In the formative years of the Japanese labor movement after World
War II, the socialist unions affiliated with the General Council of
Trade Unions (the labor federation known colloquially as S hy )
formally endorsed the principles of women's equality in the
workforce and put in place measures to promote women's active
participation in union activities. However, union leaders did not
embrace the legal framework for gender equality mandated by their
American occupiers; rather, they pressured thousands of women labor
activists to assume supportive roles that privileged a
male-centered social agenda. By the late 1950s, even Japan's
radical socialist unions had reestablished the primacy of
conservative gender norms, channeling women's labor activism to
support political campaigns that advantaged a male-headed household
and that relegated women's wage-earning value to the periphery of
the household economy. By showing how unions raised the wages of
male workers in part by transforming working-class women into
middle-class housewives, Christopher Gerteis demonstrates that
organized labor's discourse on womanhood not only undermined
women's status within the labor movement, but also prevented unions
from linking with the emerging woman-led, neighborhood-centered
organizations that typified social movements in the 1960s-a misstep
that contributed to the decline of the socialist labor movement in
subsequent decades.
General
Imprint: |
Harvard University Asia Center
|
Country of origin: |
United States |
Series: |
Harvard East Asian Monographs |
Release date: |
February 2010 |
First published: |
February 2010 |
Authors: |
Christopher Gerteis
|
Dimensions: |
235 x 156 x 24mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Hardcover - With dust jacket
|
Pages: |
275 |
Edition: |
New |
ISBN-13: |
978-0-674-03569-0 |
Categories: |
Books >
Earth & environment >
Geography >
General
|
LSN: |
0-674-03569-0 |
Barcode: |
9780674035690 |
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