| - The Five Year Plans increased the status and independence level of women unintentionally, by allowing them into the work force to deal effectively with the high demand for labor needed to strengthen the economy.
- Women worked the same hours as men; however, they to had to put in more effort at home, because there were no changes in their role in the household.
- Careers were interrupted due to childbirth or job assignment problems, since most factory work was hard labor in heavy industries; women lowered their chances at gaining advancements.
- Stalin believed that the traditional family was the base unit of society, and was useful to enforce his policies.
- Restrictions on women’s independence.
- Marital stability was a necessity in bureaucratized society.
- Government told women to “enjoy motherhood”
- Abortion restrictions to increase population after labor shortage
- Women that gave birth to many children were given medals or awards.
- Communal services (nurseries and laundries) declined
- Women were tied down to homes
- During World War II, worked in absence of men to produce military needs or enlisted in armed force motivated by patriotism
- Women were also medical officers, nurses and technicians during WWII
- Women in armed forces were often not promoted
- Women maintained status in workplace, effective equality to men
- Increase in family incomes and further improvement in social institutions for the community due to women and men in the labor forces.
| - In the early 20th century the situation for women began improving in China as Western ideas began take hold.
- Foot binding was banned and there were efforts to improve the literacy of women.
- Child marriages, prostitution, arranged marriages and concubines were banned.
- The Communists were proud of their women's right record. Mao used to say, "Women hold up half the sky"---an ancient Chinese proverb.
- The Communists raised the status of women and made them a useful part of the revolution.
- They did a lot to improve the health care and education of women, and helped them enter the work force as pilots, doctors, factory workers and farm machine operators and currently are trying to combat the cultural preference for boys.
- Chinese women did their part fighting for the Communists against the Kuomintang.
- The Communist system empowered women to work outside the home which in the end, in many cases, just doubled their work load—because they were still expected to take care of the house and raise the children when they weren't working.
- A typical woman in the Maoist era rose at 5:00am in cramped apartment with her family and parents to fix breakfast for everyone and get her kids off to school. She then took a crowded bus to work. At 2:00pm she got off work and then rushed to the butcher shop with a ration card and queued for meat and after she was done rushed to another store to wait in another line for vegetables. After arriving at her apartment bloc she walked up the stairs because the elevator didn’t work, fixed dinner, washed the dishes and collapsed into bed exhausted only to have to wake again the next day and do it all over again.
- Under the Deng reforms, things improved. Women were able to choose their jobs and careers, improve their status and gain more freedom over their lives.
- Improved status meant that women no longer had to obediently follow the orders of their in laws. They could pick their boyfriends and husbands, chose where they wanted to live, and enjoy life in a way they would have never dreamed of in the past.
- He believed that by forcing gender equality he could make China a world power.
- He persecuted Christians and mandated policies that lead to millions of deaths, he did lift shift the oppression of Chinese women from producing for the home to the producing for the state.
- Husbands were not allowed to abusing their wives, have concubines, or use prostitutes.
- Divorce was made easier to obtain.
- Both sexes were forced to wear the same gender neutral padded clothing.
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