The future of the Nordic knowledge economy depends on our ability to attract the most highly qualified men and women to excel in the field of research and research based innovation. At a time where scientific excellence and international competition is increasing in significance and our welfare states are under ever greater pressure, it is crucial to produce solid knowledge on which to base further policies and practices in the field.
The project seeks to accomplish five inter-related major objectives, each constituting a pillar of dedicated activities:
First: To assess the impact of equality policies already implemented in Nordic academic institutions. The NORDICORE Centre of Excellence will produce new and critical knowledge about which types of measures have had an impact on gender balance in Nordic academic institutions.
Second: To identify barriers both internal to research organizations and external to them, impeding gender equality and inclusion, and suggest ways to overcome these barriers. We focus on two fundamental barriers at work in creating unequal opportunities in career development, a) (implicit) biases among gatekeepers in central decision making positions and b) biases in the rules of the game of career advancement.
Third: To understand challenges to gender equality in research and innovation within the larger labour market contexts in the Nordic countries. This major objective emerges from a central hypothesis that many of the mechanisms at work in sustaining gender inequalities in the research and innovation area are paralleled by similar mechanisms in other areas of the labour market.
Fourth: To bring words to action by engaging stakeholders at all stages of the research. This major objective is founded on a simple hypothesis that engaging stakeholders in the research process will produce better results, where impact is part and parcel of the process. By involving stakeholders and policy makers we will make sure that our results will be relevant, in order to contribute to real and lasting change.
Fifth: To encourage knowledge exchange among national and international experts, researchers, students, policy makers, stakeholders, managers, equality workers and other interested parties through a range of activities such as workshops, seminars, conferences and researcher education.
