THE WAY FORWARD TOWARDS THE EMANCIPATION OF WOMEN

THERE IS MUCH discussion in various organisations in South Africa trying to identify what is the correct step to take which will ensure women's emancipation. This discussion seems a bit futile, since no single isolated initiative is likely to yield a successful result. What we need is a multi-pronged onslaught affecting all areas of life. This must first and foremost be aimed at ending patriarchal domination. It must also seek to change women's position in the occupational division of labour. For this, the national question has tobereformulated tointegrally incorporate gender interests. Maxine Molyneux (1986) has developed an interesting way to group gender interests in a way which is helpful to planning political policy and organising women for change. She makes the point that it is "difficult, if not impossible to generalise about the interests of women"' because of women's different class, ethnic, religious and personal background and positions in society. She therefore chooses to use the term "gender interests" to "differentiate them from the false homogeneity imposed by the notion of 'women's interests"' (Molyneux, 1986:283). Gender interests are those'which women (or men) develop as a result of the way in which their gender attributes have positioned them in society. She divides gender interests into two groups. "Strategic gender interests . are derived from the analysis of women's subordination and from the formulation of an alternative, more satisfactory set of arrangements to those that exist" (Molyneux, 1986:284). They would include issues such as: * abolition of the sexual division of labour * alleviation of the burdens of domestic labour and child care d removal of institutionalised discrmation * establishment of political equality * freedom of choice over childbearing * adoption of adequate measures against male violence and control over women. Molyneux calls these 'feminist' demands, and the level of consciousness required to struggle effectively for them, a feminist consciousness. Clearly these sorts of demands are all directed at challenging and ultimately eliminating all forms of patriarchal domination. "Practical gender interests. arise from the concrete conditions of women's positioning by virtue of their gender within the division of labour. ... (These) are usually a response to an immediate perceived need and do not generally entail a strategic goal such as women's emancipation or gender equality" (Molyneux