BahiraSherif Trask. Women, Work, and Globalization: Challenges and Opportunities. New York, NY: Routledge, 2014, 298 pages, $49.95 paperback.
本书从全球跨文化视角考察女性劳动参与率上升对工作、家庭和社会的影响，分析了全球化的利弊，适合高级本科生或研究生课程及政策制定者参考。
Women, Work, and Globalization: Challenges and Opportunities examines women's increased labor force participation throughout the world and its impact on work, family, and society from a global, cross-cultural perspective. Trask explicitly addresses the consequences of globalization from both macro- and micro-level perspectives. The book's title says it all; globalization is often viewed as an entirely positive phenomenon, but Trask insightfully notes that “some individuals benefit from globalization and others are harmed by it” (p. 28). This theme is woven throughout the book, providing the reader with a more thought-provoking, balanced perspective on the intersection of gender and globalization. This book contains 10 chapters, divided into three parts. There are case studies and examples peppered throughout the book, which are engaging and provide context, and each chapter concludes with a synopsis. Trask's discussion of this topic is intelligent, timely, and complex; for example, she explores the opportunities and challenges introduced by women's increased representation in the paid workforce, in both industrialized and developing countries, and the consequences of this phenomenon for women, men, families, and societies. The author studies this topic from an interdisciplinary perspective, blending key literature from multiple fields, such as anthropology, economics, gender roles, psychology, and social justice. As Trask notes, this book would be particularly useful as a primary or supplementary text for advanced undergraduate or graduate-level curricula on gender, work, family, social justice, or globalization; however, others, such as policymakers, would also benefit from reading this work, particularly Part III, in which policies and programs are described. Part I—An Overview of Gender, Work–Family Issues, and Global Restructuring—provides the reader with a foundation for the scholarly literature on globalization, including both historical and current information, as well as statistics on this topic. In the first chapter in this section, “Perspectives on Women, Work–Family Life, and Global Transformations,” Trask explores the “work–family–gender-globalization intersection” (p. 3) and describes the conflicting messages women in both developing and industrialized countries receive about their participation in the paid workforce. On the one hand, “the global economy encourages and demands that a constantly growing number of women join the formal workforce” (p. 24). On the other hand, women throughout the world are faced with “contradictory rhetoric and public policy” (p. 24). This theme is expanded on in the remaining chapters in this section. Although the three chapters in Part I are informative and valuable on their own, the reader would benefit the most by reading all three chapters. In Part II, Women's Unique Experiences in the Global Economy, there are four chapters, each focusing on a different topic. These chapters would be excellent as supplemental reading for courses on these and related topics. This section of the book begins with a chapter on gender role socialization. In this chapter, Trask focuses the reader's attention on gender role socialization in developing countries, a context that is not as well-researched or understood as gender role socialization in industrialized countries. Trask states, “While certain trends are spreading such as the rising age of marriage…, these trends are not uniform in nature nor do they characterize every society. In many parts of the world, girls do not have the choices and opportunities that are increasingly associated with contemporary social life for middle- and upper-class women in the West” (p. 102). The author's coverage of this topic then extends into more specific applications of the intersection between globalization and gender, with chapters on sexual exploitation and trafficking, transnational migration and motherhood, and caring labor. On the whole, I enjoyed this section of the book because Trask provides a more balanced perspective on this topic. We often describe globalization as being universally good; however, after reading this section of the book, the reader is left with a very clear message: our discussion of globalization and gender must be contextualized, and the extent to which globalization is a “good thing” depends on a multitude of factors. Part III—Policy Responses in Developing and Industrialized Countries—examines program and policies that have effectively provided girls and women, in both industrialized and developing countries, with opportunities to develop skills and obtain education. Chapter 8 begins with several powerful statistics, which underscore the positive impact of educational opportunities for girls and women on outcomes such as decreasing mortality rates. Trask then describes the two most predominant development agendas. The neoliberal approach encourages developing countries to engage in free trade and participate in the global marketplace and is supported by The World Bank and International Monetary Fund. In contrast, the human development perspective focuses on the well-being and betterment of individuals, with economic growth as one of many success factors. The remainder of this chapter highlights key efforts to address female health concerns, such as HIV/AIDS, provide access to high-quality education for girls and women, and initiate economic empowerment programs. This chapter, as well as Chapter 9, was informative and covered a lot of ground in describing initiatives aimed at girls and women throughout the world. Trask concludes her book by stressing the importance of individual agency to any discussion on this topic, stating that, “We are all not just cogs in the great machinery of globalization…While we may be constrained by contexts, beliefs, and resources, ultimately we are still the architects of our own lives” (p. 250). Indeed, globalization is happening around us, but the effects of globalization are not universally positive for all women in all societies. As a psychologist, the concept of free will is important to me, so I was pleased to see Trask's emphasis on individual agency in the study of globalization and in policy making and programmatic responses to globalization. When phenomena occur on a global level, individuals often feel out of control and miniscule, but the concepts of individual agency and free will remind us that even in the most seemingly uncontrollable situations, we have choice. For women who feel lost in the globalized world that is happening around them, choice is, indeed, an empowering notion.