Keynotes: Prof. Emmanuelle Auriol (Toulouse School of Economics) and Prof. Estefania Santacreu-Vasut (ESSEC Business School).

We wish to provide a space where selected high-quality research presentations from all fields will be met with a challenging and benevolent audience. The broader aim of the conference is to promote a meaningful discussion among economists of diverse backgrounds on remedies to the gender gap in our profession, with a focus on fairly representing all voices of our community. Two dedicated events will take place after the conference: a public roundtable about gender discrimination in our profession with an emphasis on possible solutions and an open and interdisciplinary discussion to reflect about the persistence of the gender gap in economics. More details will follow. 

We invite Ph.D. students in their third year or later and post-docs working in ALL FIELDS to submit a full paper by May 27, 2021. The call for papers can be found on the website.

This conference grew organically out of our learnings from Women in Econ Léman’s monthly workshops last year in which we combined reading the literature on gender gaps in the economics professions (check out our blog and reading lists) with women in the profession sharing their experiences. Specifically, we learned that departments can make a difference in closing the gender gap by: (i) having a more equal gender balance among faculty, (ii) facilitating faculty/student interactions, (iii) having a supportive and collegial seminar culture and (iv) having senior professors who are aware of gender biases, especially men. In addition, the conversation around gender biases needs to take account of the heterogeneity in experience of women at different intersections of gender with other identity layers such as gender, caste, sex, race, class, sexuality, religion, disability, physical appearance, and height where the degree of under-representation often rises to the extent that their stories rarely get told, thereby further exacerbating an outsider status. The conference has the primary purpose of giving a stage to “rare voices” in economics and promoting an inclusive conversation on reasons and remedies for the striking persistence of the gender gap. 

The International Economics department at the Graduate Institute is not only comparatively gender equal (though less so when looking at the most senior level) but its members have also supported this initiative early-on by participating in our workshops, being mentors to our members and/or being part of the program committee of this conference. In addition to faculty from the University of Geneva and the University of Lausanne, we are happy to have Prof. Lore Vandewalle, Prof. Martina Viarengo, Prof. Richard Baldwin, Prof. Ugo Panizza and Prof. Cédric Tille on our program committee. We are also generously supported by the administration, the economics department, the Gender Centre, and the Centre for Finance and Development at the Graduate Institute as well as by the Lives Centre at the University of Geneva and the Geneva 2030 Ecosystem Micro Grant.

Women in Econ Léman is a growing student-led initiative which was founded in 2019. For more information, check out our website and follow us on Twitter or Instagram.