Articles by Maithreyi Krishnaraj

Communalism, the actual and possible effects of economic reforms on women's position, and the rising violence in our society have become problematic issues for the womenâ??s movement. Many of these developments have roots in the past while some are new emanations. Feminist response to these issues has been more in the form of a generalised anxiety rather than clear analysis and understanding of the nature of our polity and changes therein; the nature of economic reforms and how they have been carried out; policy shifts in many areas and their impact on different sections of women; and importantly, where the movementâ??s energies should be spent. Past strategies have reached a dead end and recourse to legal remedies is not sufficient to bring about changes in the entrenched attitudes and values in society. Where does one go from here?

Women's engagement with economics, in its theory and its practice, takes several forms: to draw attention to problems not addressed before; to point out how the way problems have been addressed are unhelpful or fallacious and lead to wrong conclusions and wrong prescriptions; to critique theories and tools in order to expose their inadequacy or invalidity; to refine existing tools using available frameworks so as to 'let in' gender; and to seek new tools of analysis. The engagement can also be at a more philosophical level, namely, the foundational assumptions of the discipline. This paper seeks to explore these themes.

Critical Issues for Women Studies Maithreyi Krishnaraj THREE events of major import have made imperative a re-examining and rethinking of the relationship between women and the public domain, By this I mean more than what is conventionally known as the 'public' arena. There is involved in this our understanding of the state and of appropriate feminist politics to meet feminist goals,These three events pertain to: first, the New Economic Policy which has changed the direction of our economy; second, the uniform civil code controversy which has raised many uncomfortable questions for feminists about religious identity and gender; and the third relates to the debate on reservation of seats for women in the parliament which has supporters and detractors. Implicated in all these three issues are notions of public space and citizen rights.

Maithreyi Krishnaraj The concept of androgyny, it has been suggested, offers a means of transcending the duality of gender differences imposed by culture, And once gender polarities are reduced, traditional sex and gender differences can be broken down. What androgyny obscures, however, is the social context it is as if individuals can effortlessly balance traits and behaviour in a social vacuum. The greater individual freedom in certain directions promised by the construct is of little help, therefore, in dealing with deep-seated structural gender inequalities.

of Change Maithreyi Krishnaraj Accurate and reliable statistics are important for any group in a given population for analysing trends and for evolving policies. On many aspects of life which reflect the development of a society, we have poor data or inadequate coverage. The problem is many times compounded for women.