THE TRIPLE WORKDAY: A LEGAL AND SOCIAL ANALYSIS OF WOMEN'S TRIPLE WORKDAY

Abstract

This article analyzes the historical evolution of the role of women in Brazilian society, highlighting the legal, social, and cultural inequalities that have consolidated the patriarchal structure over the centuries. The female condition has historically been marked by subordination in the domestic sphere and exclusion from the formal labor market, a scenario reinforced by legal provisions such as the Civil Code of 1916, which required the husband's authorization for a woman to practice a profession, a situation that was only overcome with the enactment of the Federal Constitution of 1988. The triple shift — paid work, domestic work, and emotional work — emerges as an expression of this structural overload, highlighted by theorists who identify the oppression of women as a founding element of modern capitalism. It is argued that the division between production and social reproduction sustained the marginalization of women, especially by transferring care and domestic work to the sphere of economic non-recognition. Although recent legislation, such as the Civil Code of 2002 and Law No. 14,611/2023, represent advances in formal equality, studies indicate that gender inequality remains present in the social and symbolic organization of work. Thus, the article argues that overcoming these disparities requires, in addition to legal reforms, profound cultural transformations, intersectoral public policies and the recognition of domestic work as an essential element of the economy and gender equality.