15 ms·

Why is Russia so good at encouraging women into tech?

147 points by carlmungz 10y ago

JackPoach 10y ago
In reality Russia neither encourages nor discourages to go women into tech. But there's a long tradition way back from the Soviet years, when women flew in Space, worked as ministers, etc.
sartemis 10y ago
because there are fewer stereotypes. Maybe well be a leftover from communism as well, when individualism was strongly discouraged and the only way you could stand out is by doing your job well. Individualism I mean in all aspects of current society - choice and variety of this. I suspect there is a similar trend in China as well.
- gambiting 10y ago
  If that was the case, then I would expect the exact opposite forces to work. My ex used to study mechanical engineering at one of the top universities of poland and the older professors who must have tenured during communism would frequently either openly ask "what is a girl doing in this class" or one straight up said to her that he doesn't believe women can be engineers. She complained to university only to be told that the professor was joking and nothing happened. Communism might have been promoting individualism, but certainly engineering professions were men-only affairs.
- thirdsun 10y ago
  > Maybe well be a leftover from communism That may very well play a role. Here in former East Germany women were expected to work despite being parents which resulted in some side effects like widely available daycare / kindergartens.
- stiGGG 10y ago
  >because there are fewer stereotypes. Maybe well be a leftover from communism as well It think this is the main reason. Stereotypes are great for capitalism. I can speak only for germany, but in the 90es i felt, there was a movement to reduce this gender stereotypes stuff, but this got completly reverted in the last 15 years or so. Nowadays there exists a Kinder Surprise Girls Edition with pink flowers on the packaging and special potato chips flavors for men and women (WTF). I also recognise the effects frim this in my personal environment, with young parents going full into this stereotype things. The boy has to play football from day one he can walk. The younger daughter can not wear clothes from is older brother because they are not pink and she is put into ballett school ignoring that she obviously prefers football too. It's a real shame!
  - usrusr 10y ago
    > The younger daughter can not wear clothes from is older brother because they are not pink From the industry point of view, hand-me-down is a bug that has since been fixed, at least 50% of it. Business cannot uphold ideas when they are at odds with profit (single companies can, as long as they are not public, but business as a whole can't).
- Frqy3 10y ago
  The phrase used in China was that women hold up half the sky, and the expectation was that males and females participated equally in the economy. While there has been some regression on this coinciding with more exposure to Western culture, I still notice that there is a much higher proportion of women in Chinese tech companies than in Western ones, although not a 50-50 split.
dep_b 10y ago
I think there's a high correlation between the relative salary for a techie compared to other jobs in the same country and the amount of women you see. The US pays a lot better than The Netherlands and has a much higher percentage of female programmers. In countries like India or Russia a developer earns even more compared to other traditionally well paying careers. Maybe a smart girl is so smart she's not going to get underpaid for her skills?
- raducu 10y ago
  Eastern European here: in 2003 when I joined a computer science university I had ~15% female colleagues; as the net salaries for programmers have reached ~70% of the western european levels(while average salaries are nowhere near that level), I see about 40% of the interns being females. So, this might not be politically correct, but yeah, I think women pursue safe, well-trodden paths while men are much more likely to be single-minded risk takers.
macspoofing 10y ago
I've seen it argued that, paradoxically, the richer and more egalitarian a society is, the more the differences are magnified in the kinds choices individuals of both genders make. So Russia being a poorer nation with less paths to success would lead more women to make career choices based around economics, while in Sweden, a richer welfare state, economic factors may be a lower driver.
- paganel 10y ago
  > I've seen it argued that, paradoxically, the richer and more egalitarian a society is, The former-Communist East-European country I lived in as a kid was a lot more egalitarian than most of present-day Western countries and the women were treated pretty much the same as men were when it came to work. I remember as a kid that I regarded my mother going each morning to work and returning in the evening as a very normal thing, and I regarded the few kids' mothers who weren't doing that as being lazy (to this day I still think that a stay-at-home parent is a lazy human being). State-run kindergartens were also of much help for women back then.
  - 2muchcoffeeman 10y ago
    > The former-Communist East-European country I lived in as a kid was a lot more egalitarian than most of present-day Western countries That really depends on how you measure gender equality and general freedom though. > to this day I still think that a stay-at-home parent is a lazy human being You're just being too judgemental though. If a family is wanting for nothing and they agree that one parent should stay at home to spend more time looking after the family, why not?
    - paganel 10y ago
      > That really depends on how you measure gender equality and general freedom though. Like I said, gender equality was pretty well established. "General freedom" doesn't have that much in common with equality, we can all be equal but not free. I'd say that for further reading on the matter Mona Ozouf's essays on "liberté, égalité, fraternité" is a good starting point (a related article about it in French: http://www.letelegramme.fr/bretagne/mona-ozouf-pas-simple-de-faire-vivre-la-liberte-et-l-egalite-04-04-2015-10582676.php http://www.letelegramme.fr/bretagne/mona-ozouf-pas-simple-de...) > You're just being too judgemental though. If a family is wanting for nothing and they agree that one parent should stay at home to spend more time looking after the family, why not? I know this point-view might be seen as judgemental, it's just that I see people not contributing back to society with their work-time as not giving it all. It's not a matter of money, I am a little marxist inside me and I do believe that work it's one of the things that define us as a species. I've heard my ~84-year-old peasant grandma' saying that she was very upset that her legs were hurting her because she wanted to continue working.
DarkKomunalec 10y ago
Good for them. Hopefully after we reduce the gender tech gap, we can focus on fixing the far below-replacement-level fertility in Europe, North America, and Russia. Personally I find it to be more pressing, but it gets barely any press...
- sanswork 10y ago
  Why? It's not like we are in risk of running out of humans on the planet.
  - simonsarris 10y ago
    IQ is highly heritable[1], and if smart people are having zero or one children, that should be of concern to everyone. It's possible that nutrition + butts in school seats created the Flynn effect, where the population's IQ rose. The next century might see the reverse. [1] Per gwern: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13729085 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13729085
    - sanswork 10y ago
      Are you saying people in Europe, north America, and Russia are smarter than people in the rest of the world?
      - redfieu 10y ago
        Across East Asia birth rates are also well below replacement levels. A lot of the world's population growth is coming from rapid increases in Africa.
        sanswork 10y ago
        I mean the fact that you went and registered a throwaway to head down the path you're intending to gives away what you are really thinking.
beaconstudios 10y ago
my guess: a cultural and social value placed on STEM subjects. My personal theory is that young women in the West are less likely to get into tech because they are seen as stuffy, the domain of greybeards and model train enthusiasts. Don't forget that people generally pick up their core interest in subjects at a young age where social value and coolness are some of the most important personal objectives (early teen years). I think the advent of the startup as being culturally associated with youth and creativity (i.e. that they're cool) is helping to rectify this image, but the startup industry has only recently gotten into mainstream culture. [edit: as tptacek notes, this is not an issue that extends to all of STEM, so I've updated my comment to reflect this. I've left in the highlight on Russia placing cultural value on STEM subjects because I think it's relevant, and that saying Russian culture places value in programming but ignoring the value of Maths, Science and other logical pursuits like Chess would be giving a partial and inaccurate picture. Also, I'm not Russian myself so this is purely an outside-looking-in perspective.]
- tptacek 10y ago
  I don't want to repeat this comment but worry that I'll have to: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14164886 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14164886 There is major disparity in tech, but it is not a problem common to all STEM fields.
  - rimliu 10y ago
    The kind of work you do in STEM field is not the same across them.
    - tptacek 10y ago
      Mathematics is so thematically similar to CS that it used to house the CS departments. Please don't waste your time trying to conjure an argument about how CS somehow requires a different kind of brain than mathematics.
      - douche 10y ago
madengr 10y ago
Russia has a very low birth rate for native Russians. Here in the US, having kids and working in engineering is difficult. My wife took 5 years off and it has definitely affected her pay and advancement. Low pay and little vacation maybe have something to do with it too. Both the wife and I are engineers. Our daughter shows no interest in tech. She does like to mix stuff, so maybe Chem E. Though I'm not going to prod her. STEM just does not pay over the long term.
- drittich 10y ago
  >STEM just does not pay over the long term. Whaa? What's your definition of pay? Anyway, IMO no prodding needed - expose the child to a wide variety of things, and then help them find and nurture their passion.
  - madengr 10y ago
    $100k - $200k long term (ages 30 - 67). STEM has initial high pay, but tops out by middle age. Late middle age, or 55+, and you are a target for elimination. My coworkers daughter and her husband are both accountants. In their mid 30's they are doing much better than any STEM majors. They will both be firm partners by 40. +200k salaries for two people over 27 years (not that they'd work to 67 anyway). I know of a mechanical engineer who went into finance. Not a quant, or even in NY. Just a manager for VISA. Her bonus is larger than my salary, and so is her salary. STEM, well really TE, need to bank that initial high salary for, often forced, early retirement. SM majors, you are just fucked.
    - sanswork 10y ago
      Most accountants will never make partner. You are taking two exceptions and comparing them to the whole population. You should be comparing them to people who become CTOs. Besides that most people will never even make half of your lower end salary during their whole career.
      - kamaal 10y ago
maxxxxx 10y ago
They had female fighter pilots in world war 2 and the first female astronauts. That was long before anybody in the west could even think of that possibility. Not sure if it's a Russian thing or communism. East Germany also had more female engineers and scientists.
- treehau5 10y ago
  Yep. They just expected women to be able to do the same thing as men. There weren't these half-hearted attempts to "boost diversity" that just never, ever feel genuine. There are Russian greats across the board both male and female -- even pre-soviet. But yes, female astronauts, engineers. Go back a couple centuries, and you had Catherine the Great -- one of the greatest and longest tenured Russian monarchs, a woman. The faith of the Russian people -- the Orthodox Faith -- venerates a woman as the "greatest Saint" and the "Queen of Heaven". It's just always been a part of the mindset. So women are everywhere and it just isn't treated as anything out of the ordinary, or as hitting some diversity figure. It needs to be natural.
- raducu 10y ago
  There's a wikipedia page with with female astronauts(google list of female astronauts). Out of the 60 that actually flew to space, only 2 are from the USSR/Russia, and both of them were elected to the soviet/people's representatives, so I'd say female astronauts in the USSR was nothing but a publicity stunt.
  - maxxxxx 10y ago
    Actually it's four as far as I could see but your point is valid.
  - areyousure 10y ago
    Random statistics alert. Of those 60 women in space: 2 flew on Chinese spacecraft, 10 flew only on Russian spacecraft, 42 flew only on American spacecraft, and 6 flew on both American and Russian spacecraft (including the one woman currently in space).
- LyndsySimon 10y ago
cabalamat 10y ago
It's because Russia isn't a particularly nice place to live. From the article: > Most of the girls we talked to from other countries had a slightly playful approach to Stem, whereas in Russia, even the very youngest were extremely focused on the fact that their future employment opportunities were more likely to be rooted in Stem subjects. They do tech because it provides a way of getting a good life. In the West, where conditions are less harsh, women don't feel the need to go into tech to get a good life. Similar considerations explain why female university students are more likely to do STEM subjects in Iran than in Sweden. This, incidentally, blows out of the water the argument made by some feminists that women don't do STEM because of conditioning in nasty patriarchal societies.
- tptacek 10y ago
  Without engaging in any of the rest of your comment, I'm going to call out again the attempt to shift goalposts from tech to STEM in general. Tech people want to believe that the gender disparity in their field is shared among all the STEM fields, but, of course, it is not: women are far better represented in other STEM fields. Computer science, physics, and engineering have similarly acute gender disparity. The rest of the STEM fields --- including mathematics --- have closer to 50/50, and some STEM fields, like molecular biology, have better than 50% representation of women.
  - stablemap 10y ago
    I hesitate to hold up mathematics as a good example. There are an encouraging number of female majors but further down the pipeline the numbers get much worse. For tenured faculty positions the latest number [1] I've seen is 14%. [1] http://www.ams.org/profession/data/annual-survey/ http://www.ams.org/profession/data/annual-survey/
  - ohstopitu 10y ago
    so would you say those fields that have >50% women would need to work on their gender diversity to include more men?
    - 10y ago
SilverSlash 10y ago
Maybe because like men all over the world, Russian women aren't specially "encouraged" to go into tech? Maybe nobody has to tell them or tell anyone to 'like science'. People just do. The same argument goes for women in science. Albert Einstein was told he wouldn't amount to much. Doesn't mean he 'got discouraged' and quit physics. That's not why we do science - for public appreciation - we do it because we love it no matter what anyone else says. This is the point that the girls in tech people miss I think. Instead of buying your daughters lego sets with women wearing fancy lab coats and looking into telescopes, buy them gyroscopes, or electronics kits, or lego's own DIY robot? None of the toys mentioned above feature gender and actually give a sense of what science is about. I'm open to hear your thoughts, especially from women.
- raducu 10y ago
  Do you have any data on this? I'd be willing to bet women are nowhere near as interested in a pure science career in Russia as they are in IT. I think it has to do with psycho-evolutionary factors -- men have much more incentives to take risks, women much more so to play it safe.
  - laughingman2 10y ago
    Yeah right, and how did you arrive at your reasoning, any list of scientific studies? This is good old sexist/racist talk "X is inferior in math because genes"
    - eof 10y ago
      This is not just humans, virtually every species has obvious gender roles and proclivities. Where humans differ, is our faculty for reason and (to some degree) overcoming our intuition. In my opinion, it's obvious that women being under represented in STEM is caused significantly by both evolutionary /and/ cultural factors.
    - raducu 10y ago
      That is not what I was saying, far from it. My evidence is anecdotal, but think about it -- Russia recently decriminalized domestic violence, not exactly the hallmark of gender equality, that's surely not the reason why more females are interested in IT in Russia. I was not suggesting that females are inferior to men, just that males and females will make vastly different life choices because of psycho-evolution. It's a scientific fact that while male and female median IQ is the same, men have much more variability (more men at the extremes). Just think about your reproductive strategy(not necessarily in the modern monogamous society)-- you have bilions upon billions of sperm replenished every day while females produce one egg per month. A smarter/fitter man can produce much more offsprings than a smarter/fitter female. That has got to produce some profound differences in the way men and women behave.
chiefalchemist 10y ago
It's the wrong question. Which is ironic, since the inability to ask to right question (about the US) is indicative of the problem (here). The question tech here should be asking is: If our "party" is so great (and being the self-absorbed Kool Aid drinkers that we are, we're 100% certain it is), how come so few outside our immediate circle wants to come to our party? Maybe it's not them? Maybe it's us? Could it be us? No!!! Never!!! It can't be us. THAT is what should be the mindset of trying to understand to problem. It's not. Funny tho'. Tech is willing to solve all the rest of the world's problems. But it's unwilling - and unable? - to solve its own. Yeah I know. Let the down votes begin. Please feel free, cause that only proves my point.
- 2muchcoffeeman 10y ago
  What are you even on about??? 1. We don't understand what our problem is. 2. Nothing we try seems to really work. 3. So we compare ourselves to places that don't have the problem. 4. We hope the differences shed some light on the things we are doing wrong so we can change. Why exactly do you think they take other countries as case studies?
  - chiefalchemist 10y ago
    Did I type too fast for you? :) Let me break it down. Nice and simple...The answer isn't in Russia or any other country for that matter. The answer is in the mirror. IF you're willing and able to look into it. The key to problem solving is...wait for it...to identify the right problem. But before that, it's admitting you have a problem. So how exactly does looking at Russia help? (Hint: it doesn't.) And now, look at that, we're back at the mirror, or should me. p.s. Thanks for the DV. As already mentioned, it only makes my case stronger.
hamilyon2 10y ago
Maybe 70 years of praising progress and science had some lasting cultural effect.
- PerfectDlite 10y ago
  If you think that USSR "praised progress and science" for 70 years, I have some grim news for you...
djkrudy 10y ago
Probably the same way they're so good at getting 9 year olds into the Olympics.
- nommm-nommm 10y ago
  That's China, not Russia and while its almost indisputable that age falsification happened nobody was that young, more like 14. I think one even confessed to being underage a few years later. Its worth noting the age limit for gymnastics was only raised to 16 in 2000 and many previous Olympic gymnasts competed while 14, including Nadia Comăneci who earned a perfect score (which was until then considered unobtainable, the scoreboards weren't equipped to even handle that score) at 14. Of course, at the time, the Chinese athletes were competing against other athletes that followed the age rules which, arguably, gave them an unfair advantage. That's all irrelevant though because the whole subject is totally off topic.
baybal2 10y ago
Offtopic: I dated a girl who programmed ICBM guidance blocks from Russia :) I'm so proud of this fact :)
djkrudy 10y ago
Probably the same way they're so good at getting 9 year olds into the Olympics.
baybal2 10y ago
In 1988, 64 percent of Engineers were women in USSR
thriftwy 10y ago
Is it? I had one female engineer at my previous job, and one female engineer at my current job. Out of a medium-sized team. Some other less-technical positions held by women, still much less than 50%.
keymone 10y ago
the reason there are many women in tech is simple: IT jobs pay ridiculously good compared to non-IT jobs and barrier of entry has been lowered enough for even non-techy women to realize they can train for few weeks and get a solid paying job as junior QA. and when they are smart and went for math/technical education - being software developer is a no brainer, it pays easily 10-100 times better than average job in any other sector. same thing is happening in ukraine: https://s.dou.ua/files/lenta/salary-report-dec-2016/fem-titles.png https://s.dou.ua/files/lenta/salary-report-dec-2016/fem-titl... full survey: https://dou.ua/lenta/articles/salary-report-dec-2016/?from=salaries https://dou.ua/lenta/articles/salary-report-dec-2016/?from=s... compare to previous surveys: https://jobs.dou.ua/salaries/demography/dec2016/ https://jobs.dou.ua/salaries/demography/dec2016/
rntz 10y ago
> According to Unesco, 29% of women worldwide are in science research, compared with 41% in Russia. In the UK, about 4% of inventors are women, whereas the figure is 15% in Russia. These numbers seem ludicrously high regardless of gender. I'd be surprised to hear that 29% - almost 3 of 10 - men were scientists. Is what they're actually saying that 29% of scientists are women worldwide, but in russia it's 41%? That would make more sense.
- Safety1stClyde 10y ago
  It's just a typo for 29% of science researchers are women.
drglitch 10y ago
Being from that part of the world, I think there are two factors - first, a lot of previous generation females are in engineering/stem - back in soviet times there were a ton of engineering positions and therefore a lot of women went on to fill them. Today this lead to a lot of engineer-mothers who encourage their daughters to be same. Second, and I think more important, is that engineering jobs pay - and especially so today. Given the issues with economy there, being an engineer (not just software) yoru'e almost guaranteed to find a job, either at home or remote/abroad.
mynegation 10y ago
As a Russian who got university education in Russia and worked in both Russia and Canada, I can confirm that the reasons are both cultural and economic. First, for the big part Soviet Russia did not have a sizeable percentage of stay-at-home mothers: women were _expected_ to work, childcare was absolutely free, tight living conditions made multi-generational families, when retired grand-parents took care of children, a norm. It is also true that once young women chose to work they tried to maximize the earnings while not going to high-paying jobs traditionary considered male (think police or oil rig jobs in Siberia). It used to be law and business degrees, but now it means STEM.
- paganel 10y ago
  > women were _expected_ to work, I also grew up in Eastern Europe in the '80s, and this is what most of present-day Westerners don't get. And women were not supposed to hold only "women-related" jobs, for example my aunt was an industrial-crane operator.
  - branchless 10y ago
    Socialist countries (whether in theory or in practice) tend to put more of an emphasis on equal rights.
    - deleted 10y ago
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    - mynegation 10y ago
      Too bad you were downvoted, because it is actually true. People here probably confuse the good civil rights (which socialist countries in Eastern Europe did not have) with the equality of rights. USSR constitutions actually had an article of every citizen being guaranteed the right to work.
      - branchless 10y ago
        HN capitalism zealots care not for facts
kimsbutt 10y ago
It's fascinating that she would think "there's no problem at all", but this is a quite common opinion in Russia. However, if other Russian tech women from Skolkovo state dramatically different things, who's bullshiting: Anna, BBC or both? https://sk.ru/news/b/articles/archive/2016/03/08/celebrating-women-in-science-and-technology-on-international-women_2700_s-day.aspx https://sk.ru/news/b/articles/archive/2016/03/08/celebrating...
- erikj 10y ago
  Skolkovo is a Potemkin village, all real work is being done elsewhere.
odiroot 10y ago
If they're anything like my country, Poland, and we were pretty similar before (together in Warsaw pact) there basically doesn't have to be any "encouraging women". Your gender doesn't matter that much. Both men and women usually pursue most of the majors. And in physics and maths you usually substantial amounts of women. In IT, being pretty fresh in this part of the world, men are majority but still not overwhelming. Anecdata: from primary school to the end of my university I've only had male maths teachers for a year and a half. I don't have an immediate source for this but I have an impression that post-Soviet societies are a lot more equal than Western ones.
- dgudkov 10y ago
  I can confirm it (born in USSR, grew up in Eastern Europe). It's an interesting phenomenon which I believe can be explained by the fact that the movement for gender equality was started by marxist-bolsheviks in 1900-1920s, almost 50 years before it started in Western countries. Arguably, it was more successful and led to less controversy in society than what I can now see in Western countries. One of the key differences was that gender equality was initiated and led by the Soviet government (i.e. it was top-down) according to Karl Marx's ideology. While, in the West it was initiated and led by civil activists -- i.e. it was bottom-up.
usrusr 10y ago
Provocative idea: maybe modern Russia is just bad at getting men into tech, so that a relative large part of the existing STEM inertia left over from Soviet days falls on women? Not saying that it is true, but from my outside perspective, it could be part of the puzzle. Also, the Soviet era contained a lot of progressives in terms of gender roles. That is easy to forget with today's stereotypes of male-exclusive buddy networks on all levels of economic success and high-heeled golddiggers. (again: outside perspective! I don't know the facts on the ground, just talking about perception)
- korzun 10y ago
  Provocative idea: Maybe nobody in Russia cares about the whole gender thing and (surprise!) women can like and study things they want. You sound like a caveman: 'Maybe woman are learning to drive cars because men can't drive anymore?!'
- uzoodoo 10y ago
  That's a good question! Has anyone ever met a male Russian programmer? I don't think I've ever heard of one! /s
  - usrusr 10y ago
    That's where the word "relative" comes in!
futun 10y ago
Silly Americans. You are always prohibited from talking about the differences between men and women. Americans think that men and women are exactly the same except for genitalia. We Russians don't. It's an example of primitive, anti-scientific thinking driven by America's cult-like obsession with gender equality. Historically speaking, placing "equality of outcome" over "equality of opportunity" destroys nations. America will learn this the hard way, I think. Here is the reality which is too painful for Americans to accept: Women are as good at STEM as men. Women have a high capacity in STEM. BUT statistically, far fewer women than men enjoy STEM. Women are less interested in STEM. And no, that's not because of some invisible patriarchy. It's because wealth affords choice. Here's a news flash: Women like different things than men do. Entertainment, fashion and other industries understand this deeply. But tech apparently does not. Women and men have different goals, and therefore different tastes. (That's statistically supportable. But since it doesn't match the narrative, it's always easier to brand it as "sexist". Which is deeply ironic considering we're talking about science here.) Let the down-modding begin... for great justice.
- nnfy 10y ago
  So absurd that even in a community like this, one is not allowed to suggest inconvenient answers to certain questions.
  - Chris2048 10y ago
    I'd agree sensitive topic require thoughtful posts, but the epedemic of "I'll down-vote because I'm emotionally offended by the conclusion" rather than discussion on topics is a shame.
    - Chris2048 10y ago
      case-in-point..
- CalRobert 10y ago
  If you make a poor argument with emotionally loaded words (e.g. "primitive"), and then phrase it such that downvoting is a vindication of your argument, you are not contributing to the discussion. You're just lazy.
m23khan 10y ago
same thing in China as well - Chinese ladies and men are both serious in their studies. I think it has to do with the national psyche developed during the harsh years of Communism where either inherited wealth or proving academic mettle meant getting a comfortable lifestyle. In Soviet Union, it is no secret how much the scientists, mathematicians as well as intelligent people (e.g. chess players) were revered on national level.
mason240 10y ago
They didn't have a culture that depicted everyone in tech as terrible smelling, overweight or scrawny, socially inept losers.
to_bpr 10y ago
I'd be really interested to see some thorough research into the possible factors behind this. I've personally zero experience with Russian culture beyond what makes it to the media. From a Western perspective, we've a society that promotes and idolizes women based on their looks and sex appeal. Young girls look up to and subscribe to the snapchats of people like the Kardashians and other transient entities with a very low social value-add but a very large capitalist value add (product promotion, sales, etc.). The visibility into successful women outside of these looks or "personality" orientated industries is about on par with the modern man. Successful female scientists and successful male scientists receive roughly the same media or social coverage. Successful female business people and successful male business people receive roughly the same, etc etc. (all anecdotally based / personal experience / intuition). There's also a (social?) pushback against successful non-media women bringing themselves to the spotlight (such as Sandberg) for being seen as pushing themselves into the spotlight for being successful despite being a woman. Like others have suggested, it could also have to do with the lack of routes to prosperity offered in Russia vs the West. As a whole, women in the West are have far greater access to self-actualization than men in the West, which also spreads the same women across many more routes while condensing men into a more fixed set. Again, all non-academic and anecdotal but intuitively I feel that, like many other social issues in Western society, the heavy capitalist nature of our society is likely the root of any "issue" we perceive here.
- kutkloon7 10y ago
  I can't speak for all of Russia, but most Russian women I've encountered seem to have an even stronger desire to look good than many Western women.
- Arizhel 10y ago
  >From a Western perspective, we've a society that promotes and idolizes women based on their looks and sex appeal. Maybe, but it's interesting that at least in America (which is relevant since you specifically cite the Kardashians), women don't actually put much effort into looking good. Obesity in America is among the highest in the world (Mexico is a little higher). On average, you'll have a much easier time meeting attractive women in Russia, east Asia, or anywhere in Europe (except probably the UK). People just aren't as fat in other countries. So while American society might "idolize" women based on looks/sex appeal, I don't see that actually translating to regular women trying to look good, or succeeding at it at any rate. People here like to look at pretty people on TV and in the movies, sure, but that doesn't translate to them trying to make themselves look good. They'd rather drive everywhere in their big SUV and drink sodas and eat junk food.
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korzun 10y ago
Are you telling me the countries that could care less about spamming elegant PR pieces every other day about women in technology, have more women engineers? Can we brainwash them with a Chinese version of Kardashians or something?
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- robteix 10y ago
  > Are you telling me the countries that could care less about spamming elegant PR pieces every other day about women in technology, have more women engineers? Wouldn't that be natural though? If there was no issue of lack of diversity, there would not be a need for PR pieces on the subject, right? So the fact that PR pieces about women in technology exist may very well be a good indicator that there is a lack of women in tech.
- dang 10y ago
  Please don't do this here. These threads are problematic enough without it. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14164831 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14164831 and marked it off-topic.
Grue3 10y ago
Because the basic premise of the article is wrong. Nowhere where I worked the ratio of women in tech positions has exceeded 10%. In many ways people here are way more sexist. At my former job my superior told me that he had a job application from a woman and said to me basically "women can't be programmers, their brains are just wired differently" and asked me if I met any women programmers. I said the gender doesn't matter, and yes, we had one woman programmer at a job before that one, and she was pretty good (but yeah, just one). Anyway, he actually hired her, so I'd like to think I changed his mind.
- reitanqild 10y ago
  And that is IMO the way it should be done: standing up and saying the obvious with enough power that it actually get heard.
avdicius 10y ago
The article totally misses the point. It just picks a single area and wonders why in this particular area women and men are more equal in Russia than in the West. By asking such a narrow question you will never get the right answer. The right answer is that in Russia there is more gender equality in general and therefore in every particular area too. For instance, from a women-in-business study it follows that the proportion of female-ocuppied senior management positions in Russia is 47% while in the US it's 23% and in UK it's 19%. https://www.grantthornton.global/en/insights/articles/women-in-business-2017/ https://www.grantthornton.global/en/insights/articles/women-... A quote from it: "Eastern Europe continues to top the rankings (see figure 3), with Russia in the lead as the only country in which every business has a woman on its senior leadership team. In Poland, the proportion of senior roles held by women has improved by six percent to 40%. The region owes some of its strong performance to the legacy of communist principles which have placed women as equals for generations." Of course, such a conclusion goes against the main-stream narrative of communism being all about abuse and human rights violations while the West being the undisputed champion of human rights. So the BBC article just have to provide the following paragraph: "While Russia is doing something right, it's still not there yet in terms of gender parity." What is this about? Nothing. Whatever the subject is BBC must retain some reservations about Russia however unsubstantiated they are.
- therpe1 10y ago
  Exactly. This article is naive to think there's something special about IT. All the mental gymnastics in the world can't avoid what is a pretty obvious truth: women in Eastern Europe never suffered a lost century of labor prejudice while women in the West did. Since 1917 (and even a bit before then) advanced labor and education institutions in Eastern Europe did not systematically exclude women the way these institutions did in the West. Free of systemic prejudice, women in Eastern Europe have historically been equal to men in terms of participation in the labor force and in education. The numbers on this are very clear if people are willing to look. (What makes this all doubly ironic is that in these same areas "feminism" has, until recently, not taken off and they were somehow viewed as backwards by feminists in the West.)
ryanx435 10y ago
isn't this because there were very few males left after WWII (because they all died) to enter the workforce, so women had to step up to fill in the gaps? I think I remember reading that there were so few males left that the soviets literally bussed males around the country to impregnate women so they could rebuild their population.
wwwater 10y ago
This article massively exaggerates the positive attitude Russians have towards women in tech. My Russian mother keeps telling me time to time that there must be something wrong with me that I have this genuine interest in tech things being a girl, because "all this physics and computers is not a girl's business"... As some commentators already mentioned, Soviet Union tried to make no distinction between male and female professions. But nowadays social roles of men and women are strongly polarized and Stem mostly considered as not women's business.
amai 10y ago
Russian women also have fewer prejudices against male scientists.
amai 10y ago
"Only 14 percent of Russian women confirmed they were using birth control pills." (https://rbth.com/society/2013/03/28/russian_women_prefer_abortion_to_the_pill_24379.html https://rbth.com/society/2013/03/28/russian_women_prefer_abo...) Maybe not taking artificial hormones keeps women interested in science and tech?
icegore 10y ago
Listen, people. Those whom we call Russians have at least KILLED 10 000 Ukrainians at the time being in the east of Ukraine. What do you discuss? Their women? Are there any?

147 points by carlmungz 10y ago

In reality Russia neither encourages nor discourages to go women into tech. But there's a long tradition way back from the Soviet years, when women flew in Space, worked as ministers, etc.

sartemis 10y ago

because there are fewer stereotypes. Maybe well be a leftover from communism as well, when individualism was strongly discouraged and the only way you could stand out is by doing your job well. Individualism I mean in all aspects of current society - choice and variety of this. I suspect there is a similar trend in China as well.

gambiting 10y ago
If that was the case, then I would expect the exact opposite forces to work. My ex used to study mechanical engineering at one of the top universities of poland and the older professors who must have tenured during communism would frequently either openly ask "what is a girl doing in this class" or one straight up said to her that he doesn't believe women can be engineers. She complained to university only to be told that the professor was joking and nothing happened. Communism might have been promoting individualism, but certainly engineering professions were men-only affairs.
thirdsun 10y ago
> Maybe well be a leftover from communism That may very well play a role. Here in former East Germany women were expected to work despite being parents which resulted in some side effects like widely available daycare / kindergartens.
stiGGG 10y ago
>because there are fewer stereotypes. Maybe well be a leftover from communism as well It think this is the main reason. Stereotypes are great for capitalism. I can speak only for germany, but in the 90es i felt, there was a movement to reduce this gender stereotypes stuff, but this got completly reverted in the last 15 years or so. Nowadays there exists a Kinder Surprise Girls Edition with pink flowers on the packaging and special potato chips flavors for men and women (WTF). I also recognise the effects frim this in my personal environment, with young parents going full into this stereotype things. The boy has to play football from day one he can walk. The younger daughter can not wear clothes from is older brother because they are not pink and she is put into ballett school ignoring that she obviously prefers football too. It's a real shame!
- usrusr 10y ago
  > The younger daughter can not wear clothes from is older brother because they are not pink From the industry point of view, hand-me-down is a bug that has since been fixed, at least 50% of it. Business cannot uphold ideas when they are at odds with profit (single companies can, as long as they are not public, but business as a whole can't).
Frqy3 10y ago
The phrase used in China was that women hold up half the sky, and the expectation was that males and females participated equally in the economy. While there has been some regression on this coinciding with more exposure to Western culture, I still notice that there is a much higher proportion of women in Chinese tech companies than in Western ones, although not a 50-50 split.

dep_b 10y ago

I think there's a high correlation between the relative salary for a techie compared to other jobs in the same country and the amount of women you see. The US pays a lot better than The Netherlands and has a much higher percentage of female programmers. In countries like India or Russia a developer earns even more compared to other traditionally well paying careers. Maybe a smart girl is so smart she's not going to get underpaid for her skills?

raducu 10y ago
Eastern European here: in 2003 when I joined a computer science university I had ~15% female colleagues; as the net salaries for programmers have reached ~70% of the western european levels(while average salaries are nowhere near that level), I see about 40% of the interns being females. So, this might not be politically correct, but yeah, I think women pursue safe, well-trodden paths while men are much more likely to be single-minded risk takers.

macspoofing 10y ago

I've seen it argued that, paradoxically, the richer and more egalitarian a society is, the more the differences are magnified in the kinds choices individuals of both genders make. So Russia being a poorer nation with less paths to success would lead more women to make career choices based around economics, while in Sweden, a richer welfare state, economic factors may be a lower driver.

paganel 10y ago
> I've seen it argued that, paradoxically, the richer and more egalitarian a society is, The former-Communist East-European country I lived in as a kid was a lot more egalitarian than most of present-day Western countries and the women were treated pretty much the same as men were when it came to work. I remember as a kid that I regarded my mother going each morning to work and returning in the evening as a very normal thing, and I regarded the few kids' mothers who weren't doing that as being lazy (to this day I still think that a stay-at-home parent is a lazy human being). State-run kindergartens were also of much help for women back then.
- 2muchcoffeeman 10y ago
  > The former-Communist East-European country I lived in as a kid was a lot more egalitarian than most of present-day Western countries That really depends on how you measure gender equality and general freedom though. > to this day I still think that a stay-at-home parent is a lazy human being You're just being too judgemental though. If a family is wanting for nothing and they agree that one parent should stay at home to spend more time looking after the family, why not?
  - paganel 10y ago
    > That really depends on how you measure gender equality and general freedom though. Like I said, gender equality was pretty well established. "General freedom" doesn't have that much in common with equality, we can all be equal but not free. I'd say that for further reading on the matter Mona Ozouf's essays on "liberté, égalité, fraternité" is a good starting point (a related article about it in French: http://www.letelegramme.fr/bretagne/mona-ozouf-pas-simple-de-faire-vivre-la-liberte-et-l-egalite-04-04-2015-10582676.php http://www.letelegramme.fr/bretagne/mona-ozouf-pas-simple-de...) > You're just being too judgemental though. If a family is wanting for nothing and they agree that one parent should stay at home to spend more time looking after the family, why not? I know this point-view might be seen as judgemental, it's just that I see people not contributing back to society with their work-time as not giving it all. It's not a matter of money, I am a little marxist inside me and I do believe that work it's one of the things that define us as a species. I've heard my ~84-year-old peasant grandma' saying that she was very upset that her legs were hurting her because she wanted to continue working.

DarkKomunalec 10y ago

Good for them. Hopefully after we reduce the gender tech gap, we can focus on fixing the far below-replacement-level fertility in Europe, North America, and Russia. Personally I find it to be more pressing, but it gets barely any press...

sanswork 10y ago
Why? It's not like we are in risk of running out of humans on the planet.
- simonsarris 10y ago
  IQ is highly heritable[1], and if smart people are having zero or one children, that should be of concern to everyone. It's possible that nutrition + butts in school seats created the Flynn effect, where the population's IQ rose. The next century might see the reverse. [1] Per gwern: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13729085 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13729085
  - sanswork 10y ago
    Are you saying people in Europe, north America, and Russia are smarter than people in the rest of the world?
    - redfieu 10y ago
      Across East Asia birth rates are also well below replacement levels. A lot of the world's population growth is coming from rapid increases in Africa.
      - sanswork 10y ago
        I mean the fact that you went and registered a throwaway to head down the path you're intending to gives away what you are really thinking.

beaconstudios 10y ago

my guess: a cultural and social value placed on STEM subjects. My personal theory is that young women in the West are less likely to get into tech because they are seen as stuffy, the domain of greybeards and model train enthusiasts. Don't forget that people generally pick up their core interest in subjects at a young age where social value and coolness are some of the most important personal objectives (early teen years). I think the advent of the startup as being culturally associated with youth and creativity (i.e. that they're cool) is helping to rectify this image, but the startup industry has only recently gotten into mainstream culture. [edit: as tptacek notes, this is not an issue that extends to all of STEM, so I've updated my comment to reflect this. I've left in the highlight on Russia placing cultural value on STEM subjects because I think it's relevant, and that saying Russian culture places value in programming but ignoring the value of Maths, Science and other logical pursuits like Chess would be giving a partial and inaccurate picture. Also, I'm not Russian myself so this is purely an outside-looking-in perspective.]

tptacek 10y ago
I don't want to repeat this comment but worry that I'll have to: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14164886 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14164886 There is major disparity in tech, but it is not a problem common to all STEM fields.
- rimliu 10y ago
  The kind of work you do in STEM field is not the same across them.
  - tptacek 10y ago
    Mathematics is so thematically similar to CS that it used to house the CS departments. Please don't waste your time trying to conjure an argument about how CS somehow requires a different kind of brain than mathematics.
    - douche 10y ago

madengr 10y ago

Russia has a very low birth rate for native Russians. Here in the US, having kids and working in engineering is difficult. My wife took 5 years off and it has definitely affected her pay and advancement. Low pay and little vacation maybe have something to do with it too. Both the wife and I are engineers. Our daughter shows no interest in tech. She does like to mix stuff, so maybe Chem E. Though I'm not going to prod her. STEM just does not pay over the long term.

drittich 10y ago
>STEM just does not pay over the long term. Whaa? What's your definition of pay? Anyway, IMO no prodding needed - expose the child to a wide variety of things, and then help them find and nurture their passion.
- madengr 10y ago
  $100k - $200k long term (ages 30 - 67). STEM has initial high pay, but tops out by middle age. Late middle age, or 55+, and you are a target for elimination. My coworkers daughter and her husband are both accountants. In their mid 30's they are doing much better than any STEM majors. They will both be firm partners by 40. +200k salaries for two people over 27 years (not that they'd work to 67 anyway). I know of a mechanical engineer who went into finance. Not a quant, or even in NY. Just a manager for VISA. Her bonus is larger than my salary, and so is her salary. STEM, well really TE, need to bank that initial high salary for, often forced, early retirement. SM majors, you are just fucked.
  - sanswork 10y ago
    Most accountants will never make partner. You are taking two exceptions and comparing them to the whole population. You should be comparing them to people who become CTOs. Besides that most people will never even make half of your lower end salary during their whole career.
    - kamaal 10y ago

maxxxxx 10y ago

They had female fighter pilots in world war 2 and the first female astronauts. That was long before anybody in the west could even think of that possibility. Not sure if it's a Russian thing or communism. East Germany also had more female engineers and scientists.

treehau5 10y ago
Yep. They just expected women to be able to do the same thing as men. There weren't these half-hearted attempts to "boost diversity" that just never, ever feel genuine. There are Russian greats across the board both male and female -- even pre-soviet. But yes, female astronauts, engineers. Go back a couple centuries, and you had Catherine the Great -- one of the greatest and longest tenured Russian monarchs, a woman. The faith of the Russian people -- the Orthodox Faith -- venerates a woman as the "greatest Saint" and the "Queen of Heaven". It's just always been a part of the mindset. So women are everywhere and it just isn't treated as anything out of the ordinary, or as hitting some diversity figure. It needs to be natural.
raducu 10y ago
There's a wikipedia page with with female astronauts(google list of female astronauts). Out of the 60 that actually flew to space, only 2 are from the USSR/Russia, and both of them were elected to the soviet/people's representatives, so I'd say female astronauts in the USSR was nothing but a publicity stunt.
- maxxxxx 10y ago
  Actually it's four as far as I could see but your point is valid.
- areyousure 10y ago
  Random statistics alert. Of those 60 women in space: 2 flew on Chinese spacecraft, 10 flew only on Russian spacecraft, 42 flew only on American spacecraft, and 6 flew on both American and Russian spacecraft (including the one woman currently in space).
LyndsySimon 10y ago

cabalamat 10y ago

It's because Russia isn't a particularly nice place to live. From the article: > Most of the girls we talked to from other countries had a slightly playful approach to Stem, whereas in Russia, even the very youngest were extremely focused on the fact that their future employment opportunities were more likely to be rooted in Stem subjects. They do tech because it provides a way of getting a good life. In the West, where conditions are less harsh, women don't feel the need to go into tech to get a good life. Similar considerations explain why female university students are more likely to do STEM subjects in Iran than in Sweden. This, incidentally, blows out of the water the argument made by some feminists that women don't do STEM because of conditioning in nasty patriarchal societies.

tptacek 10y ago
Without engaging in any of the rest of your comment, I'm going to call out again the attempt to shift goalposts from tech to STEM in general. Tech people want to believe that the gender disparity in their field is shared among all the STEM fields, but, of course, it is not: women are far better represented in other STEM fields. Computer science, physics, and engineering have similarly acute gender disparity. The rest of the STEM fields --- including mathematics --- have closer to 50/50, and some STEM fields, like molecular biology, have better than 50% representation of women.
- stablemap 10y ago
  I hesitate to hold up mathematics as a good example. There are an encouraging number of female majors but further down the pipeline the numbers get much worse. For tenured faculty positions the latest number [1] I've seen is 14%. [1] http://www.ams.org/profession/data/annual-survey/ http://www.ams.org/profession/data/annual-survey/
- ohstopitu 10y ago
  so would you say those fields that have >50% women would need to work on their gender diversity to include more men?
  - 10y ago

SilverSlash 10y ago

Maybe because like men all over the world, Russian women aren't specially "encouraged" to go into tech? Maybe nobody has to tell them or tell anyone to 'like science'. People just do. The same argument goes for women in science. Albert Einstein was told he wouldn't amount to much. Doesn't mean he 'got discouraged' and quit physics. That's not why we do science - for public appreciation - we do it because we love it no matter what anyone else says. This is the point that the girls in tech people miss I think. Instead of buying your daughters lego sets with women wearing fancy lab coats and looking into telescopes, buy them gyroscopes, or electronics kits, or lego's own DIY robot? None of the toys mentioned above feature gender and actually give a sense of what science is about. I'm open to hear your thoughts, especially from women.

raducu 10y ago
Do you have any data on this? I'd be willing to bet women are nowhere near as interested in a pure science career in Russia as they are in IT. I think it has to do with psycho-evolutionary factors -- men have much more incentives to take risks, women much more so to play it safe.
- laughingman2 10y ago
  Yeah right, and how did you arrive at your reasoning, any list of scientific studies? This is good old sexist/racist talk "X is inferior in math because genes"
  - eof 10y ago
    This is not just humans, virtually every species has obvious gender roles and proclivities. Where humans differ, is our faculty for reason and (to some degree) overcoming our intuition. In my opinion, it's obvious that women being under represented in STEM is caused significantly by both evolutionary /and/ cultural factors.
  - raducu 10y ago
    That is not what I was saying, far from it. My evidence is anecdotal, but think about it -- Russia recently decriminalized domestic violence, not exactly the hallmark of gender equality, that's surely not the reason why more females are interested in IT in Russia. I was not suggesting that females are inferior to men, just that males and females will make vastly different life choices because of psycho-evolution. It's a scientific fact that while male and female median IQ is the same, men have much more variability (more men at the extremes). Just think about your reproductive strategy(not necessarily in the modern monogamous society)-- you have bilions upon billions of sperm replenished every day while females produce one egg per month. A smarter/fitter man can produce much more offsprings than a smarter/fitter female. That has got to produce some profound differences in the way men and women behave.

chiefalchemist 10y ago

It's the wrong question. Which is ironic, since the inability to ask to right question (about the US) is indicative of the problem (here). The question tech here should be asking is: If our "party" is so great (and being the self-absorbed Kool Aid drinkers that we are, we're 100% certain it is), how come so few outside our immediate circle wants to come to our party? Maybe it's not them? Maybe it's us? Could it be us? No!!! Never!!! It can't be us. THAT is what should be the mindset of trying to understand to problem. It's not. Funny tho'. Tech is willing to solve all the rest of the world's problems. But it's unwilling - and unable? - to solve its own. Yeah I know. Let the down votes begin. Please feel free, cause that only proves my point.

2muchcoffeeman 10y ago
What are you even on about??? 1. We don't understand what our problem is. 2. Nothing we try seems to really work. 3. So we compare ourselves to places that don't have the problem. 4. We hope the differences shed some light on the things we are doing wrong so we can change. Why exactly do you think they take other countries as case studies?
- chiefalchemist 10y ago
  Did I type too fast for you? :) Let me break it down. Nice and simple...The answer isn't in Russia or any other country for that matter. The answer is in the mirror. IF you're willing and able to look into it. The key to problem solving is...wait for it...to identify the right problem. But before that, it's admitting you have a problem. So how exactly does looking at Russia help? (Hint: it doesn't.) And now, look at that, we're back at the mirror, or should me. p.s. Thanks for the DV. As already mentioned, it only makes my case stronger.

hamilyon2 10y ago

Maybe 70 years of praising progress and science had some lasting cultural effect.

PerfectDlite 10y ago
If you think that USSR "praised progress and science" for 70 years, I have some grim news for you...

djkrudy 10y ago

Probably the same way they're so good at getting 9 year olds into the Olympics.

nommm-nommm 10y ago
That's China, not Russia and while its almost indisputable that age falsification happened nobody was that young, more like 14. I think one even confessed to being underage a few years later. Its worth noting the age limit for gymnastics was only raised to 16 in 2000 and many previous Olympic gymnasts competed while 14, including Nadia Comăneci who earned a perfect score (which was until then considered unobtainable, the scoreboards weren't equipped to even handle that score) at 14. Of course, at the time, the Chinese athletes were competing against other athletes that followed the age rules which, arguably, gave them an unfair advantage. That's all irrelevant though because the whole subject is totally off topic.

baybal2 10y ago

Offtopic: I dated a girl who programmed ICBM guidance blocks from Russia :) I'm so proud of this fact :)

djkrudy 10y ago

Probably the same way they're so good at getting 9 year olds into the Olympics.

baybal2 10y ago

In 1988, 64 percent of Engineers were women in USSR

thriftwy 10y ago

Is it? I had one female engineer at my previous job, and one female engineer at my current job. Out of a medium-sized team. Some other less-technical positions held by women, still much less than 50%.

keymone 10y ago

the reason there are many women in tech is simple: IT jobs pay ridiculously good compared to non-IT jobs and barrier of entry has been lowered enough for even non-techy women to realize they can train for few weeks and get a solid paying job as junior QA. and when they are smart and went for math/technical education - being software developer is a no brainer, it pays easily 10-100 times better than average job in any other sector. same thing is happening in ukraine: https://s.dou.ua/files/lenta/salary-report-dec-2016/fem-titles.png https://s.dou.ua/files/lenta/salary-report-dec-2016/fem-titl... full survey: https://dou.ua/lenta/articles/salary-report-dec-2016/?from=salaries https://dou.ua/lenta/articles/salary-report-dec-2016/?from=s... compare to previous surveys: https://jobs.dou.ua/salaries/demography/dec2016/ https://jobs.dou.ua/salaries/demography/dec2016/

rntz 10y ago

> According to Unesco, 29% of women worldwide are in science research, compared with 41% in Russia. In the UK, about 4% of inventors are women, whereas the figure is 15% in Russia. These numbers seem ludicrously high regardless of gender. I'd be surprised to hear that 29% - almost 3 of 10 - men were scientists. Is what they're actually saying that 29% of scientists are women worldwide, but in russia it's 41%? That would make more sense.

Safety1stClyde 10y ago
It's just a typo for 29% of science researchers are women.

drglitch 10y ago

Being from that part of the world, I think there are two factors - first, a lot of previous generation females are in engineering/stem - back in soviet times there were a ton of engineering positions and therefore a lot of women went on to fill them. Today this lead to a lot of engineer-mothers who encourage their daughters to be same. Second, and I think more important, is that engineering jobs pay - and especially so today. Given the issues with economy there, being an engineer (not just software) yoru'e almost guaranteed to find a job, either at home or remote/abroad.

mynegation 10y ago

As a Russian who got university education in Russia and worked in both Russia and Canada, I can confirm that the reasons are both cultural and economic. First, for the big part Soviet Russia did not have a sizeable percentage of stay-at-home mothers: women were _expected_ to work, childcare was absolutely free, tight living conditions made multi-generational families, when retired grand-parents took care of children, a norm. It is also true that once young women chose to work they tried to maximize the earnings while not going to high-paying jobs traditionary considered male (think police or oil rig jobs in Siberia). It used to be law and business degrees, but now it means STEM.

paganel 10y ago
> women were _expected_ to work, I also grew up in Eastern Europe in the '80s, and this is what most of present-day Westerners don't get. And women were not supposed to hold only "women-related" jobs, for example my aunt was an industrial-crane operator.
- branchless 10y ago
  Socialist countries (whether in theory or in practice) tend to put more of an emphasis on equal rights.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - mynegation 10y ago
    Too bad you were downvoted, because it is actually true. People here probably confuse the good civil rights (which socialist countries in Eastern Europe did not have) with the equality of rights. USSR constitutions actually had an article of every citizen being guaranteed the right to work.
    - branchless 10y ago
      HN capitalism zealots care not for facts

kimsbutt 10y ago

It's fascinating that she would think "there's no problem at all", but this is a quite common opinion in Russia. However, if other Russian tech women from Skolkovo state dramatically different things, who's bullshiting: Anna, BBC or both? https://sk.ru/news/b/articles/archive/2016/03/08/celebrating-women-in-science-and-technology-on-international-women_2700_s-day.aspx https://sk.ru/news/b/articles/archive/2016/03/08/celebrating...

erikj 10y ago
Skolkovo is a Potemkin village, all real work is being done elsewhere.

odiroot 10y ago

If they're anything like my country, Poland, and we were pretty similar before (together in Warsaw pact) there basically doesn't have to be any "encouraging women". Your gender doesn't matter that much. Both men and women usually pursue most of the majors. And in physics and maths you usually substantial amounts of women. In IT, being pretty fresh in this part of the world, men are majority but still not overwhelming. Anecdata: from primary school to the end of my university I've only had male maths teachers for a year and a half. I don't have an immediate source for this but I have an impression that post-Soviet societies are a lot more equal than Western ones.

dgudkov 10y ago
I can confirm it (born in USSR, grew up in Eastern Europe). It's an interesting phenomenon which I believe can be explained by the fact that the movement for gender equality was started by marxist-bolsheviks in 1900-1920s, almost 50 years before it started in Western countries. Arguably, it was more successful and led to less controversy in society than what I can now see in Western countries. One of the key differences was that gender equality was initiated and led by the Soviet government (i.e. it was top-down) according to Karl Marx's ideology. While, in the West it was initiated and led by civil activists -- i.e. it was bottom-up.

usrusr 10y ago

Provocative idea: maybe modern Russia is just bad at getting men into tech, so that a relative large part of the existing STEM inertia left over from Soviet days falls on women? Not saying that it is true, but from my outside perspective, it could be part of the puzzle. Also, the Soviet era contained a lot of progressives in terms of gender roles. That is easy to forget with today's stereotypes of male-exclusive buddy networks on all levels of economic success and high-heeled golddiggers. (again: outside perspective! I don't know the facts on the ground, just talking about perception)

korzun 10y ago
Provocative idea: Maybe nobody in Russia cares about the whole gender thing and (surprise!) women can like and study things they want. You sound like a caveman: 'Maybe woman are learning to drive cars because men can't drive anymore?!'
uzoodoo 10y ago
That's a good question! Has anyone ever met a male Russian programmer? I don't think I've ever heard of one! /s
- usrusr 10y ago
  That's where the word "relative" comes in!

futun 10y ago

Silly Americans. You are always prohibited from talking about the differences between men and women. Americans think that men and women are exactly the same except for genitalia. We Russians don't. It's an example of primitive, anti-scientific thinking driven by America's cult-like obsession with gender equality. Historically speaking, placing "equality of outcome" over "equality of opportunity" destroys nations. America will learn this the hard way, I think. Here is the reality which is too painful for Americans to accept: Women are as good at STEM as men. Women have a high capacity in STEM. BUT statistically, far fewer women than men enjoy STEM. Women are less interested in STEM. And no, that's not because of some invisible patriarchy. It's because wealth affords choice. Here's a news flash: Women like different things than men do. Entertainment, fashion and other industries understand this deeply. But tech apparently does not. Women and men have different goals, and therefore different tastes. (That's statistically supportable. But since it doesn't match the narrative, it's always easier to brand it as "sexist". Which is deeply ironic considering we're talking about science here.) Let the down-modding begin... for great justice.

nnfy 10y ago
So absurd that even in a community like this, one is not allowed to suggest inconvenient answers to certain questions.
- Chris2048 10y ago
  I'd agree sensitive topic require thoughtful posts, but the epedemic of "I'll down-vote because I'm emotionally offended by the conclusion" rather than discussion on topics is a shame.
  - Chris2048 10y ago
    case-in-point..
CalRobert 10y ago
If you make a poor argument with emotionally loaded words (e.g. "primitive"), and then phrase it such that downvoting is a vindication of your argument, you are not contributing to the discussion. You're just lazy.

m23khan 10y ago

same thing in China as well - Chinese ladies and men are both serious in their studies. I think it has to do with the national psyche developed during the harsh years of Communism where either inherited wealth or proving academic mettle meant getting a comfortable lifestyle. In Soviet Union, it is no secret how much the scientists, mathematicians as well as intelligent people (e.g. chess players) were revered on national level.

mason240 10y ago

They didn't have a culture that depicted everyone in tech as terrible smelling, overweight or scrawny, socially inept losers.

to_bpr 10y ago

I'd be really interested to see some thorough research into the possible factors behind this. I've personally zero experience with Russian culture beyond what makes it to the media. From a Western perspective, we've a society that promotes and idolizes women based on their looks and sex appeal. Young girls look up to and subscribe to the snapchats of people like the Kardashians and other transient entities with a very low social value-add but a very large capitalist value add (product promotion, sales, etc.). The visibility into successful women outside of these looks or "personality" orientated industries is about on par with the modern man. Successful female scientists and successful male scientists receive roughly the same media or social coverage. Successful female business people and successful male business people receive roughly the same, etc etc. (all anecdotally based / personal experience / intuition). There's also a (social?) pushback against successful non-media women bringing themselves to the spotlight (such as Sandberg) for being seen as pushing themselves into the spotlight for being successful despite being a woman. Like others have suggested, it could also have to do with the lack of routes to prosperity offered in Russia vs the West. As a whole, women in the West are have far greater access to self-actualization than men in the West, which also spreads the same women across many more routes while condensing men into a more fixed set. Again, all non-academic and anecdotal but intuitively I feel that, like many other social issues in Western society, the heavy capitalist nature of our society is likely the root of any "issue" we perceive here.

kutkloon7 10y ago
I can't speak for all of Russia, but most Russian women I've encountered seem to have an even stronger desire to look good than many Western women.
Arizhel 10y ago
>From a Western perspective, we've a society that promotes and idolizes women based on their looks and sex appeal. Maybe, but it's interesting that at least in America (which is relevant since you specifically cite the Kardashians), women don't actually put much effort into looking good. Obesity in America is among the highest in the world (Mexico is a little higher). On average, you'll have a much easier time meeting attractive women in Russia, east Asia, or anywhere in Europe (except probably the UK). People just aren't as fat in other countries. So while American society might "idolize" women based on looks/sex appeal, I don't see that actually translating to regular women trying to look good, or succeeding at it at any rate. People here like to look at pretty people on TV and in the movies, sure, but that doesn't translate to them trying to make themselves look good. They'd rather drive everywhere in their big SUV and drink sodas and eat junk food.

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korzun 10y ago

Are you telling me the countries that could care less about spamming elegant PR pieces every other day about women in technology, have more women engineers? Can we brainwash them with a Chinese version of Kardashians or something?

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robteix 10y ago
> Are you telling me the countries that could care less about spamming elegant PR pieces every other day about women in technology, have more women engineers? Wouldn't that be natural though? If there was no issue of lack of diversity, there would not be a need for PR pieces on the subject, right? So the fact that PR pieces about women in technology exist may very well be a good indicator that there is a lack of women in tech.
dang 10y ago
Please don't do this here. These threads are problematic enough without it. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14164831 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14164831 and marked it off-topic.

Grue3 10y ago

Because the basic premise of the article is wrong. Nowhere where I worked the ratio of women in tech positions has exceeded 10%. In many ways people here are way more sexist. At my former job my superior told me that he had a job application from a woman and said to me basically "women can't be programmers, their brains are just wired differently" and asked me if I met any women programmers. I said the gender doesn't matter, and yes, we had one woman programmer at a job before that one, and she was pretty good (but yeah, just one). Anyway, he actually hired her, so I'd like to think I changed his mind.

reitanqild 10y ago
And that is IMO the way it should be done: standing up and saying the obvious with enough power that it actually get heard.

avdicius 10y ago

The article totally misses the point. It just picks a single area and wonders why in this particular area women and men are more equal in Russia than in the West. By asking such a narrow question you will never get the right answer. The right answer is that in Russia there is more gender equality in general and therefore in every particular area too. For instance, from a women-in-business study it follows that the proportion of female-ocuppied senior management positions in Russia is 47% while in the US it's 23% and in UK it's 19%. https://www.grantthornton.global/en/insights/articles/women-in-business-2017/ https://www.grantthornton.global/en/insights/articles/women-... A quote from it: "Eastern Europe continues to top the rankings (see figure 3), with Russia in the lead as the only country in which every business has a woman on its senior leadership team. In Poland, the proportion of senior roles held by women has improved by six percent to 40%. The region owes some of its strong performance to the legacy of communist principles which have placed women as equals for generations." Of course, such a conclusion goes against the main-stream narrative of communism being all about abuse and human rights violations while the West being the undisputed champion of human rights. So the BBC article just have to provide the following paragraph: "While Russia is doing something right, it's still not there yet in terms of gender parity." What is this about? Nothing. Whatever the subject is BBC must retain some reservations about Russia however unsubstantiated they are.

therpe1 10y ago
Exactly. This article is naive to think there's something special about IT. All the mental gymnastics in the world can't avoid what is a pretty obvious truth: women in Eastern Europe never suffered a lost century of labor prejudice while women in the West did. Since 1917 (and even a bit before then) advanced labor and education institutions in Eastern Europe did not systematically exclude women the way these institutions did in the West. Free of systemic prejudice, women in Eastern Europe have historically been equal to men in terms of participation in the labor force and in education. The numbers on this are very clear if people are willing to look. (What makes this all doubly ironic is that in these same areas "feminism" has, until recently, not taken off and they were somehow viewed as backwards by feminists in the West.)

ryanx435 10y ago

isn't this because there were very few males left after WWII (because they all died) to enter the workforce, so women had to step up to fill in the gaps? I think I remember reading that there were so few males left that the soviets literally bussed males around the country to impregnate women so they could rebuild their population.

wwwater 10y ago

This article massively exaggerates the positive attitude Russians have towards women in tech. My Russian mother keeps telling me time to time that there must be something wrong with me that I have this genuine interest in tech things being a girl, because "all this physics and computers is not a girl's business"... As some commentators already mentioned, Soviet Union tried to make no distinction between male and female professions. But nowadays social roles of men and women are strongly polarized and Stem mostly considered as not women's business.

amai 10y ago

Russian women also have fewer prejudices against male scientists.

amai 10y ago

"Only 14 percent of Russian women confirmed they were using birth control pills." (https://rbth.com/society/2013/03/28/russian_women_prefer_abortion_to_the_pill_24379.html https://rbth.com/society/2013/03/28/russian_women_prefer_abo...) Maybe not taking artificial hormones keeps women interested in science and tech?

icegore 10y ago

Listen, people. Those whom we call Russians have at least KILLED 10 000 Ukrainians at the time being in the east of Ukraine. What do you discuss? Their women? Are there any?