Some books change society - Invisible Women by Caroline Criado-Perez sets out to be one of those. It is a book that every legislator, every employer, indeed, everyone who believes in a truly equal society should read.
The core argument is simple:
- There is a significant gender data gap because most of the data which we collect is not sex-disaggregated.
- This matters because 'data determines how resources are allocated' (p.256)
- This means that 'Male is the default Human' with a consequence that
- The world is designed by men for men and this is not working (and, at times, dangerous) for women.
- Furthermore, 'Gender neutral does not automatically mean gender equal' (p.309)
Criado-Perez demonstrates this thesis by looking in turn at range of issues which illustrate that women have different priorities and needs:
Daily Life
- 'Women's travel patterns tend to be more complicated' than men's because they do more unpaid care work (p.30).
- Women have different needs re toileting (this is a safety issue both in terms of hygiene and attacks from men). This strikes a chord with anyone who has witnessed the queues for women's toilets
Workplace
'Women's work, paid and unpaid, is the backbone of our society and our economy' (p.142).
- 'Women do the majority of unpaid work irrespective of the proportion of household income they bring in' (p.71) - 'Globally, 75% of unpaid work is done by women'. This has implications of women's health and financial status. There is a need for properly paid maternity leave.
- 'Women continue to be disadvantaged by a working culture that is based on the ideological belief that male needs are universal' (p.86).
- There is a significant gender pay gap, which needs addressing - collecting and analysing data on hiring procedures to see whether these are gender neutral is a good place to start (p.110).
- There are a range of occupational health issues which affect women differently to men (Chapter 5)
- There are significant issues with sexual harassment at work (estimated 50% of women in the EU p.137) which need addressing.
- 'The culture of paid work as a whole needs a radical overhaul. It needs to take into account that women are not the unencumbered workers the traditional workplace has been designed to suit' (p.91).
Design
There is a 'one-size-fits-men approach to supposedly gender-neutral products [which] is disadvantaging women' (p.157).
- The problem is not women, it is with male-based design.
- Examples: Grand Piano keyboard width (p.157), Smartphones (p.159), Voice-recognition software (p.162 - if it doesn't work for a woman - try lowering your voice!); online datasets (p.164).
- Women find it difficult to get funding for design ideas. One factor is that '93% of VCs are men and men back men' (p.171). 'Given the male domination of VCs, data gaps are particularly problematic when it comes to tech aimed at women' (p.174).
- 'The [male-dominated] tech industry is rife with examples of tech that forgot about women' (p.176).
- 'Car design has a long and ignominious history of ignoring women' (p.185). 'When a women is involved in a car crash she is 47% more likely to be seriously injured than a man, and 71% more likely to be moderately injured . . . She is also 17% more likely to die' (p.186).
Medicine
We have 'a medical system which, from root to tip, is systematically discriminating against women, leaving them chronically misunderstood, mistreated and misdiagnosed' (p.196)
- There are significant sex differences (pp.198ff):
- fundamental mechanical workings of the heart
- lung capacity
- women are 3x more likely to develop an autoimmune disease
- blood-markers for autism - etc
- 'Because women have largely been excluded from medical research, this data is severely lacking' (p.199) ... 'The failure to include women in medical trials is a historical problem that has its roots in seeing the male body as the default human body' (p.201).
- 'The lack of sex-disaggregated data affects our ability to give women sound medical advice' (p.208).
- There are many drugs and treatments that don't work for women.
- Yentyl Syndrome: 'women are misdiagnosed and poorly treated unless their symptoms or diseases conform to that of men' (p.217).
- There is a lack of research into medical issues that mainly or only affect women (p.229)
'Women are dying, and the medical world is complicit. It needs to wake up.' (p.216)
Public Life
'The failure to measure unpaid household services is perhaps the greatest gender gap of all.' (p.241)
- Unpaid work is excluded from definitions of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). 'The omission of housewives from national income computation distorts the picture' (Paul Studenski, p.241).
- 'The upshot of the failure to capture all this data is that women's unpaid work seems to be seen as a costless resource to exploit' (Sue Himmelweit, p.244)
- Taxation: 'There's a fairly simple reason why so many tax systems discriminate against women, and that is that we don't systematically collect data on how tax systems affect them' (p.260)
'Together with our woman-blind approach to GDP and public spending, global tax systems are not simply failing to alleviate gendered poverty: they are driving it.' (p.264)
- 'The presence of women in politics makes a tangible difference to the laws that get passed' (p.266).
- Discussion of women in politics - and a call for electoral reform.
- 'The evidence is clear: politics as it is practised today is not a female-friendly environment' (p.281).
- 'When you exclude half the population from a role in governing itself, you create a gender gap a the very top' (p.285)
- 'Female politicians are not operating on a level playing field' (p.286)
Disaster Situations
- 'The failure to include women in post-disaster efforts can end up in farce.' (p.290). This is illustrated with examples from Gujurat in 2001; Miami 1992 Hurricane Andrew; New Orleans 2005 Hurricane Katrina
- 'The presence of women at the negotiating table not only makes it more likely that an agreement will be reached, it also makes it more likely that the peace will last' (p.294).
- 'Women are disproportionately affected by conflict, pandemic and natural disaster ... Domestic violence against women increases when conflict breaks out' (p.296).
- 'The data gap when it comes to sexual abuse is compounded in crisis settings by powerful men who blur the lines between aid and sexual assault' (p.306)
- Homelessness: 'women are actually more likely to experience homelessness than men' (p.306)
Afterword
- Criado-Perez identifies three important themes that define women's relationship with the world:
- The female body: this needs to be taken into account in design medical, technological and architectural.
- Male sexual violence against women: we need to measure it and design out world to account for it - not to do so is to limit women's liberty.
- Unpaid care work: we need to measure this and to make it more equitable.
'Failing to collect data on women and their lives means that we continue to naturalise sex and gender discrimination.' (p.314)
One major reason why gender data gap needs to be addressed as a matter of priority is because
'the introduction of Big Data into a world full of gender data gaps can magnify and accelerate already-existing discriminations.' (p.136)
The Book
This is a very well researched book. It is fully referenced and indexed allowing the reader easily to follow up on the points made.
