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90 Women in the Economy (MWG-011)
The proponents of modernization theory consider life in ‘traditional’ societies to limit women’s
resource access, decision-making power, and work role options. They claim that modernization
improves women’s situation by expanding their occupational choices and by increasing their material
security.
Advocates of Marxist feminist theory on the other hand, hold that women’s well-being deteriorates
with the advent of class-based, capitalist society.
Modernization theory to a large extent explains female labor force participation in terms of supply
side factors like individual choices and preferences. It tends to attribute women’s inability to enter and
to remain in remunerated employment to factors that limit the supply of qualified and interested
female workers.
Marxist feminist theory emphasizes structural factors over which women have little control. It
emphasizes conditions that restrict the capitalist system’s demand for female labor. The explanation
provided by the Marxist perspective is more near to the realities of women in the developing countries
but not sufficient.
We need to combine the realistic explanation provide by Marxist theory about structural condition
and demand side factors and the social and psychological factors affecting supply of women labor as
developed by the development list to understand the complex reality of women’s labor.