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1. Our goal is to present the status of rural women’s participation in the decision-making process in Armenia, to show the nature and content of it, to reveal those difficulties and constraints, which especially prevent women from equally participating in the development processes that take place in the country.
2. Armenia was the first country among the states that gained independence after the collapse of the Soviet Union, where in 1991 land privatization was implemented to its full extent. 321 000 peasant farms were established in the country. In compliance with the operative law the head of the household became the owner of the farm. Traditionally, in an Armenian family the head of the household was considered to be the oldest member. As a result, the heads of the peasant farms mostly became males. The privatization process also covered the livestock, machinery and most capital assets of production.
3. Reforms in the villages were accompanied by the plight of energy crisis, economic blockade and war. Thus, the peasant was left alone with his problems and hardships. It was especially difficult for an Armenian peasant woman, since even with the presence of her husband as the head of the farm, the woman bore the overload of family rearing and farm management on herself. The circumstances it was determined by follow:
4. Around 219 thousand city-dweller Armenian refugees from Azerbaijan have been removed to the rural settlements of the republic, where they are not only unable to work by their profession but also find difficulties in land activities.
5. A rural woman along with her husband is equally involved in manual land cultivation, livestock and farm management hard activities. Whereas the responsibilities for child rearing, education and creation of future educational opportunities, clothing and other daily problems rest mainly with the woman. Having no official recognition as a head of the farm, she carries the major burden of responsibilities on her shoulders.
6. At present, under the conditions of social-economic turn-about, establishment of market relations, transition to the self-management of local government, an immensely significant issue appears to be the creation of rural organizations, which provide possibilities to address certain rural social development problems through community efforts. For example, since 1995, in the rural areas of Armenia, Agricultural Co-operative Village Associations have been in the process of being established, which include family farms in themselves, and, since 1997, Water User’s Associations have been emerging. The leadership in these organizations is exclusively composed of males, who constitute a large number of membership. Even during the founding and general assemblies the number of female participants is at the minimum.
7. During the recent years a number of international and foreign organizations and agencies have established their offices in Armenia, mostly in the city of Yerevan, which implement humanitarian, development projects, as well as programs addressing women’s and children’s, refugees’ and other problems. Some of them have set up their sub-offices in the marzes(e.g. Save the Children, UNHCR, USDA, etc.). The directors of those offices are mostly men. There seldom happens a woman from the city. It is determined by the passive activity of rural women and attitudes of the husbands towards working. Not of less importance are the difficulties connected with obtaining advanced professions, and training in the latter.
8. However, there are such spheres in the villages, where women have predominance in the decision-making process. These are education, health, culture and social welfare, which at present certainly require devotion and will-power.
9. At 860 schools of rural settlements 75% of the teachers are women, and at 453 preschool institutions the percentage of female teachers reaches to 100%. Besides, about 70% of women working at schools have higher education. The overwhelming majority of headmasters and vice-headmasters at rural schools are also women.
10. Today, due to the serious financial constraints, the school headmaster confronts with major difficulties regarding repairs of the school building, especially the bombed school premises in the border zone areas, as well as procurement of text-books, stock, and similar type of other issues to be addressed through the decisions made by herself. This fact is supplemented by the high number of children missing the classes due to the decline of the social-economic status of the families and the drop in the general level of education. People involved in the field of education over the last decade might be ranked among the recruit of "volunteers", since the salary they get at the amount of US $5-15 per month for the work done by themselves does not even suffice the family for the daily bread.
11. Due to the lack of functioning of the communication channels rural schools are deprived of the reform programs that are carried out in the field of education, as well as new methodologies, training and retraining courses.
12. The next sphere in the village, where women have an absolute predominance, is health. Numerous are also those difficulties, which mostly increased after the transition to the partially paid health service system. The first and the most serious problem is the extremely hard material state of the population. On the one hand, illnesses have grown in number, on the other hand the possibilities to apply to a physician have decreased. In many villages, the health services are located in the apartment of the medical worker, and under these conditions it is impossible not only to provide with emergency but also there is no telephone communication to get the necessary medical advice.
13. During the former years the active involvement of women in the sphere of culture was significant. At present, when the Ministry of Culture has decentralised its responsibilities in the marzes and the governors’ offices due to the lack of the budgetary resources are not able to sustain the culural centres in the villages, the activities of this branch, especially the participation of women in culture, is practically not carried out, with the exception of separate cases.
14. The number of women engaged in the social security network structures of the village is significant. However, while 67% of the total employees are women, the percentage of women’s participation in the leading positions in total amounts to 13%.
15. Although, the Armenian society traditionally preserves itself as emphasized "male society", nevertheless, during the most severe years of 1992-1993 crisis in the republic, when men were the first to appear in uncertainty, one could easily notice the highly organized nature and active behavior of women not ever displayed in everyday environment, i.e. their intrusion into the "external relations" of the family. In the city, as well as in the village, women were the first to organize street trade and fairs to help the family survive the crisis.
16. Transition period was also characterised by the rapid growth of the non-governmental organizations (by 1997 there were 1.363 NGO-s registered by the Ministry of Justice of the RA, and 461 NGO-s registered in the NGO Center). The percentage of NGO-s on women’s and children’s problems is 12% of the total number of all NGO-s registered in the Center. But the number of the permanently operating organizations is 20, the rest are simply on paper.
17. The female NGO-s in the rural areas are unique, mainly representing the sub-branches of the operating organizations in the marzes. Let us bring a few examples:
18. At present the symbol of a female leader in an Armenian village is the head of the village. The number of those leaders is 20. In reality, these are mainly those women who by their nature have capacity and talent to govern. In 1996, when the Law on the Local Selfmanagement was adopted by the National Assembly, they succeeded to pass through the electoral struggle, in many cases even competing with 10-12 men, they won the confidence and love of their co-villagers and were elected in those difficult posts. And it is not accidental that, according to the statements made by the male governors, the work in the communities run by the female heads of the villages is proceeding perfectly well, and they are easy to work with.
19. Just the mere meetings with these women testify the fact, that they are experts in their job, humane, resolute, consistent and with strong will, who are respected in their environment due to the qualities mentioned. In many cases they rank the general interest higher than their own interest. For a female leader, in Armenian villages, especially in the farthest, mountainous, isolated and borderline villages, the process of decision-making, especially the process of implementing decisions is characterized by difficulties of political, economic and social-psychological nature.
20. The constitutional principle of equality between both sexes has not yet become a regulator of relationships within the society of the republic. The proceeding democratic processes haven’t yet brought to the uprising of the status of the women in a way that it continues to develop by its own. There are certain discriminatory practices seen. More often the tendency to limit the role of the woman in the frames of the family, and isolation of women from political and social life is felt.
21. The best example of it were the 1995 National Assembly elections, where in more than half of 150 uni-mandate precincts there was neither a single woman elected, nor even proposed. And as a final outcome only 11 people or 5.7% of the National Assembly deputies are women, with none from the rural areas.
22. The situation is the same in the government and marz structures, local communities. There is no female leader in the Government, as well as urban and marz authorities. And it is here that the rural women have shown relatively high activity: in 871 rural communities the number of the female heads of villages, as was already mentioned above, is 20.
23. Along with a number of difficulties during the recent decade the Armenian nation gained Independence as its greatest achievement, thus becoming the owner of its own country and land. By obtaining independence in 1991, Armenia became a member of United Nations Organization and joined a series of conventions including the "Convention on the Elimination of All Types of Discrimination Against Women." Hence, it indicates that the state challenges by all means, including constitutional, to urge the provision of women with the multilateral development and progress equal to men. Attention needs to be paid to those particular problems with which rural women confront, and on the significant role, that women play in ensuring economic prosperity for their families. The state undertakes all the necessary actions to ensure participation based on the equality between males and females in the regional development process. For this reason women should be given rights to participate in all the levels, within the creation and implementation of development projects, as well as use agricultural extension services, etc. and participate in all forms of community activities. Rural women should be provided with access to credit, consumption network and etc. The basis for this is laid by the Platform for Action adopted in Beijing, which maintains that it is required to change the traditional roles of men and women in the family and society, i.e. to leave aside the prejudices and stereotypes that are based on the idea of perfectness and privileges of one sex and the incompleteness of the other.
24. In order to increase rural women’s participation in the process of decision-making in the main structures, it is required to:
25. Through the arrangements recommended, by the escalation of female self-consciousness it will be possible to reach rural women’s wider participation in the process of decision-making in the main management structures, on the socio-political and state levels.