Gender Inequality: Confronting Social Challenges Together
Introduction
While conducting research on texts surrounding gender inequality, specifically within academia, I have developed further knowledge as to how university settings can both directly and indirectly effect the workplace environment within Canada. In this gender inequality solutions essay, I will discuss my findings by organizing my paper into five main sections, followed up by a brief conclusion as to how social locations affect my own lived experiences of gender inequality within academia. In the first section, I discuss the current status of gender inequality, and the likelihood of inequality in the near future. In the second section, I discuss the causes of gender inequality, and in the third section I focus on the consequences to gender inequality, specifically economic and social forces. In the fourth section, I offer solutions to gender inequality by focusing on positive trends or changes, and finally in the fifth section, I discuss challenges to these solutions by focusing on negative trends or changes. My goal in this essay is to bring to light the issues surrounding gender inequality in academia by focusing on the causes of gender inequality, the consequences affecting those disadvantaged, and solutions to the challenges of gender inequality.
Current Status of Gender Inequality
It is quite prevalent that gender inequality exists within the workforce environment globally, but gender inequality in academia, specifically Canadian universities has had one of the slowest changes towards gender inclusivity. In fact, Canadian universities are among the worst sectors for gender wage gaps. This is further explained in The Globe and Mail’s article on Canadian universities undervaluing female academics, such that male and female within academia attain different research funding, different recommendation letters, and are cited differently within research publications solely because of their genders. Currently, we see changes more than ever implemented within the Canadian government to create more gender inclusivity, and as a result Trudeau's government continually tries to implement feminist ideologies, such that their goals are to steer away from gender inequality and create more economic inclusions for women. Despite Trudeau’s efforts, there is currently an unequal distribution of females studying and progressing within the realms of science, tech, engineering, and math which directly affects female professors' income. This unequal distribution is further discussed in another article that overlooks a 25-year study conducted in 1979 to 2004 by Statistics Canada, in which the results focus on the relation between undergraduate attainment and gender composition within the workforce. Further, this article states that as replicated today, the social sciences are predominantly a gender-integrated field, such that health studies and health fields are female overrepresented fields, and engineering or applied science fields are female underrepresented. With that said, although gender inequality is slowly diminishing, it is still prevalent within academia specifically. For instance, each stage of the senior administration of Canadian universities is a prime example of gender inequality, and results from a study conducted in 2007 shows that only 14% of university presidents in Canada are women, and 26% of women are deans. With this, we are left to question whether inequality will grow or diminish in the near future, but as of right now we can conclude that the progressive acts of our government aren’t being replicated within Canadian workplaces or universities.
Causes of Gender Inequality
If my main focus in this paper is gender inequality within the realms of academia, it is important to discuss the causes of gender inequality, by looking at the relations between gender inequality in early career part-time or temporary employment, and the effects of one’s educational attainment. From this, a huge contributing factor to gender inequality has to do with the ways in which wealth is concentrated in the hands of the few, specifically the gender wage gaps. With this, it is prevalent that graduates from male-dominated fields of study are proven to be more advantageous within the labour markets. Also, men and women are segregated within non-standard employment due to factors such as the type of industry, or the existence of a child within the household. Evidently it is not just the underrepresentation of women within the labour force that causes gender inequality, but rather it is about the over- and underrepresentation of men and women that contributes to gender inequality. Similarly, the Canada Research Chairs (CRC) Program, continually reinforces the disadvantaged image of women in academia, and undermines their efforts and contributions to future research. The CRC program is in charge of attracting top international scholars to Canada, and positioning Canada amongst the top five countries for research and development. With that said, studies show that the CRC Secretariat has the full potential to appoint or refuse candidates without an appeal process, and for a duration of two decades, women have been severely underrepresented in research positions such as professors, and junior researchers such as assistant or associate professors. To be more specific, women consist of just over one-fifth (22.5%) of CRC's total appointments, or in other words 395 women out of 1755 people have been selected. Referring back to The Globe and Mail, this article states that Canadian Association of University Teachers developed a recent study, in which a wage gap of approximately $13750 existed between women and men working in Canadian universities. Given the data surrounding gender wage gaps in the workforce, it is also important to note the effects of educational attainment on one’s experience of gender inequality. More specifically, results show that even when women attain an undergraduate education, majority of these women are underrepresented within most fields of studies.
Consequences to Gender Inequality
Although educational attainment represents a cause for gender inequality, it also represents a consequence, and as a result economic and social forces influence a concentration of wealth. As a result, female-traditional fields socially restrict female workers, and segregations are created between economic units, such that a concentration of wealth favours both males and breadwinners of the family. It is also important to note that economic forces influence a concentration of wealth for people with specific disciplines of study and types of skills, and those who aren’t favoured are less rewarded and susceptible to non-standard employment. When considering the CRC Program, we can also see that there are numerous consequences of gender inequality that directly disadvantages women specifically. For instance,
- the distribution of chairs favour natural sciences and engineering in which women are significantly underrepresented in these two disciplines,
- research within universities are given higher standards than teaching, such that researchers are predominantly male,
- there are no standards or procedures set out by the CRC Program, but rather there is a tendency of selecting white, able-bodied, male candidates amongst CRC’s Secretariat.
Having this said, it is evident that the acts of CRC and other workplace environments replicate an unfair body of systems that actively works to undermine and disadvantage women.
Solutions to Gender Inequality
As time progresses, we have seen more relevant changes in which women are represented in more male-traditional fields, in fact pushing their boundaries to dismantle gender inequality. For instance, women are slowly being incorporated into senior administration positions, and for this reason representation of women within academia is improving. As for the CRC Program, past complaints have been brought to the attention on the federal government’s involvement of the CRC Program, specifically acts of discrimination, segregation and gender-specific inequality. Further, women argued that CRC failed to comply with their promises of employment equity, and that workplaces are no longer representative of all individuals. As of November 2006, the CRC Program has ensured a number of changes have been implemented such as undergoing gender-based and diversity-based analyses. Further, universities are given the full rights to represent undermined groups, such that if the CRC Secretariat is noncompliant there will be sanctions imposed on behalf of the university, such as withholding funds. As a solution offered, the CRC Program in August 2005 negotiated a settlement to prevent future inequality and inequitable practices within federal programs. As for changes and trends, a positive change over the years is the integration and representation of women within the labour force and academia, and a positive trend is that women have increasingly attained university degrees and become more involved in engineering and applied sciences. Having this said, a feminist theoretical lens can be applied when considering solutions for gender inequality, and segregations within the labour market. To be specific, with a feminist lens we can make efforts to critique and advocate change for women with high educational attainment and dismantle their underrepresentation within specific fields of study by looking at traditionally-male/traditionally-female subfields, and considering factors such as socioeconomic backgrounds, racial and ethnic minorities. As for what we can do to eliminate gender inequality, we must use strategies that pursue federal human rights complaints, and continue to address the structural discrimination and gender inequality within academia. Further, we must actively dismantle the notion of gender roles within academia and use the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to our benefit. On a global scale, we should encourage policymakers and labour markets to be more understanding and considerate of one’s educational attainment when giving opportunities to workers.
Challenges to the Solutions of Gender Inequality
On the other hand, challenges to gender inequality still exists, and trends over time suggest that sex segregation is quite prevalent within higher education and certain fields of study. Further, gender integration has become greatly dependent on the norms surrounding certain fields of study . Overall, trends show that women are more inclined to choose female-traditional fields of study such as social sciences, humanities and education, over traditionally male fields such as physical sciences and mathematics. As for CRC, skills and educational attainment in certain fields are still favoured, and “excellence” amongst top scholars are viewed as an individual characteristic.
Conclusion
In conclusion, gender inequality in academia, specifically within Canadian universities is a slow and progressive change that we should all work towards. More specifically, from examining numerous articles, it is quite prevalent that women are severely underrepresented within academia, such that I myself have witnessed gender inequality within women’s gender courses being significantly made up of and taught by females, as opposed to courses viewed as traditionally-male such as engineering, or physical sciences being predominantly made up of and taught by males. Further, I have also witnessed gender inequality within university, such that when partaking in course evaluations students seem to be harsher and unfair towards female professors as opposed to males. Moreover, I have also experienced social locations such as race, gender, and sexuality as factors that specifically influence students’ perceptions on a female professor. With that said, women are significantly over-represented when it comes to gender inequality in academia and this notion is strongly supported when looking at the causes, the affects and the solutions to the challenges posed by gender inequality.
