Implicit Bias: Root Cause of Discrimination Against Women in Construction

This article focuses on indirect bias as the root cause of historically generated gendered oppression which leads to the marginalization and underrepresentation of women in construction. Covert and gatekeeping institutional and social bias leads to discrimination from governments, markets, employers, and unions even though anti-discrimination policies are structurally embedded in the policies/customs/rules which regulate these institutions' behaviours. Implicit bias is problematic because it produces behaviour different from an individual's espoused beliefs, values, and principles and makes identifying discrimination, which by law must be intentional against a protected group, difficult to expose. Within an employment context, implicit bias affects how outreach, hiring, and retention policies are fashioned and the way employees are treated. Implicit bias's effect on policies relating to gender discrimination should be exposed and mediated because it negatively affects workers' job opportunities, earning ability, and job security and satisfaction. Situated in political economy theory which posits past influences contribute to the oppression of equity-seeking groups in the absence of collective action, implicit bias fosters gender discrimination, the historic marginalization of women, and the hiring and retention of women in construction. Addressing these deficiencies through strategies which encourage the inclusion of women in construction, strengthen legislative and workplace policies promoting women, and decrease masculine dominance in the workplace is necessary. The past's influence on the present and the unequal power relations and unequal access to resources between and among social groups/organizations is a component of a system of racial and gender oppression which historically marginalizes and disenfranchises equity-seeking groups and persists in institutional discrimination in the absence of collective action (Albelda, 2001). Using groups as a basic unit of analysis and assuming external influences (religions, economic systems, and social institutions) shape contextual relationships such as social experiences, situations, and circumstances which drive group behaviour, political economy theory defines groups as some set of individuals who share some interest and have a social relationship to other groups with which they share commonalities or compete for scarce resources. The nature of the group then is explored through "context, collective behaviour, conflicting interest, and change" (Albelda, 2013). Implicit bias contributes to present day gender oppression and discrimination as the result of past influences on women's place in society and roles in institutional and cultural environments.