by Peggy Antrobus

Edited from a letter (July 28, 1988) offered to The New Yorker.

Congratulations on your article on the Debt Crisis in the July 4th issue. I like the irony of the article being published on the occasion of this country's celebration of its Independence - although I doubt that many Americans would see the connection between this event and the struggle of Third World governments to have some control over their own policies. But the people on whom the burden of IMF conditionalities have been shifted are the poor women, and they don't have much say in anything. Which is why our governments can accept the conditions, without risking instant revolution.

At the Nairobi Conference marking the end of the UN Decade for Women, Latin America women chanted: we didn't ask for the loans; we didn't benefit from them; we are not going to pay them. For it is at the level of the most marginalized members of our societies that the full impact of macroeconomic policies are felt.

Of course, these women are not the only ones negotiating with the IMF, or the banks - if they were, we would not have these endless debates about whether, or how, the debt is to be paid. But they are certainly the group paying the price of those loans, often with the blood of their children. In most of the countries which have adopted the policies (structural adjustment) being urged on governments by the international financial institutions (with the backing of the US government, which has such influence with them) malnutrition and infant mortality rates have risen as subsidies on basic food items have been cut, currencies devalued, and unemployment (especially among women) increased with the cut-backs in social services.

While your article, in quoting Brazilian labor leader Luis Ignacio Silva's statements at the Havana Debt Conference, made reference to the effects of this 'silent war' on Third World countries, not sufficient attention is paid to the particular impact on women; and on the implications of this for the whole society.

The particular policy mix includes cuts in government's expenditures on social services such as health, education and social security, as well as on roads and low-income housing; the removal of subsidies on food, and imposition of charges, or steep price increases on basic services such as water; and steady and steep devaluations of the currency. This policy mix jeopardizes poor women in three ways: by simultaneously reducing their access to income and services while increasing the demands on their time to fill the gaps created by the cuts in social services.

The interrelation of women's productive and reproductive roles means that social services are an essential part of what makes it possible for women to continue to be productive in the economy. Indeed, because of the intricate linkages between production and reproduction, these policies have serious implications for the medium and llong-term performance of many Third World economies. It is a point that is often overlooked by governments and their economic advisors. They seem to forget that production is a function not only of capital, technology and markets, but also of the physical, psychological and intellectual capacity of the labor force - and that these attributes are determined in the sphere of reproduction.

That people survive at all in this devastating situation, is largely due to the survival strategies, often devised and adopted by women. UNICEF (the only major international agency to pay attention to the social consequences of the Debt Crisis, in its publication of case studies from ten countries - Adjustment with a Human Face) has classified these strategies as those aimed at increasing incomes; an increasing number of women seeking wage work, increased involvement in formal sector activities (including those that are illegal or illicit); those aimed at reducing expenditures: adjustments in diet, decreased utilization of basic goods such as food and clothing, decreased utilization of health and education services, increased use of family land to grow food; increased dependence on family support systems: remittances from abroad, and increasing the size of the households as people move into already over-crowded accommodation in order to save rent; and of course, migrate.

But the crisis also affects the lives of women in other ways: the incidence of violence against women has increased in many societies, along with the general level of violence, as governments resort to increasingly repressive measures to quell legitimate social protest. This in turn, has implications for democratic institutions, and for popular participation. Of course, it is also women's ability to cope that acts as a cushion against even more devastating consequences, which might provoke stronger action on the part of poor communities. In fact, this has broken down m many countries as women have began to lead the protest against these inhuman macro-economic policies.

This type of (gender) analysis helps to illuminate both the linkages between the economic crisis and its social, cultural and political consequences, as well as possible alternative approaches to this crisis. In fact, it has been suggested that it is precisely the failure to recognize that vital link between women's reproductive and productive roles which leads to the institution of policies which have such a devastating effect on the whole society in the short-run, and threaten the long-term social, economic and political development of Third World countries. In short, by failing to take account of women's role in socio-economic development and the impact of women's role in socio-economic development and the impact of these policies on them, structural adjustment policies actually exacerbate the problems they seek to resolve.

However, I have been arguing recently that, far from overlooking the important role played by women in the socioeconomic life of Third World countries, the policies of structural adjustment are based on a deeply gendered ideology which simultaneously minimizes the value of the tasks necessary for social reproduction (women's traditional roles) while promoting a pattern of economic growth based on the exploitation (by multinational corporations) of the socio-economic vulnerabilities of a female population which bears major responsibility for both nurturance and financial support of children.

And here lies the ultimate irony: what Latin America women term the 'super-exploitation' of women may be, the logical consequence of all our efforts at drawing attention to the important role of women in development. For in the name of 'efficiency' governments are now prepared to save money on services in the confidence that the women will somehow cope. "Leave it to the women" has become the new path to our 'empowerment'.

Source: Concerning Women and Development 4/88 Women and Development Unit Extra Mural Dept U.W.I. Barbados