Women and the democratization movement in Tonga: Nation versus state, authority versus power

• Published in: Women's studies international forum 1996, Vol.19 (1), p.169-178
• Main Author: Gailey, Christine Ward
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Activism; Democracy; Democratization; Females; Nation; Political Movements; Politics; Power; Protest Movements; Resistance; Role; Sex Roles; Sexual Division of Labor; Social classes; State; Tonga; Women; Women and politics; Women's participation; Women's role; Womens Roles
• ISSN: 0277-5395; 1879-243X
• DOI: 10.1016/0277-5395(95)00068-2

A political crisis has emerged in the constitutional monarchy of Tonga (southern Pacific). A movement of commoners pressing for democratic reforms includes women as participants, although gender issues are not central to the reformist agendas. It is argued that, alongside the recognized form of political opposition, stands a deeper set of oppositional practices now associated with commoner women, namely the production and exchange of indigenous wealth objects that mark life transitions and other special events. The circuit of these women's goods carves out a respectable place for women in public, a place from which they make claims about national issues while acting in accordance with what is seen as tradition. In addition, women have spearheaded official protests against governmental development agendas and general corruption. These occasions show commoner women's insistence upon governmental accountability in ways consistent with prestate forms of social hierarchy. In the process, in a society where kin identity has traveled traditionally through men, women are coming to represent the nation. In defending and mobilizing their customary sources of authority, commoner women are also calling into question the nature of state power.