[ad_1]
On February 11, a committee representing India’s Academy of Sciences will launch SWATI, a portal to a database that it hopes will one day include every woman in science in the country. This is the latest in a long list of efforts by the academy to address the gender gap, which began with a scathing report published two decades ago. While we wait for SWATI, it is important to reflect on some of these efforts.
The 2004 report by the Indian National Academy of Sciences (INSA) is perhaps the first of its kind to receive government support, and it is also notable for its content. The 66-page document clearly outlined his ideas about gender disparity in STEM, which were far from mainstream at the time. It showed evidence of workplace discrimination based not only on gender but also on caste. The entire 10 pages were devoted to the solution.
The high degree of nuance in this report may be attributed to the fact that it is the result of collaboration between scientists and social scientists. Although a social issue, the Indian scientific community rarely engages with social scientists on the gender gap that plagues it. As a result, the debate on this topic relies heavily on the mistaken idea that marriage and motherhood are the only ones responsible.
The initial report by INSA was followed by a number of other initiatives. Highlights include the Indian Academy of Sciences (IASc) omnibus “Daughters of Lilavati” and a national conference attended by more than 1,000 women scientists. Both happened in 2008. The latter was organized by a special committee of the Department of Science and Technology (DST) established in response to the INSA report. This national conference was particularly noteworthy as it featured several landmark announcements by the then Minister of Science and Technology Kapil Sibal. The minister promised flexible working hours, on-site childcare, work-from-home options, research grants and housing for female scientists.
Unfortunately, the standing committee set up to implement Mr. Sibal’s promise was never established.
In 2010, another team of sociologists and scientists supported by IASc published a report focusing on why women scientists leave academia. The survey of approximately 800 male and female scientists revealed several new facts. When asked why so many women drop out of science, most men blame family and sociocultural factors. Women agreed with this, but a significant proportion also pointed to lack of opportunities and factors that inhibit organizational functioning (such as flexible timing, logistics and infrastructure, and discrimination) as also holding them back. As expected, these were also the areas that women felt needed improvement in order to remain in science. However, the men believed that their female colleagues could also benefit from refresher courses, social activities, awareness and awareness campaigns.
Uncovering gender-based perceptions can be very helpful in understanding where policies come from and why they are the way they are. This explains why we see so many initiatives to ‘support’ or ‘motivate’ girls and women to stay in science, such as mentorship programmes, workshops, books on role models, and women-specific awards and grants. I’m explaining. The gist of this approach is that it is women who need to be “fixed.” This is a sore subject for many women in science, but what else can we expect from the consistently male-dominated top ranks?
These efforts may be necessary, but they are not sufficient. We also need rules and laws to address the unique challenges faced by women from multiple borderlands such as caste, transgender identity, and disability. Gender equality policies need to boldly state that discrimination exists and grapple with the idea of holding some accountability to the majority in the scientific community: upper-caste cis men.
New initiatives such as the Gender Advancement for Transforming Institutions (GATI) Charter and the 2020 Draft Science, Technology and Innovation Policy (STIP) have adopted more progressive language, including Gender-neutral parental leave is featured. Not surprising, since these policies involved a more inclusive group of cis and trans women scientists and sociologists.
Last week, a new acronym started making headlines: “SWATI” (Science For Women: A Technology & Innovation). This is celebrated worldwide on 11 February as the International Day for Girls and Women in Science by a committee representing scientists from INSA, IASc and the third academy, the National Academy of Sciences of India (NASI). This is the name of the portal that will be opened in . It is hoped that the active inter-academy committee will make the three academies’ gender gap-related efforts more streamlined.
Although well-intentioned, it is wise to be cautious, given that new initiatives are often launched with great fanfare and then quickly fizzled out. SWATI itself has also fallen victim to this. It was first announced on International Women’s Day 2021 by the then Department of Biotechnology (DBT) Secretary Renu Swarup as a “portal dedicated to all women scientists of DBT and its autonomous institutions”. After that, nothing was said about it until recently. Over the past few weeks, the committee has been inviting women in science to register for her 2024 avatar in SWATI through Google Forms. However, it does not disclose how this personal information will be used or what signing up for SWATI means.
It remains to be seen whether the Inter-Academy Committee will break with old practices and become more inclusive, transparent and efficient. There are many positive signs. The SWATI form includes all genders other than men and does not appear to impose criteria such as a Ph.D. This acknowledges that cis women are not the only marginalized gender, and that women work in science in a variety of capacities, with or without specific degrees. It’s also refreshing that the committee is comprised of male and female scientists, a nod to the fact that equity is not just a women’s issue.
Jayaraj and Dogra are independent science journalists and co-authors of Lab Hopping: A Journey to Find India’s Women in Science.
[ad_2]
Source link
