Gender, Globalization, and Postsocialism: The Czech Republic after Communism

Review
"This excellent study of gender, globalization, and postsocialism in the Czech Republic is a welcome addition to feminist international relations and comparative politics theory and the literature on transitions in Central and Eastern Europe.... highly readable and well organized." -- Karen J. Vogel, Perspectives on Politics


Review
"This well researched study of the Czech Republic challenges conventional wisdom about the fate of women in post-socialist transitions in Eastern and Central Europe and shows how women, although they have lost ground in terms of formal political representation and employment opportunities, are finding ways to participate informally in building democracy from below. Linking her study to the broader international context, Jacqui True convincingly demonstrates how global forces shape and are shaped by gender relations in the family, the workplace, and in politics. True convinces us that we cannot understand the processes of globalization without paying attention to gender. This is not only an important contribution to a growing body of empirical feminist IR; it should also be of great interest to those concerned with post-socialist transitions as well as with the political, economic and cultural aspects of globalization." -- J. Ann Tickner, University of Southern California


Review
This well researched study of the Czech Republic challenges conventional wisdom about the fate of women in post-socialist transitions in Eastern and Central Europe and shows how women, although they have lost ground in terms of formal political representation and employment opportunities, are finding ways to participate informally in building democracy from below. Linking her study to the broader international context, Jacqui True convincingly demonstrates how global forces shape and are shaped by gender relations in the family, the workplace, and in politics. True convinces us that we cannot understand the processes of globalization without paying attention to gender. This is not only an important contribution to a growing body of empirical feminist IR; it should also be of great interest to those concerned with post-socialist transitions as well as with the political, economic and cultural aspects of globalization.


Book Description
True examines political and gendered identities in flux in post-communist Czech Republic. She argues that the privatization of a formerly state economy and the adoption of consumer-oriented market practices were shaped by ideas and attitudes about gender roles. This book also offers a provocative general thesis about the inextricable linkages between political and economic changes and gender identities.


About the Author
Jacqui True is assistant professor at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. She has been a visiting assistant professor of political science at Michigan State University.


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How are changing gender relations shaping and being shaped by post-socialist marketization and liberalization? Do new forms of economic and cultural globalization open spaces for women's empowerment and feminist politics? The rapid social transformations experienced by the people of the Czech Republic in the wake of the collapse of communism in 1989 afford political scientist Jacqui True with an opportunity to answer these questions by examining political and gendered identities in flux. She argues that the privatization of a formerly state economy and the adoption of consumer-oriented market practices were shaped by ideas and attitudes about gender roles.Though finely tuned to the particular, local traditions that have defined the boundaries of globalization for Czech men and women, Gender, Globalization, and Postsocialism also offers a provocative general thesis about the inextricable linkages between political and economic changes and gender identities.


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