Interactions between gender, work, and technology in male-dominated industrial organisations – changes and resistance?
The project aims to synthesise previous research on the constructions of gender in male-dominated work organisations and relate it to the state of the art in gender studies and working life research. The project is about the complexity of the interactions between gender, work, and technology in the industrial work of the future that comes with the green and digital transformation. Major changes in technology and organisation often become challenges of prevailing gender patterns. This can lead to resistance as well as openings for change. By understanding technology, work, and organisation as gendered phenomena, we can better handle resistance and support the development of a better work environment and a sustainable and gender equal working life. The mine is interesting because of the great contrasts between the old and the new. As in other industrial contexts, there are quite stable connections between work, technology, and masculinity. If we can understand why and how these masculinities change (or do not change) in relation to other changes (in technology, work), we can better understand the difficulties of changing unequal gender patterns in the workplace. This project will provide important knowledge contributions since there are currently few new studies of gender, technology and organisation in “classical” and male-dominated industries and of how both gender equality and inequality are done, both doing and undoing gender, in this type of organisations.
Final report
The results of my work in sabbatical projects are presented in a book with the very preliminary working title From macho to the modern with the subtitle Masculinities in transitions in male-dominated organizations. Other keywords that could form a title are Gender equal mining workers or Women and men in the mine with the subtitle Change and resistance in male-dominated organizations. The schedule is for the manuscript to be completed in the spring of 2025 with a preliminary publication in the autumn of 2025. The book is written with a popular science approach, in a partly narrative form and with a certain chronological order.
The book is about what happens in male-dominated industrial workplaces – more specifically mining workplaces – when new technology, improved work environments and increased gender equality challenge and change prevailing workplace cultures and gender patterns. Based on theoretical and empirical findings from 25 years of research on gender and mining, I discuss how changes in mining both affect and are affected by gender constructions and gender orders in the workplace, but also how these gender constructions and gender orders change. The focus is on the tension between, on the one hand, the long history of mining as a stable male-dominated and male-coded industrial work, and on the other hand, the changes in mining and its gender constructions that come from the fact that mining companies for many years have tried to approach the vision of automated, digitalized, safe, sustainable and equal mines. When this book is written in 2025, major technological shifts and investments are underway in the ongoing so-called green and digital industrial transition and neo-industrialization in northern Sweden, which means continued major changes in jobs and workplaces.
Major changes in the workplace tend to challenge prevailing gender patterns by changing important parts of the basis of gender structures – work and workplaces. This, in turn, can lead to gender-based organizational resistance and reproduction of gender constructions and how work, places and organizations are gendered. But also new forms of gender constructions that may be unequal in a different way or are even more equal (Abrahamsson 2020). My argument is that by understanding technology, work and organization as gendered phenomena, we can better manage and prevent such obstacles and resistance processes. This could support the development towards a better working environment and a sustainable and equal working life.
During the work on the book, I have conducted several seminars and presentations of it, not least in Sydney where I spent a few months of the project time. Overall, the work has resulted in new conclusions and new research questions in the field. Below is a preliminary table of contents:
From macho to modern.
Masculinities in transitions in male-dominated organizations.
1. INTRODUCTION
Gender, work and organisation
Making gender and organization
Gender matters in single-sex organisations
Mine workplaces – a male-dominated world
Gender research on women in male-dominated workplaces
An old but modern capital- and technology-intensive export industry
A small industry with a good working environment, well-paid jobs and high status
2. THE COAL MINES: "IT'S IDIOTIC TO BE MACHO"
An extreme work environment
Macho male workplace cultures
Machomanity and resistance to security
The local hegemonic masculinities
The rescue station's double-bottomed stories about coal mining
"It's idiotic to be macho" – but important to be heroic
Communities of Practice and Masculinity Constructions
New attitudes towards occupational safety and new masculinities
The slender, strong and fit male body
3. HOW MINING BECAME MALE
Women worked in the mines during the pre-industrial period
50 percent women in today's artisanal and small-scale mining
The mine maid disappeared
Ideological opposition to women
Ban on women working underground
Women on the sidelines – part of masculinity
Women as wives and energetic and happy laundresses
Women as invisible miners
The image of the male miner
Male homosociality shaped occupational identity and masculinity
4. WOMEN IN A MINORITY IN A MALE-DOMINATED INDUSTRY
Miners' masculinities formed around the old mining work
A few women were employed on dispensation
The ban on women working underground was removed in 1978
The women met resistance
The minority situation created work environment problems (for women)
And it became part of the formation of miners' masculinities
5. "IT'S EASIER TO MINE ORE THAN TO BREAK GENDER PATTERNS"
From breaking gender roles to well-being
Gender equality was given lower priority
Fluctuations in views on gender equality
Then back to breaking gender patterns
The hunt for the women (and the ore)
Views that preserve differences between women and men
But also: "How are we going to get rid of the macho culture?"
The mining culture of the future – a different gender equality project
Lukewarm reactions and sensitive to talk about masculinity
Gender equality became important for ideas about the future of mining
Men and masculinities were the subject of analysis
6. THE MASCULINITIES OF THE MINE
A miner's masculinity with roots in the old mining work
History, mystery and uniqueness
A real miner and man
Different masculinity expressions
A special group of problematic men?
Intertwined masculinities
7. THE MASCULINITIES OF THE MINING COMMUNITY
A new mine is established
Surplus of men in both the Torne Valley and the mining industry
A society for men and a certain kind of masculinity
Men and women in separate worlds
The establishment of a mine means more of the same
But also a different picture and a dawning faith in the future
What happened next?
Bankruptcy, reboot and new problems
8. GENDER EQUALITY AS BRAND BUILDING
Increased demands for new values, attractiveness and diversity
Wash away the image of the mine's macho culture
Hopes that the new technology will solve everything
Inclusion and diversity
More women and more equal workplace cultures
9. MINING WORK IS CHANGING
From the depths of the mountain to the ”seventh heaven”
New technology, new places and new tasks
Better and safer work environment
New ways of organizing work
New competencies
Increased focus on work organisation
Technology-driven changes to work
But also a renaissance for sociotechnology
The future of digitalized mining
Working together with autonomous technology
Safer and more varied work, but also lonely
Learning Organization
Safety and gender equality culture
The green industrial transition
10. A RELUCTANT CONTEXT
Resistance to women and gender equality
Nudes and things like that – an extra work environment problem for women
Defending mining against women
Better now, but also residual raw jargon and sexism
Opposition to gender equality work
Resistance to new technology
Feminization of new technology
Resistance to a better work environment and new values
The workers' collective resists everything new?
Homosociality, loyalty and equality norms
Cheating, sabotage and secret rooms
What happens to the workers' collective in the encounter with the future of work?
A workplace culture that both includes and excludes
Workplace culture is lagging behind
To preserve the links of mining to men and men
11. MASCULINITIES IN TRANSISTIONS
New inequality and new gender boundaries
Cracks in the workers' collective
Variations and ambiguities of change
Equal mining work and equal masculinity?
Attractive, inclusive and safe mining...
Back to the coal mines...
12. CONCLUSIONS
The book is about what happens in male-dominated industrial workplaces – more specifically mining workplaces – when new technology, improved work environments and increased gender equality challenge and change prevailing workplace cultures and gender patterns. Based on theoretical and empirical findings from 25 years of research on gender and mining, I discuss how changes in mining both affect and are affected by gender constructions and gender orders in the workplace, but also how these gender constructions and gender orders change. The focus is on the tension between, on the one hand, the long history of mining as a stable male-dominated and male-coded industrial work, and on the other hand, the changes in mining and its gender constructions that come from the fact that mining companies for many years have tried to approach the vision of automated, digitalized, safe, sustainable and equal mines. When this book is written in 2025, major technological shifts and investments are underway in the ongoing so-called green and digital industrial transition and neo-industrialization in northern Sweden, which means continued major changes in jobs and workplaces.
Major changes in the workplace tend to challenge prevailing gender patterns by changing important parts of the basis of gender structures – work and workplaces. This, in turn, can lead to gender-based organizational resistance and reproduction of gender constructions and how work, places and organizations are gendered. But also new forms of gender constructions that may be unequal in a different way or are even more equal (Abrahamsson 2020). My argument is that by understanding technology, work and organization as gendered phenomena, we can better manage and prevent such obstacles and resistance processes. This could support the development towards a better working environment and a sustainable and equal working life.
During the work on the book, I have conducted several seminars and presentations of it, not least in Sydney where I spent a few months of the project time. Overall, the work has resulted in new conclusions and new research questions in the field. Below is a preliminary table of contents:
From macho to modern.
Masculinities in transitions in male-dominated organizations.
1. INTRODUCTION
Gender, work and organisation
Making gender and organization
Gender matters in single-sex organisations
Mine workplaces – a male-dominated world
Gender research on women in male-dominated workplaces
An old but modern capital- and technology-intensive export industry
A small industry with a good working environment, well-paid jobs and high status
2. THE COAL MINES: "IT'S IDIOTIC TO BE MACHO"
An extreme work environment
Macho male workplace cultures
Machomanity and resistance to security
The local hegemonic masculinities
The rescue station's double-bottomed stories about coal mining
"It's idiotic to be macho" – but important to be heroic
Communities of Practice and Masculinity Constructions
New attitudes towards occupational safety and new masculinities
The slender, strong and fit male body
3. HOW MINING BECAME MALE
Women worked in the mines during the pre-industrial period
50 percent women in today's artisanal and small-scale mining
The mine maid disappeared
Ideological opposition to women
Ban on women working underground
Women on the sidelines – part of masculinity
Women as wives and energetic and happy laundresses
Women as invisible miners
The image of the male miner
Male homosociality shaped occupational identity and masculinity
4. WOMEN IN A MINORITY IN A MALE-DOMINATED INDUSTRY
Miners' masculinities formed around the old mining work
A few women were employed on dispensation
The ban on women working underground was removed in 1978
The women met resistance
The minority situation created work environment problems (for women)
And it became part of the formation of miners' masculinities
5. "IT'S EASIER TO MINE ORE THAN TO BREAK GENDER PATTERNS"
From breaking gender roles to well-being
Gender equality was given lower priority
Fluctuations in views on gender equality
Then back to breaking gender patterns
The hunt for the women (and the ore)
Views that preserve differences between women and men
But also: "How are we going to get rid of the macho culture?"
The mining culture of the future – a different gender equality project
Lukewarm reactions and sensitive to talk about masculinity
Gender equality became important for ideas about the future of mining
Men and masculinities were the subject of analysis
6. THE MASCULINITIES OF THE MINE
A miner's masculinity with roots in the old mining work
History, mystery and uniqueness
A real miner and man
Different masculinity expressions
A special group of problematic men?
Intertwined masculinities
7. THE MASCULINITIES OF THE MINING COMMUNITY
A new mine is established
Surplus of men in both the Torne Valley and the mining industry
A society for men and a certain kind of masculinity
Men and women in separate worlds
The establishment of a mine means more of the same
But also a different picture and a dawning faith in the future
What happened next?
Bankruptcy, reboot and new problems
8. GENDER EQUALITY AS BRAND BUILDING
Increased demands for new values, attractiveness and diversity
Wash away the image of the mine's macho culture
Hopes that the new technology will solve everything
Inclusion and diversity
More women and more equal workplace cultures
9. MINING WORK IS CHANGING
From the depths of the mountain to the ”seventh heaven”
New technology, new places and new tasks
Better and safer work environment
New ways of organizing work
New competencies
Increased focus on work organisation
Technology-driven changes to work
But also a renaissance for sociotechnology
The future of digitalized mining
Working together with autonomous technology
Safer and more varied work, but also lonely
Learning Organization
Safety and gender equality culture
The green industrial transition
10. A RELUCTANT CONTEXT
Resistance to women and gender equality
Nudes and things like that – an extra work environment problem for women
Defending mining against women
Better now, but also residual raw jargon and sexism
Opposition to gender equality work
Resistance to new technology
Feminization of new technology
Resistance to a better work environment and new values
The workers' collective resists everything new?
Homosociality, loyalty and equality norms
Cheating, sabotage and secret rooms
What happens to the workers' collective in the encounter with the future of work?
A workplace culture that both includes and excludes
Workplace culture is lagging behind
To preserve the links of mining to men and men
11. MASCULINITIES IN TRANSISTIONS
New inequality and new gender boundaries
Cracks in the workers' collective
Variations and ambiguities of change
Equal mining work and equal masculinity?
Attractive, inclusive and safe mining...
Back to the coal mines...
12. CONCLUSIONS