Only the summary is available in English:
Gender equality is a priority for the Swedish Research Council and the Council has been actively monitoring gender equality in its research funding and devising measures to improve gender equality for many years. In addition to gender equality assignments in instructions and appropriation directions, the Council has a gender equality strategy with several goals and statements. This report analyses and illustrates gender equality in universities and the Swedish Research Council's research funding from a structural perspective. Sweden's gender equality goals and the Swedish Research Council's instructions and gender equality strategy are used as the basis. This report is a part of the knowledge base the Swedish Research Council has compiled to contribute decision-making documentation to the government's upcoming research bill and to facilitate prioritisation within the Swedish Research Council.
The report demonstrates the importance of the Swedish Research Council continuing to monitor its research funding from the perspective of gender equality. The grant approval rates and average amounts granted compared between women and men must continue to be monitored. Grant approval rates have become equal for several forms of grants in recent years, while differences in amounts granted between women and men have increased slightly.
The Swedish Research Council should also continue to monitor the gender distribution in universities to be able to meet government instructions and appropriation directions. This report presents gender distribution, and how it has changed over time, in different career stages and different subject areas on the university level. Major changes have occurred over the past 10 years with respect to the number of women in comparison to the number of men in different career stages, especially in medicine and health.
One of the most crucial findings of the report is that women early in their careers do not apply for funding from the Swedish Research Council to the same extent as men early in their careers. At present we do not know the reasons why this is the case. The report also shows that the main areas the Swedish Research Council funds have a low proportion of women and a high proportion of men.
The report summarises the recommendations of several European expert groups for research-funding bodies for achieving greater gender equality. The Swedish Research Council has already implemented most of these recommendations at present. What is not being done, or is being done to a lesser extent, is consulting the higher education institutions on gender equality and research funding as well as including gender equality perspectives in research projects.
Sweden's academic career system is often criticised for being insecure and unpredictable. We have compared employment conditions for women and men on the university level and seen that temporary posts are slightly more common among women than among men.