Paper to be presented at Feminist Research methods An international Conference, 4-6 February 2009, Stockholm University Workshop no. 2: Doing Gender Studies in Organizations Hanne Nexø Jensen, Department of Political Science, University of Copenhagen, hnj@ifs.ku.dk Don t quote without author s permission. How to study the doing of gender in top management in Danish? My point of departure is how we can understand and analyse political and public organizations undergoing changes in a gendered perspective including new institutionalism. I m curious to understand why the existing gendered balance of power were disturbed when the local government reform were implemented January 2007. What kind of doing of gender does it reflect? Empirically, I depart from the fact that the number and percentage of female city managers declined drastically, when the Danish government composed of the Liberal and Conservative Parties decided to restructure the public sector as such. Among other initiatives 275 were amalgamated into 98, however, one third of these were not affected by the amalgamations. When the reform was implemented January 2007, seven out of 98 managers were women. It s 7.1 per cent. Before the reform the per cent of female city managers were 18. How come that the numbers of female managers were reduced drastically even when Denmark has a policy of equality? How can I collect data, which might highlight those mechanisms and processes reflecting the doing of gender in top management and thereby understand what kind of political perspectives, changes in public organizations and so on, this development reflects? Firstly, I ll go through figures concerning the division of men and women in top management in 2006 and 2008. Second, I report on two major explanations brought forward in public when the decline became a reality. Thirdly, I briefly go through my analysis of the figures using elements from new institutionalism inspired by FIIN (see below). Fourthly, I discuss which methods I can bring into play. Facts about my case In Denmark female employees outnumber men in the as such. But at the level of management the picture is different. The boards of directors main responsibility is to provide services to the politicians and to secure that political decision are carried out in order to benefit both citizens and society as such. In 2008 just below every fifth board member were a woman and as mentioned above there were four female city managers out of a total of 98 (table one). There are twice as many women in the board of directors in the, which hasn t been amalgamated, compared to those which were amalgamated. I.e. in those organizations which have changed significantly, the number of female has declined. Of the 30 women who were city managers in 2006, four of them continued as city managers after January 2007. In 2008 two fifths of the former female city managers and three fifths of the former male city managers where part of a local government board of directors. And twice as many women as men have a position in a local government outside the board of managers. One third of the former female city managers and about one fifth of the male hasn t a job in 2008, or haven t been traceable (Table two). 1
Table one. The number of men and women in the boards of local government before and after the amalgamation (Kommunal Årbog, 2006; Kommunal Årbog, 2008). City Managers The amalgamated 2006 2008 All the The amalgamated Nonamalgamated All the Nonamalgamated Men 237 206 31 94 63 31 Women 30 29 1 4 3 1 pct. 11 12 3 4 4,5 3 Rest of management Men 650 558 92 325 230 95 Women 215 181 34 92 48 44 pct. 25 24 27 22 17 32 Total Men 887 764 123 419 293 123 Women 245 210 35 96 51 45 pct. 22 22 22 19 15 27 In public two explanations are recurrent when talking about the few appointed female city managers. One is that the number of former managers, which ought to be reemployed where numerous, i.e. there were many men to be considered to different occupations at high scale of pay since you can t downgrade people employed. The posts were mainly advertised internally due to rules about recruiting people. The chairman of the Local Governments pay pool panel has said:. One has chosen to recruit from the cards on the table.. (Pihl-Andersen & Olesen, 2008). But this statement cannot explain why men have been twice as successful as women in getting a job at the same level due to the figures: 32 percent of men and 14 percent of the women, which were city managers in 2006, were also city managers in 2008 (table two). And the statement doesn t explain why a larger percentage of the men still are a part of a local government management compared to the number of women at the same level. Table two. The 2006 city managers occupation in 2008 (Own figure based on (Kommunal Årbog, 2008), Google and Infomedia). City managers Government officer in management Government officer, not in management Job out side a local government No job, retired, dead or not Total N traceable Kvinder 4 7 9 1 9 30 Pct. 14 24 30 3 30 100 Men 77 63 33 21 47 241 Pct. 32 26 14 9 20 101 The other explanation is that those hiring wanted to continue with well known figures (literate translation) 1, since guaranteed service (literate translation) has been a mantra (Bøgelund, 2006; Olesen & Pihl-Andersen, 2008). For example has the city manager in Aabenraa said: there were only about five percentages of the applicants who were female but we should chose the most qualified. It s not specified what most qualified means. The chairman of the public managers has said: The politicians have chosen what they consider as the surest cards (literate translation), i.e. those city managers with experiences from larger. (Friis, 2006). It is evident that there was a larger amount of men with experiences from larger since many women 1 The following phrases are more or less constructed to this specific occasion there fore I have not found appropriate English phrases. 2
has managed smaller units. No one knows how many women in total who applied for a city manager position, but there has been some. And it seems strange to me that guaranteed service (literate translation) had priority rather than experiences with fusions. It s plausible to assume that choosing men with a special kind of work experience support one way of thinking public organizations and possibilities of changes; those hiring have chosen more of the same or the well known in stead of using the amalgamation as an occasion for (re)designing the institution (Mackay & Meier, 2003, p. 11). Some has stated that it is only a matter of time before women regain the losses (Bøgelund, 2006; Friis, 2006; Pihl-Andersen & Olesen, 2008). However, an examination of the situation in the second largest municipality in Denmark (Aarhus) shows that more women at the lower levels are not a guarantee for a higher number of female managers. Some of the constraints are that the job advertisements appeal to men in preference to women, that women do not apply internally and female role models are missing (Rambøll, 2007). Further more it s becoming widespread to downsize the board of managers and then the backlash in percentage of female city managers will be even harder to recover 2. To improve the number of female managers some emphasise the need for diversity in management. A wider range of competences can be written into the job advertisements. Demystification of management and the need for anonymity if applying internally are two other advices. What are the institutional values at play since the local government reform has resulted in a decrease in the number of female city managers in a situation where the existing percentage of female managers could have been maintained? In Denmark there is not a political majority voting for gender quotas. The government think that equality should be obtained voluntarily. The Minister of Equality has invited companies and public organisations to sign a Charter for Equality (Ligestillingsministeriet, 2008). The Opposition think that concrete actions should be taken in order to improve the number of female managers and politicians (Egekvist & Rysgaard, 2008; Kudahl, 2008; Kaas, 2006; Skadhede, 2008). My analysis so far I have combined analyses of gender and new institutionalism in order to find answers to whether the decline of female city managers is a matter of suppression and/ or control problem? Suppression is seen as a manifestation of feminism and a control problem as a manifestation of new institutionalism. As mentioned, I have primarily worked with figures and articles from news papers and magazines. This shortly summed up below. I ve been inspired by the idea from FIIN of combing new institutionalism and studies of public organizations undergoing changes in a gendered perspective. FIIN, The Feminism and Institutionalism International Network were formed in 2006 by a group of researchers in the field of gender and politics. The aim is to explore the interplay between feminist approaches to gendered institutions and new institutional theory. Our aim is to use and synthesize insights from each approach in order to address issues of gender, politics, power and change. (FIIN, 2008). I find it useful to think of gender in a study of public organizations. Political science studies rarely studies public organizations in a gendered perspective, not only in Denmark, but internationally as well. My results 2 The information is based on Danish new paper articles and articles in magazines (Bøgelund, 2006; Friis, 2006; Olesen & Pihl-Andersen, 2008). 3
In my analysis of figures from Danish I have used elements from historical and sociological new institutionalism, since my question about the decline in the number of female city managers should be understood in a historical perspective at a macro level (historical institutionalism) and at an organizational (meso) level (sociological new institutionalism). I won t go into details elaborating on concepts and so on, but concentrate on my findings in order to discuss relevant methods to collect data 3. In a historical perspective one can explore what kind of norms and values that are chosen to be continued and which aren t. 25 years ago one percent of the city managers were women. Ten years later the figure were eight percent (Fiig, 1999, p. 38). In this time span one could ague that the increases from one to eight percent reflect norms and values in society which support improvement of equality. Path dependency could be attributed to the fact that the number of women should rise continuously. However, the local government reform seem to become a critical juncture, i.e. moments when substantial institutional change takes place thereby creating a branching point from which historical development moves onto a new path. (Hall & Taylor, 1996, p. 942). In Australia the number of femocrats declined as well (Sawer, 2007). The Danish and Australian cases indicate that institutions cannot be taken for granted. Institutions are created, recreated and changes constantly. Hall & Taylor emphasis asymmetrical relations of power (Hall & Taylor, 1996, p. 940). The Danish local government reform seems to have disturbed the existing balance of gender power. Generally speaking, new institutionalism focuses on relations between institutions and actions (behaviour). In my case action is hiring more men than women in the new. Institutions are both formal and informal rules, norms and procedures, which are embedded in the structures and have an affect on and make sense for /of actions and behaviour (Hall & Taylor, 1996, p. 938; March & Olsen, 1989, p. 160). The hiring committees could have been affected by some arguments such as: employment law (rules), the best qualified (informal norm) and guaranteed service (literate translation) (informal norm), but then equal opportunity policy is ignored (could be a formal norm). The employment law ascribe that one cannot promote a person when the position is advertised internally and that a person should be offered an adequate position when amalgamations take place. But these aspect cannot explain why only 14 percent of the former female city managers where replaced as city managers, whereas 32 percent of the former male city managers were offered a top post. According to the concept of logic of appropriateness in sociological new institutionalism, an organization would adopt a new praxis in order to secure legitimacy (Hall & Taylor, 1996, p. 949). By hiring men with management experiences from larger, the organizations could argue that s a way to signal confidence and thereby secure legitimacy. (Despite men s competences in making units amalgamate). My preliminary analysis shows that existing practices and norms concerning gender has been passed over in the amalgamated. I ve concluded that the decline of female city managers is a consequence of both problems with suppression and control. This of course, is a simple answer. However, political signals, indicating that equality should be improved haven t been implemented in the amalgamated. The Ministry of Equalities management tools have failed completely. And another consequence of the reform is a disturbed balance of gender power. 3 My analysis is explained in more details in another paper. 4
However, other kinds of data than figures are needed in order to unmask power relations and thereby get a grip of the doing of gender in these organizations. How to proceed? How is gender done in top management in Danish in 2009? I.e. how is power relations gendered and what the consequences? I m eager to go more into details and try to get to understand in which ways mechanisms and processes are gendered. In my case I see the administration at each town hall as an organization, not in isolation, but as a unit to investigate in more details than figures concerning the number of men and women in top management make possible. But what is a relevant method? Of course, an important point of departure for any study is that the method(s) should be chosen in relation to a specific research question. So far, my question concerns the doing of gender in local public administration bodies in a more general way. Through my study, I might contribute to discussions about continuous improvements of the organization. I see two ways to proceed in order to narrow my focus 1. What method(s) could be used in a study of the doing of gender in organizations where you don t focus on biological men and women? 2. One could identify an analytical toolbox (theory) and use it as a point of departure for choosing methods and ask what are the central categories to be operationalised in for example new institutionalism, Connells concepts in relation to gender regimes and gender orders in organizations or other toolboxes? Since one of my challenges is to figure out what kind of data I can get hold of, I would like to discuss what different methods can offer in relation to unmasking the doing of gender in top management in Danish, i.e. depart from number one. Methods to choose A tricky thing with the doing of gender is that it s practice, i.e. behaviour and speaking (oral and written) which can be both intentionally or unintentionally. It can be difficult to get people to tell about there own or to some extent other peoples behaviour as well as to elaborate on ones own prejudices. This means that a combination of methods (triangulation) would be of relevance. And I definitely need to collect other kinds of data than figures. What are relevant sources to illustrate the doing of gender in a municipality? And what kind of advantages and disadvantages do different methods represent in relation to my case? Overall one can distinguish between three categories of methods (Launsø & Rieper, 2005, p. 109ff): 1. Inquiring methods; such as questionnaires, interview and focus groups 2. Observation methods; participant observation, formative evaluator, photos etc. 3. Documentation methods; which is existing material collected for another purpose (Launsø & Rieper, 2005, p. 108) such as statistics, minutes (record of meetings), official documents, diaries, mass media, fiction, film and electronic communications. Based on my preliminary findings and scare resources in relation to further collection of data I think I should choose between the following methods: 5
Ad 1: A focus group could be a point of departure. I could invite a number of persons employed in. It could be a number of men and women holding a city manager position in 2006 and some, which did in 2008, and some who don t. They would have the opportunity to read my paper in advance and the focus group could discuss how they have experienced the doing of gender in their organization. I.e. it could be interesting to hear what experience they have concerning the selection processes, which qualifications are emphasised, what are of importance in relation to improvements of the organizations performance and so on? Collecting narratives could be another way of getting to know more about the practicing of gender according to Patricia Martin (2006), but I m not sure how to do this in my case. Face-to-face interview would not necessarily be of much help if focus is on gender and it might not be trustworthy if one frames the interview on changes or improvements of the organization instead of gender. Of course it s of interest to identify the formal and informal rules applied in the selection processes of city managers. How did the reform alter these rules on what levels and why is the outcome so heavily gender-biased? But I think it s unlikely to get any to talk about the selection process. Ad 3: Official documents concerning gender equality could be relevant. According to the Danish Law of Equality it s compulsory for to work out a statement of Equality every second year 4. However, more than half of the pay only little attention to equality. Sixteen out of 98 do a fairly good work on equality according to the 2007 statement (foot note 2). It would be interesting to get hold of papers concerning the selection process of city managers. Job advertisements and any reports from hiring committees would be of relevance in order to identify the formal and informal rules applied in the selection processes of city managers. However, it s rare to get any information about discussions in hiring committees since their work deals with concrete persons. Personal dairies could be interesting to read, but probably hard to get hold of. Fiction could be an interesting source (Czarniawska, 2006; Jørgensen, 1986). However, the amount of fiction published dealing with the recent development in would be sparse. A combination could be a blog or something similar at a website, where people write about daily life including their occupational experiences. I ve looked for a website, but not found any yet. Ad 2: Observation methods is time consuming and varies due to the way the researcher gets involved in the object studied. As a researcher one could be the silent observer, maybe taking photos or one can choose a more active role as researcher and even become part in a transformation process as practiced in formative evaluation or interactive research. Of course one can get involved differently. One way is to make invisible knowledge visible. Participants should tell about their knowledge in spoken or written or drawings. This knowledge could be analysed and transformed by the researcher and brought back to the participants (Gjelstrup, 2008). This method of pragmatic evaluation do in one way or another depart from an assumption that some in the organization wants change to take place. This might not be the case dealing with the doing of gender. 4 http://www.ligestillingidanmark.dk/dynamicpages/ligestilling_i_kommuner.aspx 6
Concluding remarks I find triangulation of methods of relevance for my project since I m interested in different kinds of data due to the fact that the doing of gender in an organization can be hard to observe and interview people about. My resources are limited, there fore I favour a research model where I after the Femmet09- conference would analyse the statements of equality from 2007 in order to see whether if any and if some, how deals with gender and top management. Then I would see if I succeed finding a website (blog) describing daily life at the town hall. Next step would be to invite a number of people to a focus group as described above (Ad 1). I would use the text from the focus group in combination with the contributions from the first two sources in rewriting my paper. The revised version should be discussed with a new focus group. Eventually, the focus group could be selected from the same municipality. This gives me the opportunity to use an adjusted observation method visiting the site. One of the major challenges would be to avoid a selective focus on biological men and women, since this often end up with gender stereotypes. I hope that the use of different sources and methods would be helpful in this process. Of course my paper, discussions with involved people and my presence in a concrete organization could influence the sayings and doings of those involved. It would be interesting if my project could contribute to a discussion about the doing of gender in top management in Danish and even changes for the better. Finally, I need to elaborate on my analytical frame in order to grasp the doing of gender. Here, I find that elements from new institutionalism can contribute. But a gender perspective should be explicated in the analysis. Here, I find it relevant to turn to studies dealing with gender in organizations. References Bøgelund, E. (2006). Kvinderne tabte chefkabalen i kommunerne. DJØF Bladet, 13. Czarniawska, B. (2006). Doing Gender unto the Other: Fiction as a Mode of Studying Gender Discrimination in Organizations. Gender, Work & Organization, 13(3), 234-253. Egekvist, K. S., & Rysgaard, K. K. (2008, 08. juni). Baggrund: Stadig langt til ligestilling i toppen. Politiken. Fiig, C. (1999). Behandler man folk lige når man behandler dem ens? Rapport fra Ligestillingsrådets høring om positiv særbehandling den 26. november 1998. København: Ligestillingsrådet. FIIN. (2008). The Feminism and Institutionalism International Network. Retrieved 15. juli, 2008, from http://www.femfiin.com/ Friis, L. (2006, 18 maj 2006). Kun seks kvinder på toppen. HK/Kommunal. Gjelstrup, G. (2008). En metodologi til studiet af politikeres og topchefers magt til at forandre. In Y. Stubbergaard & P. Hall (Eds.), Demokrati och makt (pp. 213-240). Lund: Statsvetenskaplig Tidskrift. Hall, P. A., & Taylor, R. C. R. (1996). Political Science and the Three new Institutionalisms. Political Studies, 29, 936-957. 7
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