Including women in public affairs departments: Diversity is not enough

Edwards, Lauren Hamilton; Holmes, Maja Husar; Sowa, Jessica E.

doi:10.1080/15236803.2018.1565051

Cited by 20 publications

(19 citation statements)

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“…A crucial battleground for the fight to empower underrepresented groups in political science consists of the recruitment, retention, and placement of students from underrepresented groups seeking to gain admission and achieve academic success in graduate school. .............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. .............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. Regardless of the success of diversity-oriented programs, we recognize that making representational gains for marginalized groups and diversifying is not enough to achieve inclusion if scholars from these groups are brought into hostile climates (Edwards, Holmes, and Sowa 2019). The "glacial pace" at which political science is diversifying is a reflection of the ways in which the lasting legacies and continuity of systems of oppression map onto our field.…”

Section: Addressing Challengesmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Organizing Approach to Diversifying Political Science

Tormos-Aponte

2020

APSC

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Section: Addressing Challengesmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Organizing Approach to Diversifying Political Science

Tormos-Aponte

2020

APSC

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“…Indeed, gender discrimination has been identified to explain hiring practices and promotion disparities among millions of employees across a wide range of businesses (Thomas et al 2018). These gendered norms contribute to environments in which women are targets for microaggressions and bullying, gender harassment behaviors that are difficult to recognize (Edwards, Holmes, and Sowa 2019;Thomas et al 2018), and in which hierarchical power structures see more men than women in leadership positions (Johnson, Widnall, and Benya 2018).…”

Section: Equity Barriers In the Academymentioning

confidence: 99%

The Slippery Slope: Struggling for Equity in the Academy in the Era of #MeToo

Knepper

Scutelnicu

Tekula

2020

Public Administration Review

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The complexity of the sexual harassment language of the #MeToo movement creates discontinuities that may muddy intended communications. Yet understanding this language provides a fuller picture of the experiences that women face. Gender harassment has persisted in the workplace despite long-standing antidiscrimination policies, perhaps because of a universal failure to recognize all forms of it-some of which are more pervasive and common than sexual abuse. This article considers the ability of the academy to affect sexual harassment in public administration. It discusses the implications of gender harassment, the least recognized form of sexual harassment, and makes recommendations for overcoming gender barriers in the academy and in practice. Evidence-based guidance for advancing women in the academy may create more equitable and just spaces for teaching and learning. Public administration classrooms and scholarship represent critical opportunities to recognize patterns of organizational practice and systematically redress gender harassment in the workplace.

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“…Just as not all professors, students, and bureaucrats are white males, not all solid evidence is quantitative. Causal links are not all we need; we also need to know more about how to forge them, that is, about social processes.(2) Several of the essays (e.g., Edwards et al, 2019;Thomas, 2019) raise the issue of strategies for public administration education, given the fraught gender and race dimensions in many academic departments. One such dimension: When there is only a sprinkling of "other" faculty, they are frequently loaded down with responsibility to…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…(2) Several of the essays (e.g., Edwards et al, 2019;Thomas, 2019) raise the issue of strategies for public administration education, given the fraught gender and race dimensions in many academic departments. One such dimension: When there is only a sprinkling of "other" faculty, they are frequently loaded down with responsibility to…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As these authors all know, the challenge we face is not simply a matter of "add difference and stir." As Edwards et al (2019) note, inclusion is not just the numbers, it stands or falls on "felt acceptance." Greater variety of faculty and student identities inevitably creates fault lines that require willingness to work on building a new sense of belonging that, over time, everyone can come to feel.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Forging new tools for new administrative houses: Comments on the symposium

Stivers

2019

Journal of Public Affairs Education

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In 1964, a reporter asked Fannie Lou Hamer, a redoubtable leader of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, whether she and her party were "seeking equality with the white man." She answered, "No! What would I look like fighting for equality with the white man? I don't want to go down that low. I want the true democracy that'll raise me and the white man up…raise America up" (Harding, 2010, pp. xx-xxi).Among the amazing aspects of Ms. Hamer's declaration is her conviction that freedom and equality do not mean assimilation to the normal, nor conformity to the neutral. More than 50 years on, as we continue to struggle with the hegemonic power of maleness and whiteness, her dedication to "true democracy" still inspires, and reminds us that gender and race equity offer America an opportunity rather than requiring a sacrifice.The essays in this symposium reflect many interesting and heartening views on where the field of public administration stands now on these issues, and where we might head. Their arguments and empirical evidence give us all hope of "raising America up." From this rich assortment, a few points stand out for me.(1) The first has to do with what Bishu, Guy, and Heckler (2019) call "seeing gender." Their essay focuses on the persistence of gender (and by implication race) neutrality, even blindness, in organization and management texts. It seems to me this issue has implications for the paradigm that has come to constitute "normal science" in public administration, that is, quantitative empiricism. Feminist theorists have long observed the implicit masculinity of this form of science: objective, unbiased, rigorous, and dependent on the model of the scientist as a "separated self" that supposedly has no identifying entanglements (e.g., Keller, 1985, Bordo, 1987Harding, 1986).Today, the gender dimensions of normal science persist in the scientist's fear of contamination by Mother Nature and in the preference for "hard" over "soft" data, norms our field has doubled down on in the last couple of decades. The entire conversation about social equity is imprisoned within the disciplinary rule that only objective measurements count (pun intended), even though equity is an ethical-political issue. In our field's normal science terms, to understand gender and race as they are lived (see Edwards, Holmes, & Sowa, 2019) somehow seems to threaten bias. As accomplished a piece of research as Thomas (2019) has produced should not have to justify including interview results, especially those that so clearly reveal the lived experience of African-American female faculty members. In my view, there is a huge literature gap that only interpretive research can fill with evidence on this and other issues, documenting how individuals and groups understand social realities in bureaucracy and academia. Just as not all professors, students, and bureaucrats are white males, not all solid evidence is quantitative. Causal links are not all we need; we also need to know more about how to forge them, that is, about social processe...

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Including women in public affairs departments: Diversity is not enough

Cited by 20 publications

References 80 publications

An Organizing Approach to Diversifying Political Science

An Organizing Approach to Diversifying Political Science

The Slippery Slope: Struggling for Equity in the Academy in the Era of #MeToo

Forging new tools for new administrative houses: Comments on the symposium

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