Etan-main text

Policy points
•
Clear criteria for competition.
•
Gender disaggregated statistics on application and success rates to
funding councils to be in public domain.
•
Investigation of under-representation of women among applicants.
•
All funding bodies to have at least 30% members of men and
women by 2002 and 40% by 2005.
•
Review of mechanisms for selecting board members and referees.
•
Open competition and limited terms for members of research
councils.
•
Scrutiny by research councils of own peer review systems.
Research councils to develop EO policies and benchmark for good
practice.
•
Adherence to strict criteria of peer review.
•
Review of gender make-up of committees of award granting
bodies.
•
Support for dependents of post docs awarded fellowships to
conduct research abroad
•
Funding for research on one sex only should be refused without
adequate justification.
Fairness and funding/modernising peer review
Bias is subtle (at MIT)
‘Bias is subtle and largely unconscious. The most lasting correction will come only
when the numbers of women in science and engineering have grown significantly. For
this to happen it is important that the women who are already in the system become
an integral part of it: treated equitably and included in decision-making roles at every
level of the institution.
Junior women felt included in and supported by their departments. Their most
common concern was the extraordinary difficulty of combining family and work.
However, as women progressed through their careers at MIT they became increasingly
marginalized and excluded from positions of real power in their departments. An
important finding to emerge from the interviews was that the difference in the
perception of junior and senior women faculty about the impact of gender on their
careers is a difference that repeats itself over generations. Each generation of young
women, including those who are currently senior faculty, began by believing that
gender discrimination was ‘solved’ in the previous generation and would not touch
them. But gradually their eyes were opened to the realization that the playing field is
not level after all, and that they had paid a high price, both personally and
professionally, as a result.’
Pardue et al, Nature web site on debates/women
http://helix.nature.com/debates/women/
45

---

---

5
Shaping scientific policy
A critical thirty per cent threshold should be regarded as a minimum
share of decision making positions held by women at the national
level’.
(UN Commission on the Status of Women 1990 (cited in Human
Development Report, Oxford: Oxford University Press)
(By the year 2000, there should be) ‘...  a 25 per cent representation of
women for all public appointments and senior positions in science,
engineering and technology including chairmanships’.
(Committee on Women in Science, Engineering and Technology
(1994) The Rising Tide: A Report on Women in Science, Engineering and
Technology, London: HMSO)
To what extent are women involved in the top decision-making
committees that shape the scientific agenda in the EU? Considerable
budgets are distributed on a wide range of disciplines and projects and the
results of the research supported by the EU can have far reaching
implications for everyday life.  This chapter looks at the involvement of
women in shaping scientific policy and setting the agenda in the top
committees of the EU and of the Member States.  It asks how well the
numbers match up to those called for by UNESCO and by the report
commissioned by the UK Government, The Rising Tide.  It also questions
the way science itself addresses the issue of gender in research.
EU framework programmes
At the EU level, science policy decisions are most evident in the measures
known as the Framework Programmes.  The Framework Programmes
encompass specific activities concentrated in particular areas.  It is
instructive to look at how the money has been distributed between the
different areas in the five Framework programmes funded to date.  As Figure
5.1 shows, research into energy and particularly into nuclear power
dominated spending on research in the early Framework Programmes.  The
Fifth Framework Programme has been organised in a different fashion and
is focused more on problem solving.
‘Half of the brainpower on
Earth is in the heads of women.
... Today, the difficulty is to move
from the acceptance of equal
rights to the reality of equal
opportunity.  This transition will
not be complete until women
and men have equal
opportunities for occupying
position in power structures
throughout the world.’
Mr Donald J. Johnston, General
Secretary, OECD, at the OECD
Conference Women Entrepreneurs in
Small and Medium Sized Enterprises: A
Major Force in Innovation and Job
Creation.
47

---

Science policies in the European Union
The issue of women’s representation on committees that decide budgets is a
different one from that discussed in Chapters 2 and 3 which focused on
women in scientific professions.  The question here is whether women, as
over half the population, should have an equal say in the allocation of
budgets and the focus of scientific endeavour.  A case could certainly be
made for 50% representation.  Would the distribution of resources outlines
in Figure 5.1 have looked different with more women on the committees?
This is a question to which we return.  The following sections examine the
gender balance in the key top scientific committees in the EU and
emphasise the recent changes in gender composition of many of these
committees.
EU level
Science policy at the EU level is determined by several bodies.  These
include the European Parliament, the Council of Ministers, and the
Commission together with the Committees that advise them.  Input at the
political level for the Framework Programmes comes from the European
Parliament and in particular from the Committee on Industry, External
Trade, Research and Energy and from the Council of Ministers of the
Member States who together determine the form the Framework
Programmes will take.
Women are relatively well represented in the European Parliament
compared with most Member State Parliaments.  After the 1999 elections,
30% of the MEPs were female.  The representation of women among MEPs
varies from a low of 10% in Italy to a high of 50% in Sweden.  In 1999, a
third of the members of the Committee for Industry, External Trade,
Research and Energy are women (19/60 or 32%).
‘There are too few women
involved in defining quality’
(Ministry of Research and Information
Technology (1997) Women and
Excellence in Research Copenhagen:
Ministry of Research and Information
Technology)
Information and Commercial Technology
Industrial and Materials Technology
Environment
Life Sciences and Technology
Energy
Transport
Socio-Economic Research
International Cooperation
Dissemination and Exploitation of Results
Human Capital and Mobility
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
0%
1982
1st F.P 1984-87
2nd F.P 1987-91
3rd F.P 1990-94
4th F.P 1994-98
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
0%
5th F.P 1999-2004
Source: All figures from European Commission Research Directorate-General
Quality of life and management of
living resources
User-friendly information society
Competitive and sustainable growth
Energy, environment and sustainable
development
Confirming the international role of
Community research
Promotion of innovation and
encouragement of SME participation
Improving human research and the
socio-economic knowledge base
Direct actions (JRC)
Figure 5.1: Changes in RTD Priorities between the different Framework Programmes
48

---