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Snow and avalanche safety is a male dominated field. The aim of this paper is to increase the knowledge on the gendered conditions and the prerequisites this poses for snow and avalanche safety professionals, and to shed light on why relatively few women enter and stay in the industry. Our analysis is based on quantitative and qualitative data from a survey sent out to avalanche professionals in North America, Continental Europe, and Scandinavia. We inductively coded and categorized responses to open-ended questions into themes based on patterns and commonalities, using a content analysis. We find that avalanche work requires a wide skill set - skills that are traditionally associated with men as well as skills that are traditionally associated with women, and that our participants think that increased diversity at large would benefit the industry. However, our data also reveal persisting cultural and structural gender barriers that make it more difficult for women and non-binary individuals to enter and thrive in the industry compared to men. We discuss management implications that can help make the industry better for all.

This study explores the role of gender as a central organizing principle in the inclusion work within martial arts clubs in Sweden, against a backdrop of inclusion being an explicit focus in the policy programs of the sports movement. Based on qualitative data collected through focus group interviews with representatives from three martial arts clubs, this study departs from a social constructionist perspective where gender is understood as a social process or a ‘doing’. The analysis of the data reveals two distinct approaches to gender as an organizing principle: downplaying the significance of gender and explicating the significance of gender. Within the first approach the meaning and significance of gender are subordinated by organizing mixed-gender groups and regulating interactions within the groups. The importance of equalizing potential physical differences and avoiding sexism in practice, is emphasized. However, the approach also brings forward challenging situations related to gender and other inclusion aspects, such as religious beliefs and cultural backgrounds. The second approach recognizes the significance of gender as a structural aspect and employs gender-separatist training groups and specific activities for girls and women. These targeted efforts are justified by the respondents because of the male dominance and masculinity norms that exist in martial arts and hinder girls’ and women's participation. The findings highlight the complexities and tensions of how gender is constructed and reproduced within the context of martial arts clubs and contribute to deepening the understanding of how these constructions condition the inclusion work.

The Swedish labour market is relatively gender segregated and the forest sector is no exception, with a dominance of men among forest owners, users and employees. Gender segregation affects working conditions and constitutes a significant obstacle to gender equality. Within the forest sector, awareness and efforts linked to gender equality have increased over the last decade through e.g., the sector's national gender-equality strategy launched in 2011 and a sector-specific #metoo appeal in 2017. In relation to the strategy, men and women with higher-education degrees in forestry were surveyed about their conditions and experiences in the forest labour market. The survey showed, among other things, clear patterns of gender segregation. A decade after, this study revisits the survey, with 860 responses and a response rate of 53 %, to investigate whether and how conditions, experiences and gender segregation have changed. The result shows a small decline in the overall gender segregation, but a persistence with respect to employer, work area and professional function. This affects and shapes men's and women's experience of, and conditions for, their work, which contribute to, for example, that women have been exposed to discrimination and harassment and left the sector to a greater extent than men.

Equality, diversity and inclusion have been discussed in the sports context for many years, in practice as well as in research. In Sweden, increased inclusion is an explicit ambition in policies of the sports movement. However, there are no specific directives on how inclusion and inclusion work should be interpreted and implemented. Rooted in a theoretical framework inspired by Foucault, the present study intends to contribute to that discussion by exploring the meaning-making around inclusion and exclusion as both a discursive and social practice in a sport context.

The empirical basis for this study is four focus group interviews, carried out with participants from four different martial arts sport clubs in Sweden. The interviews circled around a) the norms in the sport clubs, b) the design of the concrete activities; the logics behind the sport practice and conditions for participation, and c) the work with inclusion, involving thoughts on existing policies and active measures. The data analysis was carried through utilising a thematic analysis procedure, based on the theoretical framework. The preliminary findings highlight both obstacles and opportunities for inclusion. Furthermore, the respondents’ comprehension of inclusion and exclusion indicates there is a negotiation on how social practices are understood in relation to inclusion and exclusion. The discussion addresses that different social categorisations and inclusion aspects seem competing, demonstrating notions on superiority and subordination in the inclusion work.

The title of this thesis is Business as usual? Doing gender equality in Swedish forestry work organizations and while the latter part, the subtitle, is rather self-explanatory, the former part can be read in different ways. The aim of the thesis is to increase the understanding of the doing of gender equality in the male dominated work organizations of the Swedish forestry sector, and thereby contribute both theoretical and empirical understanding regarding how doing gender equality in the forestry sector relates both to notions of gender and notions of organizations. Forestry has traditionally been characterized by physically demanding, manual harvesting work, with practical and symbolic associations with men and certain forms of masculinity. The forestry sector still remains one of the most gender segregated labour forces in Sweden, all while gender equality has been addressed to some extent during the 2000s. The theoretical frame of reference of the present thesis is rooted in feminist organizational research and the doing gender framework. Based on a perspective of reality as socially constructed and by deploying a feminist participatory action research methodology, my analysis focuses on how complexities of meanings are ascribed to the actions and processes, that are framed as gender equality and I have qualitatively analysed empirical material, such as policy documents, interviews and written testimonies of sexual harassment, that explicate these aspects of doing gender equality in organizations. The thesis is built experiences from two different research- and development projects and consists of 5 articles and a synthetizing chapter.

The results highlight how doing gender equality relates to notions of gender as well as notions of organization. In both Article I, where policies were studied and in Article II, that builds on interviews, women are in general constructed as the “other”, as people who lack (forestry) skills and competences and who are in need of help or as contributors of social and emotional competence. Men and masculine norms are mainly absent from the doing of gender equality in this material, just as notions of the organization. But, deploying a feminist participatory action research methodology can bring forward other perspectives on gender equality, as shown in Articles IV and V, such as the articulations of men and masculinities. Further, this thesis shows that gender equality is in general understood by the organizations studied as a process that regards gender, predominantly women, rather than the organization. Put differently, gender equality work in the forestry sector does not to any significant extent, affect what is perceived as the core activities in these organizations. However, the overarching depoliticized and degendered business case framing that mainly evades accounting for the role of the organization when doing gender equality, is disrupted by the testimonies of #slutavverkat explored in Article III. Here, the political dimension of gender equality is highlighted by stories of men’s behaviours (reprehended but at the same time sanctioned) in organizations that come at the expense of women’s rights to a workplace free from condescending comments, harassment and sexual violence. While previous research has pointed to the importance of gender awareness, and gender aware leadership, in organizations that wish to succeed with their gender equality work, this thesis suggests that there is also a need for “gendered organization awareness” in order to understand and discuss not only how gender is done in organizations but also how everyday organizational life, such as notions of competence, is done and how that in turn relates to gender and power. This underlines the need for organizations to make room for conflicts and politics and to let the otherwise marginalized voices contribute to more nuanced interpretations of gender equality.

The title Business as usual? encompasses the starting points for the thesis work as well as the main findings. Read with an emphasis on business, the seemingly all-embracing business case rhetoric’s that encloses the official narratives of gender equality in the forestry sector are visualized, while emphasizing as usual denotes to the sectors resistance to do other than what it usually does. Read as the hole saying, business as usual, that title signals that gender equality work is done in ways that not interfere with forestry core activities, thus making gender equality work in the organizations side streamed or de-coupled. Yet, read with emphasis on the question mark, opens up for the subversive potential that nevertheless exists when more multifaceted ways of making sense of gender equality are articulated and as the findings suggests that there are ways to re-gender and re-politicize organizational gender equality work in the context of forestry work organizations.

Purpose

This study aims to deepen the understanding of inequality regimes in male-dominated industries, specifically in Swedish forestry and mining, by exploring how conceptions of gender, class and place are articulated and intertwined when doing gender equality in these organizations.

Design/methodology/approach

The article draws on empirical material from four research and development projects inspired by a feminist action research methodology.

Findings

This paper shows how gender equality works in these male-dominated organizations simultaneously constructing gender, class and place. When men are at the focal point of gender equality, our empirical findings suggest that blue-collar workers in rural areas are described as “being the problem” for gender inequality in these organizations. Addressing specific groups such as women or blue-collar workers in rural areas is not enough to challenge the inequality regimes that exist in these organizations, since a unilateral focus on certain groups leads to skewed problem formulations.

Originality/value

Research on gender equality work and its relation to intersectionality in male-dominated industries is limited, and by focusing on men and masculinities, this paper contributes to knowledge concerning gender equality in male-dominated industrial organizations.

This study investigates how a design team with researchers and participants from different parts and levels of an organisation may function as a participatory method for socially transformative innovation. The experiences gained by a design team in one of Sweden’s major forestry companies are examined through a participatory, single case study approach, in which researchers and employees jointly developed new insights and ideas. The results reveal that the design team functioned well in terms of channelling the participants’ expertise and experiences into innovative ideas, but less well as regards aligning the latter with the company’s regular management procedures, thus reducing the function of the design team to an abstract symbol of organisational ‘modernity’, rather than an effective instrument for social transformation.

Building on the claim that gender matters, this chapter problematizes the possibilities and constraints that the rising bioeconomy discourse offers regarding the gendered practices of forestry. While (pre)industrial forestry centred around a goods-dominant logic ("the pile of timber"), contemporary forestry is in some ways incorporating a more service-dominant logic ("the pile of timber plus something else"). The gendered practice of forestry, however, still draws on notions of masculinity rooted in the physically demanding manual harvesting work, in tandem with technical know-how and the overall industry is struggling with gender equality issues. The emergence of the bioeconomy as a new meta-discourse in forestry, where the industry is aiming to articulate itself as sustainable, modern and competitive, may challange the almost all male structures of forestry so that the future of forestry is more diverse. We conclude that the bioeconomy is unlikely to solely challenge the gendered practices of forestry because of its inherent neoliberal gender blindness, but with awareness of gender and power, this new discourse may at least offer an opening for problematizing taken-for-granted practices and values which in turn have the potential to shape the forestry of tomorrow in a more inclusive and diverse way.

This article adds to the understanding of men’s discursive resistance in relation to gender-equality interventions at work. Using Swedish men forestry professionals as the empirical base, the result shows how discursive resistance were performative acts, part of the construction of the same gender-equality interventions and organizational contexts that they were perceived to describe. In this case, direct opposition to gender equality provided a limited discursive position and sets of logics available in practice. Instead, the possibilities to renegotiate gender-equality interventions as unjust and unnecessary required, we conclude that the industry’s ambition to hire and promote more women was perceived to have led to the use of affirmative action and the disruption of meritocratic principles and that the problems of gender equality were placed in the traditional forestry and among “prejudiced old men,” as oppose to the more “modern” and “women friendly” forestry of today.

Purpose: In Sweden, gender mainstreaming policies have a long political history. As part of the national gender equality strategy of the Swedish forest industry, the ten largest forestry companies committed themselves to gender mainstream their policies. Limiting the impact of policies and the agency of change, the purpose of this paper is to focus on the varied and conflicting meanings and constitution of the concepts, the problem and, in extent, the organisational realities of gender mainstreaming.

Design/methodology/approach: In both, implementation and practice, gender mainstreaming posse challenges on various levels and by analysing these documents as practical texts from the WPR-approach. This paper explores constructions of gender and gender equality and their implications on the practice and the political of gender mainstreaming in a male-dominated primary industry.

Findings: The results show that the organisations themselves were not constituted as the subject of the policy but instead some of the individuals (women). The subject position of women represented in company policy was one of lacking skills and competences and in the need of help. Not only men and the masculine norms but organisational processes and structures were also generally invisible in the material. Power and conflict were mainly absent from the understanding of gender equality. Instead, consenting ideas of gender equality were the focus. Such conceptualisations of gender equality are beneficial for all risk concealing power structures and thereby limit the political space for change.

Originality/value: By highlighting the scale of policy and the significance of organisational contexts, the results indicate how gender and gender equality are constitutive through the governing technologies of neoliberal and market-oriented ideologies in policy – emphasising the further limiting of space for structural change and politicalization within the male-dominated organisations of Swedish forest industry.