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2009:4 The Gender Segregation of the Czech Labour Market. A Quantitative and Qualitative Image

Alena Křížková (ed.)

This publication presents a quantitative look at the issue of gender segregation – a statistical image – and a qualitative image of the social reality of women’s labour as portrayed in contemporary Czech television drama series. The authors identify the scope of this issue, its context, and its media depiction. They examined gender segregation in the Czech labour market through an analysis of statistical data on the labour market with the aid of segregation indexes, which are commonly used abroad. The analysis showed that the Czech labour market continues to be and has long been heavily segregated and the degree of segregation is only decreasing very slowly. Almost one-half of all working women are concentrated within just ten occupational categories (out of a total number of 107), while the occupational concentration of men is somewhat weaker. The fact that the problem of segregation lies in the very strong stereotypes that continue to operate in Czech society is clearly revealed by the most commonly held occupations among women – administrative employees, nurses, elementary school teachers, cleaning women and shop assistants – and the most commonly held occupations among men – technicians, manual labourers like fitters, machine workers, repairmen, drivers, and police officers. Women are still regarded mainly as mothers, caregivers, and as those best able to keep things tidy, while men are viewed as technically and manually skilled and as natural protectors. The associated gender system of prestige, segregation, wage differences between men and women, and the aspects and conditions of work that apply in each individual occupation form the foundation of gender inequalities. The creators of contemporary Czech television serials depict social reality as strongly patriarchal, while the working roles of women are portrayed as marginal, self-evident, but also of little interest to women, and the success of women at work is depicted more in negative terms.

Keywords

gender segregation of the labour market, segregation index, gender stereotypes, media content analysis

Summary

This publication, ‘Gender Segregation of the Czech Labour Market: A Quantitative and Qualitative Image’, is the outcome of a 2008–2010 research project titled ‘The Processes and Sources of Gender Inequalities in Women’s Careers in Relation to the Transformation of Czech Society since 1989 and the Czech Republic’s Membership in the EU’, which was supported by the Grant Agency of the Academy of Science of the Czech Republic. The goal of this study was to examine gender segregation of the labour market both from the perspective of the scope of this negative labour market phenomenon in the Czech Republic and in a European context and from the perspective of the breadth of issues that segregation is connected with, and to propose new methodological approaches for the study of this issue. The publication combines a ‘traditional’ quantitative approach to the study of segregation and the relatively unusual approach of a qualitative analysis of media contents. The authors believe that this combination provides a more comprehensive overview of the scope of the problem of gender segregation than would be possible using just one of these approaches.
In the introductory chapter, Alena Křížková outlines the goals of this publication and the innovative approach of the research combining quantitative and qualitative analyses. At the same time, she explains the use of the term ‘gender segregation’ in relation to the position of the authors of this publication in the field of gender and feminist studies.
In the second chapter, ‘Gender Segregation of the Labour Market – A Statistical Picture’, Alena Křížková defines the phenomenon of segregation and draws on foreign studies to answer the question of how segregation is usually measured in sociology. In the third part of the chapter she uses the results of statistical data analyses to provide readers with a picture of the situation in the Czech Republic. For this purpose she uses commonly used mathematically estimated indicators of segregation and descriptive indicators of employment segregation and integration. By using this approach it was possible to situate the Czech labour market from a segregation perspective within a European context, to identify the developmental trend in gender segregation in recent years, and to describe specific types of integrated and segregated occupations and the degree of concentration of women and men in certain types of occupations.
Gender segregation in the Czech labour market is strong, and desegregation is proceeding only very slowly. In a European comparison, the Czech Republic ranks among the countries with a strongly segregated labour market. The relatively high level of gender segregation in the Czech labour market may have its historical roots in the long tradition of high employment of both men and women (full time) and in the persistent division of labour into male and female, not just at home in the private sphere, but also in the public sphere, in the sphere of employment, and this despite the ideology of emancipation and equality that existed even in the state-socialist period. It was found that 45.7% of working women are concentrated in 10 types of occupation out of a total of 107 occupational categories. Every sixth Czech woman works as an administrative employee, every eleventh is a nurse, and every thirteenth works as a shop assistant or cashier. While in the past several years there has been a further increase in the concentration of women in several occupational categories, the concentration of men in the most common occupational categories is 40.8% of working men. Every seventh Czech man works in a manual job, like a metalworker, fitter, mechanic, tool fitter, or machinist. Every twelfth man is a technician, and every twentieth is a driver.
In the third chapter, Alena Křížková focuses on the ‘Causes and Effects of Segregation’. In the first part she presents the basic theories of gender segregation of the labour market and in the second part informs readers about the broad scale of effects of segregation in the form of gender inequalities. Using an analysis of statistical data and data from an occupational prestige survey, she shows how in the Czech labour market there is a gendered system in which there are links between the degree of employment segregation, wage levels, job prestige, and the quality of work. In the third part of this chapter she proposes other directions that sociological research on gender segregation could pursue and possible policy directions that could help to reduce segregation.
Theories of labour market segregation essentially concur that the observed segregation is primarily the result of the way in which women and men are allocated to different occupational roles, whether by their own choice or by coercion. Economic and sociological theories of segregation – the theory of human capital, neo-liberal and institutional theories – are incapable of fully explaining the causes of the persistent existence of strong labour market segregation. Gender theories of labour market segregation, unlike other theoretical streams, take into account the fact that labour market is not an isolated system and note the strong connection between the gender segregation of paid work in the labour market and the gender division of unpaid work and care in the household.
Segregation is one of the direct causes of gender inequalities, the most visible examples of which are wage inequalities. In the Czech labour market there is a gendered system, in which there are links between the degree of employment segregation, wage levels, job prestige, and the quality of work there are links between the degree of employment segregation, wage levels, job prestige, and the quality of work, and that system creates gendered types of occupation. This system functions not just in the labour market as a whole but above all in individual occupational fields and occupations. Examining the mechanisms and links involved in how this interlinked system of segregation, wages, prestige, and work quality functions within individual occupations is a matter for further research.
The fourth chapter, by Zdeněk Sloboda, presents ‘Images of Working Women in Contemporary Czech Television Series’. The media on the one hand depict and on the other hand co-construct reality, and for this reason an analysis of media contents is an important tool with which to examine this reality. Zdeněk Sloboda presents the results of a qualitative content analysis conducted on selected contemporary Czech drama series from the perspective of women’s employment. Given that this involves an unorthodox perspective on the segregated labour market in the Czech Republic, his analysis is framed in the cultural and media studies theory and the theory of gendering of the media contents. The media work with elements of reality, the reality of people’s lives, in the way that corresponds to the symbolic structure of society. The media are omnipresent, they structure our time and space, and they give us information; they are an important socialisation tool that transmit values and behavioural patterns and norms, which are primarily gendered. Given the fact that Czech television series are usually situated in the workplace and not in the home, a content analysis of them is one of the best instruments for examining the reality of gender segregation in the Czech labour market. The use of a qualitative approach enabled Zdeněk Sloboda to find an answer to the question of what working women in Czech television series are like (and how they are depicted). Contemporary Czech television drama series symbolically re-produce the gender segregation of the labour market and they present the social reality of work as patriarchal. Although the series tend to be situated in workplaces, women’s roles in the workplace are portrayed as secondary and women’s job success is depicted as a negative value.