To Government & Business Leaders

19 September 2007

By Kellie Tranter

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights recognises the right of every person to take part in the government of his or her country. A necessary precondition for the proper functioning of a democracy is men and women having equal access to power, decision making and leadership at all levels. This seems to be something that Australia needs now more than ever!

Former Secretary-General Kofi Annan said that the role of women in decision making was central to the advancement of women around the world, and to the progression of humankind as a whole. Women are every bit as affected as men by the challenges facing humanity in the 21st century - in economic and social development, as well as in peace and security; often, they are more affected. It is therefore both right and necessary that women are engaged in decision making in every area, with equal strength and in equal numbers.

The United Nations has established a comprehensive code of corporate conduct focused on empowering and investing in women worldwide. These principles provide companies with a set of goals to measure progress, and investors a set of guidelines against which to assess performance on gender equality. Here in Australia the EOWA actually had an interesting online "Women in Leadership Census Tool" which allowed an organisation to input its figures for Women on the Board, in Senior Management and in the organisation; the tool then compared the organisation's figures with others from the USA, Canada and its own industry. Unfortunately this page is no longer available! More Info »

Why is it so important to have women at the heart of decision making at all levels?

Author and humanist Arundhati Roy said, 'A political struggle that does not have women at the heart of it, above it, below it and within it is no struggle at all.' Her observation agrees with behavioural studies which suggest that women are more trustworthy and more public spirited, and their presence promotes honest government, which in turn has a profound anti-corruption effect both at micro and macro levels. More Info »

More Info »

Gender orientated legislation and bureaucratic bodies have been in place in Australia for a long time, but their impact seems to be lessening over time. Every week there seems to be yet another report confirming that Australia is going backwards in gender equity, that the pay gap between men and women remains or has widened, or that some parts of women's policy machinery has been dismantled or that some part of the women's NGO has been silenced. More Info » It's the same story everywhere, from Workchoices » to the Victorian Bar Council » to science » to mining », to demographical areas », and so the list continues.

To top that off, Australian shares with the United States the dubious honour of being the only OECD countries yet to adopt some form of paid parental leave. More Info » Even in Venezuela, as part of the redistribution of the oil revenue, the work done in the home by women heads of households - starting with those who live in extreme poverty - is now recognised with a housewife's payment equivalent to 80% of the minimum wage. More Info ». Australia's economy, and our government's much touted surplus, similarly float on windfall revenue from mineral and other resources sales, but how much of this is allocated to recognise the contribution of women in the "domestic" workforce? Venezuela can do it but Australia can't? At the same time, how much money are we spending on defence?

We know that neither of the major political parties is much committed to reversing these negative trends, but the question is why? Are women too busy to put themselves on the political and business agenda? Do women really support one another? Is it because women haven't taken the time to understand the problem, appreciate its implications and develop a unified strategic plan?

Perhaps the problems facing women are more fundamental than obvious day to day issues like work/life balance and the high cost of childcare and aged care services. What we need to do is to analyse and strip back our social programming.

When we speak of gender we are highlighting our psychological and social conceptions of what it means to be a man or women. "Gender Schemas" refers to our intuitive hypotheses about the behaviour, traits and preferences of men and women and boys and girls. Correspondingly, the term "gender roles" refers to expectations, to our ideas about how men and women are expected to behave.

The notion that gender schemas or bias exists is not new. In her book 'The Advancement of Women: Why so slow?", Professor Virginia Valian provides exceptional insight and practical guidance about how to avoid succumbing to this conditioned thinking. She suggests that we 'look at our cognition--how we interpret information, store it in our memory, reason with it, and draw inferences from it.'

During the leadership crisis last week our Prime Minister gave a classic demonstration of gender schemas in operation. During an interview with Kerry O'Brien on the 7.30 Report he said: "I've got a better team than the Opposition leader. I mean, when you look at people like Costello and Downer, and Turnbull, and Ruddock and Abbott, and Nelson, and Brough and Hockey --Brough and Hockey more recent arrivals on the prominent stage --I really do have a very talented team." Did you notice the conspicuous omission from Howard's "team" of Julie Bishop, his Minister for Education, Science and Training; and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women's Issues. More Info ».

Dear o dear.

To achieve gender equality in political participation the first and most important step is to recognise the fundamental need to change gender schemas. The importance of that cannot be overstated. In seeking to redress gender imbalance by taking positive steps to lay down egalitarian norms without addressing gender schemas, our society is confronting and dealing with the characteristics or consequences of the real problem rather than its cause; they are treating the symptoms rather than the disease.

Consider also the research by the authors of Women Don't Ask: Negotiation and the Gender Divide which suggests that women are 45% less likely than men to see the benefits and importance of asking for what they want; that instead of expressing interest in new opportunities as they arise, they bide their time, assuming that they will be asked to participate if their participation is warranted and that allowable divergences from the status quo will be announced and offered to everyone; indeed, they more generally expect life to be fair http://www.womendontask.com/

In order to change gender schemas we first need to recognise them. And the place each of us must start is within ourselves, by drilling down through our perceptions of the division of tasks between male and female, down through our more fundamental preconceptions of the roles of males and females, and down to the basic foundations of our own schematic processing. It is only by understanding the nuts and bolts of our own schemas that we can contain their inappropriate influences in the way we perceive the world and the people with whom we share it; if we are able to do that we will be able to recognise how schemas influence the words and actions of others; if we can do that then we can expose those schemas to scrutiny in the cold hard light of day, and if we do that the schemas that discriminate on the basis of gender will crumble.

The clear message for government and business, if they are serious about equality, is that they need to study how gender schemas develop, how they work, how they are maintained, and how they influence aspirations and expectations; they need to devise procedures and programs to neutralise gender schemas, including training staff about the effect of conversational styles and gender schemas, and how to combat their effects; and they need to assist individual women about the need to implement their own strategies for the 'Accumulation of Advantage'.

Some clear messages for women, on the other hand, are that most opportunities in business and in life are not shared equally; that fairness is not an inherent quality of interpersonal behaviour, and that gender schemas are subtly entrenched but dangerously widespread. Equally important: if you want to be given a chance don't be afraid to ask for it!

::BACK::