Page 211 - Through the gate of the neoliberal academy • Herschberg

critically questioning and resisting these criteria, their application by committee members may wrongly exclude talented early-career researchers. They limit the pool of ‘acceptable’ candidates to those who fit the narrow definition of the international mobile and excellent early-career researcher.
The peril of potential
In chapter 4, I study the enactment of gender practices in the evaluation of assistant professors in six European higher education institutions. Many committee members expressed that they are in favour of hiring more women academics in order to create a more equal representation of men and women in their departments. However, in this chapter I show how inequalities come to the fore in the assessment of excellence potential that tend to disadvantage women candidates. I explain how inequalities are (re)produced through the stereotypical perceptions, expectations and ascriptions committee members have of and attribute to women (and men) candidates.
Due to the limited track record of candidates for early-career positions, committee members make an assessment of potential, and to do so they rely heavily on tacit criteria. I observe, for example, that committee members perceive a lack of confidence and commitment as well as limited mobility opportunities for women early-career researchers and this way they construct women as less suitable for assistant professor positions. They construct confidence, commitment and international mobility as necessary aspects for survival in what they refer to as the competitive academic world. Committee members reproduce stereotypical images of women as modest, non-competitive, collaborative, and as less devoted to academia because of care responsibilities. I observe one tacit criterion that is considered important for assistant professor positions that might be to the advantage of women candidates: the criterion of academic citizenship. Most committee members confirm the stereotypical belief that women have better relational skills and are more prone towards collaboration and academic service, which suggests that women candidates may score higher on the criterion of academic citizenship than men candidates.
I show that the detrimental gender practices of constructing potential through the perceptions of an ideal, confident, committed, and international mobile early- career researcher are so ubiquitous in all six European higher education institutions that they can cause committee members to make gendered selection decisions, attributing more potential to men researchers. Moreover, committee members tend to put the responsibility of solving gender inequalities on the individual woman researcher making women responsible for limited success in acquiring assistant professor positions. This adds to women researchers’ precariousness who, in the
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