Protect, Track, Emancipate: The Role of Political Masculinities in India's Fight against Sex Selection. (August 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Rahm, Laura
• Other Names: Starck Kathleen guest-editor.; Luyt Russell guest-editor.
• Is Part Of: Men and masculinities. Volume 22:Number 3(2019)
• Page Start: 529
• Page End: 562
• Publication Date: 2019-08
• Subjects: political masculinities -- patriarchy -- gender-biased sex selection -- son preference -- missing women -- India -- thematic analysis; Men's studies -- Periodicals; Étude de genre; Étude sur les hommes; Homme; Identité masculine; Masculinité; Perception sociale; Recherche; Rôle selon le sexe; Ressource Internet (Descripteur de forme); Périodique électronique (Descripteur de forme); 305.3105
• DOI: 10.1177/1097184X18768873
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1097-184X

Abstract

One of the side effects of India's rapid socioeconomic transition has been a growing demographic masculinization with millions of "missing" women. Modern technologies have enabled couples to determine and select the fetal sex. Since the 1990s, political efforts to control sex selection have met with little success. This article assesses policy effectiveness and the role of political masculinities in India's fight against sex selection. This qualitative analysis draws from policy files and forty-seven in-depth semistructured expert interviews conducted in Delhi, Punjab, and Haryana in 2014–2015. Interview participants included national policy makers, state and district implementers, and representatives from nongovernmental and international organizations. This article finds that state action against sex selection frequently follows the logic of "protecting, " "tracking, " and "emancipating" females—analogue to roles of a family patriarch toward his kin and thus reproducing gender biases and undermining policy efforts against sex selection.