Gender Stratification and Women in Developing Nations - Essay Example

? Gender Stratification and Women in Developing Nations “Rwanda's economy has risen up from the genocide and prospered greatly on the backs of our women.” says Rwanda’s agriculture minister, Miss Agness Kalibata. She has becoming a huge example of the empowered women who have made it to greater heights from the ashes of Rwandan genocide. The thought of Rwanda and the 1994 genocide which killed brutally murdered 800,000 Tutsis and Hustus runs parallel. Tutsi, Twa and Hutu have communal diversity since ages. Though, these groups have exited mutually and in considerable peace. Historians claim that ethnic violence was initiated by German and Belgian colonies. The most intense riots broke out in the aftermath of president Habyalimana’s assassination, a mad Hutus tried to wipe off a complete Tutsi tribe. Not only women and young females were killed, raped and mutilated, the moderate males also faced mass killings establishing these killings as genocidal and gendercidal. Rwanda’s demographic disparity today is due to the killing of approximately 70% Tutsi males by the hands of radical Hutus, about which the socialist say that, it will continue to exist. An intense impact is a tilt in power towards females in all walks of life. This paper researches this very fact and will also investigate the effects of demographic disparity in the wake of the genocide Rwanda. Additionally, it will throw light on the role of women in Rwanda at present in its economical, social and political development, especially after the 1994 genocide in this African country. To realize the positive effect on empowered women in the present Rwandan setup; factors that played an important role in the 1994 massacre have to be understood. The Rwandan population composes of 85 % Hutu, 14 % Tutsi and 1% Twa tribe. The Twa are native of Rwanda and are different from the influential Hutu and Tutsi. All three tribes are racially the same; Twa finding economics from forestry; although, deforestation and indifferent behavior from other tribes have isolated them. They were placed in the lowest cast in the Rwandan culture after the involvement of Hutu/Tutsi tribe and the German/Belgium colonization. By tradition, the main fields of Hutu and Tutsi were agriculture and cattle herding respectively. Both tribes have different features and share the same race. People of the Hutu tribe are bulky, short and with round faces whereas, people from Tutsi tribe are taller, with a lighter skin-tone and elliptical faces. The physical features of Tutsis match the old Ethiopians (History, 2010). Men have, historically, been powerful positions than women in Rwanda. Even though, the work has been shared by both in the agriculture sector; sharing the field clearing and daily work load between men and women respectively. The care of livestock was done by men, along with younger men in the society. Although women seek business in the market, males oversee the outside-home activities, leaving the women to handle house chores and the children upbringing. Marriage is the basic building block of society and the raising of children in Rwanda is considered to be a sign of affluence and influence. Therefore, these women are under increasing pressure to marry and bear children. Women enjoy a fair share of socio-political power, which is an astonishing fact, keeping in mind the status of men and women in the Rwandan society. Saying all this, men still have the major share of power and public offices. The role of women in politics was minimized by the colonies (History, 2010) The Twa tribe was suppressed by both the Hutu and the Tutsis. Both these tribes did not permit intermarriages with the Twa people; even when allowing them among themselves. Because of these intermarriages the divide, that there was, between the Hutu and the Tutsis was eliminated to a minimum extent. Post colonization, social status was of more essence than that of the race itself (History, 2010). Even still, the Belgium and Germans under the colonial time-period functioned on the principle of ruling the colony with the existing power structure. They thought that the power can be divided on the lines of ethnicity. Therefore, for political power, the existing Belgium higher-ups placed great importance on ethnic divide by using things like different identification cards. Their polar-policies widened the gap between the Tutsi minority and the Hutu majority. Many historians claim that these policies initiated ethnic violence and set up a deadly encounter that parallels the harm of the holocaust (History, 2010). The missile that shot down president Habalimana,s airplane was the trigger to the 1994 massacre. The ground-to-air missile that brought down plane of Rwandan president, Juvenal Habyalimana, killing him, was the first salvo that started the 1994 Rwandan genocide. Consequently, Hutu killed 800,000 Tutsi people after accusing them for the conspiracy. When discussing the 1994 genocide, one cannot put aside the history, in which the Hutu tribe hunted down Tutsi men. This is believed to be the sole reason for not only tagged as a massacre but also gendercidal (Jones, 2002). Large quantity of Tutsi men were murdered by Hutu fundamentalists. Also grouse actions were done to the Tutsi women while the men were forced to watch. A very handful amount of Tutsi men survive by fleeing to neighboring countries like Congo and Zaire. The rape of women in this whole episode was Throughout the carnage of this genocide-gendercide, the victimization of Tutsi women through rape and mutilation at the hands of extremist Hutu was astonishing. Bijleveld, Morssinkhof, & Smeulers (2009) believe the rapes were carried out as a plan to destroy the Titsu community. According to Neugebauer, Fisher, Turner, Yamabe, & Sarsfield (2009), the mutilation of body parts was so horrendous, that many Tutsi people tried to save themselves by hiding under the dead bodies. Neugebauer et al (2009) claim that many of these people suffer from post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), especially women who witnessed murder of their own children. Widow women also faced many difficulties including rape. The fact that shows the ugly truth is the 2000 illegal children that were born as a result to these rapes in the genocide (Elizabeth, 1997). These children, who are often referred as “devil’s children, are claimed to be Hutu, even when being born of Tutsi mothers. Elizabeth (1997) reports, that rejection of these children is a common practice. Even with all the said social and moral issues, seem to have long-lasting effect on the Rwandan society. One such effect is the high demographic inequality as there are more women (80%) than men (20%) (History, 2010). One of the most devastating effect is polygamy, in simple words husband or men sharing, as there are less number of men available for marriage, causing high number of HIV cases in Rwanda (History, 2010). Women’s psychology in the aftermath of the genocide played a significant role in the progress of Rwanda as these victims became the main source of income. These women knew that the fate of Rwanda is in their hands. As a result, women today in Rwanda are the spearhead of Rwanda’s economic, social and political development. Rwanda, now is a great example to follow for developing countries; proving the manner in which stability can be brought to the devastate country by the empowerment of women. Women are no more, just house runners, because of a huge gap drawn as the actual inherent of these lands died in the genocide. Due to international aid and help, entrepreneurialism spread widely among the Rwandese women, the country moved forward. Today, the Rwandese women are a force to reckon with, running the country’s economy, industries, business and a lot many other departments. It is claimed by researchers, that compare to men, women are better investors, more keen at learning modern techniques. They are, statistically, more prone to invest their profit on the family structure of their country. These include family, education, nutrition and improving living standards (Scholer, Domeisen, & Hulm 2007). Rwanda is also dented by urbanization, as a major chink of the population inhibits the city life. The mass effect of women running the country is visible without any effort. It is not an unusual sight in Rwanda, that women are seen working in factories, construction sites and even taxi-driving. Old traditions still run in the streets of Rwanda, even with this population imbalance. 55 % of the government is composed of women, an act accomplished by the current president Kagame and his social engineering techniques. He is considered as pro-women policy maker. Some of the policies establish the rule that, 30% seats in the cabinet and parliament will be composed of women. The remaining 70 % are for both men and women through open elections. Due to this, Rwanda was the first country to boast a women majority parliament in the world, having 56 out of every 100. Some of the major positions like Supreme Court Chief, education minister, foreign minister, police commissioner general, and even the speaker of the house are held by women. These women while walking in the power corridors have ensured the abolishing of laws that have suppressed women in their country for ages. Many laws have been changed to return balance to the men-women relationship regarding domestic violence and laws like husbands authority on bank loans for women. Moreover, policies have been devised which emphasize greatly on education, population, HIV/AIDS and contraceptive programmes. Conclusion The fact that so much change in such small time-frame is not understate to the common logic; while the world was going on its normal routine, 800,000 of Rwanda’s men were killed in just about a 100 days. The massacre of 1994, was indeed a huge crime against the human race and just like in the case of the holocaust, the world and its inhabitants must confront this injustice and make sure that it never happens again. This is a true lesson for any leader who thinks suppressions, discrimination and helplessness of a specific part of society is the way to go. The speech of Ethiopian emperor, Haile Selassie, in 1963 at the forum of UN, where he told a hard truth, world peace cannot be achieved unless there is brought equality amongst the different ethnic and social groups. Countries in the aftermath of such a cruelty are most likely to fall apart; sadly, in this case, women saw a window of opportunity and grabbed it with both hands. The Rwandese women proved it to the world and especially to the women of developing countries, that women are no lesser to men. Additionally, they demonstrated that if they have a platform o work from, they can steer the male dominant system to a more balanced society. The policies these women made, not only benefited women but as a whole positively affected family, communities and societies. Still, Rwanda is long away from rebuilding completely, this shift in the balance of power towards women amends the thinking ways of boys in this present era for a long lasting time. This not only dents the way of thinking for boys about their mothers and sisters, it also is a thought provoking act for developing countries who are looking for ways to come out strong from a disaster in their past or present. . Read More