Working Conditions and gender discrimination in the hard sciences sector: the case of National Institute of Nuclear Physics in the South of Italy

The paper analyses the phenomenon of gender discrimination in the Hard Sciences Sector. Our purpose is to discover more hidden dimensions of the discrimination phenomenon, such as the implementation of organizational models, the time management, the productivity indicators, which all refer to men workers. The sample used is the universe of INFN (National Institute for Nuclear Physics) in Naples, a sector of “Hard Sciences” (Physics, Astrophysics, etc...) always known for its strong segregation, both horizontal and vertical (we refer to the underrepresentation of women in the sector and /or in top positions). We used the narrative interviews and the functional analysis to study the characteristics of the workers inside INFN. We interviewed some of the employees at INFN in Naples: researchers, technologists, administrative staff and technicians. The results show that the models adopted inside the organization penalize women and often men too: they affect not so much the conventional discrimination indicators (kind of occupation, wages, tasks to be carried out and so on), but the quality of life of the workers (especially the women); these models find their origin in the way the society and the labor market are structured (e.g. the asymmetry of familiar and house tasks).