Women's status and marital satisfaction in Bolivia

Varying viewpoints on the construction and maintenance of satisfactory marriages and families assess the impact of recent social changes on the quality of family life differently. The conservative view raises alarm that the family is weakening. According to this view. the solution to family decline is maintenance of commitment to family stability and reaffirmation of gender specific roles in the family setting rather than promotion of individual fights and gender equality. The reformist view, as evident in the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo, focuses on the need to increase women's autonomy, status and opportunities. Those supporting this view argue that with increased autonomy women are able to receive the resources and education needed to care for their families. There is a disjunctive between research on policy recommendations regarding women's status and marital well-being, however, since much of the research is from the more developed countries and policies to promote the status of women are particularly concerned with the third world. The purpose of this paper is to explore the effect of women's status and autonomy on marital satisfaction in a setting where family structure, economic structure, and educational systems have not changed as much as is the case in more developed industrial societies. Less developed regions of the world will likely experience dramatic changes in social arrangements that impact on family organization of gender roles. It is also in these settings that women's socioeconomic status is low and cultural values are more likely to emphasize male authority. To the degree that there is a positive relationship between women's position and marital well-being, we contend that efforts to improve women's status and autonomy will not undermine family well-being. Status is defined in terms of education, employment, and value given to their opinions. Autonomy is defined as 'having control over significant decisions affecting their lives and having access to the resources that would enable them to enact those decisions (Ravindran, 1999). Data collected from mothers in several Bolivian communities during the year 2000 are used to examine the hypothesized relationships. Findings from the data were, presented to the studied communities in August 2001, and feedback from these community meetings were taken into consideration when drawing conclusions to this study.