Changing social relations of production and Peruvian peasant women's work
Deere, C.D.
Latin American Perspective 4(1/2): 48-69
1977
DOI: 10.1177/0094582x7700400107Document Number: 501193
The effect of the development of capitalism on women's economic participation and social status is studied, based on the situation in the northern Peruvian Sierra department of Cajamarca. The pre-capitalist hacienda system is first examined, the main characteristics being servile production relations and exploitation of the entire peasant family, particularly women. The development of capitalist enterprises was underway by the 1940s, and the establishment of a milk processing plant, Perulac, in 1947 provided the department with its first agro-industrial enterprise. By the late 1960s the transition from the hacienda system to a system of capitalist enterprises was complete, and in terms of production relations this created (1) a class of wage workers, and (2) an increased number of peasant smallholdings, some haciendas having resorted to land parcelling, selling off plots to the peasants. With the development of the dairy industry female wage labour was in demand, but many more women are involved in running the smallholdings while the men migrate in search of wage work to supplement the inadequate income from the farms. Following the 1969 agrarian reform co-operative enterprises were formed, improving employment opportunities for women, but their status is still inferior and they are rarely involved in decision-making. Women's conditions have therefore improved in some respects, but a transition to socialism is felt to be the best means of attaining freedom from repression.