Water, Culture ,, and power

Local Struggles in a Giobal Conrext

Edited by'|ohn M. Donahue andBarbara Rose /ohnston

ISLANDWashington, D.C. .

PRESSCove io, .California

Copyright O 1998 Island Press

A11 right reserved mder lltemational and pan-American Copy_

right Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced in any

form or by any means without permission in writing from the pub-

lisher: Island Press, 1718 Connecticut Avenue, Suite 300, NW,

Washington, DC 20009.

Library of Congress Cataloging in publication Data

Water, culture and power : local struggles in a global context //ohn M. Donahue and Barbara Rose /ohnston, editors.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.ISBN 1-55953-521-5 {cloth.) - ISBN 1-55963-522_3 {paper)1. Water resources development-Case studies. 2. Water

resources development-Govemment po.licy_Intemationalcooperation. 3. Water-supply-political aspects. 4. Water_supply-Social aspects.

I. Donahue, John M. tr. Iohnson, Batbara Rose.

HD1691.W323 1998

333.9l-dc21 I7-4IO5ICIP

Printed on recycled, acrd-{ree paper @ @

Manufactured in the United Stares of America

t09876s432r

Dedicated to our children as they enterthe twenty-fir st century

Edward Donahue

Bemadette Donahue

Roberto ALejandro Donahue

Benjamin |ohnston Edwards

Chtistopher /ohnston Edwards

whose lives and futures dependon decisions made in the here and now.

Gender

CHAPTERll

and Socie ty in Bar.rgiaciesh'sFlood Acticn Plan

Suzanne Flanckett, lesmin Ai<hteLand Kazi R ozann t\khter

Author Surnmary

This chapter discusses the inteffation of gender-relatedissues and other soci.al constructions into a nationaL-scale deveiopment program, Bangladesh's Flood ActionPlan {FAP). The program, based on thirty difierentstudies oi flooding in Bangladesh, began in 1989 andended in 1995. Every phase of rhe FAP, which was orig-inaily intended as an engineering and planning exer-cise, was marked by compiex rnachinations of severaleconomic, political, and sociaL interest groups. In re-sponse to criticism, a Gender Siudv was added to onecomponena of the FAP, the Flood Response Study, ini991. The results of the Gender Str,rdy {ocused aiten-tion on the unrecognized role of women in agriculturalproduction. AJthough the effects oi the Gender Studyon the FAP were mixed, it may serve !o broaden the so-cial perspective of future deveiopment programs.

Introduction

Foreign aid programs operate within sometimes di{ficult donor-rectp-ient power relationships. Requirements to reduce governmentspending or otherwise change economic and social processes arecommon and controversial aspects of contempotary atd. programs.Recipients may want ard but not want to comply lvrth its terms andconditions, and some among the recipi.ents may challenge the wisdomof accepting assistance at all. Such tensions, which exist to somedegree in most internationai development projects, can produc ebyzan-ti.ne relationships among donors and aid recipients in large projects.

In large, long-term aid programs, the interests and agendas of209

;*,0r,r., and,,outsiders,, may ;. ;,:..-:^:

":'*' ^*: -AKHTER

vious dr f f ererr. ", "* o ng ttr.,rr ri o,r, p}ilt :H[:?HH:.:H;T'1with some local peopie igainst

"ii.., J"rfr,ro.,, otfor.ifr.rr.",ro fo.rfr,and so on. Anthropolotrt srr^i wil,. describes such overlap inBangladeshi,,women an J derrelopm.nr;;'n.o*r"*r,

To maintain that foreign aid has had a highly significant im-ff:ffi:H

wav that gender has figured l" n"urt. lir.""rr.'r"outsidet","*.1,",1#ff ,:ffi Jil"'o';il,..fJ""'":::,|.] jx[;both sides there is .on.ia.rrUt. iirrlflict and manipuratio"

"r ii. ir.*.r"rtjtlll:

controverst con-

i s no t tru e that l o car,." d;;;;;;i-#;:': JrTT:i^J.:;*, ::as rnany ,,women..and deveiopment,, approaches assume.Rather, gender is a ,,conresr"d;"g""

also within Bangladesh

ff;.:ffitra externai intervention-irticui"tes and integrares

{White 1992)

This chapter discusses the integration of gender and other socialconsiderarions into a- national-s."I. a".r.top.ment program, Bangra-desh's Frood Action plan, here;.f;;;;i;;;s the FAp {see figure 1r.r).The rAp was a program composed of thirty different studies of floodproblems and issues.in Bangiadesh ;h;;;"g* in 1989 and ended in1995. It was funded ly " .oirori"nl^;i;

wortd Bank, ;ii;-r, times served;;;;,_. nH:f;i:H:.:i:ffi1l::::T':i'j1..'"'ed a new '.',, ,'r-,. -Frood pran coo.-a"ii,,ioncomprex*".n,.*'o1'..il::J.l"J::,::"JJTff ,IilTf *"|J,ffterest groups. The stakes were high: ."...rrf"i plr,rrrl;g;;;o.r, *r*n,result in lucrative future construction con

;,ff ifi:T:i":.,.,i:":::,*"*,,".-,;##lii ji;'r:1,:".TI.:l,T::i

The FAp began as a response to severe floods that covered nearrythree-quarters of Banglad"r; '" ;;;, lnrr,

""0 i988. These floods dls_rupted che lives of res.idenrs ,nd ,...iuj'r,*,n.rrr, media arrenrion,arousing inrernational;on;ern f", ;; ;;ie of Bangladesh. The finaloutcome of the FAp wa1 to b-e " r., oi plinr"ih"t *or.rd give Bangladeshifarmers enough protection iro* ttoo-arl;"ii"- them to increase foodproduction. This improvement. ir w,. .._,,.quaterood,"oorr]",",i;;:::::,Tr-rTrXfJ,*,:ililJ::::..ll,if

^ The chirry FAp studies _.r. ;;;;;',s ome were a. r i gn",

" Jrs s upporting s tudi es ffi :Tr: ;?li:ir::l.tiai background information to fi; ..gi"""] teams deveroping rocai

cENDER AND soclrry IN BANcLADEsH,s Fap

JOTN

iD.*^ ounqS;),

fl"T*uxf*Y:jl"'^,i"+t"

.GURr r r. r. BaNGLADEsHBangiadesh,s Flood Action plan (FAp) began as a response to severefloods thac covered nearly three-qr,rr,.r.". o{ th. countf ," ,Sgo,1987, and 1988. tndicated here are the cities and villages thar werethe focus of the Gender Study, a component of the FlJod n.rporr..Study of the FAp. {Courtesy of Suzanne Hanchett.)

flood action plans.l The authors of this chapter worked on one suchsupporting study, the Flood Response Stud.y, iunded uy irr" u.s.Agency for Internationar Development, which investigut.d ,r* ao"aexperiences of 2,264 households in thirty villages tiro,rgt o,r,-it.floodpiains (see ISpAN I992c).2 Another, gritish-funded, supportingstudy investigated the experiences oi communities that already hadflood control devices in place and compared. them with theexperiences of some communities that did not (see Hunting TechnicarServices Ltd. L9921.

J->/ \ r CHINA

./ >.,/ \*J\-N

\ 1J'""'""'J

Two kinds of acti.on were planned. One was flood control-the de-

sign and construction of embankments or other structures to controlwater flow during the rainy season. The other was called "floodproofing"-the development of ways to help loca1 popuiations survivefloods with minimal disruption o{ work and sociai li{e. Socially definedprograms were never given high prionty, but they ciid serve to broaden

the scope o{ some follow-up projects.The Flood Action Plan was surrounded by controversy from its

inception. Its scale and cost (more than U.S.$155 million) were grand.

A coterie of Bangladeshi and foreign critics outside the FAP continu-a1ly questioned whether the program represented the best use of such

a large amount of money. There were numerous disputes both rnside

and outside the FAP about the ways in which construction planning,cost-benefit analysis, social analysis, environmentai protection, and

other FAP activities could or should relate to one another. Outsidecritics alieged that conflicts of interest pervaded the program.3 Thecase against the FAP is summarized in Adnan 1991 and lF'agga* 1994.

One debated point was the definition of the much-discussed "floodproblem," which in the FAP's view meant riverine flooding but not thecyclonic storms and tidal waves that periodically devastate coastal

lands. Bangladesh, once the eastern part of the colonial Indian state of

F- Low-tand vilage

--+-

Medium-tand viltage ->l€- High-land vitlage I

FIGURE I I.2.VILLAGE TOPOGRAPIIY iN BANGLADESH

During the summer monsoon season {May-October) heavy rainfall normallycauses water levels to rise in the Ganges Deita. Human and animal life are

more or iess adapted to the delta environment. Village homes are built on highmounds. lloodplain fishes are an important part o{ the Bangladeshi diet, and

floods provide the conditions necessary for the 6sh to spawn. (F-levels re{er todegrees of inundation.) From Irrigation Support Project {or Asia and the NearEast, Flood Response Study (FAP 14): Draft Final Report {Dhaka, Bangladesh:

Ministry of Irrigation, Water Development, and Flood Control, Flood PlanCoordination Organization, 1992).

I

> i.2 2t3 Bengal and an independent nation since 1971, is sj.tuated on the delta ofthe Ganges, Brahmaputra, and illeghna fuvers (see figure i 1.2). Duringthe summer monsoon season (h1ay-October), healry rarnfail normallycalrses water levels in one or more oi these rivers to rise. Human and

anj.mal iife is more or iess aciapted to the delta envrronment. Villagehomes are buiit on high mounds. Floodpiain fishes are an importantpart of the Bangiadeshi diet, and floods proviCe the conditions neces-

sary lor the fish to spawn.Bangladesh's oificial langr:age, Bengali, disting'.rishes normal "sea-

sonal hea-,y rain and flooding" (barsha) from unusually deep and pro-

longed "severe flooding" lbannel, which ma;r dri.ve people from theirhomes and endanger livestock or crops. In a normai year,3A percent ofBangladesh's land surface is flooded by overbank spi11s during the mon-soon season. But in a severe flood year, nearly ali the national territorymay be underwatera {see figure 11.3).

Nlonsoon season problems of greatest concern to the generai publicrt'.i

!

I

;Eri:l

Nomal flood-affected uea Flood-affected uea dumg i974

FIGURE II 3 C€M""1:::X;;JJ;i;;;"*" EXTREME

The map at left indicates the area of Bangiadesh that is normally flooded during

the summer monsoon season. Although lhis annual floociing is extensive, rt isnot considered out of the ordinary. The map at right shows manmum ilooding\n 1974. Such unusually severe floods occurred again ln 1984, 1987, and 1988,

arousing internatronal concern that 1ed to the creation of the Flood ActionPlan. Adapted from Mahabub Hossain er aI., Floods in Bangladesh: RecurrentDisastu and People's Survival (Dhaka, Bangladesh: Universrties Research

Center, 1987), A.T.M. Amihu Islam and Sanat Kumam Saha.:::

214 HANcHETT, AKHTER, AND AKHTER

include not only unwanted water flow but arso drainage congestionand waterlogging caused by rairroacl rines, roads, and everiflood controistructures themseives. Frash floods, res'lting either from normalprocesses or irom breaks in embankma.r,r, ,r" another source ofdanger. Local experiences o{ floods and reactions to them vary fromyear to year and from one section of the country to anorher. Thus, itsoon became evident that there was no single, clear ,,flood probrem,,for the FAp to solve.

Introducing a Gender Focus

Because the FAp framework, as defined by the government ofBangiadesh and most donors, emphasized the mechaiical aspects offlooding and its control, gou"r.r-"nt officials showed littre interest inthe social effects of flooding. Nonetheress, severar rAp studies didinciude social research along with mechanicar studies of waterdynamics, and eventually the government and like_minded donorsmodified their approach somewhat. outsiders *.re erp.ci*rry criticalof the early lack of attention to women,s interests orrthe part of thegovernment of Bangladesh and the u.S. Agency for InternationaiDevelopment {Aro1.s In response to noisy criticism at a l99l work-shop, the u's. government, with permission of the government ofBangladesh, added a Gender study component

f our prolect) to the AID-funded Flood Response study. At first, the consideration of women,spoints of view made some people in both the donor and the recrpientcamps nervous. But outside critics were politically troubiesome, andquieting them was a priority. Bangradeshi poritics, services, and dever-opment schemes were (and still are) largeiy in the hands of men, andthus the contribution of women to agricurtural production-^ key goaiof the FAP-was not widely ,ckno*ledged in poricy making circles.

such biases tend to b_ecome self-perpetuating, as severa.i generationsof development researchers in Bangladesh have observed. o"ne earry re-port observed, "people in foreign agencies, evaruators and the erites of[Bangladeshj have no confidence i., *o*..r, nor do they think thatmoney spenr on them wiii actually help the development of Bangla_desh" {Mccarthy, Abdullah, and Zeidenstein rg79,3i5r.The chalrengefacing us as rAp gender researchers was to determine whether it wasnecessary to include women's concerns arong with men,s in this signif-icant environmental planning effort. If we found that it *"r, *. wouldthen have to persuade policy makers that women had standing to be in,cluded in new ways-in water development projects and programs.

Interviewers for,the Flood Response StuJy *"r. .rr"orrr",i"J to *rit.case studies on subjects that interested. them, and some lf th.s. fo_

.:,", :;i,.. ;, "*,:;::::'*" case s,udies,.,,"o'::to understand many of the dilemmas faclng women during severefloods and described some women's coping strategies. Rahima was oneof the first to te1l her story:6

RahimaRahima is a houselvife. She is thirty-six years old and has two sons andone daughter. Her husband is a sharecropper. The iamily lives inChhoto Bashalia Village in Tangail District. At flood time, Rahima'shouse was underwater for fifteen days. This case study describes theproblems Rahima faced during the 1988 flood and how she managed tosave her family from danger.

She was very disturbed by the unclean and dangerous condi-tions in which they had to live during the flood. Their housewas surrounded by paddy fields, and at flood time all sorts ofcreatures came to her house {rom the fie1ds. This gave her thefeeling that the place was filthy. Also, snakes came, flushedout of their underground hiding places, into the houselooking for dry places. Her fear of snakes kept her awake atnight. She tried to keep her children, especially the youngestone, on the bed all day so that they would not fall into thewater and get leeches on them. Of course she also very muchfeared that her children would be bitten by snakes.

During the flood time Rahima fed her children early andtook them to a neighbor's house at night to sieep. She wasafraid to have them sleep in the house because of the snakes.Her husband, who insisted on sleeping in the house [to pre-vent burglaryj, demanded that she keep him company. So shehad to spend her nights in the flooded house without her chil-dren and in a state of fear.

One night she saw a poisonous snake wrapped around theneck of the vessel lkolshil in which she kept rice. She hadthat vessel on the corner oi the bed, so she was terribly fright-ened and called to her husband. He, however, did not showany anxiety and went to sleep, but she could not sleep thewhole night. Even after this frlghtening incident she couldnot leave the house at night.

Her kitchen garden was only partially submerged by theflood waters. Although the fruits and vegetables she grewwere not sufficient, the family was fully dependent on thissource of food. Every day she had to go by herself throughflood waters barefoot to the garden to gather her produce, butshe felt this was very difficult and unsafe, mainly because ofsnakes.

- l'r c,oKrng purposes Rahima macle a portable mud stove 1' t tbefore the flood time, and she gathered sote dri.d i;";;';;; I t b

twigs, straw, and wood for fuel. She stored her fuel on a-tree,and kept a bamboo ladder to climb up and get it. She did thisjob alone, as she is always in charge of coli.ing

""a i".ai"gthe whole family.

As her husband -r,vas

quite aware of the bad effects ofdrinking and using{looclwater, Rahima had to coilect waterirom the nearest tubewell, .,vhlch was betwee" ^

q"rr,., ""aa half a k_iiometer away in Member,s [that is, ,r,

-.G","Aunion or area council member,s] house. This was not an easytask' Ea-ch day she walked barefoot through ,ir" *^i.t^-irr,her pitcher {kokhil on her head, const"rrtti

"*rr" "irir" ;".sibility of being bitten by leeches. Because of the rures ofsociety, which she has to obey, she had to do this ioU.i"a".no circumstances would her husband ever go "rrd

g",d'nking water; and because the job was so hard, she could. not send her children to do it.The division of work in the household meanr Rahima hadto do a lot of extra work, and she suffered {r;;;;;;J;r",

sure roo. Though men do some things during nooa tn*iir"yotherwise do not do, the burcien of rirork f"d; _;;i; o,r'rf."woman's shoulders. At times her husband became ";;;;p"tient and perulant. He did not want to help her witli-herhousework; rather, he decided to stick to ,."ditiorr"i -"rr,.work. He took on a passive role. \&-hen fr. U".u*" l"* ,n.did not quarrei with him. she just accepted the situati"# andwent on with her work.

iHanchett, n.d.)

Rahima's was a situation like others we encountered in which thecllstomary division of labor was only slightly modified drr.rr,g trr"severe flood crisrs. Also like others, Rahima made good use of her rim_ited resources' In her struggle to feed her family dirring ,'" Rooa, tr"vegetables she had grown -,vere of life-saving importance isee photoI l. I ).

This family reiied on rocai "patron-client" power rerationships to:ope with the situation, as did others we encountered. A prominentrousehoid provided Rahima,s family with acces. to ,"f. drinkingwateti other villagers also mentioned. relying on local elite famiries foroans or food to survive the severe flood and lts potentiaily d"-rrrt",.rrg:conomic aftermath.

:-AP Studies on lvomen and Floods: An Overview'AP researchers working on at reast ereven different studies, incrudingrurs, reviewed gender issues from a variety of perspectives. Nine

2 r'7

Pgoro r r. r. BaxcLADESHI FAMILy IN FRoNT oF THErRFLOODED HOME

People of Bangladesh cio not consider flooding to be a problem untrl the watercovers the fioors of their homesreads, as in rhis home in char Bhacirasan in1993. Courtesy of Dr. Khurshida Khanciakar.

studies devoted substantial attention to \,r.omen,s concerns, and twogave gencier issues minor rrealment {see note 1}. From thrs large cor.trusoi data and recominendations ernerged some common ihenres relatinggender to the FAP. virtually a1l the studies \,vere concerned in one wayor another',vith women's economic positiorr vis-i-vis rnen's. :-\nothercornmon theme lvas the division of labor wirhin rurai society anc theways males' and females' norrnal roles and responsibiliries -,nrere

a{fected by floods and thei.r aitermath. The ciisrinctive posirion oifemale-headed households -was another gender-related topj.c receivingattention in more than one FAP studv.

Economics, Gender, and Floods

Economic status aifected people's flood experi.ences rnore than did anyother Iactor. wealthy people were far less disturbed by severe floodsthan were poor people; rn€fl were less disturbed than were women ofthe same socioeconomic class. Gender also afiected people's capacltyto cope with severe floods because oi women,s weaker economic posi-tion in Bangladeshi society. Key elements were women,s employmenr,assers/ and uses of credit.

The largely poor and landiess Bangladeshi populatron e;<perienceshunger every year during the monsoon season/ when there rs not

.l

218

enough day-labor employment to enabre peopre to buy their daily food.The ruinous economic impact of severe floods, during which there isno day-labor work at all, on families arready chronical! seasonaily un-employed is an intensified version of the hunger they endure everyyear' some of the worst probrems caused by severe floods, then, aremore the res'lt of economic inequities than the resuit of the floodwa-ters themselves. Most of the FAp studies of laboring people r.r.rd"r_scored some well-known facts of life in Bangradesh. r"oi on", the ma-jority of poor women not working in subsidized empioymen, progr"rr*are employed as household servants o, posth"rrrest *ork..s

"rid "r"paid not in cash but in meals and perh"p, some grarn. Their husbands(if they have husbands), howevet, ate- more iikely to receive dailywages for their labor. The Noakhali North Drainage and Irrigation pro-ject {Southeast Regional) quoted upper_ and middle-.l*sS frr*.rr,wives as saying that it was difficult to find female laborers to helpduring the harvest because poor women were emproyed in subsidizedFood for work jobs with GARE. According to the women working inthese subsidized jobs, the remuneration fir housework was so min_imal that it was not worth their while to take such jobs if they couldget any others (Sir M. MacDonald and partners Ltd,. I99Z).

The Land Acquisition and Resettlement study found that despitesuffering economic losses when displaced by government land acqui_sition for flood embankment construction projects, destitute womenseeking laboring iobs in those same projects were denied these money_making opportunities {Multi-disciplinary Action Research Consul_tants 1992). This case represenrs an extreme exampre of unjust genderdiscrimination, bur it is sadly typical of a general situatron in whichlesser economic opportunities for raboringlwomen reduce their ownand their families' capacity to recover from eco.romic dislocation.

Di{ferences between typically male and typicaily iemale assetsaffected the flood experiences of men and women. women,s hord onmajor economic resources, primariry land and draft animars, is weakerthan is men's, and what women do have is ress valuabre than whatmen have. Their possesslons iiewelry, kitchen utenslls, small ani-mals), often referred to in Bengaii as ,,small things,,, are sold or morr_gaged fust to help their househords survive.i This represents a rationaldecision on the part of the famiry, as women's things are not as impor-tant economically as the "big things" men tend to owrl, the forced sareof which is considered tragic. Despite their lesser ."orro.nr" ,igrrrfi-cance to the family as a whole, however, the saie of a woman,, porrar-sions may leave her with no economic resewes whatsoever.

- Borrowing money is one means of recovering from a flood; some ofthe FAP studies investigated men's and women,s uses of credit. The

HANCI{ETT/ AKI{TER/ AND AKHTER

-;.', ;; ; ffi",,"";;"-en had,^n.",":::at extremely high rates o{ interest and soid off valuable assets in orderto physically survive. This report commented that such actions couldbe financially ruinous to families (Overseas Development Administra-tion 1992). Our Cender Study found that borrowing money was part ofthe coping and recovery strategy {or two-thirds of the eighty-sixwomen in our subsample (more than three-quarters of the landless),who had used monsoon season loans to meet basic survival needs i72percent) or for purposes such as house repair or heaith care.

The flood experience of a destitute woman/ Korimon, depicts a pat-tern of economic deprivation by now sadly familiar to most socialresearchers in Bangladesh.

KorimonKorimon and her family live in Rampur Village in Brahmanbaria Dis-trict. Every year, river erosi.on takes away a good portion oi land in thisvillage. By 1991, the viilage was little more than one sma1l neighbor-hood with houses jammed together in its shrinking space.

Korimon's family is from the southern neighborhood.Korimon is the second daughter o{ Mustafa Miah, a daylaborer who lives in another village of the same Union [juris-diction]. Poor Mustafa Miah could not give any o{ his chii-dren an education due to shortage of money. Korimon had togo to work at a very early age. When other children startedgoing to school, she was collecting cow dung and also shaluklshapla root) in the water. Sometimes she used to go to thefield to give tobacco to her {ather and to help him in his work.From an early age her life was one of hardship.

As she grew up her father worked hard to arrange a mar-riage for Korimon. So one day she got married to a man ofRampur Village. Korj.mon went to her husband's house witha 1ot of things in her mind. She wanted to make a happyfamily. Her husband was a very nice man. He ioved her, andthey were leading a happy li{e. Korrmon was not at allunhappy in her husband's family. And she managed quite

',veil with her husband's earnings, even though he was only a

day laborer. She had her first child three years after gettingmarried.

This happiness did not last 1ong. Within one year herfamily faced a terribie naturai disaster. Huge flood watersdestroyed her house. They became refugees and took shelteron the property of a rich man, where Korimon and her hus-band constructed a thatched hut. As the flood waters startedreceding her husband died of cholera. This time it seemed to

ZO HANCHETT/ AKHTER/ AND AKHTI

her that she had lost everything. This was the end of her mar-

ried iife, the beginning of a new chapter in her li{e.Korimon had to iook for a job to support herself and her

baby boy. Going to other people's houses seemed to be the

oniy option she had 1e{t. But she found it was very difficult inthis viilage to get any sort of work, because hali the year thisviilage remains under water. At that time there is very littlechance of getting any work. Only one or two months in a year

could she get some work; the rest of the time she couid do

nothing. Finding it impossible to support herself and her boy,

she had to go {or begging. One or two months in a year she

worked in other people's houses and the rest of the time she

begged from door to door.The toughest time for Korimon is the fmonsoon] season' In

reply to the question, How do you live at flood time?Korimon said, "Flood has taken everything away from me. Ithas taken my house, my husband, my happy family life and

everything else. It has taken my only shelter place. Now, as

soon as flood water comes, I go to Nasi.rnagar or to someother places where there is no flood water. At flood time, noone wants to give money or food to beggars." Sometimes she

goes without food for the whole day; and sometimes she does

not eat but still manages to feed her child.Accordlng to Korimon poor people like her in this viliage

do not get relief supplies. Sometimes they hear about relief,but they never get it inside the village. If they go from "doortc door" [oifice to office] in the upazila {regional headquar-tersi, then they might get some he1p.

Korimon still ieels {or this village. Once she had a house inthis village, though she lost it. In the same way she lost herhusband. She can not forget all those memories. She loves thepeople of this village. That i.s why she does not leave thisplace. She constructed a small thatched cottage in the richman's property and lives there. This house is not waterproof.When it raj.ns water runs inside the house. Even then, she

llves there. When her husband died she could have gottenmarried again, but she did not. She thought about her child.She would rather spend the rest of her life with her onlychild. That is why without a proper house and without a hus-band she is still living in this Rampur Village.

Korimon's life up to the time of the interview represented many

women's worst fear-a series of grievous losses driving a poor, iilit-erate widow to beggary. Riverbank erosion contributed Steatly to the

iamily's decline by taking their house,s and polluted floodwaters.maywell have caused her husband's fatal cholera. It rs noteworthy that

GENDER AND SOCIETY IN BANGLADESH,S !AP

<lespite her total dependence on charity, Korimon did not receive

public relief assistance duri.ng tlmes of severe flood. Like Rahima's,

her family depended heavily on a parron-client relationship to survive

hard times.

Gencler-Based Division af Labor

lnformation on the di.rision oi household labor benveen the sexes high-

lighted the need to avoid stereorypes about the econcmic sign-ifrcance

of women's agrlcultural work as compared with men's' Women are

very rnuch involved in agricultr-rre in Bangladesh, if agriculture is seen

as inciuding more than lust field cuitivation oi stapie crops such as

rice. In its broadest sense, agriculture includes many tasks assigned to

women, such as animal husbandry', food presen'ation, homestead cul-

tivation of lruits and vegetables, and harvest and postharvest activi-

ties, as well as field crop producti.on. But eyen in crop production,

women's role is more signlficant than is usuaily acknolvledged in gov-

ernment circles. One important, but not otten recognized, female re-

sponsiblii.ty i.n crop production in Bangla<iesh is the storage and germi-

nation o{ seed grain.

In storage, rice and seed are the lvomen's province' Theywatch over them to prevent loss from dampness, insects, and

rars. . . . They determine how mu'ch is needed {or the famliy

{and therefore how much can be soid}, when it is to be huskeci

or miiled . . ., and how much each person gets'''' It istheresponsibility oi rural lvomen to test the seed, which they

have stored, ior germination quality before men take it to the

flelds to sow. {Abdullah and Zeidenstein 1982, 30, 24)

Our Gender Study collected detailed information on the division of

household labor during floods, as did some others.e Nearly all routine

household tasks are likely to be affected in one way or anothel by

floods. There are various ways in which this occurs. some tasks will of

necessity cease during floods: plowing, planting, and irrlgation of

crops or watering of kitchen gardens' ior example' Some tasks, such as

open water fishing, are iikely to be problematic in rough currents and

monsoon storms, others, which musi be perlormed consistentl.y to

maintain the family and its animais, become extremely difficuit*sometimes impossible-during severe floods'

Men's responsibilities dunng floods typically are more iimited than

are women,s. Men build rafts and plat{orms, purchase fooci, trade, and

fish; they also gather some {uel and {odcler. lvomen set up stoves and

HANCHETTi AKHTER, AND AKHTER

cook, gather fuel, {etch drinking water, care for smalr animals, and pro-tect and redry stored food and seed grains. Men and women cooperatein caring for children and large iivestock, buirding indoor platforms,guarding the home, helping neighbors, and repairing damaged home-stead molrnds lbhitl). Men and women both care for animals duringfloods.l0 In the northeastern d_istrict of Sunamgani, men and womenwork together a{ter severe floods to rebuild homestead mounds.Women, however, do most of the routine mound repai.rs and mudrepiastering after each monsoon.ll

Most of the normal work o{ adult women-protecting granaries andseeds, cooking, getting drinking watert and caring for animals, {or ex-ample-is in the required-but-di{ficult category. Chores such as gettingfuel or drinking water, usually performed by children o. ,..n^g".r, *uybe taken over by adults during floods because they become especiallydifficult or dangerous.

The l98B flood experience of Nahar, a woman of Tangail District,shows how one ingenious and determined woman struggled to protecther livestock, conform to modesty standards, and perfoim householdchores.

NaharNahar i.s a housewife whose husband works as a day laborer. They andtheir son, a student in the ninth grade, live in the village of chhotoBashalia in Tangail.

As the water level rose Nahar became very worried andstarted preparing for a flood. She built a raft out of banana treetrunks, and she gathered fuel, storing it on a tree. To keep thebed above water level, she gathered some bricks, wading outinto the llood water to search for them. She succeeded inraising the height oi the bed by putting the bricks under its1egs.

In preparing food, she found that fish were easy to get butnot easy to keep. Once she had some live fish to cook on theraft but as she had no place to put them, they all iumped backinto the water while she was getting ready to cook them andwere completely gone.

She was especially anxious about the safety of her cows andgoat, which were her only source o{ income. She was payingfor her son's education by selling their milk, although heihusband objected to her dorng this. He wanted the boy ro go towork as a day laborer like himself instead of going to school,

"'.":: ;. ;,.;.",;; ;"* ;,'.:::_.^,ing,he boy,o

continue his education. The public road was the only sa{e, dryplace where she couid keep her animals, so she walked aboutone kilorneter through the water with the cows and goat andkept them there during flood time. Every day she broughtstraw she had stored for her cows, and when the supply wasexhausted she collected water hyacinth for them. Feeding thegoat was even more o{ a problem. The goat needed leaves. But,as many others were picking leaves for their animals too, shequarreled with her neighbors about rights to village trees. Be-

cause he got no income irom the animals and they were herpropert, her husband was unwilling to help her with all thiswork. He even seemed to enjoy her trouble and spent the daysgossiping in the marketplace.

When asked why her husband did not help more withhousehold chores, she replied, "This is not the work of themale. His duty is to buiid and repair the house."

Nahar's bland comment accepting her husband's lack of ef{ortmasked the fact that the 1988 flood had exacerbated a marital conflictabout continuing their son's education. Her husband's refusal to helpcare for the livestock was not typical of households we interviewed;most couples cooperated to protect animals. Nahar, however, used heranimals to deiy her husband's wishes, educating her son so that hewould have a chance to escape the menial labor rut her husband was in.

One lesson a planner might take from this report is that spousesneed to be treated as individuals because they may have different eco-nomic stakes at risk in a severe flood. Most government programs stiiloperate on the assumption that a married couple's interests are uni-form and adequately represented by the husband.

Female-Headed Households

Femaie-headed households account {or 9 to I5 percent of all householdsin Bangladesh and possibly as much as 25 percent of all agriculturalhouseholds. (Hamid 1992). There are several reasons {or consideringfemale-headed households separately in development planning; one ofthe more important ones is that such househoids tend to be small andeconomically vulnerable. But despite their handi.caps, female-headedhouseholds in developing countries such as Bangiadesh too often are ne-glected by most sewice providers (agricultural or veterinary extension

224 workers, tor example). It is common for agencies in Bangradesh to directservices to men on the assumption that this wi[ benefit the -aromen intheir households. Thus, women without husbands or sons to representtheir interests tend to be treated dismissively by officials conductingbusiness in offices where women are rarely r.a'o., even worse/ in ruralmarkets, defined as "for men only," where women are treated rudelyand insulted. Three of the FAp studies, the Flood Response Study, theEnvironmental Study, and the Fisheries Srudy (see note 1), gave specialemphasis to female-headed households.l2

The economic posrtion of the female head of household is differentfrom that of her counterpart senior married woman. our study foundthat more women in female-headed households were empioyed out-side the home than were women in the female sample as a whore. An-other dif{erence was found in landownership. in our total surveysample of 2,264 trouseholds, 4 percent of which were female headei,approximately the same percentage of female heads of householdsowned land {presumably most of it inherited from their husbands andkept in custody for their sons) as did male heads of households. Thisfinding provided another reason to consider the special interests o{ fe-male heads of households in the FAp. Becaus. ,h"y controlred land,they had an even greater economic interest in the floods, impact onagricultural production than did other women. But their rack of mareassistance put them at a greater disadvantage.

Analyzing the division of rabor between the sexes, we found thatfemale-headed households had different patterns from others. Thesewomen had responsibilities that women in other househoids did not.Tasks per{ormed only by males in male-headed households, specifi-caiiy by the male heads of househoids themselves, were performed. byfemales in their househords. These included going out into fierds ormarketplaces, plowing with a spade iftoda1),r; plinting seeds, trans-planring {plucking and repranting) rice seedrings, weedirig, and cuttingcrops.ra In the male-headed households, there were ,i,ffi"i".r, p"rlsonnel to maintain more conventional divi.sions of labor.

Female-headed households were more rulnerabie than others duringsevere flooding. It was clear that all or most female heads of house_holds-contrary to the stereotype of the sheitered femare-were man-aging, for better or worse, "on their own.,, If they were already poor,however, they were at risk of becoming destitute. If FAp prannerswished to understand their concerns as people who own land, as agri-culturalists, as wage laborers, and as peop-Le with the usual femaleobiigations, there was no choice, we suggested, but to speak directly

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cENDER AND socrlTy IN BANGLADlsn,s rep 2ZS

with them because o{ their typical lack of representarion in the malesocial spheres.ri

IrlamataMamata is thirty-seven and has been divorced for seven years. Her hus-band was a rickshaw pu11er, and lvramata was his first wife. since he di-vorced her, her husband has married three more times. Now Mamataiives with her son in Bararia village i.n Tangail District. She makesmoney as a cigarette {biri) maker. She is paici Tk 2.50 {U.s.$.06 cents)for every 1,000 ci.garette covers she makes.

Mamara lost her house in the 1988 flood. She used to live onthe bank of the Pungli River, but her house was washed awayby flood waters. She then went to live on an embankmentwith her ten-year-o1d son. She buiit a bamboo piattorm therefor them to iive on, and the.v stayed on it for one month. Sheput a mosquito net with some paper around the platform tomaintain her pttrdah ffemale secJ.usion]. One night it wasraining, but there was no cover on the platform. So Mamatagot completely wet. She just had to sit uncler the mosquitonet and get soaked with rain water. There was no latrine, soshe used to leave stool into the llood water clirectly from rheplatform, even though she was using flood rvater for cieaningpurposes.

Mamata had become sick when her house was washedaway by the flood tyater, just at the time she had to go to theembankment to live. She was su{fering irom dysentery, ma1_nutrition, and fever. She became very weak from not gettmgany medicrne, health care, or proper food.

Cetting help at flood time was a big probiern. She was tooweak to get iresh drinking water from the nearest tubeweil,and there was no one to help her. She asked one of her neigh_bors to get her a pot of drinking water, but she re{used; soMamata had to drink flood water. She became so sick thatshe was unable to take a bath for one month (the whole timeshe stayed on the piatiormi, and her body and clorhes smelledvery bad. The only help she did get was from her eldestdaughter, who was married and five months pregnanr. Shehelped her mother prepare food on the platform. Though itwas not proper iood, somehow Mamata survived by eatrng it.Her daughter also helped her by gerting medicine frorn the

226 HANcHETi, AKHTER, AND AKHTER

viilage "quack" [paraprofessional] doctor. Because she waspregnant, the daughter found it very difficuit to walk againstthe current of the water. Once she fell down and almost gotwashed away. Apart from her daughter she did not get anyhelp from other sources. Neighbors were not ar ali helpful.

This is an unusually bitter report of i11ness, poor sanitation, embar-rassment/ and extreme discomfort suffered by a female head of house-hoid who was isolated from normal sources of social support. It isinteresting that Mamata found her marri.ed daughter to be her onlyfriend in this situati.on" Married daughters are not usually so free tohelp their parents because marriage shi{ts women's arlegiance and pri-mary responsibility to their husbands, parents.

Mamata's comment about the lack of heip from nei.ghbors was nottlpical of others we interviewed. In fact, friends and neighbors oftenhelped one another as much as they could while coping with theirown probiems, sharing food and even providing dry spaces in which togive birth.

Neighborhoods in Bangladesh, of course, are not the same as thosein western countries, whose mobile populations easiry form and breakmutual assistance relationships. In a village in Bangladesh, a highvalue is placed on friendship, but a neighborhood.(para or pratibeshilparshi] is likeiy to be settled by cousins and siblings who are econom-ically interdependent and whose reputations and relationships have asmuch to do with their parents and grandparents as with members oftheir own generation. Most rural households also are allied with localfactions (samaaj] whose members provide all sorts of aid ro oneanother i.n exchange for strict loyalty. Like positive bonds, familial andfactionai resentments and breaks also can span the generations, how-ever. we did not question Mamata in detail about her situation, but itis possible that she was isolated because of some 1oca1 conflict, perhapsone in which she had no direct role apart {rom being a member of a cer-tain kin group or faction.

The Argument for Gender Balance inthe Flood Action Plan

Like other crises, severe floods test people and rerationships. Theyforce difficult decisions and reveal deep ,,fauit lines,, withir,

" .o-_munity. survival needs are social as well as physical, and mental pres-

cENDER AND socrETy IN BANGLADEsH's rrp a17

sures can seem intolerable. Every case of iife on the ratt or platformtestified to women's resourcefulness and persistence in coping withadversity. None of these women, not even Korimon, took a passiveapproach to the problems she faced. Their stories belie official views ofwomen's childlike dependence on male relatives.

Study findings eventually did demonstrate that women and menalike have standing to parricipare in programs and pro.iects emergingout of the Flood Action Plan, though there never had been a questionof including men. The most important arguments for includingwomen were as follows:. Women have clear interests in the impact of floods on agriculture,

the main sector to benefit from the Flood Action plan.

. Women's normal household responsibilitiesl6 are such that theyshoulder a grearer burden of household flood-coping acrivitiesthan do men/ most of whose normal responsibilities, except forshopping, cease during floods.

. Female household heads deserve special consideration in the FAp,because there are more female-headed households than most plan-ners seem to think, and they are typically smalier, more economi-cally vulnerable, and have unusual ways of performing householdtasks when compared to male-headed households. Female headsmust perform tasks that only males perform in homes with maleheads. Female household heads were equally likely to own smallplots of agri.cultural land as were rhe male household heads in ourstudy sample and faced similar risks o{ crop damage in severefloods. However, in seeking public ar.d they were at a $eat disad-vantage, as sociai mores make government officials typically re-luctant ro conduct business directly with women.

. Economi.c effects of severe floods on rural households are more sig-nificant than are physical e{fects. The physical effects are sharedmore or less equally by people of different socioeconomic classes,but more affluent groups are far less likely to suf{er economically.Married women or female heads of household with independenteconomic responsibilities tend to have even less secure and lower-paying jobs than do poor men. Emergency borrowing patterns putwomen at greater risk than men of long-term flood-related eco-nomic loss.

The results of the FAP gender studies support the need for participa-tory approaches to local planning. Such approaches seem most likely to

228 HANcHETT, AKHTER, AND A(HTER

accommodate the inevitable complexity of interests-women,s andpoor people's included-in water management and frood contror inBangladesh.

;; ":"";,il;;;. ;;."""",he rAP,n".,,o,^'n';and throughout the liIe oi the prograrn they used their ciour rvith thegovernment of Bangladesh to tlk the research and planning agenda oneway or another.

Within BanglaCeshi societ,v, the FAP studies emphasizing gender

and sociaL issues tested some existing po\,vei relationships. As our case

studies and others demonsrraie, in times of crisis, poor people in ruralareas of Bangladesh depend on patron-client ties to locally i.nfluentialpeople, ties still basic to peasant f.ife worldwide. These ties, thoughnecessary under present conditions, are maintained at a high price tothe poor, who toierate exploitative worki.ng conditions and suwive atonly minimal economic 1eve1s.

The most serious issue raised by our Flood Response Study was thatof socioeconomic class as a key iactor determining peopie's abiiity tocope with severe floods and their afterrnath. The observation that eco-

nomics caused more problems than floodwaters rvas, tn its cwn \vay, a

radical one. Had this observation been heecied {it u'as largeiy igrored),it would have shaken the nation's class system and the bureaucraticservice deiivery arrangements that reinforce it.

Ail the studies that included social analysis provided an opportunityfor muitiple rurai voices to be heard in the nation's capital. But thevoices were heeded by only a iew elite decision makers. Nongovern-mental organi.zations, though more important in Bangiadesh rhan i.nmany other developing corintries, never were formaily inclucied in theFAP. Some, however, managed to create a brlef polltical stir by orga-

nizi.ng an anti-FAP demonstration in Tangail District in 1993.

Gender relationships-though they vary by region, class, and reli-gious orientation-also ai{ect flood-copi.ng processes. The economicand social poweriessness of women relative to men handicaps themdurj.ng crises such as severe floocis and their aftermach. Codes of mod-esty make shame and humiliati.on inevitable when women are forcedto live on rooftops, embankments, or raIts. lVomen's customary lack o{

access to public spaces and their rude treatment in queues and oificesdiscouraged all but the most {earless from seeking certain kinds o{ as-

sistance in a crisis.Cultural values and meanings meandered in braided streams

through the FAP, much as delta waters flow through the Ganges Delta.Vague and shilting ideas about the uses of the big rivers; about the dan-gers or benefi.ts of floods, whether normal or S€v€r€; about proper iasopposed to actual) male and female roles and responsibi-iities; andabout family and household organization underlay FAP discussionsand disputes. Staff members o{ the technically onented Ministry of

conclusion: curture and power in the Flood Action planThe FAP's social and gender stud.ies stimulated. much locar and inter-national discussion and debate. conferences and workshops, whichcontinued through rgg5, at times were scenes of acrimonio.r, dirrgr..-ment about the FAp,s approach {or lack of ,ppror"iJ;;;;i;il"r..some Bangladeshi officials and donor country representatives con-tinued to berieve that it was inappropriate for the FAp o. o,t

", *","r-oriented development programs to tackle basic social problems such asgender inequality. Others, heari.ng about women,s and poor people,s ex_periences during severe floods, broadened their concipa

"i ,rr'" laptgoals and added socialJactors to their approaches. These debates set offpowerful feelings on ar1 sides. one Bangiadeshi officiar ,""r.,ir"", "rjection in a pubiic foru.m to the social .f,"rrg. advice of p.opt. i. .iU.a"hop, skip, and jump" consultants, p"optJ who rushed in and out ofBangladesh and had no serious commitment to the country. Another

:jTtrl incredulously asked us in a workshop dj.scussion about gender,"What do you want us to do, change o.., *hole societyl,, g""gi;rhiand foreign critics of the FAp contiiued to accuse government officiaisof taking a hard-hearted approach to their own citizens,problems. suchaccusations wounded those at whom they were direcied, p.o_ftir.goutraged public responses. On and on it went-

Arguments that it rvould be inappropriare for a flood planning pro-gram to attempt to reform gender relations and other societ^l i".'q""r-ities seemed at first to have a commonsense logic. a,-rt tt ir-ioj" i,weak in the Bangladeshi context, in which water and human ,o-"i.,yare c10se1y interconnected. water regime modifications/ even *irro.ones, have profound effects on all forms of life, humans i".f"l.i, "".,large areas. Water is, after all, the dominaniJ.",.,.. of the land.scape inmost regions of Bangladesh. Therefore, the capacity of civii engineeringprojects and programs to affect life cannot be denied.

. Power relationships affected the local and internationar FAp processin various ways' An earry debate took place among the G-z industrialnations about whether or not floods were always disastrous inBangladesh. Early warnings stressed the potentiar for flood controlstructures to harm the region,s d.elicate delta environment. Even asthey signed on as FAp donors, the large internationar powers continued

2Bo HANCITETT, AKHTER,

^"o ^*,rru*i:r.tJr:::;,I:j";' o""'Jooment, and Flood.Control and some donor

:ffi **:i-;,H:1;5il::#fi ifj:',l':;:*.m:,';r;lfofficiats participated - ,;;j;;;;;1"j:--j trodriction quotas, malewi th res en tm.nt

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*t have heard, disregardedproaches. rrr. ai"roi.'ilo""i'iilt"i1o existing procedures and ap-bur ic absorb.a -r.r] o"ul.. ,"i on;":.?:5:t.o_*.rj

o, policy effect,duced a few programmatic shifts.

:ner8'y for a few years and pro-

,,"3,T;i:ifffiT1, "r ;r.,; ian's gender discussion is a current ini_Control ,o ..r.orrrrrtry

of Irrigation, Water Development, and Floodciations. s,.,.t, .gillo*t:! participation in iocai warer users, asso-

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from the.FAp audrenc., ;;;;";;,r"ljlll".r received mixed reviewssovernmenr of Bangiades;;;;;f;;;lu':t"t a position to which rheFA p - i n sp i re d p - i..i,

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Food for Thought

I"-tl "{the chapters in this book examine rhe i-^.^}^ -_r r.

;'il',""1.;.1'il^ffi ;ff T:J;i:[:i:^,.,",.1n;:io"'"';::iJT'l'.';place. Flooding in Bang1";r;;"-"#:;Y1t water.projects in the firstgro n Life on, R ooapi"l#i;l'".,'

; I J iJ,: :i:'#,il. iil:.Hll"r:;#:.i":::ft:iJfl?J" the aalv r'i'.,i""'or rire whiie noJd-at.rsfl ooding. il:;;;.;r" -to

t*n ioi t the opportun i ti es provide J oil.-r,r,capacity of the soil is enriched Ur r""*i nj"ar,

-JcENDER AND socIETy rN BANGLADTsg's tap

and aquatic ecosystems thri.ve in the marshy settings. When thewaters recede, people carry on their productive strategies-fishing,growing rice, cultivating gardens on mounds and levees.

Although flood times are always dangerous times, some floods posegreater risk than do others. In recent years, floodwaters have claimedhundreds of lives and washed away tens of thousands of homes.Bangladesh's Flood Action Plan was formed to design strategies forminimizing the adverse impacts of annual flooding. This chapterreports on attempts to introduce an awareness o{ the socioculturaldimensions of flooding into the Flood Action Plan's process.

In exploring the experiences and coping strategies of {amilies af-{ected by flooding in Bangladesh, we begin to understand how culturalvalues, traditions, and behaviors structure difierent experiences andcreate different burdens for men and for women. For reasons of cultureand class, women are more vulnerable than are men to the disasterscreated by flooding. Yet "project culture" severely inhibited the au-thors' ability to get this point across to policy makers and flood plan en-gineers. The culture and power dynamics that influenced the way theplan was designed also created tensions and barriers to modifying theplan. Future efforts might benefit from a critical examination of theculture and power dynamics that make Bangladeshi women more vul-nerable than men to disaster during flood times, the strategies utilizedin surviving the e{fects of flooding, the potential role of government inimproving women's ability to recover {rom flood-induced disasters,and the ways in which framing of the problem directiy j"nfluences thedesign and implementation of response strategies.

RESOURCESThe Global Water Partnership has initiated an electronic conlerence on genderand water. Therr website is http://www.gwp.sida.se

ACKNOWLEDGMENTSWe wish to acknowledge that our study was part of a team effort under the di-rection of Dr. G. T. Keith Pitman and Mr. Richard Aten of ISPAN. Senior acivr-

sors to the Flood Response Study were Dr. M. Alamgir, Dr. Musta{a A1am,Dr. Murray Lea{, as well as Suzanae Hanchett. The team leader for the Envi-ronmental Study was Dr. Staniey Hirst. Gender Study interviews were con-ducted by Mrs. Hosne Ara Alam.