Does political ideology hinder insights on gender and labor markets?

Charlotta Stern

No 275, Ratio Working Papers from The Ratio Institute

Abstract: Sociology is a field where a large majority of professors lean left. The left-leaning ideology is visible in studies of gender differences in labor markets. In such studies, a left-feminist ideology of equality is taken to be self-evident. Defining equality to equate to slim-outcome difference, however, pre-destines all differences to be seen as outcomes of culturally defined social constructions and discrimination. In this chapter it is hypothesized that this has produced tabooed topics in the field. One such taboo is the acknowledging of differences between men and women. Such differences challenge the left-feminism’s notion of equality in terms of slim-outcome-difference. Research on evolution and preferences is downplayed in favor of cultural explanations. Cultural explanations interpret differences between men and women in labor market behavior as constructed, as largely driven by gender stereotypes and discrimination. The notion that differences can stem from biology or from the choices made by individuals pursuing a lifestyle different than those prescribed by gender researchers is seldom entertained. I hypothesize that the situation stems from gender sociology being dominated by left-feminist ideology.

Keywords: Labor market; Sociology (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J40 Z10 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 30 pages
Date: 2016-09-30
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hme and nep-lma
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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