Review by New York Times Review
AN ancient Chinese proverb goes that women hold up half the sky. Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn want that to be appreciated - on the ground. In the opening pages of this gripping call to conscience, the husband-and-wife team come out swinging: "Gendercide," the daily slaughter of girls in the developing world, steals more lives in any given decade "than all the genocides of the 20th century." No wonder Kristof and WuDunn, whose coverage of China for The New York Times won them a Pulitzer Prize, declare the global struggle for women's equality "the paramount moral challenge" of our era. Their stories in "Half the Sky" bear witness to that bold claim. Kristof and WuDunn describe Dalit women, Indian untouchables, who swarmed, stabbed and emasculated a serial torturer and murderer - in a courtroom. Further north, Mukhtar Mai, the victim of a Pakistani gang-rape, did the unthinkable for a Muslim village woman. Not only did she expose her assailants, but she incurred the wrath of her country's president, Pervez Musharraf, endured abduction by his henchmen, started a school and even made an ally of her resentful older brother. "Half the Sky" tackles atrocities and indignities from sex trafficking to maternal mortality, from obstetric fistulas to acid attacks, and absorbing the fusillade of horrors can feel like an assault of its own. But the poignant portraits of survivors humanize the issues, divulging facts that moral outrage might otherwise eclipse. Men, for example, aren't always the culprits. "In Meena's brothel," Kristof and WuDunn report of an Indian girl forced into prostitution, "the tyrant was the family matriarch, Ainul Bibi. Sometimes Ainul would beat the girls herself, and sometimes she would delegate the task to her daughter-in-law or to her sons." The narratives respect nuance, revealing both the range of barriers and the possibility for solutions. Throughout, Kristof and WuDunn show faith in the capacity of ordinary citizens, including Americans, to initiate change - gutsy at a time when many Westerners who voice concern are ritually accused of interfering. Mingling tales of woe with testimonials to people power, the authors explain how tragedy can spawn opportunity. Their hope: "To recruit you to join an incipient movement to emancipate women." Little-known Westerners - doctors, teachers and students - serve as role models. Harper McConnell is a University of Minnesota graduate. Fresh out of college, she broke up with her boyfriend and entered the dating desert of Congo to oversee her church's relationship with a hospital for women. "At the age of 23, Harper became the principal of her own school," Kristof and WuDunn write about this young American who "jabbers away in Swahili." But "Half the Sky" prescribes some tough medicine: To be effective on behalf of invisible women overseas, Americans must "bridge the God Gulf." That is, secular humanists will have to forge common cause with religious believers, emulating an era "when liberal deists and conservative evangelicals joined forces to overthrow slavery." Kristof and WuDunn repeatedly invoke the abolitionist project. Besides stirring emotions, the antislavery lens permits Americans to see an urgent obligation. When the West cares as much about sex slavery as it does about pirated DVDs, India "will dispatch people to the borders to stop traffickers," they predict. "We single out the West because, even though we're peripheral to the slavery, our action is necessary to overcome a horrific evil." As proof, they detail how American diplomats and Congress spurred the Cambodian police to crack down on brothel owners. "Simply asking questions put the issue on the agenda." So it comes as a disappointment when Kristof and WuDunn seem to cut short their own questions. They entitle one of their chapters "Is Islam Misogynistic?" Their answer: Because ultraconservative Saudi Arabia has outlawed slaves, the Koran must be open to progressive interpretations on other human rights issues, like women's equality. The trouble is, laws ring hollow if they're not enforced, something Kristof and WuDunn robustly recognize about female genital mutilation in Africa. Why not acknowledge the same about Saudi Arabia's often appalling treatment of female domestic workers, whose condition Human Rights Watch has deemed "slavery-like"? Could their silence be traced to the "scolding" that Kristof received from a group of Muslim women in Riyadh? One of them insists to him that Saudi Arabia's ban on female drivers, and the related effects of a profoundly patriarchal culture, "are our problems, not yours." Kristof doesn't appear to question her. Yet later, he and WuDunn link "the boom in Muslim terrorists" to "the broader marginalization of women," recalling that the ringleader of the 9/11 hijackers cited a teaching about well-endowed virgins awaiting male martyrs in heaven. Clearly, a connection can be drawn between global security and certain cultural customs in the Middle East. In that case, Muslim women's problems are everyone's problems. Despite all their reminders of our interdependence as humans, Kristof and WuDunn miss an excellent chance to help fellow progressives build backbone. Perhaps a different encounter should be arranged for the two authors - with a Muslim woman in Sweden who hides immigrant Arab girls threatened by honor killings. She told me that many Western feminists condemn her because, she believes, they care more about looking tolerant than about saving lives. In confronting the failings of multiculturalism, secularists could move forward with evangelicals, as abolitionists did almost 200 years ago. Imagine the potential for progress.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [October 27, 2009]
Review by Booklist Review
Despite an estimated 107 million women and girls missing in the world population due to every form of abuse, from infant neglect to honor killings, gendercide receives none of the coverage and outrage of other human-rights violations, lament these two Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists. The husband-and-wife team chronicles the horrific abuses suffered by girls and women: sold into sex slavery, abused and exploited as workers, beaten and killed to protect male honor, and generally denied education, medical attention, and food reserved for boys and men. The authors focus on sex trafficking, gender-based violence (including honor killings and mass rape), and maternal mortality. They also examine the economic forces at work that promise more opportunities, along with required education and resulting autonomy, for female workers and entrepreneurs as developing countries recognize how they waste this valuable resource. Kristof and WuDunn reinforce the truth behind the terrible statistics with passionately reported personal stories of girls and women (including photographs) and efforts to help them, including a final chapter suggesting how readers can help.--Bush, Vanessa Copyright 2009 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
New York Times columnist Kristof and his wife, WuDunn, a former Times reporter, make a brilliantly argued case for investing in the health and autonomy of women worldwide. "More girls have been killed in the last fifty years, precisely because they were girls, than men were killed in all the wars of the twentieth century," they write, detailing the rampant "gendercide" in the developing world, particularly in India and Pakistan. Far from merely making moral appeals, the authors posit that it is impossible for countries to climb out of poverty if only a fraction of women (9% in Pakistan, for example) participate in the labor force. China's meteoric rise was due to women's economic empowerment: 80% of the factory workers in the Guangdong province are female; six of the 10 richest self-made women in the world are Chinese. The authors reveal local women to be the most effective change agents: "The best role for Americans... isn't holding the microphone at the front of the rally but writing the checks," an assertion they contradict in their unnecessary profiles of American volunteers finding "compensations for the lack of shopping malls and Netflix movies" in making a difference abroad. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A Pulitzer Prizewinning husband-and-wife reporter team track the growing movement to empower women in the developing world. Kristof and WuDunn (Thunder from the East: Portrait of a Rising Asia, 2000, etc.) traveled through Africa and Southeast Asia meeting with victims of sex trafficking, forced prostitution and various forms of gender-based neglect and violence, as well as interviewing those who are making a difference in the lives of impoverished and abused women. While they provide historical background and cite grim statistics to back their claims of oppression, the impact of their report comes from the personal stories of remarkable women, such as Mukhtar Mai, a Pakistani woman who was gang-raped. Instead of killing herself as was expected by her culture, she fought back, won compensation and is using the money to build a girls' high school. The authors argue that fighting back is key and that education that will empower women is crucial to changing culturally embedded attitudes. Along with the success stories, Kristof and WuDunn report on the failure of large-scale international aid, which often comes in the form of what they term "tree-top" projects as opposed to grassroots efforts. The authors are especially effective at getting women to speak openly about their lives, and they do not hesitate to write about unpleasant facts, bad outcomes and unintended consequences: Women are often the abusers of other women; women freed from brothels sometimes return for drugs or money; introduction of a cash crop to help women earn money for their families can end up polluting the environment. Also noteworthy is the authors' willingness to say what is politically incorrect: When microloans are made to men, the money is likely to go toward instant gratificationalcohol, drugs and prostituteswhile women are more apt to spend it on family health and educating children. Pointing out that the emancipation of girls enabled China's economic surge and that the status of women is "the greatest handicap of Muslim Middle Eastern societies today," Kristof and WuDunn forcefully contend that improving the lot of girls and women benefits everyone. They conclude with specific steps that individuals can take to support the empowerment movement. Intelligent, revealing and important. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
