This thesis takes up with the investigation of the position of women in the workplace and in the society in general in Cyprus. This thesis is focused on the investigation of gender inequality in Cyprus and especially the reasons of the non-progression of women in the workplace under the scope of the theoretical framework of agency, structure and culture. The empirical study was based on an inductive approach and using a mixed methodology the findings of the research were extracted both from an online survey and semi-structured interviews amongst accountants and academics as two representative professions in Cyprus. The main goal of this research was to examine whether there is gender inequality both in the workplace and the society in Cyprus and whether this inequality can be linked to the national culture. The thesis contributes to the general investigation of gender issues but most importantly in the investigation of gender issues in Cyprus as this area has been under-researched. The findings of this research suggest that women encounter obstacles on their way to the top of the organisational ladder and there is evidence that the difficulties they are faced with are mainly due to their role as mothers but also due to the gender specific roles deriving from Cypriot culture. However, albeit gender inequality is evident in Cyprus both in the society and the workplace things have started to improve both through the introduction of legislation on equality and also through women themselves who form their own networks and claim their rights in the workplace and the household.

This thesis investigates gender inequalities in employment outcomes in Turkey in the context of low employment rates of women, occupational gender segregation and gender wage differentials. The first empirical chapter of the thesis sheds light on the role of traditional or conservative social norms and culture on women’s employment in Turkey based on the data for the years 1998 and 2008. It provides evidence that traditional and conservative values, increasingly, reduce women’s likelihood of waged employment and they are also associated with an increased probability of women being in the informal segment of the labour market, either as unpaid family workers or informal waged workers. The second substantive chapter of the thesis points to the extent of occupational gender segregation in Turkey. It shows that women are more likely to be employed in lower-paid jobs and in lower ranked occupations, whereas men remain at an advantaged position both in terms of pay levels or the positions of the occupations they hold in the social hierarchy. The final empirical analysis of the thesis investigates the gender wage gap in Turkey and its evolution between 2002 and 2012. The results present a positive selection into employment for women, indicating that a small portion of women who are in waged work are actually those who have higher productivity levels than average. The thesis, therefore, argues that the relatively low gender wage gap figures for Turkey can be misleading and should be interpreted cautiously. Moreover, although women appear to earn more than men after the 40th quantile, they are still at a disadvantaged position as the labour market does not reward them to the same extent as men. The unfavourable situation of women with high earnings potential is found to be more pronounced in 2012.

This research consists of three sections testing the hypothesis that gender roles and gender-stereotyping of certain fields of study could be associated with women choosing traditionally female degree options characterized by lower wages. The analysis is framed within the identity economics framework. In the first chapter, data from the 1970 British Cohort Study supports the hypothesis that teenage girls are more likely to accept gender-equal beliefs when their mother shares these beliefs or she works; and that having gender equal beliefs and developing early mathematical and technological skills either encourage girls to study for high-paying degrees or discourage them from entering female-dominated degrees. The second chapter analyses the responses from an online questionnaire applied to female academics at the University of York. Such survey collected testimonies about their experiences regarding the construction of gender, encouragement and discouragement in mathematics, science and technology at school and the household environments; and their degree choice. Results provide some evidence in favour of the initial hypothesis, but they also show a disassociation between how women perceive the sex-typing of subject fields and their own confidence in their capabilities and tastes. It also suggests that bad experiences with certain subjects are more relevant in keeping women away from high-earnings degrees than the lack of positive experiences. Finally, the third chapter estimates earnings functions and provides a gender wage decomposition using data from the 1970 British Cohort Study at ages 29 and 34. Results do not support the hypothesis that having a high-earnings degree is associated with higher wages for women. Although there is an initial premium, it disappears by age 34. In contrast, working in a high-earnings occupation is positively associated with higher wages, while remaining in female-dominated occupations is negatively associated with wages for women.

This thesis compares policies in Australia and Denmark relevant to assisting women from workless couples into work, with a focus on policy learning for Britain. The research uses case studies comprising of documentary analysis and 52 elite interviews with policy actors to create a contextual analysis based on the notion of 'hard' policy learning (Dolowitz, 2009). It also develops the idea of 'policy as translation' (Lendvai and Stubbs, 2007) rather than as 'transfer'. In so doing, it examines the cultural and political underpinnings of the policy developments in each of the countries and how these impact on the translatability of policies and programmes to Britain. The concept of 'welfare recalibration' (Ferrera and Hemerijck, 2003) and its four sub-dimensions (functional, distributive, normative, politico-institutional) is used both as a theoretical basis, as well as a framework for the analysis. It is argued that the normative aspects underpin policy change in the other sub-dimensions. Policies for partnered women in both Australia and Britain have recalibrated their access to social assistance, informed by a normative shift in conceptualising them as 'workers' rather than as 'wives/partners' or 'mothers' (Sainsbury, 1996). In Denmark policies have been restructured in response to perceived challenges resulting from immigration. The thesis argues that policy change, as well as policy learning, for partnered women in all three countries is incremental. It suggests that activation for partnered women as a reflection of welfare recalibration wrongly assumes that the labour market and families have similarly adjusted and that childcare provision in Britain is a missing core foundation for activation for this group, reflective of stalled functional and normative recalibration. The analysis also argues for the incorporation of welfare recalibration as a framework for assessing the possibility of policy learning, as well as in considering whether policy translation has taken place.

This thesis explores women in paid domestic work in Mexico. The thesis draws on qualitative interviewing and observation involving the participation of women domestic workers and women who employ domestic workers. The thesis argues that racial difference in Mexico has been disguised for centuries by the myth of mestizaje (the notion of racial and cultural mixture) and racial homogenisation. The study of paid domestic work in Mexico makes visible the exclusionary discourses and practices that maintain the low status of this occupation by virtue of women's gender, class and race. The institutionalised discrimination of domestic workers in Mexico is explained by their proximity to the middle class and therefore the perceived threat of bodily transgressions. Through the study of food, sexuality and motherhood this thesis demonstrates that, in the context of mestizaje, women in paid domestic work are imagined as 'not so Other'. The thesis looks into the racial history of food in Mexico and the parallels between human and culinary mestizaje. It argues that food distinctions in Mexico are still a powerful mechanism to mark class, gender and racial difference. This work demonstrates that both human and culinary mestizaje have never been neutral constructions and involved a silent but powerful hierarchy of imagined racial origins. Food and sexuality are said to be deeply linked, as both experiences manifest bodily boundaries and are perceived as necessary for social reproduction. This thesis looks at the sexualisation of paid domestic work in Mexico. It argues that women in this occupation are sexualised since their proximity to the middle class informs concerns over workers' ambiguous place within an order of social classifications. The sexualisation of workers manifests not an individual fantasy but rather a collective one where female employers, the state, the media and education are also involved. The thesis looks at women's experiences around motherhood. It argues that paid domestic work constrains workers' right both to become and to be mothers and enables female employers to follow middle class notions of 'cool' mothering. It looks at the role of the state in reproducing discourses that define working class women as unfit for childrearing and argues that this idea works to maintain the low status of this occupation while disempowering women workers, their families and communities. The thesis concludes that paid domestic work in Mexico is a living manifestation of racial difference in Mexico and of colonial forms of social organisation. Discrimination against women workers is often perpetrated in virtue of an imagined racial difference constituted in and through gender and class hierarchies. The racialisation of paid domestic workers in Mexico has persisted through notions of mestizaje and 'true' Mexicanness that have for centuries conditioned a national sense of belonging through the denial of race and racism.

This thesis is about women migrants from different countries of Latin America who earn a living as domestic and sex workers in London. Fleeing their respective economic and social crises, these women, middle-class in their home countries, experience a variety of personal dislocations when working in London’s care service sector market that make them feel as though they have been transformed into “different people”. These temporal and personal estrangements derive from the everyday challenges they face as intimate labourers, their undocumented status and the inevitable experience of illegality, the downward status mobility they experience, and the uncertainties they feel towards the future. Exploring migrants’ narratives of their journeys to the UK, the thesis exposes both the personal predicaments and structural problems that “pushed” them to migrate, as well as recounting and analysing their everyday lives as intimate labourers, the complexities that emerge from the commodification of intimacy and the tactics they use to negotiate the conflicts (both personal and work related) that emerge from such occupations. Following their working lives, the thesis analyses their ways of recuperating the social status they think they have lost, and of constructing spaces of temporary “normality”. These choices allow them to “reconstruct their persons” while also reflecting on the limited options they have as intimate migrant labourers in London.

An analysis was made of one clerical occupation-in which women predominated, that of the office secretary. The research aimed to examine the occupation in the general context of women's employment and in particular to examine the relationship between the secretary's job and occupational and social mobility. Information was obtained from two separate' sources: a) a sample of employers in central London and all the secretaries they employed, using As a sample frame Thomson's London Yellow 4 Pages Classified telephone directory, and, b) the nationwide membership of two organisations of secretaries, the Institute of Qualified Private Secretaries and the National Association of Personal Secretaries. Two hundred and fifty-two establishments took part in the enquiry and eight hundred and sixty-one completed questionnaßres were received from secretaries and former-secretaries. Employers, who were interviewed, were asked about their needs and use of secretaries. The questionnaire to secretaries covered a number of different topics including education and training, career and job selection, a secretary's function, conditions of work, use of machinery, job satisfaction, promotion and occupational mobility, and the effect of marriage. Issues such as a secretary's role and the status of the occupation were examined. The research presents a picture of secretaries and the work they do and puts forward recommendations to improve their employment situation.