Social Research SGY 14

Aim of research


This research addresses the challenges that gender performance expectations create within the government servant and public workforce. An investigation of government servant and public workforce perceptions of the essential characteristics that define the successful professional and labourer, and the gender differences within these definitions, (is) will be described. Whether it is likely that males or females possess different career expectations and definitions of career success will be discussed and the ramifications of these differences will be explored.

Introduction
Males and females are different in many ways. History tells us that males are more aggressive, more courageous, more competitive, more intelligent and adventuresome, more self-confident (even proud) and exhibit better leadership skills than females in workplace. However, the domination of the workforce by males is long gone. The female’s duties and roles in the family no longer belong indoors; at home as just home makers where they cook, wash or baby sit. Young women no longer aspire only to get married and become housewives. We have reached an era where woman have to start making ends meet and play a role in supporting the family with their extra source of income. The trend of the current generation is to see the importance of building wealth before family. The culture cultivated now sees issues and challenges arising from responsible parties involved in the process of recruitments and employments. Through a combination of economic changes and the efforts of the feminist movement in recent decades, men in some societies now compete with women for jobs that traditionally excluded women. Some larger corporations have instituted tracking systems to try to ensure that jobs are filled based on merit and not just on traditional gender selection as depicted in the graph on the following page.


Labour force participation rates, persons aged 15 years and over


Source
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Census of Population and Housing: Ageing in Australia 2001 (Catalogue No. 2048.0) 2003, p. 52.

Females have gone through a journey of work placements and work developments. The expectations of females in the work force began low. The question now is if there is if there is such a thing as female inequalities in the working world?

Gender difference in work culture
In the law enforcement, females are told that they are welcome to join the force. Females are also told that they can expect to face the same challenges as their male counterparts; but many times, we find the segregation of gender for different duties.

A local security company will not employ female patrol officers. When asked for their reason, they mentioned that females are not capable in handling situations that would impede on their safety as the weaker sex. The company weights its pros and cons in accordance to their Occupational Health and Safety standards and make its decisions on the basis of not putting females in danger.

In the police force, there is a resistance to the recruitment of female police officers. According to Fleming and Lafferty, Industrial laws, union and the current era:
‘This position has been expressed most forcefully in 1981, when Commissioner Avery responded to the anti-discrimination lobby and what he called ‘a TV stimulating imagination’ about the role of women in policing. He argued that women were neither aggressive nor muscular enough to be ‘effective or… helpful in various areas of police work’. Although women had a role in ‘pacifying’ individuals and in ‘welfare’ type situations, there was no place for them where ‘violent confrontation’ might be an issue or where ‘heavy lifting’ was required. Avery espoused the view that the employment of women police officers should be tempered by decisions based on solid experience’ rather then ‘anti-discrimination philosophy’’ (Fleming and Lafferty 2002:7)

The Australian army employs females broadly in the defence force. It sounds like an equal employment opportunity for both male and female, but in actual fact it is not. In the Australian Army, females are not allow to participate in certain combat roles, such as; the ground (infantry) defence of operational airbases, the fighting sub-units of infantry battalions, armoured regiments (both tank and cavalry), artillery regiments and combat engineer regiments. The reason being, most modern battle space involves abnormal and often prolonged conditions of physical effort, psychological trauma, destruction, death, injury and general mayhem that females are assumed to not be capable of handling. The males in the army apparently might be distracted with the extra burden to protect the females.
We note that, although women are recruited to serve in the military in most countries, only a few countries permit women to fill active combat roles. Countries that allow this include Germany, Canada, Denmark and Norway. Only Canada has fully integrated women into the infantry, and currently has only six women in that role.
Outside of the law enforcement; females are not encouraged to work in wards where high risk patients (i.e. mental wards) are placed. In other field of employments where the establishments are open 24 hours, females are preferred to be available to work during the day only.

The society still sees females as the weaker gender that needs to be protected. It is hard to break a culture that has been around for such a long time. In saying that, employers still lean towards the cultivated culture and prefer males to females while employing. A male employed gives them the belief that there are flexibilities in rostering shift work. A female employee can sometimes be seen as a burden and less cost effective compared to the male counterparts.

The difference between the two
Males have higher IQ but females have higher EQ. The Emotional Intelligence Quotient (EQ), describes an ability, capacity, or skill to perceive, assess, and manage the emotions of one's self, of others, and of groups. An intelligence quotient or (IQ) is a score derived from a one of several different standardized tests attempting to measure intelligence.
“A study of 100,000 17- to 18-year-olds on the Scholastic Assessment Test published in the September 2006 issue of the journal Intelligence, has confirmed a surprising new finding -- that men have a 4- to 5-point IQ advantage over women by adulthood.” (Jackson, D. N., & Rushton, J. P., 2006).

“After administering EQ assessments to 4,500 men and 3,200 women, his organization found that women score higher than men on measures of empathy and social responsibility, but men outperform women on stress tolerance and self-confidence measures. In other words, says Stein, women and men are equally as intelligent emotionally, but they’re strong in different areas.” (Murray B., 1998)

Females when placed in a higher position of leadership tend to perform better than most males. There is no doubt that the males have the higher IQ and are said to be smarter but females manage and communicate better to individuals or groups, manage stress and has higher capability to manage conflicts.


Sexual harassment and gender discrimination
Article 26 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
All persons are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to the equal protection of the law. In this respect, the law shall prohibit any discrimination and guarantee to all persons equal and effective protection against discrimination on any ground such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.

Sex discrimination in the workplace comes with many different faces. In its most basic form, it involves outright exclusion of women, solely by reason of their gender. However, even where women have gained access to the workplace, sex discrimination may persist in other ways. Examples include identification of particular jobs as “men
only” or “women only” or through the existence of a “glass ceiling” that ensures women will only go so far on the corporate ladder. Another biased practice is to have two unwritten sets of rules for success: for men, based on performance, and for women, based on appearance.

There is a current issue for females in a male dominated industry or workplace. In Information Technology, females haved recently came on-board to join their male counterparts in the growth of the industry. The work culture in such places, where it has been male cultivated through the past does not invite females into the workplace. Females still struggle with workplace perks such as male egos, unwelcomed sexist jokes or remarks and gender discriminations where all females are known to be dumb or computer illiterate.

Social scientist, scholar Jane Margolis, computer scientist and educator Allan Fisher explore, why only a small fraction of high school and university computer science students are female, even though women make up a growing portion of computer and Internet users. The finding is, unfortunately, that the expectations in the field, the culture of the field, and the curriculum in the field are very much oriented toward the appetites and the learning styles of a narrow slice of males.

It is fair to say that some males were threatened by the presence of females in their ‘territories’, where they believe they know all and are in control. There is a slight but noticeable difference in the treatment of genders in the working world. Some workplaces or employers refuse to pay the full amount of wages or give females less working hours for reasons such as females are not capable of heavy physical activities required in the job. There is also the domination of males in the higher managerial positions as proved by the chart below.


Gender Imbalance
According to Australian Institute of Criminology’s reports compile, here is a data generated. There is clearly a gender imbalance in the police forces around the world.

Country Sworn Female Officers Sources
Australia 20.9% Australian Institute of Criminology, 2004
US 11.2% National Centre for Women and Policing, 2002
Royal Canadian Mounted Police 17.5% Pharand, R.2004. pers.comm., 24 July
UK – Metropolitan Police Services 17% The Job 2003
Singapore 13.8% Wee, C.N. 2004, pers.comm., 3 July
Hong Kong 13% Hong Kong Police, 2004
Phillipines National Police 7.6% Philippines National Police Public Information 2004, pers.comm., 14 July
Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency 2.7% Foreign Affairs Division 2004, pers.comm, 24 July

It is mentioned that gender imbalances affect the work culture of acceptance towards females in workforces. This imbalance causes unreported problems such as workplace harassment, sexual discrimination, sexual assaults and etc. This is due to the fact that females lack the support from other female work colleagues and, fear is instilled in them that without the numbers for support it is a wrong thing to do in the workplace.

The workplace unions and industrial laws that are getting stronger these days and they play a role in Equal Employment Opportunity. We have groups such as the ‘Women Mentoring Program’ which has been setup in different industries operating on the local level of the workplaces to assist females in the working environment. There is also the ‘Equal Employment Opportunity’ campaign that was launched by the workers unions. This campaign is to lobby the fairness of the employment system where people with disabilities or the special groups such as different races, genders and culture are given the opportunity to be employed by employers and not to be discriminated. These groups are established to provide some sort of support such as mentoring, counselling, third party negotiations, legal services and protection at workplace by being in a union.


Conclusion
As we consider all the above factors, there is a need for a balance between males and females in the workplace. Culture played a part in cultivating equal employment opportunity and gender discriminations. The current support for work groups in work places such as unions, has given a big push to drive home the idea of equal opportunity. This would help different workplace tremendously as they recognised that male and females have their roles to play in organisations; particularly in law enforcement. As we push forward with the ideology that males and females are able to provide different contribution to industry, we are creating a new social culture of equal opportunities for different genders.


References
• Fleming, J., & Lafferty, G. (2002). Equity Confounded? New Managerialism, Organisational Restructuring and Women in Australian Police Services. Paper to the Australian Institute of Criminology Conference: Third Australasian Women and Policing Conference: Women and Policing Globally: Canberra 20-23 October 2002.
• Jackson, D. N., & Rushton, J. P. (2006). Males have greater g: Sex differences in general mental ability from 100,000 17- to 18-year-olds on the Scholastic Assessment Test. Intelligence, 34, 479-486.
• Australian Institute of Criminology, http://www.aic.gov.au/conferences/policewomen3/fleming.pdf, viewed 3rd January 2007
• Parliament of Australia , http://www.aph.gov.au/house/committee/ewrwp/paidwork/chapter2.htm, viewed 3rd January 2007
• Australian Defence Association, http://www.ada.asn.au/LatestComment_files/Comment.Women&Combat.htm, viewed 3rd January 2007
• Murray B. July 1998, Volume 29 , Number 7, American Psychological Association, http://www.apa.org/monitor/jul98/emot.html, viewed 4th January 2007
• The United Nations International Covenant on civil and political Rights, http://www.hrweb.org/legal/cpr.html, viewed 16th January 2007