DOES FEMINISM COUNT? EXPLORING PRACTICE AND POSSIBILITIES

Rachel Cohen, Dept of Sociology, University of SurreyChristina Hughes, Dept of Sociology, University of Warwick

Starting point

Growing academic focus on why UK sociology, and indeed other social sciences in the UK, are so ‘qualitative’ (c.f. 2010 Benchmarking Review; Payne, Williams and Chamberlain (2004, 2005); Payne (2007); May (2005); Platt (2007))

Acknowledgement of the strength of Feminism and feminist theory within British Sociology (2010 Benchmarking Review).

Questions about the possible relationship between these two (Hughes and Cohen 2010).

Feminists and Quantitative Methods

Second wave feminists’ antipathy to quantitative methods as part of ‘malestream’ social science. Some of this was about surveys

The hierarchy of interviewing using closed-response questions – men forcing women into boxes

The lack of fit between questions and women’s interests Generally – absence of women’s ‘voices’

Some of it was about quantification per se In quantifying we objectify human experience Quantification enables the construction of scientific

‘truth’ and therefore reinforces gendered power relations Numbers are ‘hard’ and masculine (unlike ‘soft’ words)

Feminists and Quantitative Methods Critique of... The Product

The ends – a quantified social science that serves the purposes of male power and naturalises human relations

The Process A hierarchical undemocratic practice that masks

male privilege in neutrality.

Feminist research should be for women and with women

Feminists and Quantitative Methods

Developments Increasingly surveys ask questions relating to typically ‘female’ interests (for

example housework; sexuality; family relations; childcare) Methodological research on (and attention paid to) the survey interview

interaction. No longer treated as ‘neutral’ – although often not reflected upon in substantive work

Acknowledgement that ‘quasi’ quantification occurs throughout social research (‘most’ ‘many’ ‘all’ ‘some of’)

Increasing legitimacy (for example among funders) of qualitative research. In UK qualitative research is not the poor relation - but the norm in Sociology

for the last 40 years (Platt 2007). Today is little quantification (Payne et al 2004).

Formal ‘reconciliation’ around employing methods ‘most suitable’ for research question

BUT Ongoing invisibility of quants in feminist methods textbooks (Undugarra 2010) and, presumably, teaching QUESTION: Do feminists count?

State of current practice

Two studies of feminism and methods in sociology: Platt (2007) looked at impact of women’s movement

and increase in female academics on the topics covered and methods employed in mainstream UK sociology 1950s-2004. Found increasing focus on ‘female’ topics (family, gender,

etc). Quantitative articles have comprised a minority of both male

and female authors’ output throughout the whole period. Men are more likely to publish wholly theoretical articles.

Dunn and Waller (2000) look at ‘gender content’ articles in 15 North American sociology journals 1984-1993. Found ‘feminist-oriented’ studies more likely to be

qualitative than ‘gender-oriented’. Both types much more likely to be quantitative than

qualitative.

State of current practice

Study carried out with Christina Hughes and Richard Lampard, University of Warwick

Analysis of articles published in gender, women’s studies and feminist journals – space of interdisciplinary and international gender/feminist scholarship.

Journals selected from ISI citation index (‘Women’s Studies’ category). Top 17 cited journals (English language), plus 2 others, selected on basis of our knowledge of them.

Analysis of every full article in first and last issue of 2007 (unless ‘Special Issue’, then neigbouring issue chosen).

N = 256 articles from 19 journals.

See Cohen, Hughes and Lampard in Sociology (2011) ‘The methodological impact of feminism: A troubling issue for Sociology?’

Overview of methodological approaches in Women’s Studies articles.

Methodological Approach

Theoretical/secondary sources (only) 31 12%

Qualitative 96 38%

Quantitative 109 43%

Mixed: Qualitative & Quantitative 20 8%

Specification of the quantitative analyses:

Descriptive 126 98%

Bivariate 114 89%

Inferential 108 85%

Multivariate 97 76%

Feminist Engagement and Methodological Choice

Mentions of Feminism/ist

Theoretical/

Secondary

Qualitative Only

Quant only

Mixed (Qual and

Quant)

N

0 5 13 72 9 100(101)

1-2 7 43 39 11 100(44)

3-10 7 62 24 7 100(45)

11-25 21 67 9 3 100(33)

26+ 39 42 15 3 100(33)

Feminist self-position

Theoretical/

Secondary

Qualitative Only

Quant only

Mixed (Qual and

Quant)

N

Yes 25 59 12 4 100(68)

No 7 30 54 9 100(188)

Methodological justification and methodological choice

Methodological justification

Theoretical/

Secondary

Qualitative Only

Quant only

Mixed (Qual and

Quant)

N

Feminist 15 70 7 7 100(48)

Transformative 15 28 48 10 100(23)

Other/Technical 12 41 38 9 100(45)

None 9 28 59 4 100(94)

Geographic base and methodological choice

National base of first author

Not Quantitative

Quantitative

N

US 30% 70% 143

UK 86% 14% 28

Australia 67% 33% 18

Canada 73% 27% 22

Europe 74% 26% 27

Other 65% 35% 17

Unidentifiable 100% 0% 1

All 50% 50% 256

Logistic Regression of quantitative methods use (summary)

The following increased the likelihood of quantitative methods being used (irrespective of whether any other method also used): US author affiliation Multiple co-authors Publishing in a journal with ‘women’ identification Absence of methodological justification

The following decreased the likelihood of quantitative methods being used: Single author Publishing in a journal with ‘feminist’, ‘women studies’ or ‘gender’

identification (as opposed to ‘women’) Engagement with feminist literature (note: this accounted for all of

an initial effect of explicit feminist positioning and all of the author-sex effect)

Either feminist, transformative or ‘other’ methodological justification

Do feminists count?

Published articles on women, gender and feminism do employ quantitative methods.

Articles with transformative goals do employ quantitative methods.

But those published in explicitly feminist/gender studies journals that engage most thoroughly with the feminist literature rarely do.

Moreover, even when quantitative methods are used by feminists, explicitly ‘feminist’ methodological justifications for using quantitative methods are not given.

[Geography and discipline matter...]

A feminist quantitative methods

Acceptance that sometimes ‘counts’ are socially and politically important. the importance of finding out ‘facts’ about the relative position of

men/women (for example labour force participation; health outcomes) for transformative campaigns.

concerns with making measurable/counting women’s contributions that have previously been uncounted – for example via measures of GDP that take into account unpaid labour/reproduction/depletion (c.f. Hoskyns and Rai 2007).

Technical possibilities of quantitative methods for some research, e.g. intersectionality (McCall 2005)

But tactical acceptance of some counting remains in tension with hesitancy of many feminists to do number. Why?

Three ongoing issues for feminist quantitative approaches

Issue 1: Reflexivity

Feminist methods insist on the non-neutrality and presence of the researcher. As such reflexivity has been central to feminist research (Lovell 2000)

Quantitative methods are employed with little reflexive consideration of methods. Why? Constrained by word limit? Requirement to provide technical information (operationalisation/sample etc)? Social norms – about reliability/’truth’?

An exception: One study by Ryan and Golden (2006) includes a reflexive consideration of quantitative methods from a feminist standpoint. But this is unusual. Moreover this reflection on methods is published separately from their quantitative analysis – as a stand alone methodological ‘think piece’.

Therefore, central issue in producing a quantitative methods informed by feminist understandings: making space for/normalising reflective consideration within quantitative publications

Note: this risks destabilising the front of ‘scientific reliability’

Issue 2: sex/gender

Central to the feminist framing of gender is the de-linking of biological difference and gender (denaturalising of gender).

Most quantitative analysis continues to treat ‘gender’ as an external ‘independent variable’ scored as a binary (0/1), constant across time, constant within cases. This is biological ‘sex’ in all but name.

This enables the exposure of social differences between men and women (in labour participation, poverty, education etc) transformative change. But it reifies sex/gender differences.

Is there a way that quantitative analysis can be used to explore the social construction of gender? Note – similar issues arise in exploring

‘race’/’ethnicity’

Issue 2: sex/gender

Inclusion of temporality – exploring the moments at which sex differences become socially significant (as gender). When does it matter that I am a woman?

Attempts to show the fluctuating relevance of gender over the life-course

Paid work

Routine housework

Care for family members and other domestic work

Sleep and rest

Consumption and leisure

0

200

400

600

800

1000

1200

1400

Single (n=967) Acquire partner,no child (n=967)

Stay partnered, nochild (n=1790)

Stay partnered,acquire child

(n=192)

Stay partnered,keep child(n=1102)

Stay partnered,child leaves/hasgrown up (n=34)

Men’s time-use (minutes per day) by family change (From Gershuny 2004 reprinted in Scott 2010)18

Paid work

Routine housework

Care for family members and other domestic work

Sleep and rest

Consumption and leisure

0

200

400

600

800

1000

1200

1400

Single (n=1102) Acquire partner,no child (n=1102)

Stay partnered, nochild (n=1928)

Stay partnered,acquire child

(n=227)

Stay partnered,keep child(n=1644)

Stay partnered,child leaves/hasgrown up (n=41)

Women’s time-use (minutes per day) by family change (From Gershuny 2004 reprinted in Scott 2010)

19

Issue 2: sex/gender

Inclusion of temporality – exploring the moments at which sex differences become socially significant (as gender). When does it matter that I am a woman?

Attempts to show the fluctuating relevance of gender over the life-course

These still presume the location of binary gendered identities – men and women.

Is there a way to make gender a more complex ‘outcome’ (or achievement)? Can we study the process of gendering?

How can we ‘measure’ gender without asking respondents what their ‘sex’ is?

Issue 3: statistical isolates

Feminism (like other transformative social science) has focused on inter-subjectivity and relational identities/behaviours.

Most quantitative statistical analysis involves the methodological treatment of the population as an aggregate of disconnected individuals.

Possibilities from Household level data Modelling of context: time-series and event-history

analysis, multilevel modelling New non-statistical forms of data analysis (such as

network analysis)