Feminist groups acknowledge the necessity of party politics implicitly by their activism and explicitly in their publications and debates. When 19^th century feminists sought the right to vote, they wanted to stand in for elections because they were convinced that change would come when they were members of the elected legislature.  There continue to be substantial demands for equal political representation by women groups.  The implicit goal here is to secure change in attitude about gender, mainly by increasing understanding and awareness of gender difference and their implication for power relations.

Women have been inspired by their own achievements in the last hundred years.  Indeed, it is not difficult for any particular group, which organises itself and is determined to succeed in gaining power, to actually succeed and gain power.  Since the vote was first given to women in New Zealand in 1893, the women’s movement has made tremendous progress.  In just a century, many women have become literate; they have obtained education and are able to support themselves independently.  Women are now free to petition not just for very basic rights but also for more “intangible” ones such as more equal representation in the media, stricter pornographic laws and the use of non-sexist language.  It is certain that women can achieve 50% of political, social and economic representation if they continue to press forward.

This article bucks the call towards more “empowerment” and is a preliminary attempt to rethink issues of rights and dominance and to question the basic assumptions of the connection between gender and power.  It asks whether in stressing the attainment of “empowerment” for women, women are not already playing into the patriarchal order.  It questions whether women should be concerned not just with the intellectual assent to the equal position of men and women but rather with a far more fundamental change to the foundations and values of society and the evolution of a new reality.

The patriarchal society

First, let us consider how the concept of power has come to play such an important role in modern society.  The answer lies in our social structure, which is dominated by the practice of patriarchy.  While patriarchy means, literally, rule by the father, it is now commonly used to refer to a system that gives priority to men and where women and women’s interests are subordinated.  Most of the world’s cultures and religions have been highly patriarchal.  While many religions and cultures now have reformed modernised versions that are friendlier to the idea of equality between the sexes, in their orthodox or fundamental versions they closely follow patriarchal customs which hold women responsible for men’s sexual impulses, and which try to maximise control of women by men.

The fact that history is basically the record of the achievements of men and the civilisations they have built proves that much of the world has been patriarchal.  In historical accounts, very little is recorded about the thoughts, feelings and achievements of women.  Indeed, women have been regarded as little better than child bearers.  Of course, it is not just women which history has ignored but also the poor, racial minorities, slaves, peasants and the working classes.

The view that women should be homemakers and child bearers rather than workers (unless exceptional economic circumstances necessitated otherwise), is the mainstream view in most societies and Singapore is no exception (cf. Perera, 1996).  Purushotma (1992) notes that the “natural” role of women – especially those that are inextricably related to the achievement of the meanings that lie behind the notion of “male dominance” is lodged in the domestic sphere.  The encapsulated questions that confront women who seek employment in Singapore are tied first, to the consequences of her work upon her role of especially “wife”, “mother”, if not also “daughter-in-law”.  A highly significant dimension of this rests on the factor of the availability of help that working women can call upon to substitute their absence.  In addition, Heng and Janadas (1995: 195) write of the patronising “state fatherhood” of Singapore, its leaders indulging in a Confucian narrative of fatherhood and patriarchal power.

In a patriarchy, there is a set of values that is typical.  Here, value is given to the “masculine principle” (Chew, 1997) such as authority, control, victory, ownership, law, courage and strength.  Struggle and power are the key societal interactions.  So too are the concepts of superiority, might and aggression.  There is a tendency towards a centralisation of authority because that is one way of achieving greater and greater power.  It is a social condition whereby the end justifies the means.  “Winning” and “losing” or being “first” and “last” are keywords in a patriarchy.  Rewards are given to winners and to be first in a race is a deed of great merit.  Such a society is characterised by tradition, institutions, civilisation and control over the natural world.

Of all values in a patriarchy, power appears to be the one most cherished and this can be seen in for example, the field of international relations.  Here, the assessments of ego, strength, the building of enormous defence weapons are vital considerations.  Defence expenditure takes up a large portion of the budge to most nation states.  Most of the resources of this planet are largely manipulated to this end.  In addition, the success of huge business contracts and international treaties rest on how much money and patronage has been exchanged, the number of female (or male) entertainers as well as the respective assessment of each party’s ego and power.  Those who do not possess power are often treated as unimportant and are not given any attention.

Patriarchy has been so dominant that even in societies where women have ruled they have done so as honorary males.  In fact, the values of patriarchy exist even if the head of the government is female.  There have been head of states as for example, during the period in India where Indira Gandhi was Prime Minister, in Israel when Golda Meir was premier and in Britain during the 1980s with Margaret Thatcher.  These women did not transform the society into a matriarchy because the society was still in every way patriarchal.  They were honorary males within the patriarchy structure.  In fact, Mrs Margaret Thatcher, Britain’s prime minister of the 1980s, was well known as “the iron lady” and often referred to as “the only man in the cabinet”.

The subversive nature of power

I would argue that the love for power has resulted in numerous conflicts in humanity’s chequered history and has therefore enslaved its spirit.  One may wonder why power has endured so long as a prized possession?  The main reason is its intrinsically subversive nature.  For example, if Group X holds power as the supreme value and Group Z does not, then all the things that Z does will have no value.  If as the case may be, Z sticks to his own values and refuses to compete for power with X then it is subjugated and X’s value will be ascendant and will be imposed on Z.  However, if Z decides to compete with X, and this inevitably results in a power-struggle, this would mean that Z would have adopted power as its value and therefore loses its own values.  In both cases, Z’s values have been effectively eclipsed.

Another aspect of power which shows its subversive nature is that groups that prize it tend to dominate groups that do not.  Dominant groups have always tried to retain their power not just through the physical use of power but by what has been called “the social construction of reality”, that is, by their definition on what is possible, right, rational and real (cf. Farganis, 1996).  Groups such as X will always try to impose their thoughts on society through their control of the media, the education system and through the use of religion.  It is therefore not surprising to find in history, that it is always the group that regards power as its supreme value that rules (cf. Momen, 1994).

In the same way, if the primary objective of women groups is to attain their fair share, say, for example, 50% of all our political, professional and religious posts, women will have climbed the power structure of society.  This appears to be, on the surface, an achievable and reasonable objective but what is often forgotten is that some of the other groups – usually an ethnic or religious minority, either the poorer classes or the rural population from some faraway province – will have fallen into the gap in the power structure left by ascending women.  The structure itself will have remained intact despite the injustices it sustains.  Only the composition of the various groups in society would have been different.  Therefore, merely advocating a rise in the status of women through quantitative gains in representation is in reality only a superficial victory resulting only in a false sense of progress.

The fact that revolutions often means the exchanging of one authoritarian ruler for another has been well depicted in novels and plays, the most well-known being Orwell’s Animal Farm.  In the French, Bolshevik and Chinese revolution, reformers attempt to solve the problems in society by overthrowing those in power or by attempting to gain power for themselves.  Their aims were always to produce a more equal and co-operative society.  However, when they succeed, they often lose their original vision.  They themselves become corrupted by the power game they played and which had helped them to gain power.  Instead of creating the just and human society they promised, many end up creating institutions designed to keep themselves in power.  The mass media are then manipulated to convince the masses that the goal of revolution had been achieved.

Party politics is also symbolic of patriarchy because there is an emphasis on aggressive competition and on obtaining power.  If women play the game of party politics, they are also exposed to the danger of being diverted into the ultimate goal of politics.  To enter into partisan politics means accepting power as the supreme value and maybe that accounts for why more women than men are reluctant to participate in political activities.  By operating mainly from the “feminine principle” (Chew, 1997), women tend on the whole to be less confident and less ambitious in the political sense.

To be part of party politics would be to play into the subversive effect of power as a value.  This would be to follow other revolutions down a path that compromises the ultimate goal.  Of course, entering politics often means the most effective way for women groups to get society to accept its principles but in light of the final analysis, we see that entering politics will ensure failure in the ultimate goal of a more egalitarian and just society.  While we may argue for gender equality and for dominant institutions to grant greater access to women, we must bear in mind that if these institutions are themselves fundamentally flawed, if they reflect patriarchal values, languages and relationships, then including women in such positions would be a problematic victory.  For example, if multinational corporations routinely exploit female labour and pollute the environment, then integrating women into the management of such corporations would offer career opportunities to a relatively small number of women while continuing to exploit many others (cf. Ferguson, 1996).

The important question therefore is whether women wish to perpetuate the old patriarchal order by pressing for empowerment and by engaging in a power struggle?  Should women be enviously coveting party structure positions with their hierarchies and rituals?  If so, then it should be realised immediately that we will not be combating the subversive effects of power.

We have already seen that power cannot be combated directly without subverting its opponent to its own values.  Perhaps it is time to think of ways and means to bring about a society not just in which women have more power but one in which power itself as a value is greatly diminished in importance.  In such a society, women will be able to be equal to men – not though competing with men in the power structure but by expressing their own virtues.

Alternative societies

It must be noted that there have been alternative societies.  There have been matrifocal society (women form the focus of the social group) and matrilineal ones ((descent traced through the female rather than the male line).  The first period of human history is believed to be matriarchal and it has been claimed that “peasant women” in various parts of Southeast Asia have more autonomy vis a vis men (Atkinson and Errington, 1990).  Here, women play a central, if not dominant role in kinship arrangement.  There is frequent interaction among female kin, strong geographical and economic considerations of female relatives and large amounts of material and other aid flowing thorough female network (Strivens, 1996).

In such societies, it is not that women have greater power but rather that power itself is not a value of importance.  Men and women exist side by side in co-operation rather than competition.  Matrifocal societies usually exist when people are thinly spread and there is therefore no cause for competition.  When there is overpopulation and when groups interact with one another, usually one group end up subjugating another (Momen, 1994).

By contrast with the patriarchal society, the highest values in a matrifocal society are nurturing, lifegiving, compassion, sensitivity, spontaneity, creativity, working with nature and giving support to others.  The principle interactions are mutual and co-operative.  The means are as important as the end.  Victory and success are judged by the condition that everyone’s lot in life is improved and not who has/have power over whom.

I am not suggesting a switch to a matrifocal society but one where there is a balance of the masculine and feminine principles of consciousness, and where the values are not essentially patriarchal (Chew, 1997).  This does not mean that there will no longer be structures of authority and power as it will be impossible to dispense with these entirely if society is to function smoothly.  What is important however is that these structures are not controlled by a single individual or group.  Rather they should rest on elected institutions, which because of their constitution, manner of election and functioning are less likely to tyrannise individuals or minorities.  The individual or personalities, so dominant in patriarchal societies, should be downplayed.  While it is a society which will continue to have instruments of power, for example, courts, prisons, police, these should not be controlled by or become the weapons of any particular individual or group.  A decentralised power structure and the non-personal nature of authority becomes important in such a society.

Because greater centralised power characterises the patriarchal society, to achieve a more feminine society, we must have a greater degree of decentralisation than that existing today in most of our society.  We can do this by encouraging group consultation and group decision.  Dictatorial authority should go out of fashion; instead, we should aim to have fellowship in the spirit of frank and loving consultation.

In asking women to compete with men for political positions, we are ‘actually falling into the trap of the subversive nature of power.  Rather we should be looking at ways and means to make our presently patriarchal communities more balanced or more feminine.  Life’s important activities are not just trade and finance, buying and selling, but also nurturing the community, the promotion of civic consciousness etc.  I would imagine that the more important goal for the advancement of women is to change the values that matter in our society right now.

References

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Chew, Phyllis G.L. (1997).  Women, work and the family: the challenges of a working woman.  Singapore: Landmark Books.

Cooper, Darina (1995).  Power in Struggle.  Feminism, sexuality and the state.  Buckingham: Open University Press.

Farganis, Sandra (1996).  The Social Reconstruction of the Feminine Character (2^nd ed.)  London: Rowland and Littlefield Pub. Inc.

Ferguson, Kathy (1996).  Feminist thinking of Women and Power.  Asian Women, Vol 2, 1-16.

Heng, Geraldine and Devan, Janadas (1995).  State Fatherhood: The Politics of Nationalism, Sexuality and Race in Singapore.  In Aihwa Ong and M.G. Peletz (eds.) Bewitching Women, Pious Men.  Gender and Body Politics in Southeast Asia.  LA: University of California Press.

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Momen, Moojan (1994).  In all the ways that matter, women don’t count.  The Baha’i Studies Review.  Vol 4, no. 1, 37-46.

Perera, Leon (1996).  How Men see Women – the Changing Reality in Today’s Singapore.  In The Ties that Bind.  In Search of the Modern Singapore Family.  Singapore: Association of Women for Action and Research.

Purushotam, Nirmala (1992).  Women and Knowledge/Power.  Notes on the Singaporean dilemma.  In Ban Kah Choon, Anne Pakir and Tong Chee Kiong (eds.)  Imagining Singapore.  Singapore: Singapore Academic Press.

Ramazanoglu, Caroline (1993).  Up against Foucault.  Explanation of some tensions between Foucault and feminism.  New York and London: Routledge.

Strivens, Maila (1996)  Matriliny and Modernity.  Sexual Politics and Social Change in Rural Malaysia.  Sydney: Allen and Unwin.