A Gentleman's Pursuit?: The Impact of Gender on Economic Opinion

On foot of Auditor #9's point on the "Economic Thought" thread, I felt it appropriate to create this one. What do the fellow citizens of Machine Nation think is the impact of the masculine on economic theory through the years? Would a more feminine economic canon be as concerned with pin needles as Adam Smith? Would it instead focus on feelings and emotions and their role in economics? Has the analytical nature commonly associated with men left us bereft of a sense of humanity in economics, clinging to formulae and rigid laws as a means of finding out the truth?

I await the responses eagerly.

Aw Jasus Ard-T, would love to reply, but not tonight. Lap top is disintegrating and too exercised with the full horror of Mr Ganley when viewed through the cruel and unforgiving lens of Google.

Ard-Taoiseach wrote:

On foot of Auditor #9's point on the "Economic Thought" thread, I felt it appropriate to create this one. What do the fellow citizens of Machine Nation think is the impact of the masculine on economic theory through the years? Would a more feminine economic canon be as concerned with pin needles as Adam Smith? Would it instead focus on feelings and emotions and their role in economics? Has the analytical nature commonly associated with men left us bereft of a sense of humanity in economics, clinging to formulae and rigid laws as a means of finding out the truth?

I await the responses eagerly.

Adam Smith defined 18 different steps in the making of a pin and pin making was one of the first processes to be influenced by mass production and division of labour.

Would a feminine economic theory be as concerned with that?

I'm no economist but I'd argue that long before the industrial revolution women, particularly in domestic contexts, had probably come to the same conclusion as Smith - that it's a more economical use of time to get people to specialise in one area rather than switching to another and then another. There was a division of labour in the kitchens of great houses and palaces going back centuries. That's not to argue that this wouldn't have been the case in men's activities but I'd suggest that going back through time and before the industrial revolution women were more likely to work in groups and men to work in relative isolation. But this is could be a wild and inaccurate generalisation so I'm open to correction here.

What has probably held women back from contributing to economic discussion over the years has been a lack of the kind of education that would give them the 'right' to participate in the those discussions. It's likely that the markets and industry might have come to the practical usefulness of division of labour much sooner had women been involved in economic discussion at a higher level - then again, nothing much would have happened before the energy and mechanical revolutions that made the industrial revolution possible.

It's interesting however, to look at books about domestic management. Mrs Beeton could have run any factory in her day and it would have been no less profitable or effective. Could she have run a national economy or proposed economic theory? Well she and others like her did the latter on a micro level but the lack of relevant education and the social mores of the time would have made it impossible for her to do it on a macro level.

I think the last part of your question is a wee bit unfair to men and to women because what you're asking is to reinforce a stereotype. One could argue under your definitions there that marxism has a feminine angle - sharing and mutual support and all that fluffy stuff associated with women (and the fact that on a practical level it doesn't really work!) yet it was a theory constructed by men.

The ideal of course would be the synergetic outcome that it's possible to get when you put male and female perspectives to work together.

Just taking a cue from one of the founders of modern feminism, Mary Wollstonecraft, whose wikipedia entry asserts she believes that both men and women should be treated as rational beings and who imagined a social order founded on reason, would it be accurate to say that the structures and ideas of the likes of Adam Smith were non-gender based and oriented and were founded on a common human rational capacity, not necessarily a male rationality?

Women were running kitchens like Kate said but they also used the spinning jenny, didn't they? It's called that after the inventor's wife..

Auditor #9 wrote:

Just taking a cue from one of the founders of modern feminism, Mary Wollstonecraft, whose wikipedia entry asserts she believes that both men and women should be treated as rational beings and who imagined a social order founded on reason, would it be accurate to say that the structures and ideas of the likes of Adam Smith were non-gender based and oriented and were founded on a common human rational capacity, not necessarily a male rationality?

Women were running kitchens like Kate said but they also used the spinning jenny, didn't they? It's called that after the inventor's wife..

Saying that the structures and ideas are non-gender based is not the same as saying, I think, that they are coming from a non-gender perspective; particularly in the case of Smith for example whose attitudes and opinions would have been fostered in a very male environment. Mary Wollestonecraft, was the wife of William Godwin whose theories of anarchy didn't - to my knowledge - acknowledge the role of women to any great extent.

As to whether there's a common human rational capacity I'm not sure of the extent of that common capacity beyond the most basic; in the age of reason, reason was never ascribed to women and to some extent it still isn't. The word 'hysterical' comes from the word 'hysterikos' which is Greek for 'womb'.

Also meant to add that there's a material difference between working a spinning jenny and having, if you like, a management role as housekeepers would have had with responsibility for budgets, etc.

Isn't economics built on a foundation of human emotion, confidence, paranoia, sentiment, instinct etc.

If we were all androids, the economic cycles we have would not exist imho.

I think my point is that the mathematical theories of economics are only a part of the whole thing. Is it not an art and a science ?

I know a number of women locally (3 actually) who run large and complex businesses, one of them internationally known, that they built up after they were widowed. Necessity and opportunity combined seem good enablers.

The question of whether men "think differently to women" is a funny one, and I don't think it is related to performance as a money manager or business person. I believe that there is some research done that suggests there is a spectrum, or sliding scale of abilities (spatial, linguistic, analytic etc.) that are to some extent hormonally linked and found on average to be more developed in one sex that the other. However a minority of people are average, and people are generally drawn to professions that they are able to do. For that reason I think the information about the average is not helpful when dealing with individuals.

When it comes to economics, or medicine, or engineering, I can't think of any evidence that gender is an issue.
We are talking about intellectual activities that have their own self-referential framework and purpose that overrides gender difference. Women who adopt male dominated professions are trained in and have to operate within the pre-existing framework. I can't think of any school of economic thought that would be associated with one gender rather than the other.

If this question was asked in relation to racial difference, somebody somewhere would have had a seizure by now.

Kate P wrote:

Ard-Taoiseach wrote:

On foot of Auditor #9's point on the "Economic Thought" thread, I felt it appropriate to create this one. What do the fellow citizens of Machine Nation think is the impact of the masculine on economic theory through the years? Would a more feminine economic canon be as concerned with pin needles as Adam Smith? Would it instead focus on feelings and emotions and their role in economics? Has the analytical nature commonly associated with men left us bereft of a sense of humanity in economics, clinging to formulae and rigid laws as a means of finding out the truth?

I await the responses eagerly.

I think the last part of your question is a wee bit unfair to men and to women because what you're asking is to reinforce a stereotype. One could argue under your definitions there that marxism has a feminine angle - sharing and mutual support and all that fluffy stuff associated with women (and the fact that on a practical level it doesn't really work!) yet it was a theory constructed by men.

The ideal of course would be the synergetic outcome that it's possible to get when you put male and female perspectives to work together.

In an otherwise excellent post, I'd like to clarify that I reject the stereotype of women as carers, intuitive and home-makers. Equally I reject the notion of men as protectors, bread-winners and analysers. That's why I couched my comments with phrases such as "commonly associated". I treat people on their own merits as individuals rather than as members of an over-arching group or gender or religion.

EvotingMachine0197 wrote:

Isn't economics built on a foundation of human emotion, confidence, paranoia, sentiment, instinct etc.

If we were all androids, the economic cycles we have would not exist imho.

I think my point is that the mathematical theories of economics are only a part of the whole thing. Is it not an art and a science ?

Bank runs - like Northern Bank, have little to do with the figures and more to do with the sentiment (a word we hear a lot of in economics) so I'd be inclined to agree with your opening sentence.