Gender equality

In Russia, the anarchists began to fight for gender equality. In the program of the Slavic section of the International and the “Revolutionary Catechism”, the famous anarchist M. A. Bakunin demanded the complete political and social equation of a woman with a man, as well as the replacement of his modern family, legalized religious and legal marriage, free marriage. Bakunin also demanded the destruction of family law and inheritance law. He advocated social guarantees for mother and child for the period from conception to adulthood. MA Bakunin considered the struggle for higher education as the leitmotif of the women's movement. For this purpose, women's circles were organized in Russia in the 19th century, and societies of translators, publishers, bookbinders and typographers were created. Women sought the opening of higher female courses ^[3] .

Russian anarchists also fought to free women from housework. Prince Peter Alekseevich Kropotkin wrote about a woman like this ^[3] :

She no longer wants to be the beast of her home; it’s enough from her that she has devoted so many years of her life to raising children. She does not want to be a cook, dishwasher, maid in the house anymore !. It was supposed to free women by the mechanization of the household, the opening of institutions of public services and catering, canteens for each group of houses. “To free a woman,” wrote P. A. Kropotkin, “does not mean opening the doors of a university, court or parliament to her; because a liberated woman always dumps domestic work on some other woman. To free a woman means to save her from the stupid labor of the kitchen and laundry; it means to get settled in such a way as to give her the opportunity, while feeding and raising her children, at the same time, to have enough free time to take part in public life. ”

Russia is one of the first countries in the world to legally and officially proclaim equality of rights for men and women in 1917. The Great October Socialist Revolution gave women equal legal rights with men, since equality was proclaimed a universal proletarian idea.

The conditions for a genuine solution to this issue were created for the first time in history in Soviet Russia. In the very first months of the existence of Soviet power, all laws that enshrined the inequality of women were repealed. The resolution on the formation of a workers' and peasants' government, adopted by the 2nd All-Russian Congress of Soviets [October 25–27 (November 7–9) 1917, provided for the participation of workers' organizations, along with other mass organizations, in government administration.

The political equality of women was enshrined in the first Soviet constitution (1918). A number of acts of 1917-1918, the Soviet government completely equalized a woman with a man in labor law, civil, family and marriage rights, in the field of education, took measures to protect female labor, motherhood and infancy, and enshrined the principle of equal pay for equal work. As a result of the creation of socialist production relations, the industrialization of the country and the collectivization of agriculture, the cultural revolution, the de facto equality of women and men was achieved in Soviet society (especially great difficulties had to be overcome in the struggle for the emancipation of women in the Soviet East, where centuries-old traditions of slavish people stood in its way position of a woman).

Women's rights are fixed in article 122 of the 1936 Constitution of the USSR :

"Women in the USSR are granted equal rights with men in all areas of economic, state, cultural and socio-political life."

In the 1977 Constitution of the USSR, equality of men and women is fixed in article 35:

A woman and a man have equal rights in the USSR. The exercise of these rights is ensured by providing women with opportunities equal to men in obtaining education and vocational training, in work, in remuneration for it and promotion of work, in socio-political and cultural activities, as well as special measures for the protection of labor and women's health; creating conditions that allow women to combine work with motherhood; legal protection, material and moral support for motherhood and childhood, including the provision of paid leave and other benefits to pregnant women and mothers, a gradual reduction in the working time of women with young children.

The increasing diversified state assistance to the mother mother has provided the woman with the opportunity to exercise these rights. The network of institutions created to protect mothers and children has grown from year to year. In 1971, 9.5 million children were in permanent kindergartens and nurseries (4.5 thousand in 1914). In 1956, maternity leave was increased from 77 to 112 days. Old-age pensions were granted to a woman 5 years earlier than men and with less (5 years) work experience (mothers with many children enjoyed additional pension benefits).

In the USSR, respect for a woman as an equal and active citizen of a socialist state is deeply rooted. Women (53.9% of the USSR population at the beginning of 1971) made up 51% in 1970 of the number of workers and employees employed in the national economy of the country (24% in 1928), 48% of workers employed in industry. Among the specialists with higher and secondary specialized education in 1968, there were 58% of women (with higher education 52%, with secondary specialized education - 63%), and their number increased 58 times in comparison with 1928. 31% of engineers, 38% of technicians, 72% of doctors (10% before the revolution), 69% of teachers and cultural workers, 39% of scientists are women (1968). Among the deputies of the Supreme Soviet of the 8th convocation elected on June 14, 1970, 463 were women (30.5%; among the deputies of the Supreme Council of the 1st convocation elected in 1937, there were 16.5% of them). Women make up 45.8% of the deputies of the local Councils of Workers' Deputies (elections of 1971). Scientific and technological progress contributes to the liberation of women from domestic work and their further involvement in productive and social activities ^[4] .

Since the end of the XIX century. in the world, the process of granting the right to vote to women along with men is actively starting;

• 1893 - New Zealand and then Australia were the first to recognize women as citizens by vesting them with suffrage;
• 1906-1907 - Finland (within the Russian Empire) and Norway ;
• 1915 - Denmark ;
• 1917 - Russia ;
• 1918 - Germany , Sweden , Great Britain ;
• 1920 - USA ;
• 1944 - France ;
• 1945 - Italy ;
• 1971 - Switzerland .

By 1998, women had the right to vote almost everywhere except in five countries in the Middle East ( Bahrain , Kuwait , Oman , Qatar , Saudi Arabia ) and in the Sultanate of Brunei ^[3] .

In Norway, there is the Nordic Gender Equality Institute (founded in 1970 with the support of the Nordic Council of Ministers), which finances equal opportunity projects.

Critics of this concept, citing the basic postulates, argue that the concept of equality is the provision of equal opportunities for everyone . Critics of the concept of gender equality consider it virtually impossible, because “a man and a woman are built perfectly apart, not only physiologically, but also mentally” ^[5] , and therefore “there can’t be any kind of“ equality ”, since a man cannot be happy if society forces him to do what women love: to go shopping, buy elegant clothes, decorate her face with cosmetics, take care of children, and bring comfort to the house. A woman, in turn, will not be happy if society compels her to perform purely male work: to cut down forests, repair cars, and operate a bulldozer. ” However, proponents of the theory of gender equality argue that this opinion is due to patriarchal education for many generations and a great influence on the human perception of anti-scientific theories, stereotypes, and public opinion. According to some sociologists, in modern society the prevailing opinion is that the psyche, behavioral motives and way of thinking depend on gender.

Critics of the concept of equality, recognizing in general terms the essence of the concept, however give a different definition: Equality of the sexes is the possibility of development of a woman as a woman, and men as men. ^[6] .

Also, critics, responding to the demands of feminist supporters to grant women equal rights with men, object that it is not typical for a proactive and self-confident person to sit back and insist that he was infringed on his rights. Although such a person will be aware that political, professional and economic separation has always been, is and will be, since this is the essence of human civilization, he is unlikely to focus on this inequality, but will achieve his goals ^[7] .

In the treatise Democracy in America , a 19th-century French humanist and thinker Alexis de Tocqueville stated:

There are people who strive not only for equality, but also for the identity of men and women. By endowing both with the same rights, they impose the same duties on them. They want men and women to work together and have fun equally. It is clear that nothing good will come of such “egalitarianism,” but all this will lead to mutual degradation, to “weak men and indecent women” ^[8] .

In 2015, a report was published in Pakistan on the status of women in today's world, prepared by the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, better known as UN Women ^[9] .

One of the central issues of the report was the issue of women's employment. According to the authors of the report, despite the fact that the number of women with higher education has reached a historic maximum, the situation with their employment looks deplorable. Finishing with honors, young girls can’t find work, although they are increasingly ahead of young people, especially in such disciplines as medicine and mathematics . Even those who managed to get a job can not always feel confident due to social insecurity. This issue is especially acute in developing countries, where women occupy 75 percent of positions not protected by legal obligations on the part of the employer.

The report notes that in developed countries, the situation of gender equality is also far from ideal. For example, in Sweden and France, women earn 31 percent less than men, in Germany 49 percent less, and in Turkey the difference in wages is as much as 75 percent. According to the authors of the report, the main measures to combat gender inequality should be to ensure that women around the world have the right to good work.

• Suffragists
• Women's suffrage
• Gender law
• European Charter on Equality between Women and Men in Public Life
• Feminism
• Sexism

• Antonov A.I., Medkov V.M. Sociology of the family. - M., 1996.
• Volkov A.G. Family - an object of demography. - M., 1986.
• Zider R.I. Social history of the family in Western and Central Europe (late XVIII — XX centuries). - M., 1997.
• Kovalev S.V. Psychology of the modern family: Information and methodological materials for the course "Ethics and Psychology of Family Life": A book for the teacher. - M., 1988.
• Tyugashev E.A., Popkova T.V. - M., 2002.