COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES 9 that is being used as a case study and will assist in distributing an online audience survey. The researchers will also conduct case studies of paradigmatic news outlets they feel represent the future of journalism. The outlets studied serve as practical examples of journalism’s future, says De Maio, assistant professor of journalism. They are offering training for journalists in other news outlets to ensure that journalists are prepared to conduct investigative in-depth reporting and have all the tools reporters need. These outlets also fund their productions through nontraditional methods such as crowdfunding or grant support from NGOs or foundations. Their funding does not come through advertising and cannot influence their reporting at all. There is the traditional way of organizing this network by country as principal investigators are in each country gathering data. De Maio and her colleagues complement this with well-established interest group clusters, including democracy, risks and resilience, and globalization. “We are about to start data collection in each country with what I think is also a really good research design because we’re going to be looking at the journalists as creators of messages, the messages per se and the audiences of these messages,” she says. “We’re looking at the three levels, which is something that usually is never looked at altogether. “I’m thinking of this more as a think tank or something where people get together and think where are we going and what can we do to survive in positive ways for society,” De Maio says. “I hope that we can stay beyond just publishing so that we can have those in-depth discussions that are only better when you have different perspectives. And having people from different countries gives you that perspective, no doubt about it.” INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS FEMALE LABOR FORCE PARTICIPATION Female labor force participation (FLFP) is a vital element of women’s economic empowerment, as well as for broader economic growth. But it remains inflexibly low in many developing countries, and it is also substantially lower than men’s, in most countries, says Mary Anne Madeira, assistant professor of international relations. Madeira studies how trade, foreign direct investment (FDI) and natural resource exports affect female participation in the labor market, and her research is providing insights into how economic globalization is affecting women’s ability to join the workforce in developing countries. She examined FLFP in 129 low- to middle-income economy countries over a 28-year period and found that in recent years, trade and inward FDI have a largely negative effect on FLFP. Export-oriented FDI, however, may create more opportunities for women than domestic-oriented FDI and trade openness unaccompanied by significant foreign investment, she notes. Yet, this more positive effect of export-oriented FDI depends on the extent to which a country has experienced industrial upgrading, suggesting that gender segregation by industry also affects the extent to which global economic integration creates employment opportunities for women in developing countries, she adds. “It appears that the once feminizing impulse of economic globalization seems to be reversing itself in developing countries,” Madeira says. “Defeminization is largely a result of industrial upgrading, as developing countries increase their capacity to produce higher tech, more advanced goods. There’s a lot of genderbased segregation in employment in developing countries, as a result of persistent discrimination and maybe cultural norms that view certain work as not appropriate for women. “And automation plays a role here, as well, too,” she says. “So, as countries upgrade their industrial capacity, adopt more laborsaving technology, the overall labor demand may decrease. And we know that often affects women disproportionately. Women are often the last to be hired and the first to be fired. That’s kind of the story this work is telling.” Governments can respond to this dynamic to ensure that the problem doesn’t get worse. She argues that focusing on female education is a necessary but insufficient condition. Even where there is not a skills gap between men and women, women often remain segregated into lowerpaid and less-desirable industries and occupations. Governments should invest in services such as subsidized child care, early childhood education and elder care to reduce women’s unpaid work burden at home and allow them more freedom to upgrade skills, retrain in order to advance professionally and pursue a broader range of opportunities. Training engineers in Kigali, Rwanda. UTE GRABOWSKY / GETTY IMAGES
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