- The Guardian
- Issue #2167
A woman is set to be Japan’s first female Prime Minister. A woman has won the Nobel Peace Prize. Wow! The so-called ‘glass ceiling’ is being broken – or so cheer some feminists. But should we be cheering? Let’s take a closer look at these women who are breaking the glass ceiling and the position of women in Australia and capitalist society.
Sanae Takaichi is President of the conservative, ruling Liberal Democratic Party in Japan, and likely Prime Minister at the time of writing. She does not have women’s interests at heart. Far from it, her idol is union-bashing, privatising, former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. “Takaichi is one of the powerful political opponents to efforts to achieve a gender equal Japan and advance women’s human rights,” Japanese Communist Party (JCP) Executive Committee Chair Tamura Tomoko said.
The JCP warns that Takaichi will cause a serious setback in Japan’s politics with the danger of the destruction of social welfare programs and people’s livelihoods, the runaway military buildup policy, the trampling of the Constitution and democracy, as well as the backlash against gender equality. She visits the Yasukuni Shrine, celebrating its role in glorifying Japan’s past war of aggression every year on 15 August, the anniversary of the end of WW2, as well as on other occasions.
Conservative Venezuelan opposition politician María Corina Machado won the Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts to overthrow Venezuela’s progressive government and leader Nicolás Maduro. In response to the award, Machado said the prize was “an impetus to conclude our task: to conquer freedom.”
“We are on the threshold of victory and today more than ever we count on President Trump, the people of the United States, the peoples of Latin America, and the democratic nations of the world as our main allies to achieve freedom and democracy.” This is at a time when Trump is building the US military presence along the coast of Venezuela and bombing Venezuelan vessels – illegal acts under international law.
Glass ceilings are broken from time to time. However, when such reactionary women are promoted or rewarded, at best it sets back the struggle for women’s liberation. Australia still has one of the most highly gender-segregated workforces of any Western nation. While there have been some important gains in female-dominated workforces such as significant wage rises for aged care workers, the gender pay gap is still far from closed.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics’ data on average earnings for men and women reveals a whopping $488 gap in average weekly earnings. This gap of just over 27% arises in part from the segregated nature of the workforce, but also because women are more likely to work part-time, experience casual work. They are less likely to be offered or be able to do paid overtime.
Women are more likely to be unpaid carers and take more time off work to raise a family. Early childhood education and care (ECEC) remain unaffordable for women in low paid jobs. Reforms are urgently needed to facilitate the entry of women to higher paid work, to higher education studies, and access to ECEC which should be free and provided by the not-for-profit public sector.
The struggle for women’s rights and liberation will not be won by breaking the glass ceiling under capitalism. Nor will equality with men who are also exploited under capitalism achieve those aims. Women’s liberation can only be won by the united struggle of trade unions and other left and progressive forces, by men and women fighting to overthrow the oppressive and exploitative system of capitalism that uses gender as well as race to split the working class.
