STRUGGLING TO BE HEARD
Asian women in informal work
Committee for Asian Women
Bangkok
November 2001
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Preface
We will use eight-hour shoes
We will eat eight-hour bread
This was one of the songs sung in the 1870s in the USA. This
was a song of struggle for eight hours working day. All of us
must have read descriptions of the early years at the beginning
of industrialization. The abysmal conditions included long sixteen
hours work for even women and children. Workers, including children
were maimed due to the textile machinery.
That was more than 125 years ago.
Over the years, struggles by workers, including women workers
led to the formation of workers' organizations and trade unions.
Gradually this led to what is now called formal employment.
Laws limiting hours of working day were passed. Social security,
safety laws were established.
In the early years of the 20th century, laws were passed to
provide healthy workplaces, to limit the work hours. This was
done in the interest of society. Individual capitalists opposed
these laws and asked for laissez-faire. But society intervened
as the existing system was a threat to the life and limb of
society itself.
Now informal employment is fast becoming a common mode of employment
for the vast majority of the people in the world. It is growing
day-by-day, year-by-year without legal protection, without support
systems in case of injuries or illnesses.
The clock seems to be turning back.
Now again society, political authorities have withdrawn themselves.
Children, women and men are left to the mercy of market forces
and capital. The purchasing power of these sections is diminishing
and home markets are shrinking. Even overseas markets in the
developed world are shrinking.
A period seems to have come when protecting informal sector
workers is in the interests of society and this also has implications
on the process of retaining the social fabric. The home markets,
wage opportunities, decent work norms are shrinking and crime
rates and anti-social behaviour are on the rise. If civilization
is to be protected, legal protection for the informal sector
is a must.
When humankind realized the consequences of overuse of natural
resources, fossil fuel and the environment, laws are enacted
to protect the environment, the animal and plant species. Human
resources and human beings too need protection and it is high
time that in the beginning of the 21st century, laws are enacted
to protect the health, the well-being and living standards of
women in informal work.
To stop the rise in poverty, in crime rates, in organized crime
and terrorism, it is necessary to protect the social fabric
that is being torn apart due to the appalling conditions and
the increasing number of people who work and live in these.
This situation has to change. The process of this change is
likely to be at different levels. Most importantly, it will
be at the local and national levels that the legal provisions
will be struggled for and changes brought about. However, even
for this to happen it may be useful or even necessary to create
a conducive atmosphere at the regional and international levels.
This urgently calls for a network for informal workers.
The aim of advocacy in this context is:
1. to participate in international law making, ILO standards,
WTO forums, etc.
2. to participate in advocacy at national levels.
3. to create information.
4. to exchange information.
It is with this aim that we are looking at this entire process.
The purpose of this document is to begin a process of collating
information about women workers working in informal employment
in the countries of Asia and to link this information with the
twin processes of lobbying and advocacy on the one hand and
strengthening a platform for women workers in informal work.
This document is the product of an interesting process. The
CAW team prepared the first draft of each of the country-profiles.
Each of the country-profiles was then sent to activists, labour
researchers, and unionists from each of the country and the
final draft was based on the comments and suggestions that people
sent. Similarly, the introduction, conclusion and recommendations
were sent to several people involved with workers both in formal
and formal employment. The document is the product of the work
of several individuals in the region.
The spirit with which all these friends looked at this document
and their own contribution to it is brought out by Shirin Akhtar
who wrote: ` I am very glad for the chance to make comments
and suggestions on our country situation and for participating
in the process of preparing this document.'
Our idea of international network is a collaborative one. With
this idea in mind the draft was shared with all these friends
in the region. Such sharing we felt was useful in improving
the quality of the document as well as we hope it will lay the
foundation for a beginning of a collaborative network.
This document is in no way complete. It is in a way, work-in-progress
that may be a platform for us to bring in our suggestions and
use it for the purposes of knowing the situation in each other's
countries better, for lobbying-advocacy and for further debate.
Sujata Gothoskar
Project officer, Committee for Asian Women
November 2001
