Gender in the Nordic Research and Innovation Area

Research area A socially sustainable Nordic region Gender 2016 - 2023 Ended

The Nordic region is the European leader in gender equality, but when it comes to leadership positions in research and innovation, men dominate just as widely here as in the rest of Europe.

Objective

Through new and innovative, yet focused and result-oriented activities, this joint Nordic initiative will make a significant contribution to gender issues on the research and innovation agenda. The aim of the initiative is to pinpoint the reason for why the research and innovation area has not followed the trend towards a gender equal society and to identify the measures needed to remedy this.

Background

For the last forty years, gender balance and gender equality have been an important Nordic political priority and the societal changes have been significant, pushing the Nordic countries to the forefront of gender equality. However, the positive results from gender equality indexes are not reflected in the Nordic research and innovation area. Instead, all Nordic countries perform around the European average.

Committee

Katja Marjanen, Scientific Adviser, Academy of Finland
Una Strand Vidarsdóttir, Senior Adviser, Ministry of Education, Science and Culture, Iceland
Ingeborg W. Owesen, Senior Adviser, The Research Council of Norway
Inger Jonsson, Senior Advisor, Forte, Sweden
Sophia Ivarsson, Senior Adviser, VINNOVA, Sweden (observer)
Lisa Westholm, Research secretary, Swedish Research Council (observer)