Gender Roles and Attitudes towards Family Life and Paid Work in Romania

In 1997, the Treaty of Amsterdam included the gender component in all European Community policies, establishing that the principle of equal treatment is a fundamental right. Since then, Member States formulated and promoted various policies and measures to combat inequalities. On the other hand, employment strategies in the European Union laid stress on the importance and on the need to increase labour market participation of women. Attitudes to gender roles are crucial in terms of women's participation in the labour market. European Commission reported that the attitudes of European families are sometimes positive, sometimes negative, and sometimes ambivalent in relation to policies on gender equality. A process of "re-traditionalisation" is also mentioned, especially in the case of post-socialist countries (European Commission, 2013). On the other hand, family policies have an important role in facilitating the growth of the employment rates among women, but they do not necessarily produce changes in attitudes to gender roles (Motiejunaite & Kravchenko, 2008). The paper presents an analysis regarding the roles that Romanian men and women play on the social reality scene with regards to the attitudes and preferences towards paid work and family life.