1st Edition

Women in the Face of Change Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and China

Edited By Annie Phizacklea, Hilary Pilkington, Shirin Rai Copyright 1992

    The years 1989 and 1990 will probably be best remembered for the speed and breadth of political and economic change which swept through what used to be referred to as the Communist Bloc. With the disintegration of this bloc, there has been no shortage of western advice on how to `democratize' economy and politiy in these societies. However, little thought has been given to what this change means for the millions of women who have toiled for decades alongside men in the factories and fields as well as performing their `womanly mission' in the home. This collection from women in Eastern and Western Europe, and covering both Europe and China, poses many questions about the impact of change. It contributes to the debate that seeks to combat inertia and ethnocentrism within western feminism and also to the separate and the critical `women's voice' which is re-emerging in the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and China.

    Introduction, Annie Phizacklea, Hilary Pilkington, Shirin Rai; Part I Swings and roundabouts; Chapter 1 Perestroika and the status of women in the Soviet Union, Natalia Rimashevskaia; Chapter 2 ‘Watering another man’s garden’, Shirin Rai; Chapter 3 Gender and political Part icipation in rural China, Zhang Junzuo; Chapter 4 Uneven burdens, Frances Pine; Part II The construction and reconstruction of gendered identities; Chapter 5 Population policy and reform, Delia Davin; Chapter 6 Whose space is it anyway?, Hilary Pilkington; Chapter 7 Sexual revolution or ‘sexploitation’?, Rosamund Shreeves; Chapter 8 Monogamy and female sexuality in the People’s Republic of China, Harriet Evans; Part III Towards a woman–s consciousness?; Chapter 9 Gendered identities, Chris Corrin; Chapter 10 Feminism and Bolshevism, Marina Malysheva, Hilary Pilkington; Chapter 11 The women’s movement in the USSR, Valentino Konstantinova;

    Biography

    Shirin Rai Lecturer in the Department of Politics, University of Warwick., Hilary Pilkington Lecturer in the Centre for Russian and Eastern European Studies at the University of Birmingham., Anne Phizacklea Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Warwick.