European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE)

European Institute for Gender Equality, Gedimino pr. 16, LT-01103 Vilnius, Lithuania

EIGE.SEC@eige.europa.eu

+370 5 215 7444

05/08/2024

The European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE) Gender Statistics Database collects data on the numbers of women and men in key decision-making positions across a number of different life domains in order to provide reliable statistics that can be used to monitor the current situation and trends through time.

The domains covered include politics, public administration, judiciary, business and finance, social partners and NGOs, environment, media, science and research, sports, transport, COVID-19, and EU funding. The decision-making positions covered are specific to each area of decision-making and are described in detail in the section on statistical concepts and definitions.

Data on European social partner organisations cover the presidents, members of the highest decision-making body and the executive heads of employer and trade union organisations that engage in the European social dialogue.

The women and men in decision-making (WMID) data are organised into life domains and then by types of organisation and the different decision-making positions within the hierarchy of each organisational type. The domains covered are:

• Politics
• Public administration
• Judiciary
• Business and finance
• Social partners and NGOs
• Environment
• Media
• Science and research
• Sports
• Transport
• COVID-19
• EU funding

Details of the organisations and positions covered are provided in the section on statistical concepts and definitions.

Not applicable.

General definitions:

A decision-making position is a position from which it is possible to take or influence a decision:

• within a domain: at organisational level. This restricts coverage to organisations having a major influence in the domain at the territorial level of interest, which is usually national but can also be international, European, regional or local.
• within an organisation: at hierarchical level. This restricts coverage to positions within the hierarchy that have a major input to decision-making within the organisation.

European social partner organisations

Organisations covered:

• Employer and trade union organisations at EU level which engage in the European social dialogue - i.e. discussions, consultations, negotiations and joint actions taking place between employers and trade unions at European level as well as between them and EU institutions. The EU-level organisations which are covered in the database are listed under the organisations consulted under Article 154 Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU): http://ec.europa.eu/social/BlobServlet?docId=2154&langId=en.

Positions covered:

• President of the highest decision-making body
• Members of the highest decision-making body (count includes the president)
• Executive head, usually referred to as either the Secretary General or Managing Director. For organisations that do not have a separate executive head position, the president is counted instead.

Mapping tables:

• European social partners: employee organisations
• European social partners: employer organisations

Notes:

• The highest decision-making body is identified from the relevant organisation’s statutes or similar document. In line with the general methodological principle of WMID data collection, bodies such as the general congress or general assembly are not counted as the highest decision-making body. Coverage is restricted to those bodies which: have a major impact on the policy and operation of the organisation; take decisions on a regular basis (more than biannually); and whose members are clearly identifiable individuals and not organisations.
• If the head of the highest decision-making body and the head of the daily executive body are the same person, he/she is counted in both positions.

The statistical unit in WMID data is the organisational unit as defined by each specific topic (e.g. a house of parliament or a large listed company). Data are then collected on the numbers of men and women occupying decision-making positions within that unit.

Data cover all persons occupying specified positions in the organisational units covered (see statistical concepts and definitions).

The WMID data cover the 27 EU Member States, United Kingdom, five EU candidate countries (including Montenegro, North Macedonia, Albania, Serbia and Türkiye), two potential candidates (Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo⁽*⁾) and the remaining three EEA countries (Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway).

⁽*⁾ This designation is without prejudice to positions on status and is in line with UNSCR 1244 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo Declaration of Independence.

WMID data on European social partner organisations were first collected in the 3rd quarter of 2003.

Not applicable.

No legal acts are applicable. The Council of the European Union has committed to ongoing monitoring of the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action and as part of this commitment the European Commission has been collecting data on decision-making since 2003, a task that has been taken over by EIGE since 2017.

The WMID database was managed by the European Commission until end 2016 and then transferred to EIGE.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Generally, data are disseminated within one month of the data collection (see section on reference period). Data are published on the EIGE Gender Statistics database.

Not applicable.

Data are disseminated to all types of users simultaneously via the EIGE Gender Statistics database.

No regular news release.

From 2017, EIGE will publish regular bulletins on gender statistics, which may cover data on decision-making. The European Commission's Annual Report on Equality usually includes a section on this topic.

EIGE Gender Statistics database

Micro-data are not made available.

WMID data are the primary source of information for indicators to monitor the implementation of Area G of the Beijing Platform for Action.

WMID Methodological report

Not applicable.

WMID data are collected either directly from the organisations covered or from umbrella organisations providing data on behalf of member organisations. The majority of data are collected from the websites or other publications produced by the organisations concerned but some are also collected from direct contacts. There are three main risks in the data collection: ensuring the right decision-making bodies and positions are identified; ensuring that the gender of the people in these positions is correctly recorded; and ensuring that the information is up-to-date.

The data are collected by a team of experienced researchers and are subject to routine validation that includes:

• cross-checking of data relating to at least 10% of organisations covered (randomly selected) by another researcher;
• verification of data with the organisation concerned;
• comparison of data with previous periods and review in case of significant change.

WMID data need to be viewed bearing in mind the inherent diversity of institutional and organisational structures and in the scope of decision-making responsibilities for nominally similar positions. In this sense, there will always be some limitations to the extent to which data can be considered as fully comparable between countries. That being said, the data are considered to be of good quality, collected from reliable sources and with careful application of a common methodology. The data are comprehensive (cover all relevant organisations) and complete (data are available for all relevant positions in each organisation covered) in the vast majority of cases.

WMID data are the primary source of information for indicators to monitor the implementation of Area G (Power and decision-making) of the Beijing Platform for Action. The data are therefore widely used by the European Commission (DG JUST) and the European Institute for Gender Equality for analysis in this area and for reporting to the Council of the European Union.

The data are also widely used by researchers in this area.

No user satisfaction surveys are carried out.

The completeness of WMID data depends on the extent to which the organisations covered openly publish, or are willing to share, information about their key decision-making personnel. In general, there is increasing pressure on organisations of all types to be completely transparent about their organisational structure and operational practices so that completeness of the data has improved through time.

In the case of European social partner organisations, data are generally complete.

In principle, the WMID data accurately describe the situation for the area of decision-making concerned, though in some areas the coverage of organisations is restricted to limit the cost and burden of the data collection, and this could potentially impact on overall accuracy.

2019 data for members in an organisation representing employees’ (cross-industry social dialogue) refers to 2018 as the new composition was not available at the time of data collection. Apart from this point, data can be considered fully accurate.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Data are released within one month of collection.

Punctuality is 100%.

Not applicable.

In general, WMID data are comparable through time in each area of decision-making. Nevertheless, it is necessary to bear in mind that the organisations covered and the decision-making structures within these may vary through time (e.g. government ministries may be reorganised following a change of government, and the constituents of the blue-chip indices used to define the sample of large listed companies are updated by the responsible stock exchange on a regular basis).

In the case of European social partner organisations, it should be noted that for some organisations the decision-making body covered may not be consistent through time – in some cases because the organisation has changed its way of working, in others because the body covered has changed as the methodology has been improved. The list of organisations covered may also change over time due to changes in the landscape of the social dialogue (e.g. mergers or organisations, new organisations created, etc.).

Since 2007, in cases where the head of the highest decision-making body and the daily executive head are the same person, he/she is counted in both positions and if there is no separate executive head position, then the president is counted instead.

In general, there are few other sources of data on decision-making against which to assess the coherence of WMID data. Some national data exist for selected areas of decision-making but often the methodology is not the same (i.e. the coverage of organisations and/or positions within these varies) so that direct comparison is not possible.

In the case of European social partner organisations, there is no dataset compiling the number of women and men in decision-making positions over time.

Internal coherence of the data (e.g. through time or across countries) is ensured through careful application of the WMID methodology, and routine validation of data.

Revisions to data are infrequent. Occasionally, for example, a response to a request to verify the information collected for a particular organisation is received after the data collection has closed and the results disseminated. If the information leads to a change in the data, then the update is made at the next available opportunity and at the latest within one month.

There is no fixed revision schedule. Any necessary revisions are made on an ad hoc basis.

The following revisions were applied to data on European social partner organisations:

• 2016: data for period 2007-2015 were revised to record the president of the highest decision-making body as the executive head in cases where there was no separate executive head. Previously, the position was recorded as not applicable for these cases.
• 2019: following clarifications provided by the organisation, 2018 data for members in one employers’ organisation (sectoral social dialogue) was revised.
• 2020: following clarifications provided by the organisation, 2017-2019 data for members in one employers’ organisation (sectoral social dialogue) was revised.
• 2022: for sectoral social dialogue, 2020-2021 data for members in one employers organisation and 2021 data for president in another employers organisation revised.

The WMID data are a form of administrative data, being derived from the records that organisations keep regarding the personnel occupying key positions within the organisation. In all areas of decision-making, the data cover all organisations within the scope defined by the methodology. In some areas (e.g. national level politics) all relevant organisations/bodies are covered (e.g. parliaments and governments) whilst in others the methodology restricts coverage so that the data effectively represent a sample of all organisations within the broad type of organisation (e.g. data on decision-making in large companies are restricted to the nationally registered constituents of the main blue-chip index for the country).

Annually.

Direct collection of data from official websites and contact person in relevant organisations.

See section on quality assurance.

Data collected from individual organisations are aggregated by position.

Total figures are based on an aggregate of data at organisation level, with the percentages of men and women calculated from these aggregates. The total shares of men and women are therefore weighted averages rather than an average of the shares at organisation level.

Not applicable.