Producing and Reducing Gender Inequality in a Worker-Recovered Cooperative

Abstract

Decades of feminist scholarship documents the persistence of gender inequality in work organizations. Yet few studies explicitly examine gender inequality in collectivist organizations like worker cooperatives. This article draws on the “theory of gendered organizations” to consider how gender operates in a worker-recovered cooperative in contemporary Argentina. Based on ethnographic and archival research in Hotel B.A.U.E.N., this article finds that although gender remains a salient feature of the workplace, the cooperative has also adopted policies that take steps toward addressing gender inequality. It concludes by offering an updated theoretical framework for the future study of “gendered organizations.”

Keywords::

• inequality
• poverty and mobility
• organizations, occupations, and work
• sex and gender

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to express my gratitude to the members of Hotel B.A.U.E.N. for their time and trust, as well as the editors of The Sociological Quarterly, Joyce Rothschild, Christine Williams, and the participants of Fem(me) Sem for their thoughtful feedback on previous drafts of this article. I am also grateful for support received from Javier Auyero, the Urban Ethnography Lab, and the Teresa Lozano Long Institute for Latin American Studies that made this research possible. An earlier version of this article was presented at the 2014 annual meeting of the American Sociological Association.

NOTES

Notes

¹ The exchange rate changed over the course of this fieldwork. In 2014, the official exchange rate was approximately 8 ARS to 1 USD.

² Prior to occupying the hotel, former employees met with representatives of the National Movement of Recovered Businesses (MNER or Movimiento Nacional de Empresas Recuperadas) to receive support and guidance for their initiative.

³ The decision to form a cooperative was initially one of convenience as it offered an accessible legal means to reopen a business under worker control. Yet worker-recovered businesses in Argentina were divided between those advocating for the adoption of a cooperative model and those calling for nationalization under worker control. For a discussion of this division, see Hirtz and Giacone (2013:92–93); in Hotel B.A.U.E.N., Faulk (2008:602-3). On the difference between “new cooperatives” and traditional Argentine worker cooperatives, see Atzeni and Ghigliani (2007:654–5) and Faulk (2008:596–7, 601).

⁴ The cooperative logic is not the only logic operative in worker-recovered businesses. For an analysis of the role of market logic, see Atzeni and Ghigliani (2007).

⁵ For a brief history of self-management and worker control, see Atzeni (2012:10–16); in Argentina, Vieta (2010:302).

⁶ The Madres who attended events in the hotel were affiliated with the Association of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo. In 1986, the organization divided into two groups: the Founding Line and the Association. Whereas the Founding Line focused on legislation, the Association adopted a more activist approach in an effort to realize their children's unfinished political goals. On the history of the Madres and motherhood, see Bouvard (2002).