ABSTRACT
From the legislative effects on ‘freeing’ women to work and initiatives to attain status as equals within the workforce, to the choices that women make in relation to paid employment, it is possible to measure the extent to which we live in a post-feminist era. The mid- to late 1990s, in Britain, have been heralded as the ‘age of women’ by journalists, employers and researchers who have become aware of the presence of large numbers of women in paid employment. While more women may, indeed, be entering the workforce, and the conditions of work favour the ‘ideal type’ of married mother working for extra household income, the reality of women and work does not present a picture of social and economic advantage. This chapter introduces issues often invisible in the decision-making and implementation process: organisational culture, differential assumptions of equal opportunities and the defining parameters of different types of work.
