Towards gender equality in the digital sector?

Auteur(s) de l'article

Émilie
Émilie
This is the fundamental question and the common thread of the second edition of the 2023 National Conference on Gender and Digital Technology. I had the opportunity to attend these two days rich in sharing and exchanges around the issues of gender equality in digital transformation (GEDT). This event took place on September 7 and 8, 2023 at the University of Lausanne (UNIL).
The subjects addressed and explored in depth were the following:
  • The inclusion of women in digital professions (and the challenges to retain them)
  • The challenges of integrating digital technology in education from a gender perspective
  • Gender biases in technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI)
  • The use of digital tools to combat violence against women
    Source : UNIL

    What are the 3 figures that struck me the most?

    • Less than 9% of the student body in computer science in Switzerland are women (HES-SO, statistics for the period 2016 to 2021)
    • 88% of algorithms are designed by men (Artificial Intelligence, not without them!, Aude Bernheim, Belin edition, 2019)
    • 14,604 Wikipedia pages allowing to complete universal history through better intersectional and gender representation were created and improved by people from the Les sans pagEs project (Les sans pagEs, September 7, 2023)

      What was the program of this Conference?

      A multitude of precise and valuable information was transmitted by more than 30 involved professionals and specialists from complementary backgrounds, Swiss and international. The program consisted of 6 conferences, 5 round tables, 9 workshops, and several side events.

      What did I already know?

      Knowledge is very often gendered, and a large part of social interactions are imbued with gender. The same goes for education, training, and representations in general. Digital technology reflects these facts and even amplifies them in some cases.

      What can we do, individually and factually?

      Get informed, take responsibility, and invest in gender equality and equity. As a:
      • Citizen: in the face of sexist acts and habits that inhabit daily life, the words used, the representations put forward, the content shared on social networks
      • Parent: regarding stereotypes around toys, video games, the use of computers and smartphones, gender biases present in models and representations for young people
      • Professional: in relation to stereotypes in education and training, recruitment criteria and internal policies, the place given to multidisciplinary teams
      • Colleague: concerning verbalized jokes, vocabulary used, relationship to others in professional exchanges

        And what about collective intelligence in all this?

        There is still a long way to go to change gender biases. Whether it's about reducing biases and noise in artificial intelligence, offering more inclusive digital solutions, and achieving gender equality and empowering all women and girls, which is goal 5 mentioned in the United Nations' 2030 Agenda Universal Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). And this path is to be created and taken together: women, men, and non-binary people.