At a time when working from home, adopted at the height of the pandemic, is being presented as offering added flexibility for women in the workplace, G S Divya delves into the lived experiences of Malayali women in the IT sector to examine the patriarchal implications of ‘work-from-home’.
G S Divya
‘Women line up for firms offering WFH’ – Economic Times, July 29, 2022
‘Women are moving jobs for the work-from-home perk’ – Economic Times, March 8, 2022.
Above are the titles of online news articles that were published regarding work from home (hereafter WFH) during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. In popular writings and studies, WFH is often portrayed as an opportunity for IT (Information Technology) companies and workers, particularly for women (Ahuja 2003). An excerpt from an article in The Economic Times dated April 17, 2022, illustrates this interpretation by suggesting that WFH is the only viable choice for women to remain in the workforce, with more than 60% of women potentially leaving their jobs if a return to the office is enforced. Through these writings and reports, the narrative produced is that women prefer WFH, that it enhances women’s entry into the workforce, and that it helps to maintain a better work-life balance. Also, it has been considered a boon to women in a sector where 45% of women leave the workspace following the social norm that women must take care of the family (McKinsey 2013). Further, many multinational companies highlight work from home as a benefit provided to the employees, even at a cost to the employer (Mescher et.al, 2010).
However, my fieldwork data shows a contrasting account of this narrative. As part of a larger study, I spoke to middle-class, educated women IT professionals in Kerala across religion, caste, relationship status, and motherhood, yielding compelling insights that nuanced the WFH discourse. For example, Ishana, a 29-year-old Muslim woman IT employee, shared her WFH experience1:
With WFH, we had to get back to our village, where I feel stuck at home…I need permission either from my husband or in-laws even to visit my home…I feel trapped.
Although WFH has been a pre-existing practice in the IT industry, the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdown measures have resulted in a situation where WFH has evolved into a norm without leaving many choices for the employer and the employee. Three years since the height of the pandemic and even after vaccines have been rolled out, numerous IT companies have persisted with WFH arrangements, while others have adopted a hybrid model necessitating the simultaneous performance of duties from both home and the office.
In this context, where there exists a sharp contradiction in the popular narratives on WFH and in the lived experience of women IT professionals in Kerala, there is a need to unravel the WFH experience of women IT professionals in Kerala, focusing on their access to public spaces and social life.
The Kerala Context
The state of Kerala is widely known for its high female literacy rate. However, what has interested researchers for long is that women’s work participation rate—the percentage of the total workforce that comprises women—is quite low compared to other states of India (NSS 99-00). However, in recent years, in the IT sector, there has been an increase in the number of women entering the labour force (NASSCOM, 2018).
Socially, there has always been anxiety associated with women accessing public spaces in Kerala—the history of paid work among middle-class women substantiates this. Devika and Thampi (2011) have noted that since the nineteenth century, when educated middle-class women began working, spatiotemporal restrictions were placed upon them, and they faced restrictions and surveillance. Patriarchal norms and ideologies prioritised the home for women irrespective of their employment status. Measures were taken to prevent working women’s full integration into the public and political spheres. Chakravarti (1993) has explained this as a peculiar feature of Brahmanical patriarchy that controlled women’s sexuality and mobility, especially of the dominant-caste woman, who has always been an object of moral panic. Further, the loss of easily available unpaid labour for religious, ritual, and domestic work with women entering paid work has also been a subject of concern. Thus, despite paid work becoming a necessity and a status symbol, it was ensured that family and home continued as the first priority of working women. This contradiction is managed through narratives of ‘superwomen’ who do paid work, yet tirelessly prioritize the management of their families.
Studies have noted that, in such contexts, women themselves use different strategies with varying potential for active or passive resistance in the face of oppression—these strategies are termed ‘patriarchal bargains’ (Kandiyoti, 1988). Despite the double burden on working women, paid work nonetheless offers them opportunities, however limited, to negotiate better with structures of patriarchy, making the best use of their situations.
For instance, Sandhya, 34, remembers how she has managed to negotiate with the structures of patriarchy and associated restrictions in making use of her status as an employed woman in IT. Her family would initially object severely when she got back late from work on days of extended calls or team outings.2 For Sandhya’s family, the biggest concern was what the neighbours would think to see the daughter coming home so late. Gradually, she was able to make them understand that staying late is part of the work she is getting paid for, and that it is her duty to do the assigned work. Once her family understood her reasoning, she began to use it to stay back for her own needs for socialisation and networking. In her words,
I started saying that I was on a call or a team meeting when I hang out with friends and peers and get home late [laughs]…these ‘on-call’, ‘team-outing’, ‘appraisal’ kind of terms they are not very familiar with.
Despite the challenges and difficulties, work culture in the IT industry has enhanced the bargaining capacity of Malayali women in the household decision-making process and in changing their social status.
WFH or Long-Term Social Quarantine?
One of the important factors that led to the entry of women into paid work is the possibility of financial contribution, and most studies focus on this aspect. However, this has meant that the potential contribution of women’s work outside the home to their self-formation and social capital is frequently overlooked. For the women I spoke to, it is precisely these aspects that are lost out with the prevalence of WFH over the pandemic. When WFH created a situation where women could earn and work by sitting at home, the arrangement became the ideal mode of working as socially prescribed for a woman because it eliminated the chances of her going out to the public. This also further ensured the monitoring of her mobility and the control of her sexuality. Mainstream media narratives of WFH highlighted the ease of navigating between domestic chores, care work, and paid work so that the woman herself would be compelled to prioritise care work and household chores over work from office.
Ishana, 29, an IT employee who is married and lives with her in-laws, views working from home as a trap. Coming from a lower-middle-class Muslim family with conservative values in rural Kerala, Ishana sees work as more than just a means of financial support:
When the salary gets credited into the account, the same day itself, my husband transfers the entire amount to his account, and he will disburse the fund as I provide reasons. He knows my ID and password… To tell the truth, I don’t like this. But I do not say anything… because… it is through him I got this job, and he always makes me feel that he is better at managing money and that it is his duty. Sometimes, I feel angry and feel like stopping coming here [Technopark] since I don’t get the money I earn. But sitting alone in the house is very difficult for me, and this job is the only way I can come out of my home and mingle with people… I don’t want to lose it… even if I don’t get to spend the salary.
Ishana further expresses how her mobility has been curtailed in WFH:
With WFH, we had to get back to our village, where I feel stuck at home…I need permission from either my husband or in-laws to even visit my home. My husband, as such, doesn’t have any problem with me going out and all when we are staying alone. But now, he is concerned about his family and what they would say if he does not control his wife enough…I miss Technopark.
Soumya, 24 and unmarried, adds,
I have restrictions from my house to hang around with friends, especially male ones. Even if my parents allow it, I always need to tell them that it’s work-related [laughs]. When I was in the hostel, I had a kind of freedom to go on outings with friends, and since I was away from my hometown and parents, it was good.
In contrast, Nijo, 29, an unmarried male IT professional, says,
On my off days, I go out and hang around with my friends… There are no such restrictions on me, and most of my friends are in my hometown… In fact, if I don’t go out for a couple of days, my family themselves ask me to go out and mingle with people and say, aanungalayal naattukaarumayi oru sahakaranam okke vende? [Being a man, you should go out and meet others, right?]
In the study, most of the women feel that WFH necessarily limits their opportunities to access public spaces whereas earlier, working from the office was a potential instrument in enabling women to spend time outside home and socialise. Despite the obstacles and gendered dynamics prevalent in the IT industry, it is clear that women continue to exhibit a preference for working outside the domestic sphere in order to enhance their social status and agency rather than relying on the family unit and enduring potential coercion.
It is also clear that men’s socialisation outside the home is not a matter of social concern in Kerala. Even when men engage in WFH, they generally do not face significant limitations or constraints on their spatiotemporal freedom for social interactions. The family itself encourages men to venture out and engage in social activities as it aligns with the gender norm that men should actively participate in external socialisation.
In a society characterised by women’s restricted mobility and the demand for ‘valid reasons’ for women to access public spaces, the significance of paid work extends beyond mere economic independence. It functions as a means for women to attain not only economic capital but also symbolic and social capital. The work environment, culture, and interactions within the workplace collectively contribute to women’s agency, enabling them to negotiate patriarchal norms in various ways. However, the normalisation of work-from-home (WFH) can become a serious setback to even the limited progress we have achieved regarding women’s access to public spaces in areas like the IT sector.
References
- Ahuja, Shiri. 2003. ‘Tele-working: Opportunities for the Indian Woman’. In Organisation and Work Beyond 2000, edited by Birger Rapp & Paula Jackson, 49-57. Physica Heidelberg.
- Chakravarti, Uma. 1993. Conceptualising Brahmanical Patriarchy in Early India: Gender, Caste, Class and State. Economic and Political Weekly 28, no. 14, 579-585.
- Devika, J. and Binitha Thampi. 2011. ‘Mobility towards Work and Politics for Women in Kerala State, India: A View from the Histories of Gender and Space’. Modern Asian Studies 45, no. 5, 1147-1175.
- Kandiyoti, Deniz. 1988. ‘Bargaining with Patriarchy’. Gender and Society 2, no. 3, 274-290.
- McKinsey and Company. 2012. Women Matter: An Asian Perspective. McKinsey and Company.
- Mescher, Samula, Yvonne Benschop, & Hans Doorewaard. 2010. ‘Representations of Work-Life Balance Support’, Human Relations 63, no. 1, 21-39.
- NASSCOM. 2017. Women and IT Scorecard – India.
About the Author: G S Divya is a PhD Scholar in the School of Social Sciences, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, India. Currently, she is researching the topic, ‘Gendered Subjectivities in the New Workspaces; Exploring the Lives of Women IT Professionals in Kerala’.
Interesting, Divya… though I am not sure if some of this would even qualify to be ‘bargaining with patriarchy ‘. It would, only in a highly limited sense. For example, Sandhya, your respondent seems to have convinced the family that long hours are part of her work and they seem to have conceded so much. But her leisure activities and socialising do not seem to have been part of the bargain at all. Indeed, they are secured by precisely the opposite of bargaining, through a stealthy defiance of power.