Asia Pacific Diverse Economies
By Yvonne Underhill-Sem, Centre for Development Studies of the University of Auckland
Asia Pacific
Diverse Economies
Diverse Economies: Gifting, Caring, Exchanging, Exploiting, and Empowering In the Pacific and around the world, women are involved in diverse economies: the formal, informal, care, and gift economies. All may at some point be economically marginalized. In this brief article - part of a book soon to be released by ZED books—feminist geographer Yvonne Underhill-Sem discusses diversity in relation to the embodiment of economic practices and alerts against homogenizing approaches that conceal the existence of alternative economies preventing them from flourishing.
Capitalism is not the only flourishing system of economic exchange. Feminist economic geographers J.K. Gibson-Graham (1996) draw attention to the diverse way by which exchanges occur, values are attributed and systems emerge. Moreover, they argue that women in particular often move in and out of these systems with ease. This helps us understand the many contradictions in the ways women are engaged in the economy: on one hand lacking full access to land, capital, training, technology, and employment and yet on the other hand making significant contributions to national economic security as, for example, small holders, subsistence producers, domestic informal sector workers, and household workers. Consider the process by which cut flowers are cultivated mostly by women in the Global South and mostly consumed by women in the Global North. Consider the cultural and social meanings that are associated with giving and accepting of flowers. Consider the diverse ways that women are empowered and disempowered within this political ecology1 of flowers. The complications, contradictions, and challenges are not easily understood within mainstream economic discourse. Yes, there is the exploitative and dangerous work of cut flower production. Yes, regular wages are welcomed. Yes, there are escalating and devastating embodied and environmental impacts. Yes, there is solidarity in sweat. Yes, related chains of care are compromised. Yes, the list could go on. More useful than mainstream economic analysis to understand this, is a diverse economies
perspective which enlarges our understanding of the many and varied economies that many women move between. Within feminist analysis, diversity is well understood as a key concept to appreciate the multiplicity of embodied subject positions that women occupy. This has been especially important in relation to sexual and political practices. Feminist economic geographer Sarah Wright notes, “conceptualizations of the economy as diverse and multiple has garnered increasing attention [because]… against the debilitating mantra of TINA (there is no alternative) … many viable and vital alternatives to capitalism do, in fact, exist” (Wright, 297). Following the seminal work of Gibson-Graham, the notion of diverse economies provides critical means by which economic activities can be better understood in all their complexity. These contradictions arise because women operate in diverse economies. From formal paid employment, to micro, small and medium sized businesses, to regular informal fresh produce, fish and food marketing, and the periodic production of handicrafts. Even economies that did not in the past count the daily care of home, family, and community can no longer be overlooked because increasing numbers of women employ other women to undertake their care work. In addition to the care economy, the gift economy2 continues to sustain ever-present cultural obligations. In the Pacific, this includes: collecting, preparing, and weaving terrestrial and marine resources for mats, fans, garlands, and ceremonial items; and raising livestock and storing seasonal harvests. AWID 2012 • 21
IDeA Debate Articles Final ENG.indd 21
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