Rural Women's Power in South Asia:

Understanding Shakti

P. Obeng

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9781137320759
• eBook ISBN: 9781137320766
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Social Sciences

This book investigates how women's power and caste cleavages often continue to transcend and crosscut the boundaries of caste/tribe, gender, age, class and religion in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh It examines the gendered divisions of labor in rural communities and how countervailing forces have restricted women's status and roles in South Asia.

1

Introduction

Over the past two decades in India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan, economic expansion and rapid changes in industrial, agricultural, and information technology have led to a reconstitution of these countries’ social hierarchies, a reconstitution that has also affected class, caste, and (particularly germane to this study) gendered divisions of labor in the rural communities of South Asia.

In this book, I explore how rural South Asian women of various ages use the social and material resources available to them to respond to, transcend, or subvert those hierarchies and the power structures that support them. I also examine, through a series of individual profiles and case studies, how such women use their gender, tribe, class, caste, and age to publicly articulate forms of power and negotiate with or challenge systems of oppression around them. The framework I use will benefit policy makers and social theorists because it takes the experiences of poor rural women in their daily social interactions seriously.

Scholarship on the highly pluralistic societies of India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh tends to group citizens by their countries’ major and minor religions. It often ignores or minimally addresses people’s “contested role[s], status, and legal rights” (Lawrence 1994: 163).

In the present work, I explore some of these very issues, in particular the ways that rural women in South Asia craft and deploy their power at the intersections of, on the one hand, their countries’ efforts to create equality for their respective citizens and, on the other, entrenched countervailing forces of caste, ageism, class, gender, and religion. In addition, the women profiled in this work are divided into two groups: those between the ages of 20 and 60 and those aged above 60 (referred to as “seniors” by India’s Ministry of Labour and Employment).

Through research into India’s democratizing efforts, their impact on rural women, and the women’s differing responses to those measures and to similar efforts in Pakistan and Bangladesh, this comparative study on the deployment of South Asian women’s power (called shakti in this book; see my explanation below) focuses on women’s lived experiences and how the women studied mobilize the new resources now available to them for personal advancement.

Shakti is the Sanskrit word for the embodiment of female divine creative power and the agent of change and nurturing (Harish and Harishankar 2003); shakti also connotes the power of the female deity of motherly strength and energy and the force to restore balance. A person who holds power is considered to be a shaktiman (Woodroffe 1918). In this work, I use the term shakti to mean “female power,” and I investigate the various forms of shakti in the contemporary context of rural South Asia to

(1) assess sociohistorical impacts on women’s status and roles there,

(2) analyze how women understand and embrace new governmental and nongovernmental (NGO) opportunities, as well as information and technological advances, to rework their roles, and

(3) use these findings to clarify and develop a conceptual framework for understanding various constructions and articulations of the power and influence of rural women in the Global South.

I begin with a brief survey of relevant theories of power in order to explore rural women’s lived experiences and notions of women’s power (shakti) within the multiple centers of patriarchy and other social inequalities in South Asia. The study illuminates an array of rural women’s negotiations to deploy local manifestations of female power within the broader context of South Asia.

Foucault (1977) argues that power is “diffuse” and “productive” and that it relies on social relations and diverse points of resistance. Giddens (1984), following Foucault, contends that power plays out in a complex social context in which human agency and social structures have intertwining relationships. The interconnection between agency and social relations requires that we understand how the powerless may resist their exploitation or acquiesce because they have internalized a distorted consciousness that favors a dominant individual or group (Lukes 2005). Bourdieu (1977) also contends that, though marginalized people may not wield formal power, they have the capacity to disempower those who hold traditional power and influence; in some cases, for example (he argues), the marginalized choose not to obey the powerful. Hence, he points to the power of the powerless who use forms of resistance.

Powerlessness, according to Gaventa (2006), is rooted in social inequality and failed or ineffective social solutions. In the same paper, Gaventa proposes a theory of power that I find fruitful for my discussion of how South Asian rural women deploy various forms of formal and informal power. Gaventa (2006: 23–33) points out that

[p]ower “over” refers to the ability of the powerful to affect the actions and thought of the powerless. The power “to” is important for the capacity to act; to exercise agency and to realise the potential of rights, citizenship or voice. Power “within” often refers to gaining the sense of self-identity, confidence and awareness that is a precondition for action. Power “with” refers to the synergy which can emerge through partnerships and collaboration with others, or through processes of collective action and alliance building.

I use Gaventa’s categories of power to inform how I explore the ways in which power unfolds in people’s social relationships and the extent to which women manifest their transformative power (Giddens 1984). For example, I draw attention to rural women’s ability to choose, amidst obstacles, resources for consciousness-raising to unlock their capacity to empower themselves as well as those who benefit from the services they offer.

I also use Clegg’s (1989) theory of power, which addresses the dispositional, episodic, and facilitative dimensions of power, to investigate the different grades of strength, determination, and capacity to achieve results, honor, dignity, and courage, as women put up resistance, in order to elucidate shakti as it is crafted and made manifest by the women profiled. According to Clegg (1989), there are three forms of power: the episodic, in which rules, forms, and resources are changed in social interactions; the dispositional, which entails the social construction of meaning attached to roles and membership in an institution; and the facilitative, which deals with how resources, networks, and the environment may be used to empower or disempower an agent.

In this work, I further use a theoretical formulation that addresses “the voices and causes of differently situated women” (Subramaniam 2009; Shaheed 2010: 95) in rural India. This conceptual tool enables us to understand the mutual influences of the interlocking and overlapping spheres of economics, caste, social ideologies, and sexual hierarchies and politics, and how they are subject to (Bourque and Warren 1981: 211) rural women’s manipulation in their everyday social interactions.

I also draw insights from Oommen (1970) to address power as expressed by community leaders and segments of society called “power reservoirs” that shape decision-making processes, though not necessarily in the same ways as those who have formal public power. Based on Oommen’s views, I investigate how rural women use their informal networks as a critical resource to advance their goals. I also explore forms of power centers and patterns of relationships, including embedded “hidden transcripts” (Scott 1990), among rural women.

The present work also focuses on how women create social spaces and formulate discourses based on their notions of matters of exclusion, economic and political participation, and access to resources (Bourque and Warren 1981). The discussion on resistance benefits from Mbembe (2001: 110), in his On the Postcolony, where he argues that resistance be understood and conceptualized as “the dynamics of domesticity and familiarity.” By implication, Mbembe argues that a person who resists articulates ways in which the dominant and the dominated vie for power within the same cultural space (Edmondson 2007: 6).

Although Mbembe contends that the dominated tend to avoid direct confrontation with their oppressor, it is also important to include Nyamnjoh’s perspective of “domesticated agency, whereby the person is engaged in negotiation, concession, and conviviality over maximization of pursuits by individuals or particular groups in contexts of plurality and diversity” (Nyamnjoh 2002: 116). The above perspectives help us understand how counterhegemonic actors express multiple notions of agency as they engage others in diverse domains of influence.

I now turn to local understandings of female power (shakti) that open up new ideas for constructing and classifying notions and processes of power based on diverse social relations.

1.1 Caste and tribal shakti (power)

Shakti describes the primordial female principle that pervades the universe. This work uses the shakti notion to provide an alternative way of conceptualizing power, gender, and caste relations in South Asia. Shakti is understood as the force that animates the universe and therefore all living entities. In humans, shakti is the ability to act, be compassionate, and have the courage to end injustice. The divine female principle, shakti, is a source of energy for shiva (Rajan 1998). In Shaktism it is equated with Brahman, the highest spiritual reality that pervades all existence. Also, in Shaivism (with devotion focused on Shiva) and Vaishnavism (with devotion focused on Vishnu), shakti is the feminine energy of the male divinities. According to Woodroffe (1918), shakti and shiva are twin aspects of one and the same reality. Shiva is the masculine unchanging aspect of divinity, while shakti is the fluid and changing aspect. In the text Devi Mahatmaya, shakti is manifested in all women. Therefore, they have the power to both nurture the world and destroy evil forces. Thus, in the face of certain aspects of Brahminic traditions that are perceived as being oppressive in terms of caste and gender, it is the philosophical construct of the primordial female and nonpatriarchal traditions that has been deemed liberating throughout Indian religious history. Shakti can dwell in people; therefore every person’s total freedom can be achieved when she or he develops and uses the female principle. The process of reaching this is described as the union between shiva and shakti (Rajan 1998). The unmanifest shiva–shakti is knowable only in the ecstasy of yoga.

In some contexts shakti is manifested in both destructive and creative ways to “sustain the universe” (Gold 1994: 26). It is a form of dynamic power that unfolds within social relations (Foucault 1977; Dowding 1991; Allen 1999) and structures to generate ongoing self-empowerment and empowerment for others as it calls attention to systemic challenges.

It is in the lives of the ordinary rural women discussed in this work that the divine, creative energy takes its concrete form and shape. While shakti can be attained through austere living or ascetic practices, the women profiled in this study actualize their shakti by their courageous actions, determination, and insistence on justice for all. When shakti is drawn upon by these women of lower-caste communities and religious minorities, they are able to enlarge the concept of the female power as they manifest their own agency to improve their conditions in contemporary South Asia. The feminine transformative force, according to Rajan, can be appealed to and used to contest and subvert religious and patriarchal hierarchies (Rajan 1998: 38). Shakti as used in this work, though a Hindu religious idiom, does not privilege one religion over another in the struggle for women’s emancipatory efforts. Rather, shakti is used as a metaphor to describe and interpret the multiple ways in which women may deploy their influence to advance themselves in their communities (Rajan 1998: 34–38). Thus, in the current study, I borrow from notions of shakti to comment on how South Asian women embody the animating feminine principle by being strong leaders and teachers, bearers, and transmitters of culture and knowledge. In tangible ways, the women symbolize the energy and spiritual power present in the divine procreative act between shiva and shakti.

In the present work, “power” embraces respect, honor, dignity, courage, the capacity to get things done, and “weight,” such as positive influence. Power, shakti, connotes a powerholder, a shaktiman (as already mentioned). Depending on contexts, gaurava (Sanskrit for respect, importance, pride, power), vajen (Marathi for “weight” or courage), izzath (in Hindi/Urdu), and manndenscho (respect) and dairadith (courage) are words that are used to describe power. The last two are in Konkani, a language spoken in parts of Goa, Mangalore, Bangalore, and areas in North Karnataka; they are words some rural Karnataka Indians use to describe power and influence. For example, in describing the power of a woman in one village, the Siddis speaking Konkani used the words dairadith and the Muslims izzath.

The publicly articulated policies of empowerment in India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan seem to suggest that political power is conferred rather than achieved or acquired. The interlocutors of power are often not chosen by women and in general are imposed on the people being assisted. So it is important to use a fruitful model for exploring rural women’s power in order to unearth the rich and complex shakti that has historically been situated at the formal or informal sociopolitical and economic locations of present-day South Asia.

1.2 Literature review

Scholars of South Asia have used various theories of social hierarchies to address the complex and multiple domains of power at work in India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan (Agarwal 1994; Chowdhry 2004; Bhatt 2006). Batliwala (1996) and Kabeer (1999) have also called attention to “social power” that embraces “internal strength and confidence, collective organization, reflection and analytical skills, information, political participation, and knowledge” (Subramaniam 2006: 7).

The current work builds on these scholars’ insights to illuminate local notions of social power and the processes and systems within which women forge forms of shakti. It is here that I extend the discourse to include power structures and women engaged in constructing notions of honor, dignity, courage, respect, and authority to distribute power. This work, based on rural people’s understanding and practice, further helps us to reconceptualize social and private power as extensions of each other. Also, I examine specific ways in which some women perform a delicate dance as they expand and assert their shakti while operating within local understandings of femininity (Sa’ar 2006). (There are times, however, when some women in the exercise of shakti are seen and treated as deviants for overstepping the boundaries of socially acceptable behavior for women.)

Patriarchy has received much attention for how it is used to subordinate women (Bourque and Warren 1981; Basu 1992; Paul 1992; Visaria and Visaria 1996; Jejeebhoy 2002). In India’s highly stratified society, gender oppression is linked with other forms of exploitation based on caste, class, community, tribe, age, and religion. In such multiple hierarchies it is important to examine the complex articulation of different forms of patriarchy. Thus, Sangari and Vaid (1989) distinguish between the modern ways by which patriarchal systems subordinate women and the “democratizing of gender relations” to illuminate the potential and inherent contradictions in South Asian central governments’ democratizing and reform efforts.

I use gender analysis to compare information on the power relations between men and women in order to explore how social myths, legends, rituals, symbols, and language are used by the dominant to obtain an advantage in social relations (Clegg 1989; Lukes 2005). I then situate the discussion in the larger context of power as a complex and multilayered phenomenon that shifts in form and intensity (Gaventa 2006).

I also interrogate the discursive terms in which legendary women are folklorized and celebrated institutionally and in religious festivals as part of a community’s identity. I interpret and examine ways in which female heroic legends are contested in light of violence against women, covering all forms of coercion, including physical, sexual, verbal, and mental abuse. It is here that I draw insights from Bourdieu (1977), Giddens (1984), Clegg (1989), Agarwal (1994), and Gaventa (2003) to focus on women’s power to mobilize symbolic and real power to resist injustice.

The women profiled in this work include presidents of panchayats (a local system of governance) and member...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• Series Editor’s Preface
• 1 Introduction
• 2 History and Identity
• 3 Policies and Interventions
• 4 Governments, NGOs, Sanghas, and Female Entrepreneurs (20 to 60 Years of Age)
• 5 The Shakti of Senior Women (60 Years of Age and Older)
• 6 Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Index