Social Policies to Support Women's Employment and Achieve Gender-Friendly Workplaces

My research looks at the relationship between welfare state policies and gender inequalities in employment. I have already published two articles from my PhD which examine how family and employment policies in the UK and elsewhere help or potentially hinder lone mothers' employment prospects. This is because, as sole breadwinners and caregivers within the household, lone mothers provide a good 'litmus test' of how effectively policies help women to balance the demands of employment and childcare and survive and support their children independently of men. My findings indicate that many advanced economies, including the UK, are not doing enough to enable the reconciliation of employment and family responsibilities, with some policies actually promoting women's caregiving roles at the expense of their employment position.
To build on these papers, I will submit two additional papers for publication during the Fellowship. Drawing on my PhD research, the first paper argues that policies to bring women into top board and executive positions are important for improving the wellbeing of the most vulnerable women in the lowest-paying jobs. Evidence shows that enough women in top management can lead to organisational changes that benefit all women, including those at the very bottom of the organisation. Building on this, the second paper will be an original research article that aims to disentangle the relationships between various welfare state characteristics (e.g.availability of public childcare services) and gender balance in the very top jobs.
To disseminate the PhD and original research findings to the academic community, I will present at various national and international conferences. To reach policymakers and stakeholders in the third sector, I will produce a non-technical policy brief and work closely with the UK's leading charity campaigning for gender equality and women's rights, the Fawcett Society. The research can also contribute to increasing public awareness of persistent gender penalties in employment, the link between gender balance at the top of companies and gender equality at the bottom, and the role of the welfare state in closing gender inequalities in employment. Hence, to communicate my findings to a wider audience, I will produce a webpage and blog posts based on my research.
An additional aim of the Fellowship is to develop a proposal for a three-year research grant. Existing literature suggests a welfare state 'paradox'. According to this theory, women in gender-friendly Nordic welfare states with generous family benefits and services are more likely than women in ungenerous welfare states (e.g., the US) to be in employment; however, women in generous welfare states are also more likely to work in gender-stereotypical sectors and occupations and are less likely to reach managerial positions. Yet, recent trends suggest that the relationship between women-friendly welfare policies and gender labour market inequalities is not as straighforward as paradox theory predicts. While Nordic labour markets have become more gender-equal in recent years, other countries with less generous family policies and benefits are experiencing greater gender segregation in employment. Hence, my proposed project aims to develop a new understanding of the relationship between welfare states and gender employment segregation that is more sensitive to its complexities. This is important for identifying policy solutions for reducing gender inequalities in employment, which matters from a social justice perspective, and because supporting women to realise their full potential brings collective benefits (e.g., economic prosperity) and individual benefits (e.g.women's higher lifetime earnings).
During the Fellowship, I will also contribute a small amount of teaching at the University of Southampton and undertake training in advanced quantitative methods and using complex cross-national datasets to prepare me for my three-year grant.