Knowledge, Institutions and Gender: an East-West Comparative Study
The project is now closed. It ran between 2006 and 2008.
This Specific Targeted Research Project wasfunded by the European Commission in the Structuring the ERA specific programme of Framework Programme 6.
Contract number: 017617
Project acronym: KNOWING
Total cost: € 984,210
Commission funding: € 984,210
List of project partners
1. Institute of Sociology, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic
2. Faculty of Humanities, Charles University, Czech Republic
3. Comenius University, Bratislava, Slovakia
4. University of Leeds, United Kingdom
5. Department for Social Studies of Sciences, University of Vienna, Austria
6. Department of Sociology, University of Turku, Finland
7. Turku School of Economics and Business Administration, Finland
8. Department of Sociological Studies, University of Sheffield, United Kingdom
Main goals of the project
- to examine the production of knowledge contexts and cultures, including the role of gender, from an “East-West” perspective,
- to identify structural and institutionalised practices and procedures, including standards of excellence, that hinder and/or promote the equal participation of women in science,
- to encourage the establishment of feminist science studies in the partner countries, especially in the new EU member states
- to influence policy on higher education and research and development at the national and EU levels in order to promote gender equality and increase the engagement of early stage researchers
Key issues
Building on scholarship in feminist philosophy and social studies of science, the project examines the role of gender in the production of knowledge contexts and cultures in an East-West perspective in two scientific fields (sociology and biology). While critiques of science and situated conceptions of knowledge have been developed in western Euro-American contexts, traditional assumptions of knowledge production were largely unexamined in the former state-socialist countries, and the role of gender in knowledge production is still an under-researched topic East and West. The study of local knowledge contexts and cultures and the development of epistemic communities, with special attention paid to gendering of these cultures and communities, will enhance our understandings of the impact gender has on knowledge production and the position of women in science and thus to building the European research area.
Technical approach
The study applies a multi-method approach that aims to build theory and to develop appropriate conceptual tools. Research will be simultaneously carried out in the five partner countries. It encompasses the analysis of existing statistical data on two select research institutions per country that will be situated in national contexts, and the analysis of a life course questionnaire distributed to the members of these institutions requesting demographic and career related information. Subsequent stages include critical discourse analysis of relevant science policy documents, and institutional policies and procedures; targeted participant observation of research practices in the select institutions; in-depth interviews with scientists in the institutions under study and repeat focus groups that will further explore and contextualise salient concerns. The research will culminate in a comparative cross-national analysis. A summary report will give account of national practices and the role of gender in knowledge contexts, identify potential differences due to historical divergences in Eastern and Western Europe, and make recommendations for the promotion of gender equality and the engagement of early stage researchers. Findings will be disseminated at national and EU levels to influence science policies and to encourage the establishment of feminist science studies.
Co-ordinator contact details:
Marcela Linkova
Institute of Sociology, Academy of Sciences CR
National Contact Centre – Women and Science
Jilska 1
110 00 Prague 1
CZECH REPUBLIC
tel.: +420-222 222 322
fax: + 420-222 220 143