Women in the Profession: An Update on the Gendered Composition of the Discipline and Political Science Departments in the UK
| Author | Alice Ramdehal,Rosie Sullivan,Rebecca Hayton,Taylor Billings,Marianne Holt,Stephen Holden Bates,Zoe Pflaeger Young,Lola Ogunsanya,Jasmine Khatri,Fran Amery,Molly Marvin,Cherry Miller,Stephen McKay |
| Date | 01 February 2021 |
| Published date | 01 February 2021 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1478929920905503 |
| Subject Matter | Special Issue: Gender in the Profession |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1478929920905503
Political Studies Review
2021, Vol. 19(1) 12 –36
© The Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/1478929920905503
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Women in the Profession:
An Update on the Gendered
Composition of the Discipline
and Political Science
Departments in the UK
Zoe Pflaeger Young1, Fran Amery2,
Stephen Holden Bates3, Stephen McKay4,
Cherry Miller5, Taylor Billings3,
Rebecca Hayton3, Marianne Holt3,
Jasmine Khatri3, Molly Marvin6,
Lola Ogunsanya3, Alice Ramdehal3
and Rosie Sullivan3
Abstract
We present data on the proportions and seniority of female and male political scientists working
in the UK. Comparing the results with previous research from 2011, we find that progress
has been made. However, progress has been incremental and we find no qualitative changes
in the status of female political scientists: they continue to be outnumbered by their male
counterparts; they are overrepresented in the least senior job groups and underrepresented
in the most senior; and the average female political scientist occupies a less senior position
than the average male counterpart. We also run regression analyses to explore the impact of
broader contextual factors on the proportion of female political scientists within a unit and that
unit’s ‘gender seniority gap’. We find evidence that gender equality kitemarks, university mission
group membership, the gender of the Head of Unit and Vice-Chancellor and the proportion
of female members of university governance bodies appear to matter for one or both of these
measures but not always in the direction that might be expected. These results, then, raise
questions about what strategies might be pursued by those who wish to improve the status of
women in the profession.
1Department of Politics, People and Place, De Montfort University, Leicester, UK
2Department of Politics, Languages and International Studies, University of Bath, UK
3Department of Political Science & International Studies, University of Birmingham, UK
4School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Lincoln, UK
5Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Tampere, Finland
6School of International Relations, University of St Andrews, UK
Corresponding author:
Stephen Holden Bates, University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK.
Email: s.r.bates@bham.ac.uk
905503PSW0010.1177/1478929920905503Political Studies ReviewPflaeger Young et al.
research-article2020
Special Issue Article
Pflaeger Young et al. 13
Keywords
gender and the profession, the status of women in the profession, UK political science
Accepted: 26 September 2019
This article updates and broadens research undertaken 8 years ago on the status of women
in UK political science.1 As Bates et al. (2012: 139–140) then argued, research on women
in the discipline is important, not only because of issues of equality, justice and self-
reflection within the discipline but also because of the privileged role political scientists
play in the creation and flow of knowledge about gender inequality and women’s under-
representation in positions of power, as well as other important political issues more
generally.
Drawing on a dataset of 2553 political scientists, the proportion and seniority of female
political scientists at both a disciplinary and unit level are analysed. To take into account
initiatives launched and research undertaken since 2011 concerning gender equality in the
social sciences, the academy and society more broadly, this article extends this focus on
numbers and seniority by also analysing the possible impact of broader contextual factors
on the presence and status of women in political science. The analysis shows that improve-
ments made since 2011 at a disciplinary level have been incremental rather than trans-
formative, that the rate of improvement has not increased and that much of the improvement
can be seen to be due to a cohort effect. The analysis also shows that there is evidence that
contextual factors are associated with differences in the presence of female political sci-
entists and the size of the ‘gender seniority gap’ at a unit level but not always in the way
that might be expected. These results, then, raise issues about what strategies are best
employed to improve the status of women in political science as quickly as possible.
The article has five further sections. First, we discuss literature and initiatives related
to the status of women in political science and the academy more generally before going
on to discuss our data collection and methods in the second section. We then outline and
discuss our results in the third and fourth sections before concluding.
The Status of Women in the Profession: Literature and
Initiatives
At the time of conducting the previous 2011 survey of women in the profession, there was
an emerging literature on the underrepresentation of women in political science, drawing
on research and surveys focusing on the UK (Akhtar et al., 2005; Childs and Krook,
2006) and the US (American Political Science Association (APSA), 2005; Henehan and
Sarkees, 2009; Monroe and Chiu, 2010). While there had been improvements in the num-
ber of female students studying political science and a slow increase in the number of
women in the profession, men still dominated in terms of overall numbers and their pro-
portional presence increased at each level of seniority. Moreover, while there were com-
parable numbers of women and men at the teaching and research fellow level, men
significantly outnumbered women at the more senior levels (Bates et al., 2012: 141–142).
This supports the idea of a leaking pipeline in which an increasing number of qualified
women are entering the profession but gender inequalities in pay and progression persist
with a lack of representation of women in senior positions (Monroe and Chiu, 2010). In
explaining this seniority gap, existing literature identified barriers faced by women
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