La prochaine séance de l’Atelier d’économie politique du CEPN aura lieu le mardi 27 novembre de 12h30 à 14h en salle K301.

Nous recevrons à cette occasion Sonja Avlijaš (LIEPP – Sciences Po). Sa présentation s’intitule : “From Dual-Earner to Male Breadwinner? Growth models and female work in Eastern Europe”. Vous trouverez ci-dessous un résumé de sa présentation.

“Eastern European women had the highest labour force participation in the world during socialism. During the transition to capitalism, they permanently exited the labour market in some countries, but not in all. This article develops a theory of reactive structuration of the female labour force which explains why the dual-earner model declined in some post-socialist contexts, while it was preserved in others. The theory traces how the countries’ different capitalist growth models – conceptualised as economic specialisations and complementary institutional reforms that specific countries pursue to stimulate growth and create jobs – have led to this cross-country divergence in the structuring of female work. The theory moves beyond linear causal relationships and examines how different components of post-socialist economic restructuring have affected one another, and the dependent variable. The following two theoretical mechanisms are specified. Those countries that embarked on the trajectory of economic development driven by re-industrialisation and industrial upgrading created a vicious cycle for female labour force participation. This took place because industrial upgrading that was driven by foreign direct investment led to the defeminisation of manufacturing. Such a trajectory of economic restructuring also shaped these countries’ education policies and impeded the development of knowledge intensive services, which would have been more conducive to female employment. The virtuous cycle of female labour force participation, on the other hand, occurred in those Eastern European countries that turned to reforming their educational sector towards general skills and expansion of tertiary education, with the aim of transforming themselves into knowledge economies. Such a transformation required an active social investment state and growth of knowledge-intensive public and private sector employment, which provided greater employment opportunities for women. This development path created a positive causal loop for female work. The theory is tested on a cross-sectional time-series analysis of 12 Eastern European countries over the period 1997-2015. This article stands in opposition to the ‘gender essentialist’ sociological theories, which argue that Eastern European countries automatically re-traditionalised following the demise of socialism (depicted as forcing ‘premature social progress’), and which ignore the adverse effect that capitalist transformation has had on gender relations in the region.”

Sonja Avlijaš est chercheuse au laboratoire LIEPP de Sciences Po depuis octobre 2016. Elle a soutenu sa thèse et a obtenu le grade universitaire de docteure à la London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE).
Ses recherches portent sur la transition post-socialiste de l’Europe de l’Est. Sa démarche consiste à analyser ces pays pour mettre en lumière les évolutions du capitalisme à l’ère de la mondialisation.
Elle est également rédactrice de la rubrique “Europe in Question” publiée par l’ “European Institute” de la LSE. Enfin, elle est membre du conseil programmatique de la “Foundation for the Advancement of Economics” (FREN) à la faculté d’économie de l’Université de Belgrade.

Comme à l’accoutumée, des sandwichs, fruits et bouteilles d’eau seront à votre disposition.

En espérant vous y voir nombreux-ses.

L’équipe de l’atelier d’économie politique.