Professorships just for women – is it fair?

Since I have little experience of academia, I cannot say whether Minister Mary Mitchell O’Connor is acting judiciously in proposing to appoint female-only chairs to universities in Ireland.

Some say that a 50-50 gender distribution needs an imaginative push with affirmative action, since women aren’t, apparently, being appointed in sufficient numbers to professorships. Others say that it will rebound against female academics who will be seen as ‘lesser’ achievers in obtaining a chair through positive discrimination: not because they were the best candidate, but because the university had to meet the quota of women.

Experience

Prof. Patricia Casey has written compellingly about her own experience of becoming a professor of psychiatry through the simple measure of doing seven years of research, getting a senior lectureship because of the research, then being interviewed for the chair of psychiatry at UCD, for which she was appointed, defeating seven other candidates. She has never experienced any bias against women – even when she took time off for maternity leave – and reasonably concludes that she won her spurs by merit, not by gender.

By contrast, in the field of journalism, I once had the mortifying experience of being promoted to a job for which I was hopelessly under-qualified: it was one of the horrible times of my life, and it was an injustice that a more qualified man was passed over, largely because the boss thought that he should be seen to promote a woman.

So there can be grave moral drawbacks to any system which appoints individuals for reasons of filling a quota.

But let’s not pretend, either, that strings aren’t pulled and influence exerted to propel people into various jobs and positions. Despite all the best intentions about “transparency”, people can be hired for reasons that are not 100% related to merit. Connections, manipulation of office politics, ‘pull’, luck, the old-school tie, club and sporting associations, networking, and dynastic links can all play a part in job success.  As can idiosyncratic elements such as charm, amiability, personal chemistry and timing.

My advice to any young person starting out in life is – yes, do your best, work hard, be ambitious and grasp opportunities. And then – have a tribe or a network. A tribe can be anything from the GAA to the Freemasons’ Lodges, from your school or college pals to your political party, and not excluding marriage to a partner with wide connections (which two top Irish medics are brother-in-law and sister-in-law?)

As the Book of Ecclesiastes says: “The race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong, not yet favour to men of skill – but time and chance happenstance to them all.” Indeed – time and chance can be as powerful as any form of quota.

*****

Would I cheat at an exam if I had the opportunity? Cheating has risen considerably in third-level exams since 2010 – when smartphones have made it easier for students to do so. Once there was a stigma against cheating and it was seen as a character flaw. Perhaps the stigma has gone. But the old saw is still true: “If you cheat, you’re only cheating yourself.”

President Macron’s cross to bear

The French President, Emmanuel Macron, made a major speech in Berlin last weekend, in which he urged an ever-closer union between France and Germany, describing the two founding countries of the EU as a “couple”. Together they must press forward with constructing a European army for their common defence, as well as moving towards single budgetary control of the 19 countries within the Euro currency group.

Macron was speaking in the German Bundestag, strikingly flanked, in the immediate background, by five stark crosses [pictured above]: these were symbolising the German day of remembrance for the dead, including those who died in wars. No such symbol would be permitted in a French parliament, where any image linked with religious faith is prohibited by the law of laicité (secularism). Any French state institution which displays a cross is compelled to remove it.

Interesting to see how France and Germany differ in this matter.

On the substance of his address, there will be more to be said, further down the line. A European army is highly problematic for neutral EU states – like Ireland.