Betty Friedan has joined the Cornell faculty to direct a $1 million, four-year project at the Institute for Women and Work that will attempt to transform the feminist ideals and practices she catalyzed more than 30 years ago into a broader societal and workplace agenda for the new century. The announcement of Friedan's appointment to Cornell was made Wednesday at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.
"New Paradigm: Women, Men, Work, Family and Public Policy" will be directed by Friedan, who has been named a distinguished visiting professor in the School of Industrial and Labor Relations.
The project is supported by a $1 million grant from the Ford Foundation and will be based in Washington, D.C.
"It is no longer a question of women versus men," Friedan said. "For women as well as men, there is now a need to redefine the bottom line of the corporate and individual definition of success in terms of overriding human values."
President Hunter Rawlings said: "Betty Friedan redefined the place of American women in society with the publication, 35 years ago, of The Feminine Mystique. I am delighted that at Cornell she will be extending her work to examine issues facing corporations and working families. The successful resolution of these issues is as critical to America's strength in the next century as the issues of feminism and equality in the workplace have been over the past 35 years."
Friedan will lead discussions involving a diverse multicultural base of experts across a broad base of occupations, professions and political perspectives to create a new database of knowledge, ideas and practices that address current relations between the sexes and the marketplace.
A key element of the New Paradigm Project will be a series of 20 monthly symposia and roundtable strategy sessions that will address such issues relevant to the contemporary American workplace and families as flexible work schedules, the growth of nonstandard work arrangements, expanded family and medical leave, model collective bargaining approaches to balance work and family, creating a multiple bottom line and redefining the meaning of career in a restructured economy. The sessions with key decision-makers and workplace representatives will be cosponsored by the President's Council of Cornell Women, the Council of National Women's Organizations, the Institute for Women's Policy Research and the American Enterprise Institute.
Grounded in a combination of scholarship and practical experience, the series will explore the hidden effects of the restructured workplace on the relationships on jobs, home and society by (1) clarifying the issues, (2) bringing theoretical and analytical rigor to the debate and (3) designing new policies while attempting to create a new vision of the 21st century American workplace.
"Betty Friedan -- the mother of the feminist movement -- realizes that today's issues go beyond looking at women's rights in isolation," said principal investigator Francine Moccio, director of the Institute for Women and Work. "While it is important that we still be vigilant on securing the rights that women have achieved in the workplace, we must now turn to the larger economic issues that affect men and women, such as downsizing, weakened unionization growth, low-level service sector occupations and limited access to higher education, to name a few. These are the issues that this project will examine on behalf of women and men."
Other elements of the project include the following:
·a women's leadership summit, titled "What Do Women Want: Leveraging Political Influence," examining the relevance and application of feminist ideals and practices to the 21st century American workplace.
·an international conference titled "Beyond Gender and Identity Politics: Toward a Common Vision for the New Century" to exchange views with the European community and developing countries and develop new policy interventions to address New Paradigm issues.
Project activities will be held in Washington, D.C., New York City and Ithaca. Working papers, publications and reports will announce the findings and initiatives on a regular basis throughout the life of the project.
Edward J. Lawler, dean of the ILR School, said the project will help enhance one's understanding of an ever-changing workplace.
"Gender relations are of critical importance to the modern workplace, because men and women are working increasingly on co-equal terms," Lawler said. "This project will keep us in the forefront of these developments."
The New Paradigm Project at Cornell builds on the work Friedan did from 1994 to 1996 at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars at the Smithsonian Institution, where she, along with other leading figures from government and industry, explored new models for gender relations, work and family. Her work with the Woodrow Wilson Center led to the publication of her 1997 book, Beyond Gender.
Friedan is one of the foremost spokespersons on women's rights in the world. Her 1963 book, The Feminine Mystique, is now widely recognized as the seminal work in the history of the women's movement. Friedan is the founder of the National Organization for Women and the National Women's Political Caucus. Her connection to Cornell dates back to 1972 when she played a key role in launching the first women's studies courses in the United States -- at Cornell.
While on the Cornell faculty, Friedan will be most closely associated with the ILR School's Institute for Women and Work, a nationally known research and education center for the study of workplace and gender issues.
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