SPOUSAL CAREER IMPOSITION (SCI)

 

📌 Spousal Career Imposition (SCI)

One of my earliest school memory was participating in something called ‘career days’. A career day is a day in the school calendar when business partners from a variety of companies and practising professionals come together at a school to share information about their workplace, their job, and the education and skills that are required for success in their careers. The goal of such an event is to familiarize and educate young children on possible career paths, with the ultimate aim of stimulating and figuring out each child’s interest. Career day activities often include children dressing up as doctors, engineers, lawyers etc., and explaining, in the most rudimentary of ways, what they want to be when they grow up. 

I recall our instructors in these gatherings telling us as kids that we shouldn't be pressured into going into picking a career or going into a profession that we have no interest in because that would likely lead to a miserable working experience and an unfulfilling adult life. We were encouraged, at that early stage in our development, to seek counsel from our parents and teachers regarding career choice, but at the end of the day, we are the ones to decide what we want to do. The overarching goal of a typical career day is to introduce children, as early as possible, to the rudimentary aspects and features of different professions and career options, with the hope that the child would be able to identify one or two that they are fascinated by. 

Notwithstanding, it is not uncommon to find cases where parents, in blatant disregard for the interests and passions of their wards, take it upon themselves to make career choices for their children. Parental career imposition and the negative effects that they can have on people is something that has been spoken and written extensively about. I mean, at this point, most of us have heard countless stories from people about how they ended up miserable in a career chosen for them by their parents. So, that’s not what I will be addressing here. What I will be addressing is a slightly different kind of relative career imposition — one that isn't as talked about as parental career imposition: it is a phenomenon I refer to, for the lack of a better phrase, as ‘Spousal Career Imposition’ (SCI). 

SCI is when one-half of a married couple — with little or no regard for what the other person wants — makes a career choice for their spouse. Unsurprisingly, women are often at the receiving end of SCI because most societies are structured in a way whereby women are viewed as subservient and, by implication, dependent on men. In these societies, people see nothing wrong with a husband making their wife take up a certain trade, even if the wife in question were to protest. 

Now, if we can agree that parents forcing their children into certain careers isn't ideal because these children, despite being related to their parents, are autonomous individuals with their own goals and aspirations, why can't we agree that it is not ideal for husbands to do the same thing to their wives? 

It is a matter of fact that the dreams and career ambitions of many women die as soon as they get married. It is not uncommon to hear newly marred women make statements like; “My husband does not want me to do career X,” or “My husband wants me to do career X.” It is also not uncommon in this part of the world for a career woman to be asked by her husband, not long after their marriage, to quit their career. I have seen many women reluctantly give up their aspirations to appease their husbands and maintain their marriages. But why does it have to be so? 

If the man can continue pursuing his career ambitions while being married, why can’t the woman pursue her own career ambitions while being married? Why are many women put in the uncomfortable position where they have to choose between their career and their marriage?

How often do you hear a bachelor say something along the line of; “I am working hard to make money, before the end of the year, I'll get married and when I do, I'll rent a shop for my wife where she will sell fruits? Fruits selling is lucrative nowadays.” Now, don't get me wrong: I realize that a statement like that is often not borne out of malicious intention. In the mind of this man, he is making what he deems to be a reasonable plan for his future family. The problem is; while it is not wrong, in principle, to make plans for the kind of family dynamics one desires, it is wrong to impose a career or trade on your hypothetical future wife before even meeting and getting to know her. 

I mean, does it ever occur to these men that this future wife might not be pleased with the idea of selling fruits? And if they get married to this woman, and she refuses to take up fruit selling, would that make her a bad wife? Will it be a blow to his ego if the wife says she has a radically different plan for herself with regard to career path? And what if she already had a career before the marriage, is she expected to quit her career in order to fit into the family dynamic that this man has set up in his head?

Finally, I realize that there are some men out there who, for whatever reason, have decided that they will never marry a career woman — they prefer to have a sit-at-home wife. Now, to be clear, I have nothing, in principle, against the idea of a sit-at-home wife. I think men are entitled to go for that it is what they want, and women who prefer to be sit-at-home wives are free to be just that. If that's what the man and the woman want, then they can both have it their way. 

What I do have a problem with is a man imposing that particular lifestyle on his wife against her will, either through overt coercion or subtle guilt-tripping. I also have a problem with any society that influences women to settle for that role by way of rigid and normative stereotyping. 

That said, any couple that is considering the sit-at-home wife dynamic should, at the very least, factor in the economic condition of their environment. In a buoyant economic setting, it is easier for married women to dedicate themselves entirely to home keeping and rearing of the children while their husbands play the role of ‘sole breadwinner’. But in dire economic conditions, such as is the case with most people in this part of the world, I don't think being or having a sit-at-home wife is an ideal choice. The truth is, in the current economic climate, it seems to me that the average family needs multiple sources of income to be able to run optimally, and being or having a sit-at-home wife doesn't bode well with that.