Households around the world have shifted structurally from a breadwinner/homemaker model to dual-income earning arrangements. What this trend means for marital power has been a contested issue among scholars. Most studies suggest that household power is determined by a complex interplay between each spouse's economic contributions to the household and existing gender norms. Few scholars, however, have examined how this interplay is worked out under particular political-economic conditions. Responding to the dearth of research on the developing world in this area, (...) the author examines a community in Costa Rica where neo-liberal economic restructuring has led to an increase in women's informal work and a decrease in men's income-earning power. Drawing from ethnographic and interview data on married life in Costa Rica, the author analyzes the effect that these trends have on marital power and the division of household labor. The author argues that changing economic circumstances may blur the traditional gender boundaries in Costa Rican households but they do not necessarily erase them. (shrink)

This article presents a theoretical framework that views interpersonal power as interdependent with broader structures of gender and class inequalities. In contrast to oversimplified, gender-neutral or gender-static approaches, this approach illuminates the ways that structures of inequality are expressed in ideological hegemonies, which enhance, legitimate, and mystify the interpersonal power of privileged men relative to lower-status men and women in general. The discussion centers on how the relational construction of ascendant and subordinated masculinities provide men with different modes of interpersonal (...) power that, when exercised, construct and reaffirm interclass male dominance. Examples of how the construction of femininity can undermine women's interpersonal power and implications for other forms of masculinities and femininities are discussed. Examples are drawn from an analysis of conjugal power in the accounts of remarried individuals' first and second marriages to illustrate the main points of this perspective. (shrink)

Based on a series of interviews with blue-collar women and their husbands in Istanbul, Turkey, this article examines the negotiation of family work in households in which the wives are major providers. The relationships between provider status, women's expectations, and the actual configuration of family work are complexly mediated by cultural constructions, perception of women as providers, marital dynamics, and extended family relationships. Three different discourses characterize family work. Woman's evaluation of her husband as “responsible” or “irresponsible” informs the construction (...) of the male role in the household. Conflict is heightened when men default on both domestic and economic grounds. This study makes a contribution toward a comparative understanding of negotiation of family work by providing an analysis of how structural conditions and cultural ideology interact to construct a gendered division of family work in the household in the context of continuities and discontinuities in sociocultural patterns. (shrink)

Based on in-depth interviews with 18 Korean immigrant working couples, this study explores Korean immigrant working wives' ongoing challenge to male dominance at home and to the unequal division of family work. A main factor in wives' being less obedient to their husbands is their psychological resources such as pride, competence, and honor, which they gain from awareness of their contribution to the family economy. Under immigrant family circumstances in which working for family survival is prioritized, wives feel that their (...) negligence of family work, rejection of the superwoman ideal, and perceived right to demand their husbands' help with family work is legitimized. However, Confucian patriarchal beliefs lead these wives to place limits on the degree of challenge. The findings highlight the interplay of wives' psychological resources, gender norms, and the social standing of being immigrant families in affecting wives' challenge to gender inequality at home. Differences in effects among Korean immigrant families are explored. (shrink)