JAC Online

Affirmative Action
by Major JoAnn Shade

 

In Salvation Army circles these days, the development of women leaders is a hot topic.  As one who has long advocated for opportunities for women, both married and single, at first glance I’m encouraged by the attention being given to the subject.  Even as I write today, there is a conference going on in London with the goal of preparing women for senior leadership.  At first I thought, “Good, it’s about time,” but that reaction was quickly matched by a second – how patronizing to women.  Are you telling me that somehow men can figure it out on their own, but women need special conferences in order to ”catch up”?  It’s the old affirmative action argument in a skirt.

 

Writing for The Officer in Spousal Syndrome – Delight or Dilemma, Lt. Colonel Lynda Watt suggests that “when it is time to find the right person to fill a particular leadership position, the officer-wife options often become limited, with few having the necessary exposure or experience.”   Reaction #1:  Hogwash!  With the exception of the “women officer hostess class,” I had exactly the same training as my husband.  By the end of my (our) first corps appointment, I had been involved with business, personnel and program.  I had stumbled through a capital campaign and building project, no more or less knowledgeable than my husband.  

 

The Salvation Army women officers I know work as hard as their husbands, are as educated as their husbands, and most share both the pulpit and the parenting.  So is it really about exposure or experience?  Or is something else at work here?       

Reaction #2.  Considering that it may be true for some, then why?  Might it have anything to do with the fact that in training we were taught to fold napkins and put the jam and jelly in little bowls instead of leaving it in the jars?  Might it have anything to do with expectations that the division of labor within the couple will fall along gendered lines?  The Salvation Army has sent its cultural messages to its (married) women officers for years, and continues to do so every time the social security statement comes (in the United States) and every time a disposition of forces is printed (at least where I live). 

 

Is it that women can’t do the work, or that they’re not appointed to the work?  At least in my territory, it starts long before senior leadership.  Across the board, the husband is the Adult Rehabilitation Center administrator while the wife is the director of program and residential services.  The husband is the Kroc Center administrator and wife is the (his?) associate.  The husband is the divisional youth secretary and the wife is  . . . well, you get my drift.

 

I recognize that it is a complicated discussion, but I find it hard to believe that out of  twenty couples, not one might have gifts that would reverse that designation.  But, at least where I sit, it doesn’t happen.  Why?  Culture.  History.  Tradition.  Theological views that fall closer to the complementarian camp than the egalitarian one.   Patriarchy. 

 

So what can be done?  First, tell the truth.  As Watt suggests, “In the structure of The Salvation Army it may be that to give married women equal opportunity to use their skills and abilities would mean far-reaching and difficult complexities that the organization might be unable to overcome.”  Perhaps we’ve become conservative enough both in theology and praxis that we must turn our back on Catherine’s teaching and join the Baptists.  If that’s so, admit it and get on with the work of the Kingdom.  If (hopefully) that description is not accurate, then let’s find some ways to figure this out.   

 

Second, explore further the concept of single spouse officership around the world.  When released from the constraints of marital concerns enmeshed in officership, perhaps women who happen to be married could function in the same way that single women have functioned for years – and that women do in countless other denominations.  Is anyone looking at the dynamics of this in the territories where it’s in place, or are we more worried about how to move someone if their spouse has an “outside” job?

 

Third, talk about the marriage dynamics.  Make that a part of a shared consultation.  How does the marriage function?  What would harm it?  What would strengthen it?  I’m not sure that we’re talking about the wife being the commanding officer and the husband being the associate – simply that it can be possible to find positions of equivalent responsibility and fulfillment.  

 

Fourth, consider models of truly shared leadership.  Can it work?  Can two people lead together without a culturally imposed division of labor?  My son and his wife just had a baby, and it plays out every day for them.  I’m seeing shared leadership a lot from my younger officer friends.  It’s happened for years in the corps – why couldn’t divisional leadership be fully shared – in function and in title?

 

But here’s the rub.  Don’t promise what you can’t deliver.  Don’t dangle the carrot of equal opportunity for leadership in front of women if it is unlikely to happen.  As many people are discovering in these tough economic times, advanced job training doesn’t do any good if there aren’t any jobs available.  I’m thinking that women on the ground have done as much as they can – now either the doors of opportunity have to swing a bit wider.   

 

 

 

 

   

 

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