positive discrimination and quotas - right or wrong? And how do you justify it?

[LRDTheFeministDragon]

I was wondering what you think about evening up the balance of women and men in certain professions (not politics if that's ok - seems to me it's a different discussion seeing as their job is to be representatives)? Which way(s) are best/most justifable morally - quotas? Encouraging women to apply but treating their applications just like men's? Positive discrimination during the selection process?

I'm asking because I had a conversation where I didn't feel equipped to argue my side. A friend is just starting out on a career as a conductor. I think he's very good. He knows it is a very male-dominated profession. He is really fed up because he's applying to some programmes in the states (think hundreds of applicants for a handful of places). He's heard that they encourage women to apply by interviewing virtually all women who apply - so it is much easier for women to get to the interview stage. And some places, he worries, may also accept women who are less good than men.

On the one hand, I feel for him. But I also felt angry that when I suggested women who got as far as applying to this very male-dominated course might already have had to fight quite a lot of prejudice, he dismissed this. He also reckons he should not 'have to feel guilty' about discrimination against women 'in the past'.

Should we justify positive discrimination? Does what I'm describing even count as positive discrimination, or might it not be recognition that the women applying are a self-selecting bunch? How would you feel if this was your DS or DH (it's not mine but I'm trying to think of it that way) - would you be fed up?

I don't think its actually a problem per se if some professions genuinely attract more men than women, and vv - the problem with that is that still, too often, the 'male' professions are treated as more valuable. But that's really a whole other thread.

He may not have asked for it, but he still has it - hence why it is called 'unearned privilege'.

I am trying to think of helpful ways you could explain things to him.

I think Miggsie's screen/musician example is very good.

grimma - I agree there's a problem with male professions attracting more value. I'm not sure it is another thread really? Personally, I do think it is a problem if some professions attract more men than women or vice versa. I don't think men and women are fundamentally sufficiently different that this should happen really. There's an all-female builders' I read about a while back, and they seemed to be doing very well, so I doubt that composing is something so strenuous women can't or won't do it.

I came on to post about the female musician, miggsie beat me to it! It's from 'Blink' by Malcolm Gladwell and it's referenced here and here.

Brilliant, thanks!

"I agree there's a problem with male professions attracting more value. "

Is it to do with "male professions" attracting more value?

Or to do with men attracting more value?

I thought it had been shown that when traditionally male jobs became much more female, the status and wage gradually fell accordingly.

The bit about the musicians auditioning behind a screen is perhaps one of the best enactions of a gender-neutral policy.

Perhaps one methodology to pursue is to remove individuals names from submitted cv's so at least the interview shortlist is as fair as possible. Okay even with that it can be rendered unfair 'took two years maternity leave' can be a big giveaway.

I'm really wary of quotas, having seen them applied in American education over race, and it tends to dominate everything related as a result. It sounds a bit corny to say women in top roles will be accused of not getting there by merit, but I find other women will actually say that, not just men.

As far as I'm concerned the chief discrimination is the impact of the 'career break'. Society expects females to bear children, and those who decide not to hand there's over immediately to nurseries are instantly discriminated-against and thrown off the career ladder using spurious terms like 'your skills are out-of-date'. Once again though, providing say free training for mums returning-to-work discriminates against those women who have chosen to einther forego children, or did send the child straight-to-nursery.

Ultimately though the question is moot. Its a global economy and those organisations that don't employ or promote the best, regardless of sex will lose out to those who do. How we define the 'best' is the problem.

With respect to Hewitt again; nope, her actions were indefensible. She intervened and as she was the government Minister responsible for maintaining anti-discrimination legislation and policy, to actually have instigated a discrimitory practise which was both illegal and easily found-out was beyond-the-pale.

SQ - yes, you're right and I phrased that wrongly (but meant what you said).

jamma - at the maternity leave thing. Yep, bit of a giveaway.

I totally agree the career break/expectation women will take a career break is a huge issue.

I'm not quite getting your point about Hewitt. What I'm saying is, however terrible you may think she was, she's only one person, right? How can she have such an impact/be so blame-worthy as you say?

i'm not really in favour of quotas for final recruitment simply because if i benefited from one then i would feel defensive about my ability in that role and uncomfortable. they probably can work in the shortlisting stages though.

but i do like the idea of 'blind' screening as much as possible. i have a name that is mostly female but can be male which my parents gave me deliberately and went to mixed sex schools. i also don't have to put anything about children on my cv (more by luck than design).

my own area of employment is pretty equal in gender but very 'white and middle class' and the field has created 'diversity' projects involving giving people from other backgrounds placements and work experience. i think that helps level the field a bit...

I'm in favour of positive discrimination, and I feel that in some cases it is necessary because gender-neutral selection simply will not go far enough to ever result in a wholesale change.

Gender-neutral selection is a good thing in that it stops a talanted/skilled/qualified woman being passed over purely because of her gender. But it fails to take account of the amount of women who never even apply to a job because it's so traditionally male. Since we know that there isn't any male gene that makes men better at science than women, we know that society is responsible for less women being attracted to science. Gender neutral selection doesn't address that.

Positive discrimination is the only method that ever takes into account the fact the male/female career roles are often defined long before any man or woman intends to apply for a job, usually while still in school. There are countless women out there who could have made excellent engineers but have instead taken a more traditionally female route. Positive discrimination won't do anything about the women who have already missed those opportunities, but it does force employers to think about how they can attract more women for the next round of recruitment, which eventually trickles down to once male-dominated careers being talked about in schools and more girls encouraged to go for them.

There is tonnes of evidence out there to show that highly successful women who operate in traditionally male-dominated fields often achieve that success by behaving more like men. As a result, the profession never changes and continues to be biased in favour of males and still dominated by men. Whereas when you get a critical percentage of female representatives, things change. Again, gender-neutral selection won't achieve this sea-change in anywhere the near the amount of time positive discrimination could. And women that get in (in lesser numbers) through gender-neutral screening will still be subjected to patriarchal discrimination against them once they've got their job, which means they may never achieve the promotion they deserve, etc. Whereas by getting a lot of women in at the same time, through positive discrimination, there is more change of long-term and institutional change.

Positive discrimination does not give women an unfair advantage. It simply elevates women to the same starting point that men take for granted.

Sunshine - what I want is gender neutrality starting from birth - all through infanthood and schools. I reckon ultimately, doing it the hard way from the ground up is the better way to go - no one able to shout foul.

Interesting debate. I'm against quotas because they don't fix the problem of why women are discriminated against. It also gives fuel to the argument as described in the OP (which is without merit because as a group white men have it better than anyone in terms of job prospects and pay).

The recruitment points made by Meditrina are very relevant. I worked for a company based in Bradford. They found that their employees were not representative of the community they were based in so they took steps to advertise to under represented groups to make an even playing field.

There are ways of having a gender blind application process in addition to not having names (which also helps with other prejudicial assumptions like racism) putting the period of time worked in an organisation, such as 2 years, 7 months, instead of Jan 2008-August 2010, avoids the career gap problem.

Issues with actual gaps in CVs can be dealt with at referencing stage.

Teaspoons - yes - we'd need to get people to accept the earthshattering concept that each child is an individual, not a statistic.

Statistically there may be some gender differences, but that is completely irrelevant to how each individual should be treated.

There is of course another issue - challenging instances when males are overlooked for roles seen as 'traditional'.

When I was kid, male teachers, though not in primary school, weren't uncommon. In 2009 the General Teaching Council there were 25,491 male teachers in primary schools - which was then 13%.

There were just 43 male staff in state nursery schools. 43!

In 2010 4,550 state primary schools out of a total of 16,892 - or 27 per cent - had no male teacher at all.

In 2010 only a quarter of the 490,981 registered working teachers were male.

In families without an adult male, many children will have no day-to-day contact with a male until they reach 11. At the beginning of the Victorian age the situation was reversed - with most teachers being male.

Why did males leave teaching? Well financial incentive is one good reason. Accrding to this TES article Male teachers can expect to be up to £67,000 better off by leaving teaching.

And of course there is the idea that male teachers are more vulnerable to pedophile accusations. And for that we have, who else, but Patricia Hewitt to thank. This from her Wikipedia entry, which also included one of her routine attacks against mothers;

Sociologist Geoff Dench has stated that Hewitt discourages male involvement in child rearing by questioning "whether we can trust men with children" and she concluded that it would be necessary to adopt the practice of "not leaving men on their own with groups of children". Dench also criticised Hewitt for suggesting that it requires less intelligence and education to raise children than to be employed.

And you wonder where the anti-Hewitt venom comes from?

jamma - I think that is part of the same issue.

I never said I wondered where the anti-Hewitt venom came from. I am probably putting this very badly, but what I'm actually asking you about isn't 'why do you dislike Hewitt'? It's 'why do you think she is superwoman, Jesus, and Andrea Dworkin rolled into one?' She's only one person - I just don't see why you think her failures (even if they're staggeringly awful) would damn the whole enterprise.

(Sorry, I realize the Jesus/Dworkin superwoman creature would be both terrifying and liable to destroy itself, but you know what I mean! )

Not wanting to answer for jamma but on this issue Hewitt had the opportunity to do so much. She is arguably the most senior woman in government and the minister for women but she put that office into disrepute and gave ammunition to those who would like to keep the patriarchal status quo. In short she did much damage by failing to uphold her office correctly. What she did was worse than doing nothing.

She was the best hope we had to change things (at the current time) by virtue of her office and she sabotaged it.

I can certainly agree what she did was worse than doing nothing. But the idea that she has permanently and completely spoiled things? No, that's an overreaction and the sort of response few men, no matter how badly they fuck up, attract.

No I agree she hasn't completely and utterly spoilt things but she's set us back a bit. She may well have blown the chances for quotas but I'm not a fan any way so I don't see that as being the end of the world.

I suppose the difference when a senior man fucks up is that there's always plenty more. When a high-ranking woman does there's rarely another in the wings

SGM - yes, it is similar to Harman. It's tricky because I think the fact we all want them to be brilliant and to do everything means it is very, very disappointing when they don't!

Irma - cross posted, btu yes, I agree.

It's a tricky one isn't it. This weight of expectation. If they were truly radical they'd be unlikely to rise to a position of influence in the first place. And I am a liberal feminist. If there's a way of avoiding controversy and making a difference I'm all for it. That's why I favour application forms and blind recruitment processes instead of quotas.

My reluctance is also spurred by the fact much of our equality legislation has yet to achieve equality...