Gender & expertise in times of corona: a thread for my new #COVIDCalls community ( @jacremes, @USofDisaster) and int’l observers interested in what’s going on in Germany besides the obvious effects of our crisis response. Inspired by @dominikhhh, @jana_hensel and many more.

On April 13, the National Academy of Sciences @Leopoldina (major scientific advisor to government) issued recs for a sustainable exit from emergency measures https://tinyurl.com/uqe3y8c . On the interdisciplinary advisory board of 26 renowned professors, 24 are male, 2 female.

(Note: Previous ad-hoc statements were translated into English afterwards, so there’s a chance the latest one will be made available too.)

Aside from the content level, we urgently need to talk about whose advice is being heard and heeded on such crucial issues as care work, childcare and education, a large chunk of which is being shouldered by women. Even more generally, it’s about basic representation.

Common reaction when this is pointed out: “Screw gender, we’ve got a crisis to solve.” Also trending: “If you include women based on their gender, that’s sexism.” And, of course, “How would that change the advice given? Science/research is objective and neutral!”

As for that last bit, I won't lecture anyone here about the tradition of feminist/standpoint theory in STS (Longino, Keller, Haraway and others.) At its very core, science is and has always been so deeply intertwined with society that neutrality is kinda off the table anyway.

a. This committee has devised policy advice for dealing with a population of 83 million, less than half of which are male. I don’t see a convincing justification for national expert committees getting a freebie on issues of representation.

b. Don’t even get me started on diversity/inclusion issues. (Hint: that committee is as white as my grandma’s bedsheets.)

c. On the “demand” side of things, this is about expertise still being associated with masculinity, a tendency closely linked to the very basic, practical mechanisms of gender-based networking and career selection within academia.

d. That said, there are expert women out there. In epidemiology, social psychology, law, history, you name it. But, due to point c. they have to yell so much louder, which takes up time and energy on top of the amazing jobs these women are doing already.

“No time for gender, we’ve got work to do” is just plain wrong. There’s no either-or here. Gender, race, class are part and parcel of how this virus affects our society. They must inform ALL steps of our response and require representative expertise in relevant advisory forums.

None of this is new. Pandemics don’t create social inequalities, but they throw into relief and almost inevitably exacerbate existing ones, both in their immediate effects and in the origins and types of expertise that are considered in the development of mitigation strategies.

Bottom line for everyone out there looking for lessons to learn from other countries: it’s not all roses and dandelions over here. The expert committee’s gender ratio is just one example.

I do not mean to imply that @Leopoldina or others are consciously suppressing certain contributions to the debate. I can’t and won’t be the judge of that. My point is about structural biases on display in this committee. Finally, observations based on…

Personal exp: I belong to a junior research network co-organizing a conf on AI with @Leopoldina. Out of 7 committee members I was the only woman (academic nobody, no AI researcher but network spokesperson) until I pointed out the imbalance and 1 man was replaced by a female prof.

Also, note that in the process itself, @Leopoldina has been very forthcoming: gender balance maintained in selection of contributors, childcare will be offered t/o conference on request (more progressive than many German universities). But there's still a ton of work left to do.