Because both Dune and Foundation were written from the 1950's to the 1960's, the prevalent, strong patriarchal ideology in the context of those decades can be evidenced by how Herbert and Assimov have characterized the women. Foundation was a world dominated by men in all levels of society. Men were the ones who held positions of power - they fought actively and aggressively for power - action and aggression being the masculine stereotypes. The complete marginalization of women is demonstrated by the fact that only two come briefly into the story. One is a servant girl on whom Mallow advertises a new trades good, some sort of ornamental hologram (if I remember correctly). Her reaction of surprise and desire for the good to please her vanity can be deemed today as empty-headed and insubstantial emotions - society's definition of femininity at that time. Women were considered as ornaments and hence were required only to think about beautifying themselves.
The other woman mentioned was the Commdor's wife, a woman in a position of power and perhaps partially dominant in the relationship with her husband. However, this is only because of her high-ranking birth and that their marriage was needed to maintain the Commdor's political alliance with her father. Therefore, it would seem that her status is defined by both her father and her husband, another indictment of a man's world.
Dune contains many more female characters relative to Foundation. However, the Empire still runs in a patriarchal vein where the Emperor, Duke and Baron are the elite men involved in the great game of power. Men are also influential in the other major organizations, such as the feared Sardaukar and the mysterious mentats. Women have some power, as represented by the Bene Gesserit, even though they only have a marginal role to play in the story. The Lady Jessica herself was once a Bene Gesserit and she is in a position to control events as concubine to the Duke, mother of Paul and Reverend Mother of the Fremen tribe. Despite these few exceptions, generally, men are the masters in most realms of the Empire. Cultural factors certainly portray this, such as the ability of a man to take both a wife and concubine, just as Paul does, taking the Princess Irulan as his wife to lend legitimacy to his ascension to the imperial throne and Chani as his concubine, the love of his heart.
The gender roles in Star Wars are more romantically based, being a film produced in the 1970s to 80s. The trilogy stars two heroes, Luke and Han, who rival each other for a princess's hand. Here, there is again the interplay of masculine aggression and feminine passivity. The males are the ones fighting for a woman and the woman waits to be won, even though Leia does contribute to the romantic tension by kissing Luke in the Empire Strikes Back to spite Han. She is also a damsel in distress to be rescued, from Darth Vader in Star Wars and Jabba the Hutt in Return of the Jedi, whilst the men do the rescuing. Likewise, the power-brokers are again men, such as the sinister Darth Vader and the evil Emperor. Besides the princess, most of the other rebel combatants are men.
Such gender roles apparently becomes blurred in The Phantom Menace, made in the 90's, where the elected child-queen Armidala does not need to be rescued and commandeers a counter-offensive to regain Naboo with the alliance of the Gunguns. Still, she is a rare female specimen, surrounded by her bodyguards, the Jedi Knights, the Supreme Chancellor, Senator Pulpatine and her Trade Federation aggressors, all of whom are male. Hence, it can be said that the female characters in the movies have only been created for some love diversion, detracting the serious power struggle played by the males on a higher level.
Conclusion
Well, I'm sure that there are a lot more similarities but these are the most notable ones that I can think of. It can therefore be seen that scifi is based very much on our own history and uses many features of society that prevailed in the writer's context of the times. Detecting and relating these similar elements between the books make them a much more interesting read as well as furthering our contemplation of the issues in our own world.
