NOVEMBER 27 — Women’s Aid Organisation (WAO) has recently filed a petition urging the government to extend compulsory paternity leave in the private sector from three to seven days, similar to what Malaysian public servants are currently entitled to.

The petition was made on the ground that fathers’ active involvement in children’s lives is crucial for the kids to have “better social, emotional and cognitive development, and perform better in school,” according to Sumitra Visvanathan, WAO executive director.

Indeed, research worldwide has shown evidence of the benefits of paternity leave, encompassing better children’s development, higher women’s labour force participation and higher fertility rate. However, when it comes to paternity leave uptake, many countries face challenges in encouraging fathers to exercise their rights.

In Singapore, 6 in 10 dads did not take paternity leave last year, and the majority of men also did not take any shared parental leave. Traditional ideas that women are the primary caregivers were quoted as part of the reasons contributing to the statistics.

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In France, fathers accounted for only 4 per cent of parents who took parental leave in 2013. Forty six per cent of the men who did not sign up said they were simply “not interested”. Although statistics have shown improvement through time in these countries, the take-up rate among fathers is still generally low, and it is a common phenomenon worldwide.

Among OECD countries, South Korea has one of the longest father-specific paid parental leave at 53 weeks. Yet in a survey by Korean trade unions, half of the men said they are worried about prejudice if they choose to take time off for their families. In 2015, only 5.4 per cent of the total workers who took paid leave were men.

A scene in the recent South Korean film Kim Ji Young, Born 1982 comes to mind, one that closely resonates with our discourse on paternity leave. The movie tells the story of Kim Ji Young, an ordinary woman in her 30s who struggled in her role as a full-time mother, wife and daughter-in-law in a deeply patriarchal and conservative South Korean society.

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Ji Young, once a highly driven career woman, had given up her job to take care of her family. As time went by, she increasingly felt trapped in her mundane daily tasks at home, and constantly found herself yearning to work again.

However, when an exciting job opportunity knocked on her door, Ji Young was confronted with the challenges of making care arrangements for her daughter, until her husband, Dae-hyun, stepped in and offered to take paternity leave so that Ji Young could fulfil her career dream.

The striking scene was the one where Ji Young was chided by her mother-in-law, after the latter learned that her son was planning to take paternity leave so that his wife could go back to work.

“How could you do this to your husband?!” she questioned Ji Young, as if Ji Young was doing something utterly evil to her son.

Eventually, reality hits. A stay-at-home father, even for a short term, isn’t as culturally acceptable as we hope it might be.

Gender stigma that holds men back from taking larger familial responsibilities is widely known, but very little discussed. Many countries have invested time and resources in designing parental leave schemes—with length, flexibility and compensation considerations—conducive to encourage fathers to be more involved in their families.

While I strongly believe that these are crucial factors that will determine the success of the scheme, I also think that it is urgent for us to start understanding and addressing the deeply-seated cultural barriers at work and at home.

To challenge social norms is never easy. Traditional gender norms have instilled in men and women a strong identification with their respective roles as the main breadwinner and primary caregiver at home. Nonetheless, over the years, many women have been challenging these gendered expectations by increasingly joining the labour force and doing what they like in the workplace. Society has not only gradually come to terms with the professional identity many women are carrying nowadays, but also celebrate those who are capable of making a mark at work.

In the meantime, men have also been more involved in their families, but this shift has happened at a much slower pace. On one hand, there are men who are genuinely “not interested”. On the other hand, more men now desire to achieve a better balance between family and work commitments.

However, like Dae-hyun in the Korean movie, these men may find that this aspiration is harder to achieve than they first imagined.

A common concern is the way employers and other men at work would view them. In a less progressive workplace, men who take time off for family may risk being seen as less committed to work by employers, and become a source of frustration for their fellow colleagues who need to cover for them while they are away.

For some more serious cases, taking or lengthening paternity leave could even lead to slower career progression such as delayed promotion and salary increment, a consequence many families can’t afford to bear.

Ironically, these are all in spite of the many benefits that companies are expected to gain from providing paternity benefits, such as increased productivity and higher retention rate of talents.

Even within private circles, men’s decision to step down from work temporarily might not be well received. Many sons and daughters-in-law may be able to relate to Dae-hyun’s mother’s reactions in the movie.

Add to that, one can expect similar questions and doubts from relatives, neighbours, friends, etc, on this decision to leave the workforce to do care work.

“Isn’t that a woman’s job?” the constant refrain one would be asked.

In one of their reports, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) highlighted that “while men commonly take a few days of paternity leave right after the birth of a baby, only the most committed and bravest use their right to longer parental leave”.

It goes to show the level of social sanctions men often have to face in making this rather unconventional decision.

Let’s think about it — how often do we recognize men who sacrificed their career for more quality time with their family, the same way we celebrate women who made achievements at work against all odds?

The social measurement of success seems to imply that one is less of a man if he does not bring home the money. I wonder how much of these is because we have attached lower values to “feminine” work like caring for the young, old and sick, and higher values to “masculine” work such as those that drive the GDP?

Therefore, we tend to penalise men who are more inclined to do “feminine” jobs but may find it easier to accept women who do “masculine” jobs well.

Nonetheless, it is not a competition to show whether men or women have it more difficult in trying to balance work and home. The main takeaway is that the creation of an inclusive society that supports the development of the family institution requires collective awakening from all parties.

Few things affect the lives of the family as significantly as the arrival of a child. At a time when there are competing demands for care and income, there is only so much policies and institutions can do to help families cope with their needs, if there is little change in the way society perceives and shapes how men and women should support each other.

I strongly support WAO’s petition in urging the government to extend paternity leave in the private sector. In fact, I believe this is a much-needed change in the right direction.

But in order to make this work, and progressively work better for families, it is high time that we start rethinking the way we educate our sons and daughters about the choices they can make in life; that employers start evaluating human resource policies with long-term vision; and that communities start supporting mothers and fathers alike in their decision to partner with each other, both on the domestic and professional fronts.

* Tan Theng Theng is an independent researcher with a keen interest in gender inequalityissues in the labour market.

** This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of Malay Mail.