Freedom of choice is when you can decide what you want, where you want to be and how you will get there in any aspects related to your life. Every worker has aspirations on where they see themselves in the near future and beyond. However, choices that some people have may be limited by a number of factors. This is more so if you are woman. In today's world many people believe that it does not matter whether you are a woman or man the sky is the limit. But is this really true for all women in all parts of the world? Granted the answer is no. There are several traditional values and norms that dictate what women can and are able to do. This is also true for girls in some cultures.
The story of Malala of Pakistan which hit headlines around the world tells it all. Girls may freely choice to go to school but their choice is limited in some cases by the society or culture in which they are born. For some girls the choice may be limited by the socio-economic classes in which they are born. In post-independence Africa may girl children did not go as far as high school because their parents thought it was wiser for them to pay for the boys in their households' education than for the girls. After all in their thinking the girl would marry and be taken care of by her husband in the future. These assertions have slowly changed even in the most traditional societies. Girls and boys are now given the same opportunity to go to school and attain higher education. Affirmative action by many institutions of higher learning have also contributed to attainment of higher education by girls in many developing countries.
Now back to the issue of women. In Zambia's modern society most of the traditional barriers to women's progression in life in urban set ups have been minimised. Women are free to marry who they want, have the number of children they want and own their own property. However, there are still some barriers when it comes to climbing up the corporate ladder. Despite being a signatory to the SADC Gender Protocol Zambia has not yet achieved a 30% representation of women in decision making in many sectors of society. The number of women in cabinet positions keeps on fluctuating between 2-6 at any given time since independence. The number of women Members of Parliament is also much lower in relation to men. There have been several campaigns (e.g. 50-50 campaign by the Zambia Women's Lobby Group) and projects to prepare women for election to ward councils and parliament but these have yielded little results. In the corporate world women have not fared any better. A few women have held senior positions in prominent companies and banks. Some of these include Mizinga Meru (Standard Chartered Bank Zambia Limited Managing Director), Ireen Muyenga (Zambia State Insurance Corporation Managing Director) to mention a few.
The question is why has this situation changed so little? What factors affect women's progression at individual, household, community, national and global levels? There are no simple answers. One of the key things to consider is the trade offs that have to be made with any choice. There are trade off between focusing on your career or your family and friends at a personal/individual level. This may also be a key factor at community level. To excel in any position, in the corporate, political, business or any other sector you need to be results oriented and dedicated to what you are doing. In many societies, women are regarded as the nucleus of the family. Therefore this means that whatever choices they make have to ensure that the family is not adversely affected. This means that women may have limited choices when they have a young family and more when their children are older. The limitations that comes with a young family may result in missed opportunities. This is more so in societies where there is stereotyping of gender roles.
Until recently, most cultures in Zambia reserved the role of child care for women. Children between 0-5 years would naturally be expected to be taken care of by their mothers or other women and girls in the family. However this trend is slowly changing especially in urban societies where women are increasingly working away from home. Even then most people who take up child care jobs are women. In my experience, I have only heard of one case where a young mother opted to employ a male nanny for her children. In this case the her children were male. Many mothers continue to trust female 'helpers' more when they need to leave their children in someone else's care.
Some women choose to take up part-time jobs or to work from home so that they are not deprived of the opportunity to participate fully in raising their children. Again, such a choice will affect one's ability to take on more demanding responsibilities in their career. From a family perspective choosing to engage fully in raising your kids by working from home or not having any formal job at all is an excellent thing to do. It requires a lot of self sacrifice to contribute to raising your children at the expense of your career progression. Working away from home may sometimes require working away from town and having to send days from your family. This is even more demanding in terms of the trade off involved. This can be quiet stressful for some women especially when they have young children or a baby to take care of. Some employers have flexible working conditions that allow women to travel with their infants especially when they are nursing.
Working women will continue to face some of these tough choices. What matters is where you are at in your career and what you think is important for you. One of the things that I always do when I am faced with tough choices is to have a serious reflection over whatever situation I am facing and look at what is best for me and the people that I care about. One thing is for sure. The first instinct is for one to base their choice on what is best for them. However, if we have to be honest we also need to reflect on how our decisions directly affect those we care about especially our family. This is where it really gets tricky and it is only when selfless interest are at play when rational people will put the interest of others before their own. It takes a lot of sacrifice to do this and more often than not most rational women will put their family first at the expense of their own climb up the career ladder. However, like anything else there are always some exceptions.
