Gender bias in the Erasmus network of universities
- PDF / 3,224,695 Bytes
- 25 Pages / 595 x 794 pts Page_size
- 21 Downloads / 200 Views
(2020) 5:64
Applied Network Science
RESEARCH
Open Access
Gender bias in the Erasmus network of universities Luca De Benedictis1,2 and Silvia Leoni3* *Correspondence: [email protected] 3 Department of Economics and Social Sciences, Marche Polytechnic University, Piazzale Martelli 8, 60121 Ancona, Italy Full list of author information is available at the end of the article
Abstract The Erasmus Program (EuRopean community Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students), the most important student exchange program in the world, financed by the European Union and started in 1987, is characterized by a strong gender bias. Female students participate to the program more than male students. This work quantifies the gender bias in the Erasmus program between 2008 and 2013, using novel data at the university level. It describes the structure of the program in great detail, carrying out the analysis across fields of study, and identifies key universities as senders and receivers. In addition, it tests the difference in the degree distribution of the Erasmus network along time and between genders, giving evidence of a greater density in the female Erasmus network with respect to the one of the male Erasmus network. Keywords: Erasmus, Gender bias, Network Analysis, Degree distribution
Introduction and prior research on the Erasmus program At its 30th anniversary celebrations in 2017, the Erasmus program counted more than 9 million participants since its creation, increased to more than 10 million in 2018. The program, which allows its participants to study or take an internship in a foreign country,1 has become very popular among university students whose participation is increasing year after year. Its popularity has made it a true cultural phenomenon, and, given the successful outcome of Erasmus+, the European Commission has proposed, for the 2021– 2027 plan, to double the funds allocated to the program in order to support the mobility of 12 million people, making the program more inclusive, allowing the participation of those coming from disadvantaged families background and less inclined to international mobility.2 With its objective of inclusion, the program has also become a cornerstone for equal opportunities, with many of its projects, for example, directly aimed at the promotion of gender equality. Nevertheless, the participation in the Erasmus program itself is characterized by a remarkable and long-lasting gender bias, that favors women, since its launch. Evidence shows that the number of women participating in the program has been higher than that of men up to the 1990s (Maiworm 2001). This gender gap is reported 1 The
Erasmus program includes also a variety of other initiatives, such as volunteering activities, Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degrees, the European Week of Sports, Jean Monnet Modules and Chairs. 2 See Souto-Otero et al. (2013) for an investigation of the barriers to the Erasmus program. © The Author(s). 2020 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Inte
Data Loading...
