1

EU FPV Thematic Network: The Social Problem and Societal Problematisation of Men and Masculinities

NORWAY NATIONAL REPORT ON RESEARCH ON MEN’S PRACTICES WORKPACKAGE 1

Øystein Gullvåg Holter with Eivind Olsvik

1. Some important questions in recent Norwegian research and debate

-What are the possibilities for extending men’s role as care givers, especially as fathers, and how can the barriers against this development be identified and removed?

-Can men be targets of gender discrimination, e.g. men in caring roles in working life, or as sex objects in the media; how does this relate to discrimination of women?

-What are the main causes of male violence against women, including authoritarian social contexts, patriarchal privilege, structural violence, and violence between men?

-How can an active gender policy be renewed and improved especially in terms of men’s participation?

2. National gender background

Brief history:

1970s - emerging women’s struggle especially in local politics; some scattered literary reports on masculinity, consciousness groups, and similar.

1980s – major increase in women’s wage work participation; establishment of women’s studies; ’alliance’ women / welfare state, focus also on men, government creates Male Role Committee, first national survey, later follow-ups.

1990s – a mixed picture with e.g. restructuring and setbacks, but gradually an increasing female proportion of the household income; progress in education, politics, family and public life. Despite scanty support, critical studies of men becomes a broadening field especially among students. Other research point to a more materialist culture, increase in wage differences, and some signs of a return towards 1950s family ideals. Other findings, however, show new and more assertive feminine roles, sexual liberalisation, and increased gender equal status awareness also among young men.

The idea of incorporating men into the gender equal status effort was a response to the ’problem of men’ posed by international feminism in the early 1980s. In Norway this was formulated mainly in terms of a problem of men’s roles or positions in a patriarchal or non-egalitarian society (Haukaa, R et al 1982; Holter, H 1984). Although never conflict-free, this line of approach resulted in increased public awareness and engagement among men in the late 1980s and 1990s. On the one hand, the Male Role Committee should meet the needs of women, on the other, it should ’engage men’, and the two, not so surprisingly, did not always coincide.

Improved research from the late 1980s onwards showed men’s mixed interests and varying relations to women as regards gender equal status. Also, the 1988 national survey and other studies showed that equal status variation runs across different masculinity forms and cannot simply be derived from the latter (Holter, Ø 1989a). The ”different roles/positions” conceptualisation of men became the common ground of equal status policy efforts. While some of men’s interests ran against equal status, some did not, and these could be engaged positively, for example men’s increasing wish to take care of their children, confirmed by time use reports. It should be possible to create equal status reforms with this element, in order to improve the general equal status progress. The 1993 ’daddy’s month’ (or paternity quota) reform – the main practical proposal of the Male Role Committee - was the first result of this policy. This reform gave families a conditional right to the last month of paid leave after child birth, depending on the father taking it. The reform was introduced in Sweden a few years later, and recently an expanding version with three months to the father has been introduced in Iceland.

It is often said that Norway is a ”relatively egalitarian” country in gender terms. Traditionally, gender segregation in everyday life has been somewhat less marked in Norway than in e.g. the UK, US or Germany. There is much cultural and social material to the effect that masculinities have been somewhat more heterosocial and less homosocial, compared for example to continental Europe, although we lack overview studies of this pattern (Holter, Ø 1989). By implication, women’s opinions and practices carry somewhat greater weigth in men’s lives e.g in their friendship, job, or family choices. The emphasis on women has been confirmed by family studies and the new research on men (also in negative senses, eg. guilt (Hendin, H 1966; Holter, Ø 1993a). Historically, this can be related to the relative weakness of patriarchal power in a peripheral region like Norway (which furthermore was under foreign occupation for many centuries).

It is not so surprising, therefore, that ’hegemonic masculinity’, as it is currently described in international research, seems to have been somewhat less important in Norway, compared to e.g. the US or UK. On the other hand, a pattern of ”masculine normalcy” or a ”male norm” may have been more important. This is further associated with Norwegian egalitarianism and even egalitarist conformism (cf. the ’Jante Law’), the ’corporative’ social democratic state in the post WW2 period, and other social and historical traits.

Gender equality and integration have increased in many areas in Norwegian social life over the last two decades, while other areas remain unchanged, and some new barriers have emerged. Households, politics and education have been ’change arenas’, with working life and the economy lagging behind. Women’s presence in higher education has grown much faster than men’s, so that women students now outnumber men students by about 3 to 2. Yet even the change areas, power positions are often fairly unaffected; in education and research, for example, women are only 12 percent of the personell in top teaching (professor) positions.

Occupational choices and paths into working life are still quite sex-segregated, and there is a lack of studies of the active factors recreating this situation. The element of horizontal discrimination in working life has probably increased, compared to vertical discrimination. Desegregation is noticeable in some contexts. While men were about twice as often active participants in voluntary organisations and trade unions in 1980, gender participation rates are equal today. Possibly, segregation today is more structurally recreated than is often assumed - not mainly an effect of young people’s choices, but of the options and job paths offered them.

Some international observers have argued in the direction that Norway is a ’women’s society’, yet the differences are relative and should be seen in a wider perspective, Norway sharing many traits of gender un/equal status with other European countries, like violence against women and wage discrimination. Yet the relative progress of women, especially some categories of women, has been more visible in Norway than elsewhere. Although it is women’s participation in politics that has drawn most international attention, changes in everyday life, family and informal social exchange have probably been more influential. At the same time, however, the occupational and public life progress has been ”partial” for most women. The same can be said about politics – more women, but mainly in the ”soft” areas with little money, not finance or industry. In view of women’s very partial progress in working life, it is perhaps not so strange that many women still subscribe to a traditional model of the home.

One way of interpreting the mixed results over the last years is to see them as results of a conflict between two main work/family patterns. The one which seems most important, especially in the long-term view, is a development towards further equality and companionate couple relationships. Another pattern also exists, however, tied to increasing wage differences, with developments away from equality and towards a provider-type couple relation. The ”new providerism/familism” may be a minor regression in a wider progress, or a more serious reversal - we do not know yet. According to recent OECD data, the main reason why the sexual segregation in working life remains high in the Nordic countries is not so much male monopoly on jobs, but rather the continued existence of women-dominated areas, most of them in the public sector, like primary teaching, caring, and health jobs (Melkas & Anker 1999).

Men’s problems, practices and attitudes can be seen in a perspective of ”difficulties of change” as well as one of ”cross-pressure”. Norwegian men are more ”caring/child-oriented” than other Scandinavian men, according to one study. Today men in Norway put more emphasis on kindergarten development than women, according to recent findings, when choosing between kindergartens and direct cash support to families with small children.

The cash support reform, introduced in 1998, may have improved the conditions of women with few resources, yet this effect is not clear, and the net effect may be to reduce women’s longer-term education and career chances. New research shows that the reform has led to a more segregated home situation among the users, compared to families using the kindergarten alternative. It also seems to have reinforced barriers against increased male participation. The reform was proposed by a center-right political alliance that did not put any emphasis on designing it for use by men also, although it was was launched in terms of parents (not mothers) choice and freedom to care more for their children. As a result, only 1 of 30 users is a father, the rest are mothers (Aftenposten 29.03.00; Hellevik, T 2000).

Research on men has increased in the last ten years, but most of it is small, low-budget projects, student theses, or similar. Networking among researchers has improved the quality and the interest among students, but the institutional support has been low to non-existing. What Lars Jalmert called an ”in principle” stance among men (in Sweden) in the early 1980s, a combination of agreement in words and no action in practice, today seems more apt as a description of the academic position towards the field.

This is related to a broader view of gender equal status as something which is here allready. Equal status (or at least, opportunities) is realised in Norway, and so further research or active policy is not really needed. - This ideology has been one main barrier against development, hindering the formation of the new field of studies of men, isolating women’s and gender studies, and cutting down on equal status efforts. The Norwegian Equal Status Council was closed down in the mid-1990s and replaced by an information centre, however without any means for research or development. The state-sponsored national survey of men in 1988 was not followed up ten years later, when it would have been natural to do so - in fact, a newspaper noted the public demand and created its own survey (Dagbladet/MMI: Den norske mannen, 1998). Although researchers had proposed a program for studies of men in 1992 and then again in 1998, for shifting and and vague reasons this was never realized, although the last proposal was supported by the Research Council. Masculinities perspectives and fatherhood research have to some extent been integrated in existing institutions, programs etc., but the changes have so far been remarkably small. Of the 160-170 student theses and 5-10 doctoral theses on men and gender equality issues in Norway over the last ten years, generally of high quality, very few of the candidates have been offered jobs within the new field.

In other words, problematising men meets political, social and cultural barriers in Norway as elsewhere. Yet the way in which these barriers differ (and are experienced differently) is perhaps the most interesting point, compared to e.g. continental European patterns (Holter, Ø 1993d). Most men in Norway support gender equal status goals like ”equal sharing of home and wage work between husband and wife”, and even if some of the support is ’pure attitude’, studies have shown that new practices often follow. The level of support for a more active gender equal opportunities politics increases when measures are concrete, address the needs of both genders, and relate clearly to commonly held values like democracy and justice. It also appears that men’s behaviour is more practically motivated than formerly believed. Instead of an ’in principle’ positive attitude to further gender equal status efforts, as much as 7 of 10 men are sceptical to further active effort (and perhaps 4 or 5 among 10 women), and this proportion has risen over the last fifteen years. Most of the sceptics believe in the ”gender equal status is here allready” view. Yet even in this group, the majority does in fact support concrete gender equal status measures – with the strength of the support varying with the criteria mentioned. In other words, the ”in principle” man is not typical of men’s progress in daily life. Instead, the main pattern may involve caring, children, and greater support. The ”in practice” man and the ”in principle” man can be seen as tendencies, and as such both can be found empircally, but the relation between them is not well mapped. This is connected to the wider task of developing research that goes beyond types of men or forms of masculinity, to investigate the processes and social contexts creating these forms.

3 Home and work

Two tendencies are in conflict today. On the one hand, there is an increasing emphasis on home, caring, relations etc. This is not especially connected to ”family values” or a political right wing in Norway, but mainly to a gender equal status perspective. On the other hand, there is a more demanding, turbulent and shifting working life. Even if Norway is fairly well off compared to many other European countries, with low unemployment and a relatively good social security system, new forms of problems have emerged here also.

In the home and family sphere, and in society in general as far as it relates to this, the process of gender equal status has continued. For example, most couples and parents now believe in the equal sharing of wage work and household tasks, and even if the reality is still unequal, there has been progress, especially if men’s time use reports are given credibility (women’s reports are more sceptical, but we have reasons to believe that the standard has risen). Fully shared parenting is the ideal also, and so the current situation where fathers have little rights after divorce has become a source of conflict. Equal parenting after divorce is much more favoured among men (70-80 percent) then among women (40-50 percent).

The proportion 2-job-households (married/cohabitating adults where both are in the work force) increased from 68 to 75 percent in the 1986-97 period (’in the work force’ includes part-time and leave). Women’s proportion of total wages increased from 31 to 36 percent. The greater weight of women’s income for the household is one main reason for changed attitudes also among men. A 1994 survey showed that 83 percent of men agreed that care work at home should count as job experience in recruitment (Holter, Ø 1994c)

In working life, work organizations are becoming more ”time-hungry” and less secure and predictable. The proportion men who reported having a huge workload at work rose from 29 percent in 1989 to 43 percent in 1996, compared to an increase from 35 to 44 percent among women. Also, there has been a strong increase in the proportion of jobs demanding full concentration. Many changes reflect restructuring of the economy. Health research also tells of increasing workloads. Studies in Norway and other Nordic countries indicate more health problems, especially psychic problems, among employees (Grimsmo, A 2000). New evidence of background social stratification (racist, sexist etc.), often behind an egalitarian facade, also appears (e.g. Høgmo, A 1998). A study of mobbing (victimization) in working life showed that the health consequences are quite severe; suicide as result of victimization may be more frequent than fatal work accidents. Also, the study shows that most of the mobbing occurs from the direct superior towards an employee (Dan Olweus 1999).

Arguably, the problems that are ”not openly addressed” in the Norwegian model reappear in other forms – e.g. as childhood and youth problems. Although kindergartens are still scarce especially for the youngest children in many parts of Norway, the coverage has been more than doubled over the last twenty years. But even if state services have improved and gender equality has increased in family life, childhood and youth problems have also increased. For example, statistics show a large increase in the proportion of children under state/municipal child custody – 8 pr. 1000 in 1980, 21 in 1998. Due to a post-parental-divorce system where most fathers lose contact with their children, and due to higher work pressure, more work mobility, and other factors, ”father absence” has probably become more widespread in real terms over the last ten years, as has the ”general absence of men” in children’s environment, even if a more positive trend can be seen also, especially in intact families. Studies of divorce in Norway as elsewhere indicate that an absent father (or absence of men) by itself does not predict social problems for children. However, some subgroups experience more negative effects (e.g. those involved in conflict between the parents, etc.). The national 1988 survey showed that a subgroup of men with divorce in childhood, who had taken their father’s side (or did not critisise him), were more negative to gender equal status than normal, and strongly overrepresented on the far right of the political spectrum (Holter, Ø 1989). Recently, a large panel study of boys growing up in the 1950s, interviewed as military recruits in 1970 and again in 1999, shows that parental divorce has had a measurable impact later in life – increasing the chance of institutionalized alcoholism by 100 percent, psychiatric diagnosis by 80 percent, schizophrenia 70 percent, death in young age by 30 percent, and reducing overall well-being in later life (See Andreasson, S 2000. This is a Swedish study; experts believe conditions were similar in Norway).