Heike Solga (Berlin Social Science Center): Wirken gleichstellungspolitische Maßnahmen beim Zugang zu Professuren? Erfahrungen aus Deutschland

The underrepresentation of women in professorships in Germany is caused by two phenomena: the ‘Leaky Pipeline’ (the sinking percentage of women on rising career levels despite increasingly higher educational qualifications by women and an active gender equality politics) and the ‘Glass Ceiling’ (women’s limited access to higher levels of management due to gender-specific discrimination, a non-transparent information situation, and executive boards mostly being comprised of only men). The lecture will present the results of two studies that focus on the Glass Ceiling. This will provide insights into the following questions: (1) 40% of women on boards: does that help? (2) What is better: standardization (comparable achievements) or positive discrimination (prioritizing women in the case of equal achievements)? (3) What is the real reason for the underrepresentation of women in professorships?  

Heike Solga is Director of the Research Unit “Skill Formation and Labor Markets” at WZB Berlin Social Science Center and Professor of Sociology at Freie Universität Berlin.

Publications (selection):

• Das Bildungswesen in Deutschland: Bestand und Potenziale. Bad Heilbrunn 2019 (with O. Köller and others)
  
• Ed.: Journal of European Social Policy 27.4 (2017), special issue: Education as social policy: Institutions, public support and outcomes over the life course (with Valentina Di Stasio)
• Ed.: Gemeinsam Karriere machen. Die Verflechtung von Berufskarrieren und Familie in Akademikerpartnerschaften. Opladen 2011 (with Alessandra Rusconi)
  
• Ed.: Soziale Ungleichheit. Klassische Texte der Sozialstrukturanalyse. Frankfurt a.M. 2009 (with Justin Powell and Peter A. Berger)
  
• Ed.: Skill Formation – Interdisciplinary and Cross-National Perspectives. New York 2008 (with Karl Ulrich Mayer)
  
• Ohne Abschluss in die Bildungsgesellschaft. Die Erwerbschancen gering qualifizierter Personen aus ökonomischer und soziologischer Perspektive. Opladen 2005