This document is the product of a research project that began in 2018 and is entitled: “Los retos de la conciliación. Análisis comparado de la experiencia de mujeres trabajadoras en instituciones de educación superior”.
It was raised within the framework of the creation of the Ibero-American Group for Research on Women, Conciliation and Family Stewardship (GIIMCCO), a research group recognized by EMULIES and the OUI, co-editors of the work.
In its nearly 300 pages, it shows an x-ray of the reality of 15 institutions of higher education (HEI) in five countries, four in Latin America (Mexico, Ecuador, Spain and Peru) and Italy.
The publication aims to make visible, analyze and discuss the daily experiences that academic women and managers live in higher education institutions to reconcile their professional life and family life, within the framework of the existence or not, of state or institutional policies of equality.
“This Diagnosis shows that despite all the advances in normative matters and the increasing access of women to training in higher education, the family environment, motherhood and the couple still are elements that stress female trajectories. Because they are seen as disadvantages for women to occupy spaces of power – academic and political – within the institutions; and because there are no institutional conditions that consider female reproductive cycles, which become incompatible in the competitive academic career.”, affirms Dr. Liliana Ibeth Castañeda Rentería, General Coordinator GIIMCCO -University of Guadalajara and coordinator of the publication.
The process of creation of the work had three stages:
- Conduct of particular investigations or, where appropriate, identification of existing empirical material that was relevant in the framework of the project objectives.
- Presentation of chapters, which was carried out through the celebration of the GIIMCCO Virtual Seminar: “The remains of the work-family life reconciliation in Latin America”. An event that became a useful and enriching space because, with the help of technology and social networks, it allowed to dialogue and share proposals and advances of each of the members, as well as to comment and feedback in a horizontal way the advances, theories, and findings that were identified in each of the scenarios investigated.
- Editorial evaluation of the work, edition, and publication.
The book Mujeres en las Universidades Iberoamericanas: la búsqueda de la necesaria conciliación trabajo familia was presented for the first time at the VI EMULIES Meeting on October 22 in Bogotá, Colombia. Also in the First Conference of Research and Teaching since Feminism held in October at the University of Extremadura, Spain by one of the authors of the chapter, Irina Rasskin.
“In the presentations, the publication has shown great interest from the public, especially academic women who feel challenged by the issue and who consider it pertinent to discuss a substantive issue on the road to equality.” Shared María Felícitas Parga Jiménez member of the publication coordination team.
The next confirmed presentation will be at COMECSO, Social Sciences Congress in Monterrey, Mexico on April 2, by Patricia Rodríguez, academic, and researcher at the Institute of Economic Studies of the UNAM.