This volume examines the nature of married women's participation in the economies of three East Asian countries—Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea. In addition to asking what is similar or different about women's economic participation in this region of the world compared to Western societies, the book also asks how women's work patterns vary across the three countries.

As a region, Southeast Asia has undergone enormous economic and social changes in the last few decades. Women as a collective have seen their lives transformed as a result of rapid development and economic growth. In exploring the progress made by Southeast Asian men and women, this book seeks to answer the following questions: (a) In what areas have women been able to achieve parity with men? (b) In what areas do women encounter specific disadvantages based on their gender as compared with men? and (c) How have womens concerns and problems been addressed by the governments in this region with the aim of encouraging gender equality? As the title of this book suggests, the chapters provide an analysis of the broad trends - including changes and continuities - in the experiences, interests and concerns of Southeast Asian women. The chapters examine the trends related to women in the following arenas: the family, economic participation, politics, health, and religion. In some arenas, the trends reflect the disadvantages women face, which in turn have led to gender gaps; in other areas, women's progress has been found to eclipse that of the men, although this tends to be the exception.

Despite economic growth, decreasing fertility rates, and rising education levels, women in Asia are on average 70% less likely than men to be in the labor force, with the country-to-country percentage varying anywhere from 3% to 80%. Results of a new simulation model suggest that closing the gender gap could generate a 30% increase in the per capita income of a hypothetical average Asian economy in one generation. This report discusses the reasons behind the continuing gap in the labor force participation rate between women and men in Asia and the Pacific, the impact of this gap on economic growth, and policy lessons drawn from specific country experiences in the region and elsewhere in the world. The channels of gender inequality are so complex that policy interventions must go beyond economics to effectively address them. Such a multidimensional approach to reducing gender inequality could unleash a nation's full potential for inclusive growth and development.

This collection intervenes in key areas of feminist scholarship and activism in contemporary South Asia, particularly India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka, while asking how this investigation might enrich feminist theorizing and practice globally.

With thirty-two original chapters reflecting cutting edge content throughout developed and developing Asia, Women of Asia: Globalization, Development, and Gender Equity is a comprehensive anthology that contributes significantly to understanding globalization’s transformative process and the resulting detrimental and beneficial consequences for women in the four major geographic regions of Asia—East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, and Eurasia/Central Asia—as it gives "voice" to women and provides innovative ways through which salient understudied issues pertaining to Asian women’s situation are brought to the forefront.

This impressive array of essays considers the contingent and shifting meanings of gender and the body in contemporary Southeast Asia. By analyzing femininity and masculinity as fluid processes rather than social or biological givens, the authors provide new ways of understanding how gender intersects with local, national, and transnational forms of knowledge and power. Contributors cut across disciplinary boundaries and draw on fresh fieldwork and textual analysis, including newspaper accounts, radio reports, and feminist writing. Their subjects range widely: the writings of feminist Filipinas; Thai stories of widow ghosts; eye-witness accounts of a beheading; narratives of bewitching genitals, recalcitrant husbands, and market women as femmes fatales. Geographically, the essays cover Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and the Philippines. The essays bring to this region the theoretical insights of gender theory, political economy, and cultural studies. Gender and other forms of inequality and difference emerge as changing systems of symbols and meanings. Bodies are explored as sites of political, economic, and cultural transformation. The issues raised in these pages make important connections between behavior, bodies, domination, and resistance in this dynamic and vibrant region.

Millions of Burmese women migrate into Thailand each year to form the basis of the Thai agricultural and manufacturing workforce. Un-documented and unregulated, this army of migrant workers constitutes the ultimate 'disposable' labour force, enduring gruelling working conditions and much aggression from the Thai police and immigration authorities. This insightful book ventures into a part of the global economy rarely witnessed by Western observers. Based on unique empirical research, it provides the reader with a gendered account of the role of women migrant workers in Thailand's factories and interrogates the ways in which they manage their families and their futures.