To what extent is patriarchy a cause for the problems of women? Discuss. (2016)
Women’s problems include threats to survival, violence, unpaid and undervalued work, weak property rights and under-representation. Radical feminists such as Kate Millett (Sexual Politics, 1970) and Shulamith Firestone (The Dialectic of Sex, 1970) treat patriarchy as their root cause. Other feminist traditions point to class, caste and the state as well. This answer argues that patriarchy is the most pervasive single cause. It rarely acts alone.
Where patriarchy is the principal cause
- Survival: Amartya Sen wrote of “more than 100 million missing women” worldwide (1990). India’s sex ratio at birth is 929 girls per 1,000 boys (NFHS-5), and the Economic Survey 2017–18 estimated about 21 million “unwanted” girls. Son preference comes from patrilineal descent and patrilocal residence.
- Violence and control: NCRB recorded 4,48,211 crimes against women in 2023. The largest category was cruelty by husbands or relatives (1,33,676), and there were 6,156 dowry deaths. Uma Chakravarti’s “Brahmanical patriarchy” (1993) explains honour crimes: caste purity depends on controlling women’s marriage choices.
- Work: women do 289 minutes of unpaid domestic work a day against 88 for men (Time Use Survey 2024). Sylvia Walby (Theorizing Patriarchy, 1990) calls household production the first of patriarchy’s six structures.
- Persistence despite legal equality: the Hindu Succession (Amendment) Act, 2005, and the POSH Act, 2013, have not closed the gaps. India ranks 131st in the Global Gender Gap Index 2026. When problems outlast formal equality, the cause is cultural and structural.
Where other causes share the blame
- Class and capitalism: Friedrich Engels (The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, 1884) linked women’s subordination to private property. Marxist feminists argue that capital gains from women’s unpaid reproductive labour and cheap informal work. A poor woman’s problems come from class as much as gender.
- Caste and intersectionality: Kimberlé Crenshaw (1989) showed that race and gender compound each other. Sharmila Rege (Writing Caste/Writing Gender, 2006) showed that Dalit women face caste atrocities and wage exploitation, often from upper-caste employers of both sexes, which “patriarchy” alone cannot explain.
- State and development failures: a maternal mortality ratio of 88 per 1,00,000 live births (SRS 2021–23) reflects health infrastructure, poverty and distance as well as neglect of women.
- Liberal feminism traces many problems to socialisation, stereotypes and discriminatory rules. These can be reformed within existing institutions, without overthrowing a “system.”
- Agency: Deniz Kandiyoti (1988) shows that women bargain within patriarchy. R. W. Connell’s hegemonic masculinity shows that many men are also harmed by gender norms. Treating patriarchy as total misses both.
Assessment
Patriarchy is the common thread, because it shapes how class, caste and state failure land on women: through dowry, seclusion, nutrition gaps within the household and denial of inheritance. It does not explain everything on its own. Walby’s multi-structural model and intersectional analysis capture the problem better than a single cause.
Conclusion
Patriarchy is a necessary but not sufficient explanation of women’s problems. It sets the terms on which poverty, caste and weak institutions affect women. Solutions must therefore pair norm change within families with land rights, decent work, public services and effective law.