Workshop on the gender segregated labour markets – the BRYT project more than 10 years after: Results and future prospects

Introduction
Sofie Carsten Nielsen, Head of Section at the Department for Gender Equality in Denmark

·       I will start today with a brief introduction to the concept of the gender segregated labour market and why we chose to do this particular workshop on the BRYT-project which took place more than 10 years ago. Then our keynote speaker Professor Drude Dahlerup will tell us what BRYT was about, what was the idea behind, what goals were set, and whether we can talk about having achieved some of them.

·       Then we will go on to speak about the more country-specific approaches. Helle Holt will speak about the Danish situation regarding the gender segregated labour market, Leila Räsänen about the Finnish situation, Gunnel Brameus about the Swedish situation and finally Valgerður Bjarnadóttir will tell us about the Icelandic situation. Common to all the speakers is that they took part in the BRYT-project. And thank you very much, Drude, Helle, Leila, Gunnel and Valgerður for coming here to Åbo! We are very grateful for this and happy that it was possible to gather so many of you.

·       The gender segregated labour market is a term we can attach to labour markets in nearly all countries in the world, but especially to the Nordic labour markets, because of the high percentage of women on the labour markets here. If anyone here is not familiar with the concept it should be said, that the gender segregation on the labour market takes place in two ways. Both horizontally and vertically. Vertically it means that men to a much larger extent than women reach higher managerial positions. Horizontally it means that men and women to a large extent are found in different sectors and work with different functions.

·       We wanted to do this workshop, because the latest reports on men’s and women’s wages in Denmark once again confirmed that the gender segregated labour market is used as one of the fundamental reasons to explain the gender pay gap. Women and men in Denmark as well as everywhere else still do not have equal pay. New analysis in the area of education and counselling of young people have also shown that girls and boys are often still given, what I would term as even extremely gender stereotypical treatment and advice when they are to chose what studies to apply for and what direction of jobs to go into. Not surprisingly, there is still a great need to break up the gender segregated labour markets!

·       At the same time as we get these latest reports, we can look back at many, many years of work to do just this – break up the gender segregation. The common Nordic BRYT-project – and BRYT means BREAK – which took place from 1985-89 at the initiative of the Nordic Council of Ministers was one of the biggest projects on this subject to date. (And 16 years ago BRYT was also represented with a big workshop at the Nordic Forum in Oslo). The project took place in all the Nordic countries and more than 30 publications and pilot projects were published.

·       The BRYT project, which Drude will tell you much more about in a short while, produced new knowledge and understanding in terms of what kind of mechanisms are at work in creating the gender segregated labour markets and which barriers it will be necessary to break, if we are to change the gender segregation.

·       This is one of the reasons, why we found it relevant – at an anniversary conference such as this one – to gather some of the people, who had worked in depth with the BRYT project, to have them tell us about their experiences, the knowledge they achieved through the project and hopefully the advice they can give us, so that we can move on in the future.

·       One of the most important conclusions from the BRYT-project is perhaps that it is very wrong to assume, that the gender segregated labour market is something of the past. Now, almost 20 years after BRYT was started, it must be very clear to all of us, that the gender segregation does not disappear by itself! It might have changed and moved to new sectors and functions, but it has not disappeared.

·       Another important conclusion is, that it is a misunderstanding that women are found in much fewer occupations than men and that girls chose only between a narrow group of educations and job types, whereas boys make much wider choices. Girls and boys chose equally narrowly! It is thus necessary to focus on BOTH girls and boys, women and men.

·       The question is how? How do we focus on breaking up the gender segregated labour markets today? What have we learned from BRYT? Which issues should we continue to work with and which ones should we perhaps move away from? I look very much forward to hear your thoughts and ideas.