2025/01/03 by Pierre Alayrac, Sara Connolly, Miriam Hartlapp +1 · 1 voice · 5 citations
Business, Management and Accounting · Medicine · Social Sciences · #Business #Career Pathways #Commission #European commission #European union #Gender Diversity and Inequality #Gender Politics and Representation #Gender studies #International trade #Law #Medicine #Political Influence and Corporate Strategies #Political economy #Political science #Sociology
paper · doi:10.1177/14651165241300650
published in European Union Politics 26(1), 23-44 (SAGE Publishing)
openalex publication_date 2025/01/03 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23
This article assesses whether women face the same challenges in the European Commission as men by examining the career paths to top political and administrative positions. Drawing on a unique dataset, it investigates whether and, if so, how and when, women are disadvantaged. First, we analyze the characteristics and experience of all Commissioners and Directors General (2004–2019) to delineate the career paths to the top positions in the organization. Secondly, we compare pathways to find that men outnumber women in all pathways. For Commissioners women are very significantly under-represented in one of three pathways and for Directors General in two of three pathways. We identify how women are disadvantaged and the extent to which the results support arguments in the comparativist literature on gender.