Jean Viard, sociologist and director of research at the CNRS is the guest of social issue to evoke the international day of women and science, which went a little unnoticed, Friday, February 11. A day that since 2015 aims to support and promote equitable access and participation of women and girls in science. An area where inequalities are evident.
The subject also came back on the table this week in France, with professional federations calling for more diversity in baccalaureate specialties, and in particular maths. This is not new, of course.
franceinfo: Jean Viard, this imbalance between men and women in scientific professions, how is that explained? Is it related to childhood?
John Viard: It goes back 100,000 years, if I may say so… In fact, it’s the sharing of tasks between men and women, since the time of the hunter-gatherer. We have developed know-how where man hunts, and man transforms the material, we find them in industry, in engineering schools, etc. The woman takes care of the ephemeral – the body, the food, the clothing, the arrangement – try to ask a man to make a bouquet of flowers, it’s usually catastrophic.
So there are deep cultural invariants that will take time to change. And then, the second thing is that the ladies, the young girls, are overtaking the men everywhere, in terms of diplomas. The limit is 1968 or it is the first year where there are more girls than boys who pass the baccalaureate. And then now, we are at almost 50 to 55%. And in college, I think we have 57% of female students, except in engineering schools, where they are 25%. We are in the process of educating young girls and catching up with what was obviously scandalous and historic.
This is absolutely considerable progress. But indeed, this progress is linked to the cultures acquired over generations and generations. This is why I took 100,000 years as an order of magnitude, to realize that we are in the very long term of profound upheavals in the place of women in societies.
Are these inequalities not also linked to the values that are carried by scientific professions, which are sometimes said to be professions of competition, of individualism too?
Of course there are cliches. So of course these evolutions are in the brains, so as in addition Jean-Michel Blanquer made mathematics optional in terminale, and at a very high level, for those who want to have a career at a very high level, maths has become a specialty high-end, but more of a selection tool. Result: only those who are very good go there, and those who go a little rowing to do math to still have their baccalaureate, they don’t go there anymore.
And so, young girls have the idea that they are going to be less good, or that they are going to take more risks and the imagination of women is less associated, even today, with the idea of science. .
And what would it change to see more women in science, in research, since we want this equality today?
First of all, it’s a problem of principle, that is to say the right of young girls to have access to all professions, and therefore to gain access to power, particularly in information technology, in the military, all those fields where math plays an absolutely central role. It is also a question of place in society. Of course, if you went to Polytechnique, you have a social position that is not the same as if you went to business school.
And then afterwards, there is undoubtedly an apprehension of a certain number of everyday elements, for example all the robots, everyday robots, habitability, etc., but afterwards, I don’t want to be too caricatural, one can only make an assessment over the long term.