King's College London

I am delighted to be taking on the role of director of GIWL this year, succeeding Rosie Campbell, who has done an excellent job over the past six years in establishing the institute as one of the leading voices on gender equality.

As a comparative labour sociologist, I have spent more than two decades researching patterns of (gender) inequality in the labour market, with an interest in finding possible solutions to these problems.

As someone who has lived in seven different countries, I am particularly interested in drawing lessons – both good and bad – from around the world to better understand how culture and policy shape our behaviours and attitudes.

More recently my work has focused on flexible and remote working and how it can help or exacerbate patterns of gender inequality both at home and in the labour market. As my book The Flexibility Paradox (2022, Policy Press) shows, such policy initiatives can be transformative in supporting gender equality, but only if we are able to address some of the most problematic aspects of our work culture and the gender norms. As Director of GIWL, I hope to use the knowledge I have gained on these issues to provide real policy solutions to some of the biggest challenges we face today in terms of gender relations.

I believe we are at a critical juncture in gender equality. We have seen an increase in the number of men and women expressing anti-feminist sentiments, with many claiming that feminism and other diversity equality programmes have gone too far. Such patterns have been particularly evident among men, especially young men and boys. Their change in attitude has led to the election of many governments around the world, such as in the US and Korea, which explicitly mention the dismantling of gender equality policies and other EDI initiatives as one of their key agendas.

I think one of the reasons for this is that many see the feminist agenda and gender equality as a zero-sum game. Many believe that in order to improve women's position in the labour market, men have to give up their positions, they have to lose out. Or, alternatively, many see the problems that young men and boys are currently facing as being due to the policies that have been put in place to support young women and girls. But as many working in this field know, this is not and has never been the case. To quote bell hooks, the goal of feminism is to liberate all genders from the constraints of patriarchy. And that “our struggle for liberation has significance only if it takes place within a feminist movement that has as its fundamental goal the liberation of all people”. Unfortunately, this goal of feminism has not been communicated clearly and sufficiently enough.

That is why one of GIWL's key goals for the coming years is to better communicate the benefits of feminism for all genders (and races and classes). One of the first things I will be doing as Director is planning a blueprint of the activities and research themes we will focus on over the next three to five years. This will be based on conversations with our core team, our wider colleagues at King's Business School and King's College London, our donors, supporters, and hopefully you! However, here are just a few of the things we want to address in the coming year to achieve this goal.

First, I want to continue the work I have been doing with colleagues to dismantle the current model of the “ideal worker”. The current model of the ideal worker is based on an image of the male breadwinner of the 1950s, a worker who has no responsibilities outside of work, who could devote himself to work and work alone. That worker no longer exists. We need to build our labour market and design work around a new image of a worker with a wide range of responsibilities, both at home and the larger community, including self-care. Such a change will not only enable women to compete more effectively in the labour market, but it will also free men and their time to engage in meaningful activities outside of work, including within the family. Only then can we see progress in our labour market that allows all genders to thrive.

Second, related to this – and building on our previous work with the Policy Institute at King’s and Ipsos UK on the polarisation of attitudes between men and women, particularly young men and women – we want to launch a programme of work focused on developing new models of masculinities. I know it may sound strange for a women's leadership institute to be working on masculinities. But in this next stage of progress in gender equality, we need more men to work with us. We need to be able to show that the feminist goal is not just to liberate women, but also to liberate men. Men are also the victims of the current day gender norms that restrict them into only one way of being – resulting in mental health and other issues. Without such a change, we won't achieve the gender equality we want, and changing notions of masculinity – again linked to new norms for workers – is at the heart of supporting all genders to thrive in the labour market and in society.

Outside of this, we will be exploring how remote working, and current return to work mandates, shape gender and intersectional equality patterns both at home and in the labour market, impact of remote working on well-being, and we’ll be examining gender equality in the UK at a regional level through the development of a new index, as well as looking at other pressing issues through our research and events.

Do look out for invitations from us to some fascinating discussions – my colleague Elizabeth Kelan at King’s Business School will be hosting a panel later this month on how gender matters for automation, artificial intelligence, and the future of work; we’ll be discussing the “flexibility paradox” and the challenges I identified in my book; and we’ll have our usual major International Women’s Day event featuring GIWL Chair Julia Gillard in early March.

Stay tuned for more, and I can’t wait to see you at one of our events soon.

Sincerely yours,

Heejung Chung

Director of the King’s Global Institute for Women’s Leadership, Professor of Work and Employment, King’s Business School