Since the Nobel Prize was first awarded in 1901, there have been 468 winners in the sciences. Only 11 have been women. Of course, this proportion may not come as any great surprise to the masses, which consider that women, with little aptitude for abstract ideas, do not possess the “gift” for science to which men are so predisposed. In 2005, out of the 46.6% girls who passed the baccalaureate examination in scientific subjects in France, only 24.6% subsequently graduated from engineering schools.
If this disparity is considered a social injustice, it also presents problems in real terms: who is going to replace the scientists entering retirement when young people — girls in particular — are losing interest in the subject to such an extent? Or, more generally, how can we rise to the challenge, set forth by the Lisbon Strategy, to guarantee economic sustainability in the European Union? “Europe is striving to boost investment in research and development to 3% of its gross domestic product. This translates into creating 700,000 new jobs in the research sector by 2010. But Europe is going to have trouble filling the posts if half the population continues to turn their back on science and technology,” bemoans the European Union in a bill published this year. To meet this target, the number of women employed by the sector will have to increase fourfold. In 2003, women accounted for 29% of European Union research staff.
In the 1960s, some psychologists advanced the idea that dissimilarities between brain structure and functioning were down to gender. They showed that the male brain was more asymmetrical than the female brain, i.e. that the difference between the left and right hemispheres is more pronounced for men than women, a distinction that is supposed to explain the superior verbal skills and inferior spatial-visual capacities of women. Such theories found justification in sociobiology and psychological research into cognitive behaviour that exploited the gender-oriented results of verbal and spatial-visual aptitude tests.
Claims that gender-based differences were linked to the asymmetry of the brain, however, received radical and widespread criticism in the research community. Other experts showed that it was so far impossible to dissociate the influence of biology on behaviour from that of the environment; also, that the variation of cognitive function between the sexes is smaller than the variation across the population. These findings, however, attracted far less media coverage than the research that propounded the innate scientific inferiority of women. In Portugal, in 2003, 58.3% of maths PhDs were awarded to women; in France, the figure stood at 24.3%. “You’re not going to tell us that the shape of the brain changes when you cross the Pyrenees!” mocks Claudine Hermann, the first woman to hold the post of professor at the prestigious Ecole Polytechnique and now honorary president of Femmes et Sciences, an association founded with the very aim of promoting science careers among women.

Nature or nurture?

The causes for this disinterest are many, not least that while girls are dissuaded from taking up sciences by their families and peers, girls themselves are guilty of a kind of self-censorship, choosing to turn their backs on science-related subjects — and “hard” sciences such as maths and physics in particular. This was borne out by a 2002 survey carried out among French secondary school students by the association Jeunesse et Entreprises which showed, with the exception of health, that technical and science subjects were scored positively by less than a third of girls. Resistance is even stronger to industry: the construction and public works sector received 4% of their votes. “In our social imagination, all the symbolic and practical traits attributed to men are embodied by everything that’s physical. The masculine world is associated with mathematical ability, the handling of tools and weapons, the building of bridges and ports, engines and so forth, so many areas where women have, for centuries, been regarded as ‘naturally’ inferior to men,” explains Catherine Marry, Director of Research at the CNRS and author of the reference work Les Femmes ingénieurs : Une révolution respectueuse (Women engineers: A respectful revolution).
Notwithstanding the apparent neutrality of scientific knowledge where theorems and laws are concerned, this knowledge has become ingrained in a masculine environment from which women are often excluded. “Education is very important. A number of studies have shown that children are subject to different pedagogical practices according to their sex,” stresses André Grelon, sociologist and Director of Studies at the EHESS (France’s higher institute for social sciences). A difference that is expressed through the expectations and behaviour of parents and teachers. At school, sexist situations in maths of the type ‘John solves the equation and passes the solution to Sophie’ are common. Young women are also lacking in tutelary figures, women with moral authority and prominent in the science world to act as role models. Since girls are given less motivation, are less encouraged to be autonomous, they are considered as being less talented in science. “We reassure them when they’re struggling, tell them to give up; but we encourage boys to keep digging to find the answer,” says Claudine Hermann with concern.
According to recent studies, which are barely different from earlier sociological research, the ambitions of parents for their daughters are largely founded on personal success and having a family. But wouldn’t this suggest that women are therefore more inclined to achieve social success? Not if, as André Grelon reminds us, we consider that “science is the Latin of today: the path to excellence”.

Science and gender

That the students enrolled in “prestigious” science courses are predominantly male can be put down to the self-fulfilled prophecy that parents, teachers and male pupils are all striving to guarantee access to science for boys. It would seem that it’s not a natural instinct for science that attracts boys to study it but rather the social opportunities that open up by following scientific pathways.
Conversely girls, even those who perform well at school, are less likely to be fast-tracked to professional success by parents and teachers. School is still a vector of the ‘reverse’ Pygmalion effect, according to Pierre Bourdieu, whereby there exists a kind of negative subjective expectation with regard to a woman’s inclination towards science. Teachers and family, therefore, contribute to damaging the self-confidence of girls. This is supported by the fact that the few women who decide to pursue a scientific career attain a self-esteem score that is higher than other girls and comparable to that of boys.
The association Femmes et Sciences condemns the stereotypes that are in part driving women away from the study of science. They organise visits by female scientists to middle and secondary schools to speak about the fascinating aspects of their work, thus rendering it more credible. The association also co-publishes brochures with public and private institutions to “sell” science to young women. “What’s the point of the sciences?” they read. “To satisfy curiosity, to improve living standards, to understand how the environment works and, finally, to get an interesting job”.
Above all, these women endorse the idea that women can practice science without in any way jeopardising their femininity or social role — the traditional obstacles between girls and the sciences. The choices they express in terms of having an attraction or feeling for a given discipline or profession may be interpreted as an internalised sexual “habitus”. Specifically, women, raised and educated in a world where science is considered the domain of men, may have a subconscious tendency to dismiss science from their conscious decisions.
Science not deemed “feminine”, it’s difficult for women to show an interest in the subject at a time when their self-identifies are taking shape for fear of being excluded by their peers. If sex refers to the biological distinctions between males and females, gender has associations with culture and the social and cultural classifications of what is feminine or masculine. For instance, more often than not, girls conform to gender in their decision-making. Even before planning to start a family, female secondary-schoolers are likely to divide labour according to sex and intend, if not to give up work entirely, at least to slow down following the birth of a child. Given that official French legislation now grants parental leave to both mothers and fathers, a study in November 2006 showed that the law is actually ahead of social mentality: there are far fewer men than women who plan to work less after having children.
“Concerning women in science, France is hardly a haven,” says Claudine Hermann, “but there are worse countries: in Germany or Britain, in particular, lots of women take up advanced higher studies and have to give up working entirely due to poor childcare facilities”.  
Catherine Ferrant, Vice President Diversity and Accountability at Total, agrees and believes that we need to “treat maternity as something short-term, restricted to just a few months”. This involves incorporating maternity into the career management process and, more generally, making the work-life balance as much an issue for men as women. According to Manoelle Lepoutre, Vice President of R&D at Total’s Exploration & Production Division, we need to replace motherhood by parenthood. Total is striving to do just this by introducing a series of measures that aim to stop inequality with regard to promotions in the Group and to “decriminalise” the decision to have children. Accordingly, a woman on maternity leave benefits from an annual individual salary rise at least equivalent to the average of those afforded over the previous three years. This initiative has also been adopted by countless other companies and accompanied by an effective slogan, which roughly translates as “women need a baby in their arms not on their hands!”
Moreover, mobility, essential for a Group that operates in over 130 countries, needs to be made easier. Total takes potential motherhood into consideration by offering women the opportunity to work overseas early on in their careers. In addition, Total has reached agreements with 20 other companies to ensure that the partners of employees seconded abroad — working for Total or any other signatory firm — could return to the same job at the end of their contract. “Nowadays, geographic mobility is not a just a problem for men or for women but for the couple,” observes Catherine Ferrant. “The private sector has the advantage on the public sector in all these respects,” recognises Claudine Hermann. Businesses are doing their utmost to take on and retain talented staff. Of course, they have much more lost time to make up, the public sector enjoying a more positive image as regards women. In 2003, 18% of researchers employed by the private sector in the EU were women compared to 35% in the public sector.

Raising the “glass ceiling”

In 2006, 19% of managers and 7% of senior managers at Total were women. The targets for 2010 are set at 25% and 12% respectively and are sure to spur on female ambition within the Group. A study commissioned in February 2005 by the alumnae of eight of France’s top universities — Centrale Paris, Les Mines, Polytechniques and ENA to name a few — rode roughshod over some of these preconceptions. The female interviewees, former students themselves, said they had chosen a grande école, the most prestigious of French universities, in order to further their career. To their minds, achievement equals professional success, even for those with children. Nevertheless, only 15% of these women sit on the management committee of their employer companies. Few actually make it to the top of the corporate hierarchy, many women instead colliding into what is known in sociological terms as the “glass ceiling”. This barrier is no less real for being invisible, although it does seem, at least, to be lifting. Thus, after the “pioneering” era — when the very first women worked as engineers, a period that lasted right up to the seventies, there followed a period whereby this became the norm. Like their male counterparts, women began to join companies and hold posts to which they would never have aspired previously. We should use the word “norm” with relative caution, however: still very few women manage to reach the top levels of business.
Nothing of much surprise there: after all science is a “Promethean” knowledge, in other words knowledge that confers power. So, when looking at the place of women in science, we also need to consider the place of science in society and that of women in society. “The engineering corps were originally military corps and so made up of just men,” explains André Grelon. “It was so obvious that engineering schools were reserved for men that this criterion wasn’t even mentioned in the establishments’ founding documents. In the 19th century, there was no question of women, whose brains were thought by the well-meaning to be different to men’s, taking up this type of discipline; no more than law, which was believed to dry out the womb!” Recent studies show that women are being excluded from the most competitive sectors of research and development. And while in Central and Eastern Europe, the United States and the United Kingdom we are seeing an increase in the number of female scientists, they mostly hold public sector posts vacated by men attracted to the private sector by higher wages. In traditionally more female-oriented sectors, such as health, segregation is equally horizontal. The best-paid specialisations such as surgery and radiology are still dominated by men.
“Cultural and historical phenomena evolve very slowly,” notes André Grelon, who contrasts the fast changing working world to slow developments in the family unit. According to a study by INSEE, France’s national statistics institution, men’s contribution to housework increased by just 11 minutes a day over seven years, he says. Even when a man and a woman hold full time jobs, the woman will spend twice as much time on domestic chores as men on average. It’s still very difficult for women to balance work and home when the role of women, even if they have as many professional obligations as men, is still preponderant in the home.
Manoelle Lepoutre believes that the habits of “presenteeism” need to change, particularly in France. She observes that “more than a division according to gender, it’s a matter of culture”. An idea that Isabelle Bétremieux, Technical Director of Liquid Resins at Cray Valley, a subsidiary of Total’s Chemistry division, expresses as follows: “Life’s much simpler now I’m a manager because it’s me who fixes the meeting times!” Certain countries are opting for a positive discrimination approach in a bid to speed up social evolution. Austria, previously one of the OECD’s biggest culprits for this type of discrimination, tried to set the record straight but without convincing results. Avoidance strategies deployed by middle managers made it impossible to change the status quo. “Progress is never constant and one role of sociologists is to highlight problems,” says André Grelon.
Positive discrimination policies are often just as badly perceived by women as men. Claudine Hermann herself says she is the pure product of quotas. Admitted to the ENSJE (originally an all-female university), she’s noticed that since the school became mixed, the proportion of female students has dropped in maths and in her own discipline, physics. She adds: “young women are against quotas, but when they realise much later that they’re not working in their chosen careers, they reconsider.” For Catherine Ferrant, it’s a complex question that requires a vigilant approach. “Diversity itself can generate anxiety and disappointment,” she comments. “Some men might start wondering whether you need to wear a skirt to get a promotion”.

The value of diversity

While there is much diversity of opinion on what action is required, neither society nor the corporate world can argue with the obvious fact that there is too much homogeneity in the upper echelons. “Your average client in the 21st century isn’t a white man,” says Claudine Hermann. She illustrates this observation with an anecdote: “There was a big applied research institute in Germany which had installed a voice recognition system. As there were only men in the team, the system was unable to recognise high-pitched voices. But you can’t ignore half your market!”
André Grelon agrees: “to point companies in the right direction, especially in strategic sectors like energy, you absolutely need to be capable of harnessing changes in external environments. This includes pooling different opinions, points of view, cultures and implies incorporating every layer of society”. An opinion shared by Catherine Ferrant: “European research has indicated that while diverse teams are more difficult to manage at the start, they are ultimately more efficient, more creative”. One European report stated that inequality leads to a loss of potential and that excellence requires diversity. It seems that diversity is good for business and for science!
Tackling the issue of feminisation by finding concrete solutions is no easy task. To get there, business and social science research, two very distinct worlds that occasionally have difficulties of mutual comprehension, need bridging. “Business moves at a different pace to sociology,” comments Claudine Hermann. At Total, Dominique Méda, philosopher and sociologist, who took part in the latest “Diversity in all its Diversity” event organised by the Université Total, is investigating the commitment of young fathers in their families, which will ultimately help to find the most appropriate measures for industrial groups. This means that even the question of feminisation involves men, but also opens up the discussion on internationalisation. For Catherine Ferrant, “the search for equality can only happen if we respect difference. This difference, we need to preserve it,” says the Vice President Diversity and Accountability. “In difference lies the beauty and boundary of our work,” she concludes.