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New paper on gender gaps in book publishing in political science w/ @dawn_teele. http://ssrn.com/abstract=3283107. TL/DR: women are MORE under-represented as book authors than article authors, esp w/r/t collaboration. Thread has details. 1/11
We gathered all 8250 uni press books published b/w 2004-15 in poli sci, assigned subfield & classified authors’ gender. 2/11
Books w only men authors are 70.5% of all books. Books w only women: 22%. 7.5% of books have mixed-gender teams. Women’s share of APSA members in 2015: 38%. 3/11
The % of women authors has increased from 21% in 2004 to 28% in 2015 - mostly due to more women as solo authors & participation in mixed-gender teams. Still, share of mixed-gender book author teams (7.5%) is only ~1/2 of what we see for journal articles. 4/11
Women-only coauthorship is very infrequent (<2%) and did not increase substantively over time. 5/11
The gender publication gap is wider at more senior levels. Women are 38% of 1st authors at junior level & 43% of APSA members; at full level, 16% of 1st authors but 29% of APSA members. 6/11
Subfield patterns: Over time biggest increase was in comparative politics (22% to 32%). IR (18 to 25%) and American pol (20 to 25%) also saw gains. No change in Pol Theory over time. 7/11
Why the gap? We interviewed 8 press editors. Most important findings: 1) gender balance of book authors not yet of wide concern among press editors; few have discussed the issue. 8/11
2) Editors do not even know the extent of the problem because they keep no data – literally zero – about the gender balance of submitted and accepted manuscripts, in contrast to many journal editors. 9/11
3) Press editors face different professional incentives than journal editors: They are not working scholars; there is no transparency (no yearly report to ed board eg) & no accountability to professional associations. 10/11
4) Press editors have far wider discretion to seek out and publish manuscripts than journal editors, which may mean network effects slow change. See paper for further etails. END
