Gender Issues & Problems in Government and Politics

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Let's take a closer look at some of the issue to address for these two interesting questions. I also attached two resources, some of which this response is drawn.

RESPONSE:

1. Gender Issues: Identify the attitude, values, and ideologies that tend to perpetuate gender inequality?

To explain gender inequality, sociologists point to the surrounding systems that affect all human behavior. Most theories highlight the institutional structures (i.e. patriarchal structure and ideology) that assign women and men different social positions, different roles, and consequently different behaviors that often result in gender inequality, with the males benefiting mostly.

For example, materialist theories explain "gender inequality using cross-cultural data on the status of women and men, explaining gender inequality as an outcome of how women and men are tied to the economic structure of society. Such theories stress control and distribution of valued resources as crucial facts in producing gender stratification." (http://www.delmar.edu/socsci/rlong/problems/chap-09.htm), Thus, attitudes towards the woman and man and their role in the economic structure perpetrate gender inequality through inequality in the distribution of valued resources. Often women are seen as caregivers and as a second income, so they are paid less for doing the same work. For example, these materialist theories point out "that women's roles of mother and wife, although vital to the well-being of society, are devalued and also deny women access to highly value public resources." They point out that gender stratification is greater where women's work is directed inward to the family and men's work is directed outward to trade and the marketplace (Eitzen, 2000:251 cited in http://www.delmar.edu/socsci/rlong/problems/chap-09.htm).

For example, when women do enter the labor markets, they are concentrated in lower-paying jobs. This is perpetrated through socialization and ideology where girls and socialized into believing they will be nurses, secretaries, etc. rather than high executives, doctors and lawyers. This is changing somewhat, but there is still gender inequalities. Women also enter the labor market later than men due to family responsibilities and often have to leave periodically because of child care responsibilities. To add to this, women have also historically had lower levels of education than men that also contributed to gender inequality in opportunities afforded by being educated as well as income level, but recently this trend seems ...