Gender and the economy in post-apartheid South Africa: Changes and challenges

abstract

Since the transition to democracy, South Africa has made formal commitments to reducing gender inequality. The period has also witnessed a dramatic increase in both the quality and availability of national quantitative data, widening the scope to assess how gender differences in economic participation have been changing. Here we trace these developments, together with the emergence internationally of feminist economics as an established field of study and the growth nationally of a research agenda on gender and the economy. We describe positive changes in access to education, the nature of women’s labour force participation, average earnings, and the protection and organisation of the most marginal workers, where women (and African women in particular) dominate; but we also highlight some of the challenges that remain. These positive changes and persistent challenges are further explored in the collection of papers published in this special issue of Agenda.

keywords:

• gender gaps
• education
• labour force participation
• occupational segregation
• post-apartheid South Africa

ORCID

Dorrit Posel http://orcid.org/0000-0002-3343-875X

Daniela Casale http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1337-1196

Notes

1 Domestic workers would have been included in the service occupations, according to the occupational categorisation used at the time (Maconachie, 1989).

2 Most of the surveys that have been introduced collect data that are snapshots in time, or snapshots repeated over time to allow for analysis of trends; these are referred to as cross-sectional data. But South Africa now also has its first national longitudinal dataset (the National Income Dynamics Survey). This survey gathers information on the same individuals over time, therefore increasing the analytical scope to explore and unpack socio-economic trends.

3 Feminist economics spans a vast literature. Some of the earlier seminal texts include Agarwal (1994); Bruce (1989); Elson (1991); Ferber and Nelson (1993); Folbre (1994); Nelson (1996) and Waring (1988).

4 While feminist economics critiques of economic theory and policy initially focussed on valuing women’s work in the household, intra-household resource allocations, and gender discrimination in the labour market, the discipline has expanded over the decades to encompass a wide range of topics. These include the gendered implications of social and fiscal policy (or gender budgeting), the differential effects of globalisation, trade liberalisation and neoliberal policies on women and men, the gendered impact of the global financial crisis, gender and environmental justice, and many more. However, our own research interests are more firmly grounded in the former set of topics, and as it turned out, so were the papers submitted to this special issue. Nonetheless, we recognise the important gender work that has been done in other areas even though we were not able to cover them here.

5 Although not an exhaustive list by any means, examples include papers by Budlender (2001, 2005, 2016); Burns et al. (2005); Casale (2004); Casale and Posel (2002, 2005, 2011); Gradin (2018); Grün (2004); Ntuli and Wittenberg (2013); Posel (2014); Posel and Muller (2008); and Posel and Rogan (2012).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Dorrit Posel

Dorrit (Dori) Posel is a distinguished professor of Economics and holds the Helen Suzman Chair at the University of the Witwatersrand. Much of her research over the past 30 years has focused on the economics of gender.

Daniela Casale

Daniela Casale is an Associate Professor in the School of Economic and Business Sciences at the University of the Witwatersrand. Daniela is a development economist with 20 years of experience in research in the field of gender economics specifically. Other broad areas of study in economics include labour, well-being, health and education.