ABSTRACT
Do you recognize this quote? The person who shared this anecdote? This is a story that was told by Larry Summers, at the time president of Harvard University, who was trying to explain to a conference aimed at diversifying the science and engineering workforce why he thought there were gender disparities (Summers, 2005). Summers implied that there was a basic biological difference between men and women that accounted for the disparity, and he dismissed socialization and discrimination as having minimal impact. He made these remarks in January 2005, tried to clarify them a few days later, and outright apologized 1 month later. During the intervening month, he was educated about much of the research that you read in Chapters 4 and 5 and some of what you will read in Chapter 6. It was too late, though. He inspired the furor of women’s groups all over the country as well as the faculty of Harvard. One year later he resigned. It probably didn’t help that the number of women faculty who had received tenure during his 5 years of administration had declined (Bombardieri, 2005). Yes, this is the same Mr. Summers who was appointed by President Obama in 2008 to be the Assistant to the President for Economic Policy and Director of the National Economic Council.
