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Home » Opinion » Chinese Views
You've come a long way, Baby, but bias persists
By Lin Jianyang and Gui Juan |
October 15, 2009, Thursday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
OVER three years after Zhou Xianghua lost a case of sexual discrimination over retirement age - said to be the first of its kind in China - she still believes it violates the principle of gender equality by ruling that women must retire five years earlier than men.
It's 50 for women in manual labor, 55 for men; 55 for women in non-manual labor, 60 for men.
She still is adamant, despite verbal attacks against her both from people she knew and strangers.
"With more social and economic progress, it is just a matter of time for women and men to retire at the same age," said Zhou, who was born on October 1, 1949, other day the People's Republic of China was founded.
In October 2005, Zhou took her employer to court, arguing the Pingdingshan Branch of the China Construction Bank in central China's Henan Province, accusing it of sexual discrimination.
Four months later, a local court ruled against her, citing the Provisional Regulations on Resettlement of Old and Weak Cadres, issued in 1978 by the State Council, or China's cabinet.
The regulation stipulates that women retire five years earlier than men. According to the regulation, women engaged in physical labor must retire at the age of 50, those in "headwork," at 55. Men retire five years later in each case.
The regulation took into consideration the fact that Chinese women have shouldered most housekeeping duties by tradition.
As housewives, they had to feed a three-generation family, in many cases with homemade food, wash clothes by hand and even make shoes from the very first step of preparing out soles stitch by stitch. They should be relieved of labor both at home and work earlier than men, it was argued.
However, thanks to China's rapid economic develop in past decades, women's health has improved and housekeeping labor dropped significantly as household appliances became affordable. And most urban couples raise only one child.
Zhou said she was healthy in the past years and still competent in her pre-retirement job. Zhou's opinion was echoed by some experts and feminists who also see the policy - once a boon to women - as sexual discrimination today. They include Liu Bohong and Xie Lihua.
Liu, vice director of women studies institute in the All-China Women's Federation (ACWF), is one a prominent researcher on gender equality and women's issues.
Xie Lihua, editor-in-chief of "Rural Women," the only publication primarily for rural women, is a noted activist for the cause of downtrodden women in rural areas. According to Liu and Xie, Chinese women's status and living conditions have improved dramatically over the last 60 years, but they are still confronted with inequalities or discrimination in their daily life.
Historically, Chinese women's status was humble and they were required to obey men - from their fathers, husbands to sons - in a strict hierarchy.
Confucius (551-479 BC), whose philosophy has prevailed for more than 2,000 years, decided women's status with a short and influential expression: "Women and people of low birth are very hard to cope with. If you are friendly to them, they get out of hand, and if you keep your distance, they resent it."
Things changed almost overnight when the Communist Party of China (CPC) came into power in 1949, ushering in a historic movement of women's emancipation.
China had only 600,000 women workers and staff members in 1949 but today it has one of the highest female employment rates in the world, as more than 347 million Chinese women are in full-time employment, making up 45 percent of the total workforce.
Despite great achievements, both Liu and Xie acknowledge Chinese women still face inequality, discrimination or both in employment, rights of parenting, political participation, retirement age, income, and sexual harassment.
According to a research released in June by the Center for Women's Law and Legal Services of Peking University, nearly one in four female job seekers had been refused work because of their gender, and 16 percent of those polled had been denied jobs though they scored better than male peers in interviews.
The survey found one in 25 among 3,000 respondents had to sign labor contracts that contained clauses forbidding them to marry or become pregnant in a set period of time.
More than 20 percent said their employers, mostly foreign-funded enterprises and China-foreign joint ventures, were reluctant to recruit women of childbearing age.
This contributed in part to the popularity of platitudes such as "hunting for a good husband is more important than seeking a job" and "Doing (a job) well is inferior to marrying well" - both popular among female graduates.
(The authors are Xinhua writers.)
It's 50 for women in manual labor, 55 for men; 55 for women in non-manual labor, 60 for men.
She still is adamant, despite verbal attacks against her both from people she knew and strangers.
"With more social and economic progress, it is just a matter of time for women and men to retire at the same age," said Zhou, who was born on October 1, 1949, other day the People's Republic of China was founded.
In October 2005, Zhou took her employer to court, arguing the Pingdingshan Branch of the China Construction Bank in central China's Henan Province, accusing it of sexual discrimination.
Four months later, a local court ruled against her, citing the Provisional Regulations on Resettlement of Old and Weak Cadres, issued in 1978 by the State Council, or China's cabinet.
The regulation stipulates that women retire five years earlier than men. According to the regulation, women engaged in physical labor must retire at the age of 50, those in "headwork," at 55. Men retire five years later in each case.
The regulation took into consideration the fact that Chinese women have shouldered most housekeeping duties by tradition.
As housewives, they had to feed a three-generation family, in many cases with homemade food, wash clothes by hand and even make shoes from the very first step of preparing out soles stitch by stitch. They should be relieved of labor both at home and work earlier than men, it was argued.
However, thanks to China's rapid economic develop in past decades, women's health has improved and housekeeping labor dropped significantly as household appliances became affordable. And most urban couples raise only one child.
Zhou said she was healthy in the past years and still competent in her pre-retirement job. Zhou's opinion was echoed by some experts and feminists who also see the policy - once a boon to women - as sexual discrimination today. They include Liu Bohong and Xie Lihua.
Liu, vice director of women studies institute in the All-China Women's Federation (ACWF), is one a prominent researcher on gender equality and women's issues.
Xie Lihua, editor-in-chief of "Rural Women," the only publication primarily for rural women, is a noted activist for the cause of downtrodden women in rural areas. According to Liu and Xie, Chinese women's status and living conditions have improved dramatically over the last 60 years, but they are still confronted with inequalities or discrimination in their daily life.
Historically, Chinese women's status was humble and they were required to obey men - from their fathers, husbands to sons - in a strict hierarchy.
Confucius (551-479 BC), whose philosophy has prevailed for more than 2,000 years, decided women's status with a short and influential expression: "Women and people of low birth are very hard to cope with. If you are friendly to them, they get out of hand, and if you keep your distance, they resent it."
Things changed almost overnight when the Communist Party of China (CPC) came into power in 1949, ushering in a historic movement of women's emancipation.
China had only 600,000 women workers and staff members in 1949 but today it has one of the highest female employment rates in the world, as more than 347 million Chinese women are in full-time employment, making up 45 percent of the total workforce.
Despite great achievements, both Liu and Xie acknowledge Chinese women still face inequality, discrimination or both in employment, rights of parenting, political participation, retirement age, income, and sexual harassment.
According to a research released in June by the Center for Women's Law and Legal Services of Peking University, nearly one in four female job seekers had been refused work because of their gender, and 16 percent of those polled had been denied jobs though they scored better than male peers in interviews.
The survey found one in 25 among 3,000 respondents had to sign labor contracts that contained clauses forbidding them to marry or become pregnant in a set period of time.
More than 20 percent said their employers, mostly foreign-funded enterprises and China-foreign joint ventures, were reluctant to recruit women of childbearing age.
This contributed in part to the popularity of platitudes such as "hunting for a good husband is more important than seeking a job" and "Doing (a job) well is inferior to marrying well" - both popular among female graduates.
(The authors are Xinhua writers.)
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