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The future role of women
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The Future Role of Women
THE FUTURE ROLE OF WOMEN Ingrid Fredriksson Although i't is the declared Swedish view that the role ofwomen in society should be the same as that of men, the degree of sexual equality in Sweden is still not very different from that of other countries in Western Europe. However, in recent years this view has become accepted as a part of the ideology underlying planning which has far reaching implications for the planning of services, town planning, labour market policy, education policy, and family tax and social insurance systems.
THE Swedish view of the future role of women adhered to not only by the Government but also by all other political parties in Parliament, the Swedish Employers' Confederation and the employees' associations-is that it should be the same as the future role of men. This does not mean that women should have the same role as men have now. On the contrary, it is the role of men that has to be changed so that complete equality can be achieved between the sexes. If women are to be as active as men in public life and if they are to have the same position and the same pay in the labour market, men will have to take the same responsibility in family life as women. They will have to do the same amount of house-work, take care of the children, and accept that being a' parent sometimes reduces activities in other spheres." The status of women in Sweden
It is only in the 1960's that this view has been fully accepted and made part of the ideology underlying planning. But to-day, the degree of equality between men and women in Sweden still is not very different from that of other countries in 'Western Europe. Women have less power than men: only two out ofeighteen members of the Swedish Government are women. In 1968, only 51 out of 38,1 members of Parliament were women. In high managerial positions and on the boards of the labour unions and other influential organisations women are greatly under-represented, and in civil government service there are hardly 50 women in the 3000 best paid jobs. According to the census of 1965, 84% of the men of working age and only 42 % of the women were gainfully employed at least half a normal working day. Mrs Fredriksson is with the Ministry of Education, Stockholm, Sweden.
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Married women work less, although there has been an increase in the full-time employment of married women of all age groups: 26% were working at the time of the census in 1960,37% in 1965 (farmer's wives helping their husbands are not included). In Sweden, as in other countries, there is a tendency to divide occupations by sex to an extent that suggests that in many sectors there are virtually two separate labour markets, one marked 'female' and the other 'male'. The majority ofwomen work in a relatively small number ofoccupations in which members of their sex predominate. The most important female occupations are clerical work, shop assistant, cleaning woman, and nurse's assistant. The majority of blue-collar women workers in industry are classified as unskilled labour. 'Women have much lower wages than men. In 1966, 80% of all fully employed men in the 24-64 age-group were earning more than SKr 20,000, while 70% of all fully employed women were earning less than that amount. Even where the principle of men and women receiving the same pay if they have the same jobs has been agreed upon, women earn less than men because they seldom have the same jobs and the jobs they have are less well paid.! Employer attitudes to female employees
In recent years, there has been some indication of a growing demand for female employees in occupations traditionally limited to men. Confronted with the prospect of labour shortage, companies in an increasing number of industries-often prodded by the labour market authorities-have undertaken a systematic review of the potential of female workers in hitherto 'male' job categories. 'Women have, for instance, been recruited for jobs which include lathe operating, drilling, machining, welding, metal-pressing and casting, and foundry work, and they work as truck drivers, crane operators, sprayers, works carpenters, painters, inspectors, assembly workers, and stockroom and warehouse workers. Surveys indicate that firms are planning to take on more female workers. 2 In 1958-59, an exploratory study was undertaken to discover whether firms consciously pursue discriminatory recruitment and personnel policies with respect to male and female employees, and to clarify the predominant motives prompting such policies." About seventy managerial staff from medium and large firms were interviewed. The most common explanation for having 'female' jobs was that female labour was relatively cheaper and better suited to the job. The most often heard case against the employment of women in 'male' positions in production work was that all available manpower in the area should first be employed, that it was not possible to transfer a few women into all-male departments, and that the factory lacked the necessary changing facilities for women. Women were also considered to have higher frequency of absence and greater horizontal job mobility-between different work places and between home and gainful employment. It was generally assumed that physical and mental differences between men and women were great. It soon emerged that views on the subject were strongly influenced by the interviewees' preconceptions about the social roles of men and women. Many of them felt that the traditional role division between men and women should not FUTURES
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The Future Role of Women
be questioned-the right plaee for women was in the home, while the man's function was to be the family breadwinner. Marry statements were more an expression of general attitudes to sex roles than rationally considered views on manpower problems. Many statements on physical and mental differences between the sexes must be considered as prejudices. Sometimes there exist mean differences between men and women, most ofwhich can be explained by cultural influence, but available statistical findings demonstrate that in most respects differences between different individuals of the same sex are greater than those between the means of the two sexes. The results of this study on the changing role ofmen and women were published in Sweden in 1962. It made the point that "there are some women who are physically stronger and more interested in technical matters than the average man, while there are some men who exhibit greater manual dexterity and interest in languages than the average woman". In other words generalisations cannot be made about the behaviour of individual men or women. In spite of this many employers have stereotyped views. They .often exclude one sex before using more refined methods for trying to find the most suitable person for a certain job. This may be seen from the sex division in advertisements on vacant situations." The views of managerial staff presented in this study, were much analysed, criticised and ridiculed in the Swedish press. No one who has studied the problem and no official representative of the Employers' Confederation will take their attitude today but, in practice, traditions in the labour market still remain. New studies are being made and the results are being reported in the mass media that show a strong interest in these problems. For instance, scientific investigations have shown that the rather small mean differences between the sexes as regards absence and job mobility tend to disappear completely if men and women of the same age and having the same position in the job hierarchy are being compared. A recent study has demonstrated that when women were given skilled 'male' jobs they showed the same interest and involvement in their work as a corresponding male group. 4
Sex roles However, sweeping generalisations by the employers are not the only cause of the lack ofequality between men and women in the labour market. Educational statistics show that, although women and men have the same educational rights, with the exception of military training, and that although vocational guiders are supposed to tell people that they should choose the occupations they want regardless ofsex, there is a clear division between the sexes in the different lines of study or vocational training. After the compulsory nine-year comprehensive schooling, 85% of the rfi-year old pupils continue their education, 30% go to secondary school, 20% to continuation school and 35% to vocational school. Half of the pupils in these different schools are girls but they do not take the same subjects as boys. There are more girls than boys taking liberal arts (humanities) in the secondary school and choosing the social sector in the continuation school, and whereas 25% of the boys in the secondary school and FUTURES
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about half of the boys in the continuation school had chosen technical arts in the autumn of I968, less than I % of the girls preferred that sector. In the vocational schools, girls take shorter courses than boys and the majority of girls choose the kind of vocational training that will lead to traditionally female occupations; the majority of boys on the other hand choose the traditionally male training courses. These differences are explained by traditional sex roles-girls and boys arc being brought up in different ways and still have different expectations of their future role as parents which also will affect their occupational choice. The concept of 'sex roles', originally used only by sociologists, was introduced into the rather confused and emotional debate on the emancipation of women in I962, when Swedish and Norwegian sociologists, psychologists and other social scientists published a book containing data on the roles of men and women, the socialisation process, parental roles, sex and social structure, and the position of men and women in the labour market. (Part of the book has been published in a revised English edition under the title The Changing Roles of Men and Wome!2. 5) Edmund Dahlstrom, a Swedish professor ofsociology, made an analysis of the debate and suggested that what previously had been referred to as 'the woman question' from now on should be called 'the sex role question', thereby indicating that the role of women could not be viewed separately from that of men. This dispassionate and scientific analysis of the whole problem made people look at it in a less emotional, more constructive way. The term 'sex role' was picked up by journalists popularising the contents of the book and was used in a series of more or less scientific books that were published later in the sixties. It was also used in party programmes, and when it was decided to have more information about this question in the schools, 'the sex role question' was introduced into the curriculum. 'Sex role' is usually defined as the social norms and expectations that in a certain culture are directed towards an individual on account of sex: By the concept of 'role' one is referring to expectations which have a social, not a biological basis. Thus the fact that men do not bear babies is not a part of the sex role but a biological fact. From a sociological point of view, one may draw draw certain parallels between 'sex roles' and 'race roles'. In societies where there is race discrimination, social attitudes are contingent on a biological criterion, eg, colour of the skin. In the case of sex roles too, rights, obligations, jobs, etc arc distributed according to a biological criterion instead of being distributed according to individual aptitude and ability, need or some other more rational and democratic criterion. In the same way as race roles, sex roles have been firmly established in the minds of many people and often are looked upon as 'natural'. Because of the norms of society people of different race or sex arc encouraged to behave according to expectations; and when they do behave in this way prejudiced people arc given an apparent proof of the truth of their prejudices; this will then be used to justify continued discrimination. In our culture, for instance, women as a group have less ambitions in the vocational field and more often arc interested in nursing than men, but this is not, as prejudiced people would argue, because of something innate in the female character but because, in our society, this behaviour is being expected FUTURES · December 1969
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of women. It must not be used as an argument for making them do more house-work or for not admitting them to certain occupations. One may argue that it is difficult to demonstrate scientifically which sex differences are biological and which can be explained by the concept of sex roles without experiments that submit boys and girls to exactly the same kind of influence. However, it would seem that children who have been encouraged to behave according to a sex role that docs not correspond to their biological sex (because their sexual organs were malformed at birth so that their parents minsinterpreted their sex) do behave according to the sex role they were brought up to. This indicates that, whatever the biological differences, the socialisation process is decisive. G Anthropological studies show that 'male' and 'female' characteristics and behaviour are different in different cultures. Views on what are to be regarded as male and female jobs also vary with different industrialised countries and with different periods in the same country. Sex norms also vary within a country according to different generations, groups and families. Indeed, the minority of Swedish men who have shared the baby-tending equally with their wives serve as a proof of the fact that this in no way goes against the male nature but is a matter of social attitudes. The fact that the roles of men and women are based on cultural traditions is challenging -it means that a society may change them completely if there are good reasons for changing them. It is quite clear that women have much to gain if they are socialised into the same role as men; they will, for instance, get a stronger position in the labour market and in political life. But men will also have something to gain. The traditional role of man which demands toughness, aggressiveness and a lack of sensitivity and makes him the sole breadwinner, on whom the social position of the family depends, is a hard and difficult one. This may be seen from the fact that Swedish men have a higher record of criminality, die earlier, more frequently fall ill from stress and have a higher suicide rate than women. A softer education for boys as well as the consciousness that women in the future will share the economic responsibility in the family, may make life easier for them in some respects. They would also benefit from closer contacts with their children. Father and child
Children of both sexes have much to gain from a closer contact with their fathers from the very beginning of their lives. In an essay on "Parental role division and the child's personality development'" the Norwegian psychologist Per Olav Tiller points out that given the circumstances of our modern family type, "it seems likely that boys will have an insufficient foundation for masculine identification". This may lead to a type of adjustment mechanism which he calls "compensatorymasculinity", manifested in a "super-masculine" behaviour which may easily "slide over into delinquent activities". The Swedish sociologist Rita Liljestrom also analyses the importance of'fathers having intimate contacts with their children in her book on sex roles," published by Swedish Radio for a series of programmes on this problem in 1968 and 1969. Part of her analysis is based on John Nash's "The father in contemporary culture and current FUTURES
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psychological literature". 8 Liljestrom stresses the fact that children need contacts with men but it need not necessarily be with their biological fathers. In the Swedish debate, empirical data and analysis on the role of fathers have been used to support the argument for recruiting men as staff in nurseries and in the first grades at school. In future there will still be one-parent families with a sole mother or two-parent families where the father neglects his children. Being taken care of by a male nurse while the mother is working, may make up for the child's lack offather. Earlier, the Swedish debate focused on the effects on children if their mothers went to work. Now this way of posing the problem is seen as prejudiced, as it presupposes that mothers should be more responsible for the well-being of their children than fathers. One should rather ask for the effects on children if both parents are working, that is, if neither the father nor the mother is staying at home all or part ofthe day, taking turns in caring for the children. The results of the scientific investigations which have been made so far, indicate that small children do need a warm, intimate and regular contact with people whom they recognise and love, but that the quality of the contact is more important than the quantity. Both parents of small children might well work, therefore, if the children are being well looked after when they are away and if they have a good contact with them in their leisure time. 9 Planning of services
Planning in different fields may do much to retard or hasten the development towards equality between men and women. This was stressed by the Swedish Government in its report to the United Nations on The Status of Women in Sweden in 1968: To promote greater equality, one must always determine which political instruments will directly or indirectly encourage a more equal division of labour between the sexes, for every act on the part of the community affects the status of men and women -in a favourable or unfavourable direction. The question of the roles of the sexes must therefore be regarded as one of the chief problems in the continual work of reforming educational, employment, social, family and taxation policies. The report describes reforms that have been carried through or are being planned. Only a few will be mentioned here. Town planning, the planning of housing areas and of services to the families is very relevant to the question of the future roles of the sexes. If both men and women are to be gainfully employed, towns should be planned to facilitate this. That might mean good collective communications so that one member of the family does not have to aet as private chauffeur to the rest, mixed residential-industrial areas so that not too much time has to be spent in travelling, and all kinds ofcollective services to make life easier for families where no one is at home in the day-time. Collective services may consist of special service-houses, ie, multi-dwelling houses with their own nursery, restaurant, cleaning staff etc. There may also be service centres in the residential areas which have a reception desk where cleaning, child-minding and messenger services can be booked. They would include a post office, dispensing chemists' shop, a shop open in the evenings, FUTURES
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a restaurant and a cafe. Above all, good day nurseries with trained staff and localities suited for children are needed to take care of the children for the part of the day when the parents arc working. 'Recreation centres' or 'afternoon homes' for younger school-children who leave school before their parents have finished their work, are needed too. Unfortunately, the planning of services to the families has lagged hopelessly behind in Sweden, and former mistakes in this field are not easily repaired. For instance, the actual need for places in day nurseries is estimated to be about half a million. This includes both the needs of parents who are now working and have their children cared for in other ways but would prefer to have them in a day nursery, and the needs of parents who now stay at home but, according to surveys, would like to be gainfully employed if their children could be cared for. However, today there are only 24,500 places, and according to the present plans of the municipalities, in 1975 there will still be not more than 72,500 places in the whole country. It has been argued that the state should take the main responsibility for the extension of nurseries as it does for schools, and the Swedish Trade Union Confederation has proposed that the state should pay the salaries of the nursery staff. The law on the planning of housing areas is now being revised. Taxation and social insurance policies Our present taxation of families and our social insurance system have not been based on the present ideology of equality between the sexes but on the concept of husbands as bread-winners and wives as being provided for. Thus, in the words of Alva Myrdal, our present "Minister for Disarmament Questions, "today, men who want to divert female potential to care for their personal wants in marriage receive considerable tax subsidies from the state, whether or not there are children in the family". A Royal Commission has recently proposed reforms that will bring us nearer the goal of individual taxation that uses the same scale for married and unmarried people. In the social insurance system, widows' pensions and the like will have to be abolished and be replaced by children's pensions because, in normal cases, grown up people of working age will be supposed to earn money by themselves. Of course, these reforms will have to be introduced gradually aiming at the young well-educated generation. In the older generation there are too many women who have believed all their lives in the idea that they should be provided for by their husbands and, in case of the death of their husbands, by society. Labour market policy
The town planning, family tax system and social insurance system in Sweden today influence the behaviour of people in a direction that is contrary to the goals of education policy and labour market policy, where girls arc encouraged to get the same vocational training as boys and women are encouraged to work. A Swedish economist and labour market researcher has calculated that the Swedish national income could be increased by at least 50% if the unused labour potential of women were to be fully utilised and if sex discrimination FUTURES
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The Future Role oj lVomen
and other barriers were to be totally abolished. 10 The policy of full employment pursued in Sweden since the economic crises of the 1930S has been a most powerful factor in the enhancement or the status of women in Swedish society. According to the labour market policy programme, the objectives of labour market policy are to be the same for men and women. The prejudicial way of regarding married women as a reserve labour force which by all means should be mobilised in periods of high prosperity but which can be sent home again when the demand for labour begins to fall, is to be combated. Measures designed to safeguard the employment of women are not to be reduced in periods of reduced labour demand. Labour market policy is also committed to the role of a stabilising factor in economic policy. When the demand for labour exceeds supply, labour market policy should create additional stability through measures designed to encourage mobility, eg, by encouraging the migration of labour from surplus to deficiency areas. Families in which the wife cannot find employment should have the same right to get transfer grants, etc, if they want to move to a place where she can get ajob, as families where the husband is unemployed. Retraining and further education courses, varying from a couple ofweeks to a complete training lasting several years, should be given to all people who are unemployed or threatened by unemployment. In this respect, housewives who arc not gainfully employed should be regarded as unemployed. Education policy
Apart from labour market policy, education policy is important to housewives as the possibilities for adult education increase at all levels. As far as the young are concerned the comprehensive school where girls and boys are educated together and have the same curriculum, encourages egalitarian attitudes. The instruction in domestic science, cooking and childcare is obligatory for both girls and boys. In 1968, Parliament decided that girls and boys should have the same amount of instruction in both kinds of handicraft (woodwork-metalwork and needlework) up to, and including, grade 6. (Earlier, pupils could choose, which resulted in most girls taking needlework and most boys taking woodwork-metalwork.) The sex role question will be discussed in schools in a number ofsubjects in the future, and pupils will be encouraged to analyse and question the existing division of labour according to sex. They will also be made aware of the fact that certain kinds of mass media are influencing them in a way that goes contrary to the concept of equality. For example, in weekly magazines, advertising and the cinema, "the young woman is essentially a sexual partner (or marital partner), and great weight is given to beauty, sex appeal, beautiful clothes, charm, sensuality, devotion, passivity, acquiescence and the housewifemother role, at the expense ofthe vocational role. The glamour role undermines the young woman's preparation for a career by elevating the married woman's glamour to a status symboI."ll In popular books on child psychology, the role ofmothers is often more heavily stressed than that offathers, etc: Investigations have shown that even some school-books still suggest that the roles of men and women ought to be different.P In the future, there will be more instruction
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on the sex role question in the vocational training of teachers. It is believed that as general knowledge about these problems increases, there will be a change of attitudes in Swedish society which will forward equality between the sexes and make it possible for men and women to have the same roles in the future. References I.
2.
3
4 5.
6. 7. 8. 9.
10.
11. 12.
Report by the Swedish Government to the United Nations, The Status Of TVomen in Sweden (Stockholm, The Swedish Institute, 1968) A. Baude and P. Holmberg, "The position of men and women in the labour market", in E. Dahlstrom, ed, The Changing Roles of Men and Women (London, Duckworth, 1967) and A. Leijon, Swedish Women-Swedish Men (Stockholm, the Swedish Institute, 1968) S. Thyberg, "Foretagen oeh den kvinnliga arbetskraften" in Ei Dahlstrcm m.fl, Koinnors liv och arbete (Stockholm, SNS, 1962). A shorter and revised version of this chapter, "Employer attitudes to female employees", was published in E. Dahlstrom, cd, The Changing Roles of Men and Women, op cit B. Gardell, K. Baneryd, B. Gombrii and L. Lundquist, Arbetsupplecelse och Ktinsroller (Stockholm, Peronaldministrativa radet, 1968) E. Dahlstrom, The Changing Roles ofMen and Women, opcit P. O. Tiller, "Parental role division and the child's personality development", in E. Dahlstrom, ed, The Changing Roles ofMen and Women, opcit R. Liljestrorn, ]iimstiilldhetens villkor (Stockholm, Sveriges Radio, 1968) ]. Nash, "The father in contemporary culture and current psychological literature", in Child Development, Vol. 36, 1965 pp. 261-297 M. Israel, "Vern skall ta hand om barnen?" in I. Fredriksson, ed, Konsroller (Falkoping, Prisma, 1965) and P. O. Tiller "Parental role division and the child's personality development", op cit P. Holmberg, "Om de ekonomiska och sociala konsekvenserna av nuvarande konsroller", in P. Holmberg m.fl, Kynne eller kon? (Stockholm, Raben and Sjogren, 1966) E. Dahlstrom and R. Liljestrom, "The family and married women at work", in E. Dahlstrom, ed, The Changing Roles ofMen and Women, opcit I. Fredriksson, !lonsriiller i liirobiicker (Stockholm, Arbetsmarknadens kvinnonamnd, 1969)
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The Future Role of Women
THE FUTURE ROLE OF WOMEN Ingrid Fredriksson Although i't is the declared Swedish view that the role ofwomen in society should be the same as that of men, the degree of sexual equality in Sweden is still not very different from that of other countries in Western Europe. However, in recent years this view has become accepted as a part of the ideology underlying planning which has far reaching implications for the planning of services, town planning, labour market policy, education policy, and family tax and social insurance systems.
THE Swedish view of the future role of women adhered to not only by the Government but also by all other political parties in Parliament, the Swedish Employers' Confederation and the employees' associations-is that it should be the same as the future role of men. This does not mean that women should have the same role as men have now. On the contrary, it is the role of men that has to be changed so that complete equality can be achieved between the sexes. If women are to be as active as men in public life and if they are to have the same position and the same pay in the labour market, men will have to take the same responsibility in family life as women. They will have to do the same amount of house-work, take care of the children, and accept that being a' parent sometimes reduces activities in other spheres." The status of women in Sweden
It is only in the 1960's that this view has been fully accepted and made part of the ideology underlying planning. But to-day, the degree of equality between men and women in Sweden still is not very different from that of other countries in 'Western Europe. Women have less power than men: only two out ofeighteen members of the Swedish Government are women. In 1968, only 51 out of 38,1 members of Parliament were women. In high managerial positions and on the boards of the labour unions and other influential organisations women are greatly under-represented, and in civil government service there are hardly 50 women in the 3000 best paid jobs. According to the census of 1965, 84% of the men of working age and only 42 % of the women were gainfully employed at least half a normal working day. Mrs Fredriksson is with the Ministry of Education, Stockholm, Sweden.
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Married women work less, although there has been an increase in the full-time employment of married women of all age groups: 26% were working at the time of the census in 1960,37% in 1965 (farmer's wives helping their husbands are not included). In Sweden, as in other countries, there is a tendency to divide occupations by sex to an extent that suggests that in many sectors there are virtually two separate labour markets, one marked 'female' and the other 'male'. The majority ofwomen work in a relatively small number ofoccupations in which members of their sex predominate. The most important female occupations are clerical work, shop assistant, cleaning woman, and nurse's assistant. The majority of blue-collar women workers in industry are classified as unskilled labour. 'Women have much lower wages than men. In 1966, 80% of all fully employed men in the 24-64 age-group were earning more than SKr 20,000, while 70% of all fully employed women were earning less than that amount. Even where the principle of men and women receiving the same pay if they have the same jobs has been agreed upon, women earn less than men because they seldom have the same jobs and the jobs they have are less well paid.! Employer attitudes to female employees
In recent years, there has been some indication of a growing demand for female employees in occupations traditionally limited to men. Confronted with the prospect of labour shortage, companies in an increasing number of industries-often prodded by the labour market authorities-have undertaken a systematic review of the potential of female workers in hitherto 'male' job categories. 'Women have, for instance, been recruited for jobs which include lathe operating, drilling, machining, welding, metal-pressing and casting, and foundry work, and they work as truck drivers, crane operators, sprayers, works carpenters, painters, inspectors, assembly workers, and stockroom and warehouse workers. Surveys indicate that firms are planning to take on more female workers. 2 In 1958-59, an exploratory study was undertaken to discover whether firms consciously pursue discriminatory recruitment and personnel policies with respect to male and female employees, and to clarify the predominant motives prompting such policies." About seventy managerial staff from medium and large firms were interviewed. The most common explanation for having 'female' jobs was that female labour was relatively cheaper and better suited to the job. The most often heard case against the employment of women in 'male' positions in production work was that all available manpower in the area should first be employed, that it was not possible to transfer a few women into all-male departments, and that the factory lacked the necessary changing facilities for women. Women were also considered to have higher frequency of absence and greater horizontal job mobility-between different work places and between home and gainful employment. It was generally assumed that physical and mental differences between men and women were great. It soon emerged that views on the subject were strongly influenced by the interviewees' preconceptions about the social roles of men and women. Many of them felt that the traditional role division between men and women should not FUTURES
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The Future Role of Women
be questioned-the right plaee for women was in the home, while the man's function was to be the family breadwinner. Marry statements were more an expression of general attitudes to sex roles than rationally considered views on manpower problems. Many statements on physical and mental differences between the sexes must be considered as prejudices. Sometimes there exist mean differences between men and women, most ofwhich can be explained by cultural influence, but available statistical findings demonstrate that in most respects differences between different individuals of the same sex are greater than those between the means of the two sexes. The results of this study on the changing role ofmen and women were published in Sweden in 1962. It made the point that "there are some women who are physically stronger and more interested in technical matters than the average man, while there are some men who exhibit greater manual dexterity and interest in languages than the average woman". In other words generalisations cannot be made about the behaviour of individual men or women. In spite of this many employers have stereotyped views. They .often exclude one sex before using more refined methods for trying to find the most suitable person for a certain job. This may be seen from the sex division in advertisements on vacant situations." The views of managerial staff presented in this study, were much analysed, criticised and ridiculed in the Swedish press. No one who has studied the problem and no official representative of the Employers' Confederation will take their attitude today but, in practice, traditions in the labour market still remain. New studies are being made and the results are being reported in the mass media that show a strong interest in these problems. For instance, scientific investigations have shown that the rather small mean differences between the sexes as regards absence and job mobility tend to disappear completely if men and women of the same age and having the same position in the job hierarchy are being compared. A recent study has demonstrated that when women were given skilled 'male' jobs they showed the same interest and involvement in their work as a corresponding male group. 4
Sex roles However, sweeping generalisations by the employers are not the only cause of the lack ofequality between men and women in the labour market. Educational statistics show that, although women and men have the same educational rights, with the exception of military training, and that although vocational guiders are supposed to tell people that they should choose the occupations they want regardless ofsex, there is a clear division between the sexes in the different lines of study or vocational training. After the compulsory nine-year comprehensive schooling, 85% of the rfi-year old pupils continue their education, 30% go to secondary school, 20% to continuation school and 35% to vocational school. Half of the pupils in these different schools are girls but they do not take the same subjects as boys. There are more girls than boys taking liberal arts (humanities) in the secondary school and choosing the social sector in the continuation school, and whereas 25% of the boys in the secondary school and FUTURES
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The FIlIuTe Role of Women
about half of the boys in the continuation school had chosen technical arts in the autumn of I968, less than I % of the girls preferred that sector. In the vocational schools, girls take shorter courses than boys and the majority of girls choose the kind of vocational training that will lead to traditionally female occupations; the majority of boys on the other hand choose the traditionally male training courses. These differences are explained by traditional sex roles-girls and boys arc being brought up in different ways and still have different expectations of their future role as parents which also will affect their occupational choice. The concept of 'sex roles', originally used only by sociologists, was introduced into the rather confused and emotional debate on the emancipation of women in I962, when Swedish and Norwegian sociologists, psychologists and other social scientists published a book containing data on the roles of men and women, the socialisation process, parental roles, sex and social structure, and the position of men and women in the labour market. (Part of the book has been published in a revised English edition under the title The Changing Roles of Men and Wome!2. 5) Edmund Dahlstrom, a Swedish professor ofsociology, made an analysis of the debate and suggested that what previously had been referred to as 'the woman question' from now on should be called 'the sex role question', thereby indicating that the role of women could not be viewed separately from that of men. This dispassionate and scientific analysis of the whole problem made people look at it in a less emotional, more constructive way. The term 'sex role' was picked up by journalists popularising the contents of the book and was used in a series of more or less scientific books that were published later in the sixties. It was also used in party programmes, and when it was decided to have more information about this question in the schools, 'the sex role question' was introduced into the curriculum. 'Sex role' is usually defined as the social norms and expectations that in a certain culture are directed towards an individual on account of sex: By the concept of 'role' one is referring to expectations which have a social, not a biological basis. Thus the fact that men do not bear babies is not a part of the sex role but a biological fact. From a sociological point of view, one may draw draw certain parallels between 'sex roles' and 'race roles'. In societies where there is race discrimination, social attitudes are contingent on a biological criterion, eg, colour of the skin. In the case of sex roles too, rights, obligations, jobs, etc arc distributed according to a biological criterion instead of being distributed according to individual aptitude and ability, need or some other more rational and democratic criterion. In the same way as race roles, sex roles have been firmly established in the minds of many people and often are looked upon as 'natural'. Because of the norms of society people of different race or sex arc encouraged to behave according to expectations; and when they do behave in this way prejudiced people arc given an apparent proof of the truth of their prejudices; this will then be used to justify continued discrimination. In our culture, for instance, women as a group have less ambitions in the vocational field and more often arc interested in nursing than men, but this is not, as prejudiced people would argue, because of something innate in the female character but because, in our society, this behaviour is being expected FUTURES · December 1969
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of women. It must not be used as an argument for making them do more house-work or for not admitting them to certain occupations. One may argue that it is difficult to demonstrate scientifically which sex differences are biological and which can be explained by the concept of sex roles without experiments that submit boys and girls to exactly the same kind of influence. However, it would seem that children who have been encouraged to behave according to a sex role that docs not correspond to their biological sex (because their sexual organs were malformed at birth so that their parents minsinterpreted their sex) do behave according to the sex role they were brought up to. This indicates that, whatever the biological differences, the socialisation process is decisive. G Anthropological studies show that 'male' and 'female' characteristics and behaviour are different in different cultures. Views on what are to be regarded as male and female jobs also vary with different industrialised countries and with different periods in the same country. Sex norms also vary within a country according to different generations, groups and families. Indeed, the minority of Swedish men who have shared the baby-tending equally with their wives serve as a proof of the fact that this in no way goes against the male nature but is a matter of social attitudes. The fact that the roles of men and women are based on cultural traditions is challenging -it means that a society may change them completely if there are good reasons for changing them. It is quite clear that women have much to gain if they are socialised into the same role as men; they will, for instance, get a stronger position in the labour market and in political life. But men will also have something to gain. The traditional role of man which demands toughness, aggressiveness and a lack of sensitivity and makes him the sole breadwinner, on whom the social position of the family depends, is a hard and difficult one. This may be seen from the fact that Swedish men have a higher record of criminality, die earlier, more frequently fall ill from stress and have a higher suicide rate than women. A softer education for boys as well as the consciousness that women in the future will share the economic responsibility in the family, may make life easier for them in some respects. They would also benefit from closer contacts with their children. Father and child
Children of both sexes have much to gain from a closer contact with their fathers from the very beginning of their lives. In an essay on "Parental role division and the child's personality development'" the Norwegian psychologist Per Olav Tiller points out that given the circumstances of our modern family type, "it seems likely that boys will have an insufficient foundation for masculine identification". This may lead to a type of adjustment mechanism which he calls "compensatorymasculinity", manifested in a "super-masculine" behaviour which may easily "slide over into delinquent activities". The Swedish sociologist Rita Liljestrom also analyses the importance of'fathers having intimate contacts with their children in her book on sex roles," published by Swedish Radio for a series of programmes on this problem in 1968 and 1969. Part of her analysis is based on John Nash's "The father in contemporary culture and current FUTURES
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The Future Roleof WomeJl
psychological literature". 8 Liljestrom stresses the fact that children need contacts with men but it need not necessarily be with their biological fathers. In the Swedish debate, empirical data and analysis on the role of fathers have been used to support the argument for recruiting men as staff in nurseries and in the first grades at school. In future there will still be one-parent families with a sole mother or two-parent families where the father neglects his children. Being taken care of by a male nurse while the mother is working, may make up for the child's lack offather. Earlier, the Swedish debate focused on the effects on children if their mothers went to work. Now this way of posing the problem is seen as prejudiced, as it presupposes that mothers should be more responsible for the well-being of their children than fathers. One should rather ask for the effects on children if both parents are working, that is, if neither the father nor the mother is staying at home all or part ofthe day, taking turns in caring for the children. The results of the scientific investigations which have been made so far, indicate that small children do need a warm, intimate and regular contact with people whom they recognise and love, but that the quality of the contact is more important than the quantity. Both parents of small children might well work, therefore, if the children are being well looked after when they are away and if they have a good contact with them in their leisure time. 9 Planning of services
Planning in different fields may do much to retard or hasten the development towards equality between men and women. This was stressed by the Swedish Government in its report to the United Nations on The Status of Women in Sweden in 1968: To promote greater equality, one must always determine which political instruments will directly or indirectly encourage a more equal division of labour between the sexes, for every act on the part of the community affects the status of men and women -in a favourable or unfavourable direction. The question of the roles of the sexes must therefore be regarded as one of the chief problems in the continual work of reforming educational, employment, social, family and taxation policies. The report describes reforms that have been carried through or are being planned. Only a few will be mentioned here. Town planning, the planning of housing areas and of services to the families is very relevant to the question of the future roles of the sexes. If both men and women are to be gainfully employed, towns should be planned to facilitate this. That might mean good collective communications so that one member of the family does not have to aet as private chauffeur to the rest, mixed residential-industrial areas so that not too much time has to be spent in travelling, and all kinds ofcollective services to make life easier for families where no one is at home in the day-time. Collective services may consist of special service-houses, ie, multi-dwelling houses with their own nursery, restaurant, cleaning staff etc. There may also be service centres in the residential areas which have a reception desk where cleaning, child-minding and messenger services can be booked. They would include a post office, dispensing chemists' shop, a shop open in the evenings, FUTURES
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a restaurant and a cafe. Above all, good day nurseries with trained staff and localities suited for children are needed to take care of the children for the part of the day when the parents arc working. 'Recreation centres' or 'afternoon homes' for younger school-children who leave school before their parents have finished their work, are needed too. Unfortunately, the planning of services to the families has lagged hopelessly behind in Sweden, and former mistakes in this field are not easily repaired. For instance, the actual need for places in day nurseries is estimated to be about half a million. This includes both the needs of parents who are now working and have their children cared for in other ways but would prefer to have them in a day nursery, and the needs of parents who now stay at home but, according to surveys, would like to be gainfully employed if their children could be cared for. However, today there are only 24,500 places, and according to the present plans of the municipalities, in 1975 there will still be not more than 72,500 places in the whole country. It has been argued that the state should take the main responsibility for the extension of nurseries as it does for schools, and the Swedish Trade Union Confederation has proposed that the state should pay the salaries of the nursery staff. The law on the planning of housing areas is now being revised. Taxation and social insurance policies Our present taxation of families and our social insurance system have not been based on the present ideology of equality between the sexes but on the concept of husbands as bread-winners and wives as being provided for. Thus, in the words of Alva Myrdal, our present "Minister for Disarmament Questions, "today, men who want to divert female potential to care for their personal wants in marriage receive considerable tax subsidies from the state, whether or not there are children in the family". A Royal Commission has recently proposed reforms that will bring us nearer the goal of individual taxation that uses the same scale for married and unmarried people. In the social insurance system, widows' pensions and the like will have to be abolished and be replaced by children's pensions because, in normal cases, grown up people of working age will be supposed to earn money by themselves. Of course, these reforms will have to be introduced gradually aiming at the young well-educated generation. In the older generation there are too many women who have believed all their lives in the idea that they should be provided for by their husbands and, in case of the death of their husbands, by society. Labour market policy
The town planning, family tax system and social insurance system in Sweden today influence the behaviour of people in a direction that is contrary to the goals of education policy and labour market policy, where girls arc encouraged to get the same vocational training as boys and women are encouraged to work. A Swedish economist and labour market researcher has calculated that the Swedish national income could be increased by at least 50% if the unused labour potential of women were to be fully utilised and if sex discrimination FUTURES
December 1969
The Future Role oj lVomen
and other barriers were to be totally abolished. 10 The policy of full employment pursued in Sweden since the economic crises of the 1930S has been a most powerful factor in the enhancement or the status of women in Swedish society. According to the labour market policy programme, the objectives of labour market policy are to be the same for men and women. The prejudicial way of regarding married women as a reserve labour force which by all means should be mobilised in periods of high prosperity but which can be sent home again when the demand for labour begins to fall, is to be combated. Measures designed to safeguard the employment of women are not to be reduced in periods of reduced labour demand. Labour market policy is also committed to the role of a stabilising factor in economic policy. When the demand for labour exceeds supply, labour market policy should create additional stability through measures designed to encourage mobility, eg, by encouraging the migration of labour from surplus to deficiency areas. Families in which the wife cannot find employment should have the same right to get transfer grants, etc, if they want to move to a place where she can get ajob, as families where the husband is unemployed. Retraining and further education courses, varying from a couple ofweeks to a complete training lasting several years, should be given to all people who are unemployed or threatened by unemployment. In this respect, housewives who arc not gainfully employed should be regarded as unemployed. Education policy
Apart from labour market policy, education policy is important to housewives as the possibilities for adult education increase at all levels. As far as the young are concerned the comprehensive school where girls and boys are educated together and have the same curriculum, encourages egalitarian attitudes. The instruction in domestic science, cooking and childcare is obligatory for both girls and boys. In 1968, Parliament decided that girls and boys should have the same amount of instruction in both kinds of handicraft (woodwork-metalwork and needlework) up to, and including, grade 6. (Earlier, pupils could choose, which resulted in most girls taking needlework and most boys taking woodwork-metalwork.) The sex role question will be discussed in schools in a number ofsubjects in the future, and pupils will be encouraged to analyse and question the existing division of labour according to sex. They will also be made aware of the fact that certain kinds of mass media are influencing them in a way that goes contrary to the concept of equality. For example, in weekly magazines, advertising and the cinema, "the young woman is essentially a sexual partner (or marital partner), and great weight is given to beauty, sex appeal, beautiful clothes, charm, sensuality, devotion, passivity, acquiescence and the housewifemother role, at the expense ofthe vocational role. The glamour role undermines the young woman's preparation for a career by elevating the married woman's glamour to a status symboI."ll In popular books on child psychology, the role ofmothers is often more heavily stressed than that offathers, etc: Investigations have shown that even some school-books still suggest that the roles of men and women ought to be different.P In the future, there will be more instruction
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on the sex role question in the vocational training of teachers. It is believed that as general knowledge about these problems increases, there will be a change of attitudes in Swedish society which will forward equality between the sexes and make it possible for men and women to have the same roles in the future. References I.
2.
3
4 5.
6. 7. 8. 9.
10.
11. 12.
Report by the Swedish Government to the United Nations, The Status Of TVomen in Sweden (Stockholm, The Swedish Institute, 1968) A. Baude and P. Holmberg, "The position of men and women in the labour market", in E. Dahlstrom, ed, The Changing Roles of Men and Women (London, Duckworth, 1967) and A. Leijon, Swedish Women-Swedish Men (Stockholm, the Swedish Institute, 1968) S. Thyberg, "Foretagen oeh den kvinnliga arbetskraften" in Ei Dahlstrcm m.fl, Koinnors liv och arbete (Stockholm, SNS, 1962). A shorter and revised version of this chapter, "Employer attitudes to female employees", was published in E. Dahlstrom, cd, The Changing Roles of Men and Women, op cit B. Gardell, K. Baneryd, B. Gombrii and L. Lundquist, Arbetsupplecelse och Ktinsroller (Stockholm, Peronaldministrativa radet, 1968) E. Dahlstrom, The Changing Roles ofMen and Women, opcit P. O. Tiller, "Parental role division and the child's personality development", in E. Dahlstrom, ed, The Changing Roles ofMen and Women, opcit R. Liljestrorn, ]iimstiilldhetens villkor (Stockholm, Sveriges Radio, 1968) ]. Nash, "The father in contemporary culture and current psychological literature", in Child Development, Vol. 36, 1965 pp. 261-297 M. Israel, "Vern skall ta hand om barnen?" in I. Fredriksson, ed, Konsroller (Falkoping, Prisma, 1965) and P. O. Tiller "Parental role division and the child's personality development", op cit P. Holmberg, "Om de ekonomiska och sociala konsekvenserna av nuvarande konsroller", in P. Holmberg m.fl, Kynne eller kon? (Stockholm, Raben and Sjogren, 1966) E. Dahlstrom and R. Liljestrom, "The family and married women at work", in E. Dahlstrom, ed, The Changing Roles ofMen and Women, opcit I. Fredriksson, !lonsriiller i liirobiicker (Stockholm, Arbetsmarknadens kvinnonamnd, 1969)
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