Plantation Labour Revisit Required

ideology as well. Planners in China have ignored the fact that patriarchal thinking, the ideology of the men's family, pervades every aspect of Chinese society and continues to impede women's full participation in political process and organisation of the economy. The Marriage Law of 1950 did not aim at destroying the family, but it did seek to transform power relations within a patriarchal, multigeneration domestic unit. Later, however, it was left to the natural erosion expected to result from other socialist changes. The argument was that family ties, vitalised by ideology and emotions, bind together labouring individuals (both able-bodied and semi-able-bodied men and women) and secure for members an equal share in the product of labour; such ties and affection help them in their historic struggle against class oppression. What was not realised was that social relations within the family were not fully transformed and the sexual division of labour was likely to engender patriarchally constructed hierarchy and the relations of dominance and subordination between men and women.