Unfree relations and the feminisation of agricultural labour in Andhra Pradesh, 1970-95

Neo-liberal writers have argued that 'green revolution' induced agricultura l growth in south India is largely responsible for rising wages, increased land ownership among landless labourers and even some equalisation in land owned between rich and poor. Such growth is now also seen to be responsible for a faster rise in women's employment relative to men (known as the 'fem inisation' of agricultural wage labour), for declining wage differentials, and for a rise in women's 'empowerment'. These views are examined afresh in light of evidence gathered from villages in Andhra Pradesh. It is argued t hat male agricultural labourers were the chief beneficiaries of state polic ies that helped men escape from traditional permanent bonded relations and to engage in petty commodity production and non-agricultural employment. Ag rarian capitalists responded to the resulting rise in labour costs by commi ssion trading, based on tied harvest arrangements, in order to secure the l abour of smallholders indirectly, and intensifying non-permanent forms of a ttached labour The latter were designed to secure male labour for exclusive ly male work and in order to replace male workers seeking emancipation and higher wages with cheaper, unfree female labour for the remaining agricultu ral tasks. Female labour was cheaper and less free than male labour because men shifted more of the responsibility for family provisioning on to women by spending more outside the home and by refusing wage work as a protest a gainst low tied wages. As a consequence, the cost of men's struggle for ema ncipation was women's unfreedom. Under these circumstances, feminisation of labour was largely disempowering for women.