Tzanakou Charikleia, Clayton-Hathway Kate, Humbert Anne Laure
Centre for Diversity Policy Research and Practice, Oxford Brookes Business School, Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, United Kingdom.
Front Sociol. 2021 Nov 16;6:784446. doi: 10.3389/fsoc.2021.784446. eCollection 2021.
In the past 2 decades, many Certification and Award schemes (CAS) related to gender equality, diversity and inclusion have emerged in the higher education, research and industry sectors. According to a recent report, there are as many as 113 CAS which have been identified across Europe and beyond. These CAS aim at addressing inequalities in relation to the grounds of sex, gender, race, sexual orientation, and disability among others. The high number of CAS, and their continued growth, has taken place in parallel to the shift of policies and efforts from "fixing individuals" to "fixing the system." In these schemes, gender equality is often understood as a structural, systemic challenge, with a recognition that advancing gender equality is complex and requires drivers and interventions at micro, meso and macro level. Studies focused on analysing and evaluating gender equality initiatives in higher education have been scarce, and often limited to specific schemes. This paper aims to fill this gap by providing a better understanding of the CAS landscape through comparing two of the main gender equality schemes used by research-performing organisations in Europe Athena SWAN (in the UK) and Total E-Quality Award (in Germany). Based on qualitative interviews with stakeholders across Europe and document analysis, this paper focuses on strengths, challenges faced by and the impact of these CAS. This comparative exercise highlights particular learning points that can inform potential reviews of existing schemes and/or the development of new schemes such as a Europe-wide scheme. The latter is the focus of a Horizon 2020 project entitled CASPER (Certification-Award Systems to Promote Gender Equality in Research), which aims at making recommendations to the European Commission as to the feasibility of a Europe-wide CAS for gender equality in research organisations.
在过去20年里，高等教育、研究和工业领域出现了许多与性别平等、多元化和包容性相关的认证与奖励计划（CAS）。根据最近的一份报告，在欧洲及其他地区共识别出多达113个此类计划。这些计划旨在解决性别、种族、性取向和残疾等方面的不平等问题。大量的此类计划及其持续增长，与政策和努力从“修复个人”转向“修复系统”同步发生。在这些计划中，性别平等通常被理解为一项结构性、系统性挑战，人们认识到推进性别平等是复杂的，需要在微观、中观和宏观层面采取驱动措施和干预手段。专注于分析和评估高等教育中性别平等举措的研究很少，而且往往局限于特定计划。本文旨在通过比较欧洲研究执行组织使用的两个主要性别平等计划——雅典娜天鹅奖（英国）和全面平等奖（德国），更好地了解CAS的情况，以填补这一空白。基于对欧洲各地利益相关者的定性访谈和文件分析，本文重点关注这些计划的优势、面临的挑战及其影响。这项比较研究突出了一些特定的经验教训，可为对现有计划的潜在审查和/或新计划（如全欧洲范围的计划）的制定提供参考。后者是“地平线2020”项目“CASPER”（促进研究中性别平等的认证 - 奖励系统）的重点，该项目旨在就全欧洲范围的研究组织性别平等认证计划的可行性向欧盟委员会提出建议。
