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Science policies in the European Union
Women were not admitted to degree programmes on equal terms with men in UK
universities until 1895.  However, even after this date, while they were allowed to
study, women were not permitted to take their degrees from Oxford or Cambridge
universities (see photo).  At Cambridge, women had been admitted to examinations as
early as 1881, but not allowed to take anything but titular degrees until 1948.  An MA
degree would have given them a seat on Senate (until it was superseded by Regent
House in 1948) and a say in university policy. Oxford admitted women to membership
of the university in 1921 because it, along with Cambridge, was being investigated by a
Royal Commission (set up in response to Oxbridge’s request for public funds).
Cambridge set a 10% limit on women as a proportion of the student population while
Oxford fixed a maximum of 25% women.  Hence, both institutions totally ignored the
1919 Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act.  Eventually, more women’s colleges were built
(in the 1950s) and men’s colleges became mixed (from 1972).  Women now constitute
about 46% of students at Cambridge but 50% nationally.
The twentieth century saw the introduction of legislation designed to
address such discriminatory practices.  The 1957 Treaty of Rome established
the principle of equal treatment of men and women in the Member States.
Gender equality legislation introduced at the national level in the 1970s and
1980s made sex discrimination illegal.  Now, at the beginning of the
twenty-first century, men and women are found segregated into different
areas of science.  This segregation is:
•
horizontal
women are clustered in certain areas of science such
as the biological and medical sciences,
•
vertical
women may constitute about half the undergraduates
in some disciplines but they are a small fraction of
the professoriat, and
•
contractual
men are more likely to have tenure; women are more
likely to be on short-term and part-time contracts.
In Chapter 1, we identified three approaches to gender equality: equal
treatment, positive action and mainstreaming.  This section reviews some
approaches taken under these headings in science, engineering and
technology.
Photo
Commemoration of the 50th
anniversary of the full
admission of women to the
University of Cambridge in
1999 was marked by a
ceremony at the Senate House
in which women who had come
up to Cambridge prior to 1949
participated. These  women  had
not been able to take part in
the university degree awarding
ceremonies while at Cambridge.
1000 women now in their 70s
and 80s took part.
Photograph taken by Gesa Mahne,
copyright Newnham College,
Cambridge .
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Equal treatment
Some of the more obvious and direct forms of discrimination against
women have now been removed.  These include the lifting of restrictions
designed to prevent women from studying and taking degrees in science
and from becoming members of academies and professional associations.
Other, indirect forms of discrimination have largely been eradicated too,
such as marriage bars that enforced women to resign their posts upon
marriage.  Age bars are an indirect form of sex discrimination as women are
more likely to take career breaks for child-bearing and rearing.  They were
challenged in the 1980s in the UK but still exist for fellowships in many
countries and for examinations leading to permanent jobs, such as CNRS
and INSERM in France (see Chapter 9).  In Germany, one cannot be
appointed to a Chair in a university after the age of 53.  There remain
difficulties with conditions surrounding some research travel fellowships that
are based on the assumption that the scholar will be a male, sometimes with
a dependent spouse.  In essence women now have the legal right to equal
treatment including equal pay and this has certainly improved the prospects
for women wanting to pursue a scientific career.
If the principle of equal treatment was applied properly, recruitment and
promotion procedures would be transparent and follow good practice.  As it
is, some universities use networks and headhunters to fill posts (rather than
the perfectly legitimate use to swell the pool of applicants). For example, in
Finland, there has been some criticism of direct approaches being made to
individuals on equal opportunities grounds since it results in fewer women
being appointed.  The increasing use of ‘headhunting’ techniques cuts across
good equality practice.
Appointing professors
‘As a minister I had the opportunity to read proposals for appointments to
professorships.  You would not believe with what kind of criminal energy women are
kept outside such proposals.  With all kinds of tricks, for instance, women scientists
who would stand their ground in competing with men are not even invited for interview
so as not to put a list of nothing but males at risk.  This is the reality we are having to
contend with.  To me this is the second stage of the transposition of the principle of
equal opportunity.  First women were prevented from qualifying and now, when women
are qualified, new methods are being used to avert competition.’
Helga Schuchardt, former Science Minister of the State of Lower Saxony, Germany
Cited in European Commission (1999) Women and Science – Proceedings of the conference Brussels
April 28-29 1998 Luxembourg: Office for the Official Publications of the European Communities, p 141
Fair selection?
As recently as the 1960s
women were not even admitted
to physics and astronomy
graduate programs at Caltech,
MIT or Harvard.  In the 1950s:
“Margaret Burridge recalls
when the Carnegie Institute
tried to ban her from observing
with their powerful telescope
on Mount Wilson in California.
She had to go up the mountain
with her husband a cosmologist
who covered for her by telling
officials he needed the
telescope.  While other
astronomers on Mount Wilson
stayed in a heated
accommodation known as the
monastery – complete with a
chef- she recalls having to live
in a little cottage and bring her
own food.”
Source: Science 252 1601 (1991)
Quality and fairness in scientific professions
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