Gender issues and gender believe in Pakistan

Gender Issues &

Gender beliefs in PakistanPresented Arshia kanwal & Hina gul

Gender Issues and gender beliefs in Pakistan

• Pakistan appear to be modern if measured on the basis of inclination to consumerism(economically) but their social values have not necessarily transformed.

• The more things change the more they remain same.• Modern organization in Pakistan has open new job

opportunities for women, this influenced the life style of urban women and extend their roles beyond the private sphere but the socio-cultural values remained the same.

• Working women in modern organizations experience double edge pressure due to inconsistent organizational demands and social expectations of gender specific society of Pakistan.

Gender Issues and gender beliefs in Pakistan

• Their job demands are inconsistent with societal norms of Pakistani society.

• For Example:• Modern organizations demands their employees to

be more interactive, confident and empowered but Pakistani socio-cultural value of female is modesty and family encourages women to be humble in conversation and actions

• This conflicting role demands of women negatively influence their professional as well as personal life

• Collectivism, stratification, and gender segregation are the three basic elements of Pakistani culture

• Women’s mobility and interaction is associated with the family’s respect (izzat) and high social status in the society.

• According to Islamic sharia, and ethical code of Pakistani society a Muslim women is expected to remain in hijab or chadar in the presence of men especially who are unrelated to her.

• Chadar and chardiwari are taken as two appropriate domains for women in Pakistani culture.

• Women in chardiwari is taken as a sign of modesty(Haya), family(Ghairat) and tradition(Rivaj).

Gender Issues and Gender beliefs in Pakistan

Over to:Hina Gul

• Women’s mobility in organization especially young and unmarried women whose mobility is strictly regulated and controlled in Pakistani society.

• Women movements are carefully observed by the people around them and young women’s travelling(especially alone)is often taken negatively in Pakistani society.

• Western organization with gender egalitarian work environment, demands free interaction among all members(both male and female).

• The inconsistency between the role expectation at workplace and Islamic principal of female modesty women continuously strive to maintain balance between the contrasting socio-cultural and professional identities.


• When a women enters the workplace, she faces challenges of maintaining the balance between contrasting values of society and expectation of organization. Not only individual but organization try to maintain balance between local social values and modern management practices.

• Women create family like relationship with non-kin on the embedded assumption of Vartan Bhanji in Punjabi culture.

• It mean kin roles are transposed on non-kin persons.• Fictive kin:In this network of fictive kin the friends become

family members and the distant kin becomes primary kin.• In order to avoid the role confict women establish familial

(fictive kin) relationship at the workplace.


• Women develop familial relation with their male colleagues such as declaring senior colleagues as father like brother like uncle or uncle like,colleagues of same age as brother and junior colleagues as younger brother and sons.

• It also help them to save their modesty and protect their honour at workplace .

• Professional women in Pakistan develop obligatory relation with male collegues at workplace in order to make men feel more responsible(morally and socially)to save their honour and dignity at workplace.

• Professional women also introduced their male family members to their male collegues as it facilitates t support credibility of fictive relation and consequently regulate the behavior of male collegues according to the social moralities.


Gender issues and gender believe in Pakistan

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