Current research at the Chair of Gender, Governance and International Management centres on the following areas:

 

• Men and women on boards

This research focuses on the changing role of boards of directors, and in particular the determinants and effects of increasing gender diversity in board composition, in Germany and in an international comparison. It is based primarily on interviews with directors. It is also concerned with women's managerial careers and their access to leadership positions, as well as men's role in promoting gender equality in organizations. This research has been funded by an EU Marie Curie Career Integration Grant for a project titled “Women in the Boardroom: Institutional and Organizational Approaches to Gender Equality” (BOARDEQUALITY), as well by Freie Universität Berlin’s Margherita-von-Brentano-Zentrum for a project titled “Men on Boards – Change Agents for Equality?”.

 

• Sustainability reporting

This research began as part of the Berlin University Alliance’s Grand Challenge Initiative. An interdisciplinary project titled “The Laws of Social Cohesion” (LSC) examined how law promotes social cohesion, where the limits of its integrative capacity lie and to what extent it might even endanger social cohesion. In this context, law is seen as a social practice that actively shapes how we live together in society. The work conducted at our Chair focuses on how law compels companies to engage in public discourse about their contribution to societal goals, including gender equality and sustainability. It also examines companies’ reputation management strategies. We employ quantitative and qualitative text analysis methods to examine the sustainability reports of German stock-listed companies, focusing especially on how they report on their commitment to gender equality in leadership positions in light of mandatory reporting requirements.

 

• The governance of global labour standards

This research investigates how labour standards are implemented in the foreign subsidiaries of multinational companies. It also considers how companies ensure that their suppliers and subcontractors comply with global labour standards. It includes a project titled “The implementation of global framework agreements in multinational companies”, which was funded by the Hans-Böckler-Foundation and carried out jointly by researchers from Freie Universität Berlin and the University of Duisburg-Essen. At our Chair, we conducted a qualitative content analysis of global framework agreements examining their implementation provisions.

 

• Just transition to electric cars

This research is an international cooperation with researchers from Cornell University, USA and Laval University, Canada. The project is titled “A just transition for autoworkers? E-mobility and restructuring in transatlantic comparison”. We are investigating the effects of the shift to electric cars for work in the automotive industry, as well as ideas surrounding justice and fairness during the change process in an international comparison. Our research methods are interviews and observation.

 

• Digitalization and the future of work

This research uses discourse analytic methods to examine dystopian narratives about the future of work in the digital economy and appeals for action by employment relations actors.