Changing the Gender Profile of the Professoriate: An Irish Case Study

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Abstract

This chapter analyses the success of a new university in increasing the proportion of women professors from zero in 1997 to 34% in 2012, considerably above the average for Irish (21%) and European Union (21%) universities. This focus is an important symbolic indicator in the context of the entrenched male-dominated character of universities. Drawing on documentary and experiential evidence, the chapter highlights the importance of formal leaders and informal gender champions and the synergies between them. In the context of informal gender champions it stresses the importance of ‘managing management’, leveraging prestigious external funding, ‘perverse alignments’, cross-institutional ties, ‘provocative misbehaviour’ as well as the support of formal leaders and chance in facilitating this increase. It concludes that change in the gender profile of the professoriate is possible but not inevitable.

Keywords

European Union Gender Equality Governing Authority Professorial Level Gender Awareness 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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Notes

Acknowledgements

The author gratefully acknowledges the support of the European Commission’s Directorate General for Research and Innovation for FESTA (2012–2017) (grant number 287526) which provided the context for the writing of this chapter.

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Copyright information

© The Author(s) 2017

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.Department of SociologyUniversity of LimerickLimerickIreland
  2. 2.Geary Institute, University College DublinDublinIreland

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