| Abstract: | The study is an analysis of gender and power in British universities. It draws from a lifetime of experience of the difficulties encountered by those women who do reach senior decision-making positions in academic institutions, in the UK and overseas. It spans a period of forty years which begins with women as an unassimilated minority among student populations and moves to an analysis of their opportunities for shared control beneath the glass ceilings of the levels they attain as established academics. A survey of the incumbents of senior management roles in universities reveals few women. Fewer attain honorific positions. Suggesting that the observations made represent an improvement on the past, the paper presents two case studies of the implications of senior administrative work for academic women's professional lives. The first is of a small university weighted in favour of a narrow band of technological disciplines and the second a large mainstream university with many women staff. From here, commenting on external influences in Britain and elsewhere, the paper concludes by suggesting: ways in which women's leadership in academic institutions might be encouraged; the role of the professional bodies in monitoring and promoting this; and the learning required by women themselves to become effective as leaders for change once in position. |
