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Feminization of medicine in France has come about in several stages, in connection with student and medical specialists recruitment. Its dynamics show that it can’t be considered as a virtually definitive gender reversal, but should rather be viewed as a dynamic recomposition closely related to societal changes and economic situations. I explain the way women succeeded in entering medicine via the concours, and how their situation has often given rise to wrongful interpretations concerning their ‘choices’. Finally, I reflect on the complex connections between feminization and the democratization of medical recruitment, on the one hand, and with the transformations within the liberal model in medicine, on the other. I conclude that the feminization of medicine questions a wide array of social relations in the domains of family, health, economics and politics, as a complex social fact.

The purpose of this paper is to explore links between a revisionist view of the “feminisation of poverty” in developing countries and women’s work and home-based enterprise in urban slums.

The paper’s discussion of the “feminisation of poverty” draws substantially from ethnographic field research conducted in The Gambia, The Philippines and Costa Rica. This research led the author to propose the notion of a “feminisation of responsibility and/or obligation”. The latter approach draws attention to issues such as gendered disparities of labour, time and resource inputs into household livelihoods, which are often most marked in male-headed units, and are not captured in conventional referents of the “feminisation of poverty”, which are rather narrowly confined to incomes and female household headship.

An integral element of the author’s critique is that the main policy response to classic “feminisation of poverty” thinking, to date, has been to “feminise” anti-poverty initiatives such as Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) and microfinance programmes.

The paper argues that the “feminisation of poverty” compounds the tensions women already face in terms of managing unpaid reproductive and/or “volunteer” work with their economic contributions to household livelihoods, and it is in the context of urban slums, where housing, service and infrastructure deficiencies pose considerable challenges to women’s dual burdens of productive and reproductive labour. The paper emphasizes that to more effectively address gender inequality while also alleviating poverty, policy interventions sensitive to women’s multiple, time-consuming responsibilities and obligations are paramount.

In recent years, several countries and/or higher education institutions have adopted equal opportunity policies to promote women's access to the upper levels of the academic career structure. The purpose of this paper is to argue that there is no universal solution to the glass ceiling that women face within academia. Insofar as the feminisation process evolves according to a variety of models, according to national and occupational context, the solutions adopted in one context may prove to be ineffective elsewhere.

Analysis of the different models of occupational feminisation is based on a secondary analysis of the sociological literature on the subject, combined with recent data on women's access to academic positions in France and Germany.

Although there are similarities in the structure of the academic labour market across countries and in the rate of feminisation of the most prestigious academic positions, the precise mechanisms through which women gain access to an academic career vary significantly from one national context to another. This cross‐national variation would tend to suggest that there will also be variation when it comes to defining the most effective policy measures for increasing women's access to the upper echelons of the academic hierarchy. Indeed, different models of gender equality in academia may lead to very different results with regard to existing gender relations.

The paper uses the available sociological literature on the feminisation process to examine how different measures adopted to promote women's access to the highest echelons of the academic career structure may have different effects on the reproduction and/or transformation of the dominant sex/gender system.

The study combines data from the electronic version of the transcribed census enumerators’ books and documentary sources to analyse the entry of women to bookkeeping in late nineteenth century Britain. The paper explores the chronology of the feminisation of bookkeeping and presents a socio‐demographic profile and sectoral distribution of women bookkeepers. The study renders more visible the existence of female accounting labour on the boundaries of the private/public divide. It is shown that previous commentators have failed to identify the early sex‐typing of bookkeeping in the south of England and in retailing and distribution. The liberal feminist movement and the use of women as cheap or unremunerated labour are offered as explanations for the employment of female accounting functionaries.

The paper investigates the implications for gendered power relations at work of Nitaqat, a workforce localization policy operating in Saudi Arabia which, by regulating the employment of Saudi nationals in private sector firms, has stimulated greater feminization of employment.

Based on an interpretivist, phenomenological research approach, rich qualitative data were collected in two case study organizations – a retail company and an architectural firm. The mixed-method design involved in-depth interviews with managers and women workers and extensive non-participant observation.

In exploring gendered power relations in Saudi private sector workplaces under the Nitaqat regime, the paper highlights the importance of patriarchal power. However, increased feminization of employment provides women workers with access to power resources of their own, producing complexity and variation in gendered workplace power relations.

Drawing on Bradley's (1999) relational conception of gendered power, the paper illuminates how a Nitaqat-inspired feminization of employment, by increasing firms' dependency on women workers, has influenced the dynamics of gendered power relations in Saudi workplaces.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the relationship between recent transformations of labour and corresponding predictions made to gender equity. It reflects in particular the German discussion on the subjective turn in labour, termed as subjectivation of work, and the diagnosis of a feminization of gainful labour work given in this context, by focusing on the governing of the psyche.

The paper is both a theoretical reflection as well as a presentation of empirical findings. It refers to Foucault's concept of governmentality, thereby considering “psychopolitics” as a new type of power, and taking it as an approach for qualitative empirical research. The empirical findings are based on narrative biographical interviews with female and male employees working in the ICT sector.

Due to an under‐elaborated conception of the subject (and its interrelation to power), the diagnosis of a subjectivation of work as a feminization of work is inadequate and misleading. Instead, the empirical analysis gives evidence to the argument that the feminization of work turns out as a (re)masculinization of life and existence.

By drawing on considerations within governmentality studies, the concept of “psychopolitics” offers a new and fruitful approach for research, implying also a dynamic concept of the subject. The empirical analysis provides new insights on the discussion on the issue of gender equity within the realm of gainful work.

“Feminisation of poverty” is a phrase heard frequently today, not only in the popular press, but also in professional groups concerned with women. It suggests that women living alone with their children bear a disproportionate share of the poverty burden. The following questions are discussed: Is this a crisis for American society? Is the standard of living getting worse for women and children, even as it improves for the general population? If it is, why is it happening? And finally, what could be done about it? Data are examined that show that “feminisation of poverty” is a significant problem in the United States. The reasons women are more likely to be poor include inadequate paying jobs, an expanding labourforce, and unique problems associated with female head‐of‐households. Solutions to feminisation of poverty include raising low income jobs via minimum wage and comparable worth legislation, establishing and enforcing realistic child support and spousal maintenance levels, significantly raising the level of public support programmes for children, making available reasonable education‐training‐retraining programmes for women, emphasising the prevention of poverty, and providing better health education and chemical dependency intervention.

In this study, the relationship between female labour force participation rate and economic growth is investigated in middle-income countries. The study covers the period of 2001–2016 by employing a dynamic panel approach. Pooled Ordinary Least Square and Fixed Effects model estimations are calculated as a decision criterion to select proper GMM Method. The outcomes indicate that the proper estimation technique, which is a System-GMM model, evidences the U Feminisation Theory for the middle-income countries while controlling all other factors.

The novelty of this study is that the research not only employs both difference and system generalised method of moments (GMM) estimators but also includes main explanatory variables such as education, fertility, and total labour force rate. The study provides an opportunity to review the U-shape nexus between the female labour force and economic growth while controlling education, fertility and total labour participation rate.

The estimation implies that middle-income countries support a U-shaped relationship. The fertility rate does not impact on the female labour force, and education and total labour force level have a positive influence on women's participation in the labour market.

This study used data that include the period of 2001–2016 for middle-income countries. So, further studies can use different periods of data or different countries.

The authors emphasise the importance of economic growth for female labour force for middle-income countries. Thus, a country intending to increase female labour force should also focus on its economic growth. As the study points out, middle-income countries staying under the minimum threshold, $4698.15 (per capita), should priorities their economic improvement policies to reach their female labour force participation goal. Those countries also should be prepared for a female labour force participation declining phase until they reach the turning point income level.

Furthermore, education is one of the critical determinants that have an impact on FLFPR. The equal opportunity for both genders to engage in education should be considered as a policy. If females do not have an equal chance to enrolment in education, it may influence the policy of increasing female labour force adversely. Fertility rate appears no more statistically significant in our study. Moreover, today, there are some countries they practise equality between genders by providing equally extended parental leave, which may be a promising policy for gender equality in the labour force and may worth a try.

Some previous studies may suffer model mistakes due to lack of consideration the endogeneity problem and bias issue of the results as suggested by Tam (2011). Moreover, previous studies tend to choose either studying U-feminisation as excluding other variables or studying determinants of female labour force participation rate as excluding U-feminisation theory. There is not any panel data study acknowledging both concepts by using recent data to the best knowledge of the authors. Thus, the novelty of this study is that the research not only employs both difference and system generalised method of moments (GMM) estimators but also includes main explanatory variables such as education, fertility, and total labour force rate. The study provides an opportunity to review the U-shape nexus between the female labour force and economic growth while controlling education, fertility and total labour participation rate.

Purpose – Informed by Chinese mothers from four villages, the purpose of this chapter is to address the old issue of feminization of family survival, but situated within the landscape of neoliberalism. This study investigates the interplay between Chinese patriarchal values and neoliberal ideas that have shaped the Happiness Project – Action to Aid Impoverished Mothers – an official population control program that has been combined with poverty reduction “Action.”

Methodology – This research began in 2001 in Sichuan Province, Southwest China. Over a period of three years I interviewed 48 women who were participants in the Happiness Project.

Findings – The goal of the Happiness Project is to bring “happiness” to poor mothers through the introduction of microcredit, literacy programs, and the improvement of reproductive health. Three maternal aspects of the Happiness Project, as the study indicates, coincide with three particular patriarchal values. These include an official construction of a good mother image, targeting women's bodies as objects of the state's population control, and reinforcing gender stereotypes through market activity. The findings of this research suggest that feminization of family survival coincided with achieving the goal of the Project. Mothers thus have carried a double burden on behalf of the Chinese state and their families: the goals of declining fertility and increasing family prosperity.

Social implications – Based on this outcome, the study not only calls for reevaluating this “women-only” economic development model, but also calls into question whether bringing Chinese women into public production/market activity is a path to women's emancipation under neoliberalism.

This chapter examines the dynamics of occupational segregation by gender in the German vocational training system (VET) and explores the validity of two hypotheses regarding the causes of changes in the sex composition of occupations. According to the first, the ‘job growth hypothesis’, feminisation of occupations occurs when women increasingly enter growing employment sectors that are experiencing a shortage of (preferred) male candidates. According to the second, the ‘exit hypothesis’, the movement of men out of selected occupations is the main mechanism driving the changes. Using official data from enrolment into the VET of skilled crafts for the period of 1997–2013, we find a very high level of occupational segregation, a very modest trend toward desegregation and a substantial increase of female representation in a group of selected training occupations. Our analysis implies that the rising share of female apprentices within these fields cannot be explained by an increased entry of young women into growing employment sectors, but that it mainly results from a disproportionate reduction of male participation in select occupations.