Suchergebnisse

The relationship between contraceptive use and religion remains a subject of considerable debate. This article argues that this relationship is rooted in context‐specific institutional and organizational aspects of religious belonging and involvement. Drawing upon unique recent data from a population‐based survey of women conducted in a predominantly Christian high‐fertility area of Mozambique, this study examines the connections between religion and contraception from two complementary angles. First, differences in current use of modern contraceptives across main denominational groups are analyzed. The results show higher prevalence of modern contraceptive use among Catholics and, to a lesser extent, traditional Protestants net of other individual‐ and community‐level factors. Second, an analysis of religious involvement reveals that frequent church attendance has a net positive association with modern contraceptive use regardless of denominational affiliation. These findings are situated within the historical context of religious, demographic, and socio‐political dynamics of Mozambique and similar sub‐Saharan settings.

The Soviet legacy of widespread reliance on induced abortion is of critical importance to reproductive trends and policies in post‐Soviet nations, especially as they strive to substitute contraception for abortion. Using data from two Demographic and Health Surveys conducted in 1995 and 1999, this study analyzes and compares trends in abortion and contraception, women's attitudes toward abortion, and their perceptions of problems associated with abortion and contraception in Kazakhstan. Despite an overall decline in abortion and an increase in contraceptive use since Kazakhstan's independence in 1991, abortion has remained a prominent part of the country's reproductive culture and practices. This study shows how abortion‐related views reflect the long‐standing ethnocultural differences between the indigenous Kazakhs and Kazakhstan's residents of European roots, as the latter continue to have significantly higher levels of abortion. The study, however, also reveals the internal diversity among Kazakhs with respect to abortion experiences and views, stemming from decades of the Soviet sociocultural influence in Kazakhstan. In addition, the analysis points to some generational differences in views concerning abortion and contraception. Finally, the study demonstrates parallels in attitudes toward abortion and toward contraception, thereby questioning straightforward assumptions about the replacement of abortion with contraception.

This case study of women street vendors in La Paz-El Alto, Bolivia, examines the dynamics of competition and cooperation among this group of poor working women in the context of economic structural adjustment and political pluralization. It is argued that the economic and political reforms not only increase street vendors'insecurities, but may also undermine the potential for their broad-based solidarity and collective actions. Extreme competition in the overcrowded street commerce, diminishing returns, and disillusionment with traditional forms of workers' organization hinder cooperation among street vendors and fragment the social body of the street marketplace, often by further reinforcing its gender, class, ethnoracial, and religious fault lines.

Data from three separate studies conducted in Maputo, Mozambique, in 1993 are used to analyse the relationship between the type of social environment in which women work and their fertility and contraceptive use. The analysis finds that women who work in more collectivized environments have fewer children and are more likely to use modern contraception than women who work in more individualized milieus and those who do not work outside the home. Most of these differences persist in multivariate tests. It is argued that collectivized work environments are most conducive to diffusion and legitimation of reproductive innovations. In contrast, individualized environments tend to isolate women and therefore may retard their acceptance of innovative fertility-related behaviour.

Zionistische Kirchen haben in den letzten Jahrzehnten auch in Mosambik Erfolge aufzuweisen. Der Aufsatz analysiert ihre Rolle, Struktur und Mitgliedschaft in der Gesellschaft sowie die Beziehungen zu anderen sozialen Akteuren Maputos. Im Vordergrund steht für die Anhänger dieser Gemeinden die Aussicht auf eine Heilung. Gleichzeitig bieten sie aber für bestimmte Gruppen wie z.B. Frauen die Möglichkeit, traditionelle Beschränkungen zu überwinden. (DÜI-Wgm)

Examines spatial and social isolation, religious participation, economic marginalization, and contraceptive characteristics of women forced to flee from rural areas to the city as a result of prolonged civil conflict, 1993; Maputo, Mozambique.

In this study, we investigate the association between men's labor migration and changes in their non-migrating wives' self-rated health (SRH) over time using longitudinal data from rural Mozambique. In addition to comparing wives of non-migrants and wives of migrants, we account for variation in the economic impact of migration and in migrants' phone communication with their spouses. We find that migrants' wives are significantly less likely to report low SRH, compared to non-migrants' wives, net of other factors. However, this net advantage is concentrated among migrants' wives who receive frequent remittances and who report that their households' conditions have improved thanks to husband's migration. We also find that women who engage in frequent phone communication with their migrant husbands have decreased likelihoods of low SRH, compared to migrants' wives who do not communicate with their husbands during their migration and to women married to non-migrants, regardless of other characteristics. We interpret these findings within the context of multifaceted gendered implications of men's migration for left-behind women's health and wellbeing.