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Book Review: Transforming Japan: How Feminism and Diversity Are Making a Difference

Book Review: Transforming Japan: How Feminism and Diversity Are Making a Difference Book Reviews 455 Common Sense’’ narratives propose that the receipt of welfare is an issue of a poor work ethic and poor decision making, especially concerning moral choices. Women who receive welfare have had children they cannot support, and the solution to this problem is to promote paid work, marriage, and sexual restraint. Brush argues that these explanations make intuitive sense, as all taken-for-granted ideas do, until they are deconstructed and their contradictions are made clear. For example, she demonstrates how women’s employment options are affected when their batterers harass them at work, physically prevent them from working or sabotage their job search. Similarly, women can receive welfare for a limited time and are required to seek work, even though they will never be able to leave an impoverished status with low wage and often part-time employment. For both these situations, work is presented as a moral imperative even though it is not truly a solution to the problem of women’s poverty and need to depend on potentially abusive partners. For Brush, a feminist structural analysis leads to solutions that begin with viewing battering and poverty through the lenses of social justice and human rights. She advocates for developing http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Affilia: Journal of Women and Social Work SAGE

Book Review: Transforming Japan: How Feminism and Diversity Are Making a Difference

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Publisher
SAGE
Copyright
© 2012 SAGE Publications
ISSN
0886-1099
eISSN
1552-3020
DOI
10.1177/0886109912464196
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Book Reviews 455 Common Sense’’ narratives propose that the receipt of welfare is an issue of a poor work ethic and poor decision making, especially concerning moral choices. Women who receive welfare have had children they cannot support, and the solution to this problem is to promote paid work, marriage, and sexual restraint. Brush argues that these explanations make intuitive sense, as all taken-for-granted ideas do, until they are deconstructed and their contradictions are made clear. For example, she demonstrates how women’s employment options are affected when their batterers harass them at work, physically prevent them from working or sabotage their job search. Similarly, women can receive welfare for a limited time and are required to seek work, even though they will never be able to leave an impoverished status with low wage and often part-time employment. For both these situations, work is presented as a moral imperative even though it is not truly a solution to the problem of women’s poverty and need to depend on potentially abusive partners. For Brush, a feminist structural analysis leads to solutions that begin with viewing battering and poverty through the lenses of social justice and human rights. She advocates for developing

Journal

Affilia: Journal of Women and Social WorkSAGE

Published: Nov 1, 2012

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