ACTIVE CITIZENSHIP OF RURAL WOMEN - FROM COMMUNITY (NON)BELONGING TO (IN)FORMAL PARTICIPATION
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Abstract
Changes in rural development paradigms brought forward several innovations regarding developmental concept, principles and practices – new, (neo)endogenous model of rural development is focused on participation, inclusion, devolution of power, territoriality, plurality of agents. Active citizenship is considered as one the main drivers of local rural development. Various agents are encouraged to try new (public) social roles. This especially refers to those who were previously less powerful and less present in social public life, such as rural women. Contemporary sociological literature pays special attention to the issue of gender and rural development. Gender regimes determines taking certain private and public roles. Previous researches proved low level of active citizenship of rural women, especially in formal decision-making. Rural women have less political power and less self-confidence for participating in public social arena.
Three aspects of active citizenship of rural women have been analysed: a) rurality image, b) agents in rural community and c) participation in activities of communal importance. The main hypothesis was that active citizenship of rural women was low. Three auxiliary hypotheses were:
- majority of rural women have strong sense of community belonging,
- rural women consider that rural community should be governed from within,
- rural women prefer less formal types of active citizenship.
The analysis was conducted based on survey data. Total of 503 rural women living in 14 villages in Vojvodina participated in the survey. Sampling procedure was two-staged. First, we selected a sample of villages based on population size and municipal development level. Second, proportional sampling was used to select rural women from the 14 villages. Main criteria for sampling rural women were legal age and rural residence.
Research results confirmed main and additional hypotheses:
- active citizenship of rural women was very low – majority have never had participated in any public communal activity; the continuity of women`s non-active citizenship is evident, based on current practices and lack of women`s willingness to participate in future public communal activities;
- majority of rural women had positive rurality image – they were happy to live in the village and not willing to live anywhere else;
- rural women unanimously assessed local agents to have an essential importance in local rural development; they equally strong assessed the importance of formal (e.g. local community office, municipal office) and informal local agents (residents) – thus, they indicated the significance of governing rural community from within;
- socially active rural women preferred civil sector; women`s activism corresponded with patterns and relations which were a part of their everyday life.
However, women were not homogenous when it comes to their active citizenship experience and readiness to take future actions. Partial segmentation was evident based on age, economic and marriage status. Current experiences and future readiness of rural women to be publicly active are determined by: a) their individual traits; b) responsibilities regarding family and household, professional activity and free time; c) (auto)censorship regarding activities in public social life, d) (not) having suitable capitals and e)openness of formal structures.
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