Gender analysis of education in capitalist societies of the 21. century

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1 Gender analysis of education in capitalist societies of the 21. century Call for Papers for a Special Issue of the Journal: International Studies in Sociology of Education by PD Dr. Antonia Kupfer, University of Southampton Since the 1990s we have faced mayor changes worldwide: the production of many goods and services has shifted heavily from North-Western countries to Southern ones, especially in Asia (Tipton 1998). Accordingly, working conditions have changed including modes of selling one's workforce (Voss&Pongratz 1998). Whereas the rise of the Global South has improved living and working conditions for many people forming an increasing middle class in Southern countries, the contrary is taking place in the former so called "First World". Here, increasingly people have to face impoverished employment conditions, marked by flexibility, insecurity and diminishing quality (Room 1995). During this time, educational institutions have undergone major changes too. These refer mainly to their governance which has shifted from being input oriented to output oriented, arguably seeking accountability over freedom of development of students (Ball 2001, Masschelein et al. 2007, Kupfer 2008). Education is a social system being regarded as crucial for the reproduction of societies (Durkheim 1968 [1911], Bourdieu&Passeron 1979, 1990). In education, people are socialized and prepared for work in capitalist economies (Offe 1975, Bowles&Gintis 1976). Thus, education could be conceptualized as one base/foundation for capitalism. Gender -- a dualistic concept of dividing people into women and men that play different roles in societies and are related hierarchically -- forms another foundation for capitalist economies, mainly through unequal distribution of work (including its three dimensions of: employment, reproductive and civil work) and rewards (Becker- Schmidt 1987, Beer 1989). What remains unclear is the relation of gender and education concerning capitalism. There are various studies on the role of gender in education (for an overview: Skelton, et al. 2006)such as analysis of gender relations in classrooms (Gaskell 1992) and interaction of teaching and learning (Acker 1994, gender differences in educational performances (Weiner 1980), gender specific selection of subjects and gender hierarchies among university staff, education policies (Arnot 1993) and gender relations in education in changing society (Arnot et al. 1999, Unterhalter 2007). But there is a lack of concepts and assertions on the significance of the findings of these studies for the economic order of our societies which are capitalist societies. This lack 1

2 includes both, general theoretical concepts on the relation between gender and education concerning capitalism and studies, that focus on current changes in the economy and in education as described above and grasp these changes' gender dimensions for the formation of our societies. A way in to grasp the relations of such large dimensions as gender, education and capitalism is to focus the relations between education and work from a gender perspective. In the following the major relations between education and work that have been revealed so far are summed and questions relating to gender are raised that shall be addressed by the papers for this special issue. Papers of different kinds such as theoretical or empirical as well as those based on different methods are welcomed. It is planned to structure the Special Issue of the ISSE according to the following categories, thus to create a Special Issue Content of four chapters: 1. Gender Analysis of Education as a feeder into employment 2. Gender Analysis of Education as an area of employment 3. Gender Analysis of Education as replacement for employment 4. Gender Analysis of Education as safekeeping children enabling parents to enter paid workforce Each paper will be expected to cover one of the four areas. The share of papers over these chapters as well as the length of the Special Issue depend from the papers being submitted and is not fixed at this point. 1. Gender Analysis of Education as a feeder into employment Broadly speaking, there are three major concepts of how education feeds into employment: 1) education provides people with skills and abilities to produce goods and services in employment; 2) education provides people with dispositions to produce the goods and services under capitalist conditions; 3) education provides people with degrees and titles that are used in employment for the distribution of jobs and positions. ad 1.1) Education for skills and abilities to produce goods and services out of a gender perspective The main area where education contributes to the creation of skills and abilities to produce goods and services is the vocational education and training area. This is at the same time the educational area with the highest gender segregation. The main providers of vocational education are public educational institutions such as vocational schools and colleges on the one side and companies on the other that either educate people systematically or train them briefly. Thus, questions arise on how governments and companies create and deal with the changes in production of goods and services and in employment conditions, what impact has this for vocational education and what do 2

3 these changes mean for gender relations? In particular: Which vocational education practices do current providers of vocational education pursue? What are the gender relations of the contexts in which skills are being created? How do providers of vocational education recruit their students? How do students choose vocations they want to be educated for? What impact do the organization and structure of vocational education systems have on gender relations? Are there kinds of vocational education that reinforce or challenge traditional gender relations? ad1.2) Education provides people with the dispositions to produce goods and services under capitalist conditions The skills and abilities of persons can only be applied at a workplace, if they are willing to contribute under current economic and organizational conditions. Current conditions are characterized by gender hierarchies. Education feeds into employment not only by providing people with certain skills and abilities that could be applied in workplaces, but also with norms and concepts that contribute to attitudes and behaviour that are welcomed by later employers. Questions of interest are: Do educational institutions provide women and men with different abilities and dispositions to prepare them for different work and employment positions? Do girls and boys, women and men acquire different abilities and dispositions? What are the gender features of the contexts in which abilities and dispositions are being created, taught and acquired? ad 1.3) Education provides people with degrees and titles that are used in employment for the distribution of jobs and positions Many studies have discovered that people do not acquire their skills and abilities that they need in in educational institutions, but while working. This is not only true for so called unskilled work, but holds true also for so called qualified work as studies on graduates' employment report. In these cases, education does not provide people with skills and abilities that they might use for work, but with degrees and titles that are claimed to be necessary to access jobs and positions. Degrees and titles are structured by hierarchical orders which are highly contested. An example for a recent change is the recognition of the German vocational degree "Meister" to be equal to a Bachelor's degree. Questions to explore in the relation between education and employment are: 3

4 What are the contexts in term of gender in which degrees and titles are being created and negotiated? Do women and men with the same degrees and titles access the same jobs and positions? Do degrees and titles have the same significance for women and men or does education serve men better than women because women, despite their increases in education, obtain lower employment positions than men? If this is the case, does this mean that the social role and status of education is different for men and women? 2. Education as an area of employment Education, forms a huge area of employment. Educational expansion and policies of lifelong learning have contributed to its significance as an employer. Employees in education are mainly teachers, administrators, college and university staff and people being employed by private companies offering education. Sociological questions in this regard concern working conditions: Are there gender patterns of employment in the education sector? What are they? What are the main changes in working conditions in the education sector? Do these changes affect women and men equally? 3. Education as replacement for employment In times of tight labour markets, education might be used as a way of avoiding unemployment. This might be caused by individuals choosing to study rather than working in areas they do not find desirable or being unemployed. Education might also be used as a substitute for employment as the recent rise of compulsory schooling age in the UK attests. There are also various programmes of public welfare as for example the German so called transition system aimed at supporting young unemployed people to enter regular vocational education. Questions dealing with education as a replacement for employment are: Do individuals of both genders opt to an equal extent for education as a replacement for employment? Are public programmes of education for the unemployed addressing equally the interests of men and women? Are public programmes of education for the unemployed creating forms of gender differentiation or discrimination, e.g. selecting women and men for different educational studies? Are there different transition patterns for women and men from unemployment to education 4

5 to employment? 4. Education as safekeeping children enabling parents to enter the paid workforce Countries vary in their lengths of compulsory education, both in years and in time being spent during the day in schools. However, in all cases, schools relieve parents from caring for their children during school time. Thus, schools set parents partly free, e.g. for employment. Under the presumption that women mainly care for children, safekeeping is an important (side) effect of schooling for women. Various macro-sociological questions arise: What are the social, cultural, economic and political contexts of and impacts for setting up times of compulsory education? Have they changed recently? Are there connections between schools' safekeeping role and female employment participation? Please send your paper of max words to Helen Oliver, Journal's Administrator, University of Sheffield, by 15th February Papers will be reviewed by two referees. Authors will be informed of acceptance or rejection within a month. Reviewer's comments will be returned by end of March Revised papers should be completed by end of April. The publication of the special issue is scheduled for summer References Acker, S., 1994, Gendered Education. Sociological Reflections on Women, Teaching and Feminism, Buckingham, Philadelphia, Open University Press. Arnot, M., 1993, A Crisis in Patriarchy? British Feminist Educational Politics and State Regulation of Gender, in M. Arnot, K. Weiler (eds.), Feminism and Social Justice in Education: International Perspectives, London, Washington DC, The Falmer Press, Arnot, M., et al., 1999, Closing the Gender Gap, Postwar Education and Social Change, Oxford, Polity Press. Ball, S.J., 2001, Performativities and fabrications in the education economy, in D. Gleeson, C. Husbands (eds.), The Performing School, London, New York, Routledge, Becker-Schmidt, R., 1987, Die doppelte Vergesellschaftung -- die doppelte Unterdrueckung. Besonderheiten der Frauenforschung in den Sozialwissenschaften, in L. Unterkircher, I. Wagner (eds.), Die andere Haelfte der Gesellschaft, Oesterreichischer Soziologentag 1985, Soziologische Befunde zu geschlechtsspezifischen Formen der Lebensbewaeltigung, Wien, Verlag des Oesterreichischen Gewerkschaftsbundes,

6 Beer, U., 1989, Klasse Geschlecht, Feministische Gesellschaftsanalyse und Wissenschaftskritik, Freiburg, Kore-Verlag. Bourdieu, P., Passeron, J.-C., 1979, The Inheritors: French Students and their Relation to Culture, Chicago, University of Chicago Press. Bourdieu, P., Passeron, J.-C., 1990, Reproduction in education, society, and culture, London, Newbury Park, Sage. Bowles, S., Gintis, H., 1976, Schooling in Capitalist America, Educational Reform and the Contradiction of Economic Life, London, Routledge. Durkheim, E., 1968 [1911], Education and Sociology, Toronto, Collier-Macmillan. Gaskell, J., 1992, Gender Matters from School to Work, Milton Keynes, Philadelphia, Open University Press. Kupfer, A., 2008, Diminished States? National power in European education policy, British Journal of Educational Studies 56, Masschelein, J. et al., 2007, The Learning Society from the Perspective of Governmentality, Oxford/Malden, Blackwell Publishing. Offe, C., 1975, Bildungssystem, Beschaeftigungssystem und Bildungspolitik -- Ansaetze zu einer gesamtgesellschaftlichen Funktionsbestimmung des Bildungswesens, in H. Roth, D. Friedrich (eds.), Bildungsforschung, Probleme -- Perspektiven -- Prioritaeten, vol 1, no. 50, Stuttgart, Klett Verlag, Room, G. (ed.), 1995, Beyond the Threshold. The Measurement and Analysis of Social Exclusion, Bristol, Polity Press. Skelton, C., et al., 2006, The SAGE Handbook of Gender and Education, Los Angeles etc., Sage. Tipton, F.B., 1998, The Rise of Asia. Economics, Society and Politics in Contemporary Asia, Houndmills, Basingstoke, MacMillan Publishers. Unterhalter, E., 2007, Gender, Schooling and Global Social Justice, London, New York, Routledge. Voss, G., H.J. Pongratz, 1998, Der Arbeitskraftunternehmer. Eine neue Grundform der Ware Arbeitskraft? Koelner Zeitschrift fuer Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie 50, Weiner, G., 1980, Sex Differences in Mathematical Performance: A Review of Research and Possible Action, in R. Deem (ed.), Schooling for women's work, London etc., Routledge&Kegan Paul,