ABSTRACT
Cultural ideas and organizational patterns common throughout Southeast Asia support the relatively high status of some groups of Laotian women, but women of other groups do not share most of these ideas and patterns and are more subordinate. To adequately explore the effects on rural women of macro-level changes during the socialist transition and economic liberalization periods, it seems necessary to understand changes in the work and power of women from more than one ethnic group. Three groups, representative of the three ethnic group categories commonly in use among Laotians themselves, have been selected: the ethnic Lao (the major lowland group), the Khmu (the most numerous midland group), and the Hmong (a major highland group). Women’s traditional social position, work, and power are somewhat different in each group, so women of different groups react differently to change.
