Page 175 - Through the gate of the neoliberal academy • Herschberg

countering inequality dynamics and facilitating equality practices.
Selecting for diversity
I observed during my various studies that many academics who are involved in the recruitment and selection of early-career researchers expressed that they are in favour of a more equal representation of men and women staff members in the department, which in most departments entailed advocating an increase of women researchers. In most institutions that I included in my study, policies prescribe that in case of equal qualification of two candidates, women are preferred over men candidates for positions in which women are underrepresented. This practice is known in the literature as the “tie-break” selection (Noon, 2012) where the “under-representation of people with certain demographic characteristics” (such as gender) is taken into account “in order to make the final choice between equally qualified candidates when appointing or promoting” (pp. 77-78, emphasis added). However, several research participants argued that they have never seen this measure put in practice because they never consider two candidates equally qualified. This measure does not seem to result in the intended impact.
Noon (2012) offers a more progressive approach that might serve the academic institutions that I included in my studies, but also other institutions within and outside academia. He calls this approach “threshold selection”, which is “a method of choosing between candidates who have met minimum standards required for the job across a range of selection criteria” (p. 77). Then, after this threshold, a criterion like diversity in staff composition can be used to make the final selection decision. Interestingly, I have observed multiple hiring procedures in which committee members argued that all candidates whom they had invited for a job interview, would be qualified candidates for the position. However, they would then not hire a woman candidate (if selected for the interview), despite their expressed wish to increase the number of women in the department, but committee members would instead engage in (sometimes extensive) committee deliberations in which they practiced gender, to the disadvantage of women candidates. The threshold selection method can assist in hiring qualified women candidates and prevent the disqualification of women candidates based on characteristics other than the formal selection criteria.
GENERAL DISCUSSION 173
6