe[d] as an activity at all", which “suggests that activity-based surveys should be supplemented by more stylized questions regarding care responsibilities” as these activities may be undercounted . In the past, time use studies tended to measure only primary activities, and "respondents doing two or more things at once were asked to indicate which was the more important", although this is changing in more recent years.

Valuation

Feminist economists argue for three main ways of valuating unpaid work: opportunity cost method, replacement cost method, and input-output cost method. Opportunity cost method "uses the wage a person would earn in the market" to see how much value their labor-time has. This method extrapolates from the opportunity cost theory in mainstream economics.

The second method of valuation uses replacement costs. In simple terms, this is done by measuring the amount of money a third-party would make for doing the same work if it was part of the market. In other words, the value of a person cleaning the house in an hour is the same as the hourly wage for a maid. Within this method there are two approaches: the first is a generalist replacement cost method, which examines if "it would be possible, for example, to take the wage of a general domestic worker who could perform a variety of tasks including childcare". The second approach is the specialist replacement cost method, which aims to "distinguish between the different household tasks and choose replacements accordingly".

The third method is input-output cost method. This looks at both the costs of inputs and includes any value added by the household. "For instance, the value of time devoted to cooking a meal can be determined by asking what it could cost to purchase a similar meal (or output) in the market, then subtracting the cost of the capital goods, utilities and raw materials devoted to that meal. This remainder represents the value of the other factors of production, primarily labor". These types of models try to value household output by determining monetary values for the inputs (in the dinner example: for the ingredients and production of the meal) and compare these with formal market equivalents.

Criticisms of valuation methods

Monetary levels

One criticism is how monetary levels are chosen. A question which need to be addressed is how unpaid work should be valued when more than one activity is being performed or more than one output produced? Another issue is differences in quality between market products and household products. Some feminist economists take issue with using the market system to determine values. Reasons for this objection include: it may lead to the conclusion that “the market provides perfect substitutes for non-market work” ; the wage produced in the market for services may not accurately reflect "the actual opportunity cost of time spent in household production"; and the wages used in valuation methods come from industries where wages are already depressed because of gender inequalities, and so will not accurately value unpaid work. A related argument is that the market “accepts existing sex/gender divisions of labor and pay inequalities as normal and unproblematic. With this basic assumption underlying their calculations, the valuations produced serve to reinforce sex/gender inequalities rather than challenge women's subordination".

Opportunity cost

Criticisms are also leveled against the separate methods of valuation. Opportunity cost method “depends on the lost earnings of the worker so that a toilet cleaned by a lawyer has much greater value than one cleaned by a janitor” , which means that the value varies too drastically. There are also issues with the uniformity of this method not just across multiple individuals, but also for a single person: it "may not be uniform across the entire day or across days of the week". There is also the issue of whether any enjoyment of the activity should be deducted from the opportunity cost estimate.

Replacement cost

Replacement cost method also has critiques, such as what types of jobs should be used as substitutes. For example, should childcare activities “be calculated using the wages of daycare workers or child psychiatrists?". This also relates to the issue of depressed wages in female-dominated industries, and whether using these jobs as an equivalent leads to the undervaluing of unpaid work. Some have argued that education levels should be comparable, for example, "the value of time that a college-educated parent spends reading aloud to a child should be ascertained by asking how much it would cost to hire a college-educated worker to do the same, not by an average housekeeper's wage".

Input-output methods

Critiques against the input-output methods include: the difficulty of identifying and measuring household outputs and the issues of variation of households and these effects .

The formal economy

Research into the causes and consequences of occupational segregation, the gender pay gap, and "glass ceiling" phenomena have been a significant part of feminist economics. While conventional neoclassical economic theories of the 1960s and 1970s explained these as the result of free choices made by women and men who simply had different abilities or preferences, feminist economists pointed out the important roles played by stereotyping, sexism, patriarchal beliefs and institutions, sexual harassment, and discrimination. The rationale for, and the effect of, anti-discrimination law, adopted in many industrial countries beginning in the 1970s, has also been a topic of research. Women did, in fact, move in large numbers into previous male bastions (especially professions such as medicine and law) during the last decades of the 20th century.

While overt employment discrimination by sex per se remains a concern of feminist economists, in recent years more attention has also been paid to discrimination against caregivers—those women, and some men, who give hands-on care to children or sick or elderly friends or relatives. Because many business and government policies were designed to accommodate the "ideal worker" (that is, the traditional male worker who had no such responsibilities) rather than caregiver-workers, inefficient and inequitable treatment may result.

Globalization

Feminist economists' work on globalization is diverse and multifaceted. Suzanne Bergeron, for example, focuses on the typical theories of globalization as the "rapid integregation of the world into one economic space" through the flow of goods, capital, and money, in order to illustrate their exclusionary bases. She argues that traditional understandings of globalization too strongly articulate the power of global capital flows, the uniformity of globalization experiences across all populations, and technical and abstract economic processes, broadly depicting the political economy of globalization in a too limited manner. She then highlights the alternative conceptualizes of globalization that have been created by feminists. First, she describes how feminists may de-emphasize the idea of the market as "a natural and unstoppable force" instead depicting the process of globalization as alterable and movable by individual economic actors, including women. Moreover, she raises the idea that the concept of globalization itself is gendered, highlighting that in its depiction as "dominant, unified, [and] intentional" it reads in a masculinized arena. She then suggests that feminists may deconstruct this narrative highlighting the ways that the narrative of a "global economy" is highly complex, de-centered and unclear.

More specifically she raises examples of studies that illustrate these multifaceted effects, including Kumudhini Rosa's study of Sri Lankan, Malaysian, and Phillippine, workers in free trade zones as an example of local resistance to globalization. These women use their wages to create women's centers aimed at providing legal and medical services, libraries and cooperative housing, to local community members. Such efforts, Bergeson highlights, allow women the chance to take control of economic conditions, increase their sense of individualism, and alter the pace and direction of globalization itself.

Alternatively, other feminist economists, focus on policies that play a part in the development of globalization. For example, Lourdes Benería, argues that economic development in the Global South depends in large part on improved reproductive rights; gender equitable laws on ownership and inheritance; and policies that are sensitive to the number of women in the informal economy. Additionally, Nalia Kabeer discusses the impacts of a social clause that would enforce global labor standards through international trade agreements, drawing on fieldwork from Bangladesh. Ultimately, she argues, that although these jobs may appear exploitative, for many workers in these areas they present opportunities and ways to avoid more exploitive situations in the informal economy.

Methodology

Interdisciplinary data collection

Many feminist economists challenge the perception that only "objective" (often presumed to be quantitative) data are valid. Instead, feminist economists suggest that economists should enrich their analysis through the use of data sets generated from other disciplines. Additionally, many feminists economics propose utilizing non-traditional data collection strategies.

Ethical judgment

Feminist economists claim that "ethical judgements are a valid, inescapable, and in fact desirable part of economic analysis." This is a methodology that looks at systems not from the point of view of neutral observer, but from a specific moral position and viewpoint. Notably, the intention is not to create a more "subjective" methodology, but to counter-weight perceived biases in existing methodologies: By recognizing that all views of the world arise from viewpoints, it sheds light on what feminist economists claim are masculine biases. According to feminist economists, too many theories, while claiming to present universal principles, actually present a masculine viewpoint in the guise of a "view from nowhere."

Alternative measures of success

Human development index

World map by quartiles of Human Development Index in 2011.

Very High (developed country)	Low (developing country)
High (developing country)	Data unavailable
Medium (developing country)

Feminist economists often support use of the human development index as a composite statistic in order to assess countries by overall level of human development, as opposed to other measures. The HDI takes into account a broad array of measures beyond monetary considerations including life expectancy, literacy, education, and standards of living for countries worldwide.

Gender-related Development Index (GDI)

→ Hauptartikel: Gender-related Development Index

The Gender-related Development Index (GDI) was introduced in 1995 in the Human Development Report written by the United Nations Development Program in order to add a gender-sensitive dimension to the Human Development Index (HDI). The GDI takes in to account not only the average or general level of well-being and wealth within a given country, but focuses also on how this wealth and well-being is distributed between different groups within society, especially those between genders.

Organizations

Feminist economics is gradually becoming a widely recognized and reputed area of inquiry as evidenced by the numerous organizations either dedicated to feminist economics or widely influenced by its principles.

International Association for Feminist Economics

Formed in 1992, the International Association for Feminist Economics (IAFFE), is independent of the American Economic Association (AEA) and seeks to challenge the masculine biases in neoclassical economics. While the majority of members are economists, it is open "not only to female and male economists but to academics from other fields, as well as activists who are not academics" and currently has over 600 members in 64 countries. . Although its founding members were mostly based in the US, a majority of IAFFE's current members are based outside of the US.In 1997, IAFFE gained Non-Governmental Organization status in the United Nations.

Feminist Economics journal

In 1997, the journal Feminist Economics was awarded the Council of Editors and Learned Journals (CELJ) Award as Best New Journal. The 2005 ISI Social Science Citation Index ranked the journal Feminist Economics 20th out of 175 among economics journals and 2nd out of 27 among Women's Studies journals.

Relation to other disciplines

Green economics incorporates ideas from feminist economics and GreensVorlage:Who list feminism as an explicit goal of their political measures, often seeking higher valuations for such work. Feminist economics is also often linked with welfare economics or labour economics, since it emphasizes child welfare, and the value of labour in itself, as opposed to production for a marketplace, the focus of classical economy.

Graduate programs offering study in feminist economics

A small, but growing number of graduate programs around the world offer courses and concentrations in feminist economics. (Unless otherwise noted below, these offerings are in departments of economics.)

• American University
• School of Public Policy and Administration at Carleton University
• Colorado State University
• Institute of Social Studies
• Gender Institute of the London School of Economics
• Makerere University
• University of Massachusetts-Amherst
• The Masters in Applied Economics and Public Policy programs at the University of Massachusetts-Boston
• University of Nebraska-Lincoln
• The New School for Social Research
• University of Reading
• Roosevelt University
• Department of Women's and Gender Studies at Rutgers University
• Discipline of Political Economy at the University of Sydney
• University of Utah
• Wright State University
• York University (Toronto)

See also

• Notable feminist economists
• Gender equality, or gender equity
• Gender mainstreaming
• Intra-household bargaining
• Material feminism
• Time use
• Category:Feminism and society

Literature

• Agarwal, Bina. A Field of One's Own: Gender and Land Rights in South Asia. Cambridge University Press, 1994.
• Barker, Drucilla K. and Susan F. Feiner. Liberating Economics: Feminist Perspectives on Families, Work, and Globalization. University of Michigan Press, 2004.
• Barker, Drucilla and Edith Kuiper. Toward a feminist philosophy of economics. Routledge, 2003.
• Lourdes Benería. Gender, Development, and Globalization: Economics as if All People Mattered. New York: Routledge, 2003.
• Ferber, Marianne A. and Julie Nelson (eds.).Beyond economic man: feminist theory and economics. The University of Chicago Press, 1993.
• Ferber, Marianne A. and Julie A. Nelson (eds.). Feminist Economics Today: Beyond Economic Man. The University of Chicago Press, 2003.
• Jacobsen, Joyce. The Economics of Gender. Wiley-Blackwell, 2007.
• Nelson, Julie. Feminism, Objectivity and Economics. Routledge, 1996.
• Peterson, Janice and Margaret Lewis (eds.) The Elgar Companion to Feminist Economics.Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd., 1999.
• Power, Marilyn. "Social Provisioning as a Starting Point for Feminist Economics" Feminist Economics. Volume 10, Number 3. Routledge, November 2004
• Sen, Amartya. Development as Freedom. Anchor Books, 1999.
• Waring, Marilyn. 1989. If Women Counted: A New Feminist Economics. London: Macmillan. ISBN 0-333-49262-5

Further reading

• Carrasco, Cristina, and Màrius Domínguez. "Family Strategies for Meeting Care and Domestic Work Needs: Evidence from Spain." Feminist Economics 17.4 (2011): 159-188.
• Jenkins, Katy. "We have a lot of goodwill, but we still need to eat…: Valuing Women's Long Term Voluntarism in Community Development in Lima." Voluntas 20 (2009): 15-34.
• Schüler, Dana. "The Uses and Misuses of the Gender-related Development Index and Gender Empowerment Measure: A Review of the Literature." Journal of Human Development 7.2 (2006): 161-181.
• Warren, Tracey, Gillian Pascall, and Elizabeth Fox. "Gender Equality in Time: Low-Paid Mothers' Paid and Unpaid Work in the UK." Feminist Economics 16.3 (2010): 193-219.

External links

• International Association for Feminist Economics (IAFFE)
• Feminist Economics (peer-reviewed journal)