Gendered Precarity in Urban Sanitation Work: The Invisibility of Women Waste Pickers and Sweepers

Abstract

Women sanitation workers, especially waste pickers and sweepers, experience gendered precarity which is determined by caste-based discrimination, working conditions, and lack of legal protection. This literature review paper focuses on the subject of gender, caste and informal labour by looking at how the three forms of labour are both involved in order to create marginalization and invisibility of the workers within the city labour market. The paper examines the institutional forces behind this precarity using thematic analysis of scholarly literature, policy reports and feminist theoretical literature. The results indicate that caste-based marginalization, work in the informal sector, and sexist practices are all the factors that lead to exploitative labour, such as low pay, risky conditions, and stigma. The paper also suggests a new conceptual frame to think about and respond to such inequalities and require reimagined approaches to place intersectionality in the limelight. It questions prevailing labour discourses as ignoring stratified oppressions and points to the much-needed immediate policy changes, social awareness and legal protection that would make women sanitation workers in the city of India feel an equitable and just society.