Global Feminism and the World of WorkGlobal Feminism and the World of Work

Abstract

, Bahira SherifTrask situates women front and center within the context of an emerging global economy.Using feminist goals as a framework, she makes issues historically associated withwomen—for example, gender equity, women’s health, and sex trafficking—important towomen and men worldwide, and to the global transformation of society.The book is organized around work–family issues and women’s unique experiences within arestructuring of the global economy, which are discussed in the first seven chapters; the lastthree chapters are a consideration of policy responses in developing and industrializedcountries. Trask makes the case that women are central not only to social justice and equityissues, but also to economic workforce issues and to concerns about the world market andthe rapid growth of the digital age. Although work has always been central to the economy,Trask considers it now to be also central to women’s identities.Trask poses some provocative questions about how global social transformation involves theconvergence of economic and ideological issues associated with women and the world ofwork. The unprecedented growth in the number of women in the paid workforce throughoutthe world following World War II has been greater in North American and Western Europeancountries than in other countries worldwide, according to UN data.Trask raises some philosophical questions about this trend. She notes that work has movedfrom an issue of survival to one of choice for women in the 21st century; however, shequestions whether there is really a “choice.” Although the notion of “work as choice” is oftenviewed as empowerment and liberation for women within a feminist tradition, she notes that