Pandemics, parenting and productivity: academic life in the time of COVID-19
Christina Fattore, Jennifer M. Ramos, Jamie E. Scalera and Marijke Breuning
This blogpost is part of the ‘Women, Gender and Representation in IR’ series International Affairs is curating as part of the 50:50 in 2020 initiative. The core aim of this initiative is to improve the representation of women in the International Relations discipline. We are hoping to achieve this by publicly striving for fifty per cent of all our contributors to the journal to identify as women and by exploring the multitude of forms discrimination and under-representation embody in this space.
By the end of April 2020, it was clear that the COVID-19 pandemic had exacerbated the constant weight of the ‘publish or perish’ expectation of academic success. In the weeks following the initial lockdown across the western hemisphere, women academics seemed to be particularly impacted. Initial reports suggested that women were submitting less to academic journals than men. On social media, many academic parents, especially women who serve as primary caregivers, were worried about how to balance their work expectations with the new demand to serve as distance learning supervisors for their children.
To understand the severity of the problem and the additional burden on women, we conducted a survey about the initial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on their work. In this blogpost, we aim to draw on this original data in order to highlight the challenges of women in academia and caregiving responsibilities, in the hopes that those with decision-making power in higher education design policies with these in mind. In working with International Affairs for this blogpost, we are building on the work that Kerry Crawford and Leah Windsor are conducting for the 50:50 in 2020 initiative and their forthcoming book The PhD Parenthood Trap: Gender, Bias, and the Elusive Work-Family Balance in Academia in relation to the pandemic and parenting in academia.
Pandemic’s effects on caregivers and productivity
To be sure, the idea of work–life balance was precarious prior to the current pandemic. Many women mentioned in the 2016 International Studies Association (ISA) survey on the status of women that they were concerned that they were written off as productive members of their departments once they had children. The anecdotal and indirect data that lead to these stories about women’s lost productivity encouraged our team to gather direct data on the pandemic’s impact on scholars’ productivity — with a keen eye on the possibility that gender differences amplify such an effect. In the survey our team fielded in May 2020, we asked the ISA membership about their initial reactions to the pandemic and its effects on their work life. We asked questions about current work productivity and the anticipated consequences of the global pandemic on their career progression.
The results confirm that academics regardless of gender or rank, but especially parents, are struggling with productivity during the pandemic. 67.6 per cent of respondents felt that their academic productivity had decreased when compared to their pre-pandemic activity.
The overwhelming majority of respondents (90.6%) agreed that people who have young children at home are less likely to be productive, and 77.7 per cent of respondents agreed that women are doing the bulk of the caregiving during the pandemic.
Interestingly enough, the distribution of these responses hold steady when comparing men and women as well as academics who are parents against those who are not. Clearly, there is a strong consensus that productivity is down across the board, with women parents likely feeling the most adverse effects.
Long-term effects
It may be too early to observe the pandemic’s full effects on academic productivity; publications take years to develop from nascent idea to journal acceptance. Moreover, productivity does not decrease only because of a lack of writing time. Other support is necessary; the scholars who participated in our survey are also concerned about institutional support for research and conference travel (when travel can be resumed), and some women caregivers remarked about the lack of time to engage with open-ended responses when applying for grants. The inability to engage in the other elements of the research process will stifle their ability to advance toward their publication and career goals. This suggests that women with children will likely be seeing the effects of the pandemics on their productivity long into the future — as women are already published less than men within International Relations and political science and as women who are primary caregivers face additional barriers.
More broadly, our survey suggests that the long-term consequences of the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic could further entrench structural inequalities in the discipline. Almost half of the respondents in our survey (49.8%) disagree that academia will be more considerate of the effect of caregiving on scholarly productivity.
Furthermore, 76 per cent agree that women will be worse off post-pandemic.
Open-ended comments reinforce this: scholars worry that the pandemic will worsen structural inequalities in our profession. Some primary caregivers are afraid that the pandemic could push them out of academia all together.
Moving towards better policy
Our research illustrates the importance of taking these concerns seriously. Academic parents are now attempting to reconcile their caregiving responsibilities with their employers’ demands that work returns to ‘normal’. Many universities anticipate resuming business as usual in August, even as COVID-19 cases continue to rise across many countries. Recently, Florida State University announced that, effective August 7, they ‘will return to normal policy and will no longer allow employees to care for children while working remotely’. While FSU has clarified that this policy only applies to staff (which does not make it any less awful), academic parents are highly stressed as they attempt to navigate this new ‘work–life balance’ — especially as it is unclear whether and how daycares and schools will reopen. Academics understand that universities are navigating the requests of students — who pay tuition and want a return to normalcy. However, universities should be mindful of the added stress placed on employees’ shoulders by driving a reopening during this upswing in positive COVID-19 cases. Universities will need to reassure staff and students that they and their children are safe.
In light of this, universities should consider the lasting consequences of the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. As more demands are being placed on academic parents and budgets are being cut, universities must find a way to maintain support for scholarly productivity in a way that is embedded in broader policies addressing the gendered structural inequalities. Allowing for greater flexibility in teaching, allowing extensions to tenure and promotion clocks, and protecting budgets that support faculty research must be prioritized to alleviate the stress academics currently experience. Administrators must develop policies that better enable faculty to navigate these new work–life demands, especially for vulnerable groups, and their effects on research productivity in the years to come.
Christina Fattore is Associate Professor of Political Science at West Virginia University. Her research and teaching focuses on international relations, international trade behaviour, and gender and bias in the discipline and academia at large.
Jennifer M. Ramos is Associate Professor of Political Science at Loyola Marymount University and Director of International Relations. Her research and teaching interests include international norms, international peacebuilding, public opinion and foreign policy, and political psychology.
Jamie E. Scalera is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Georgia Southern University. She teaches and researches in the areas of International Relations, European Union politics and undergraduate research methods, with a special interest in the relationship between international organizations and their member states.
Marijke Breuning is Professor of Political Science at the University of North Texas. She specializes in foreign policy analysis, with research on development cooperation, women and gender, and international children’s rights (especially intercountry adoption). She has also published on the sociology of the profession.
This blogpost is part of the ‘Women, Gender and Representation in IR’ series International Affairs is curating as part of the 50:50 in 2020 initiative. If you are interested in engaging with this initiative or want to write a blogpost for this series, please email International Affairs’ Junior Editor Leah de Haan at LdeHaan@chathamhouse.org.
If you are currently balancing work and childcare at home and want to either share your experience with us or advise us on how journals can help, tell the International Affairs team in the comments or email us.
