Imagine a university asking students to submit a written assignment about reading a book. Many submit it. Few have read it. All pass the course. The system works, some would say. I would say the system pretends to work, which is not the same. Something similar happens with the gender equality plans that Horizon Europe (the European Commission's 2021-2027 research funding program) requires research centers and universities to have as a condition for accessing European funding.For the first time in the history of European research framework programmes, having an equality plan in force is a requirement. For this plan, the Commission set 4 mandatory elements: a public document signed by management, dedicating resources to it, sex and gender disaggregated data, and training for staff. And, in parallel, it recommended addressing 5 areas: work-life balance, equity in leadership, equality in hiring and professional careers, the integration of the gender perspective in research and teaching, and measures against gender-based violence. On paper, it is a lever for structural change. On paper.The problem is that the requirement has created, in some contexts, only a formal compliance. Organizations that hastily draft the document. Plans that no one has consulted with staff or students. Commitments without deadlines, training sessions attended only by the convinced. The letter of the regulation, complete. The spirit, absent. And the Commission knows it: it has already announced adjustments for this year (without waiting for the new framework program) to verify its real compliance.It is very clear that we are talking about institutional culture. And changing the culture of an institution requires leadership to assume it as a real priority, not as an external obligation. It assumes that all personnel, from the newest to the management positions, understand why equality improves the quality of science. Research has repeatedly shown that diversity in teams produces more solid science, more interesting questions are asked, and biases that homogeneous teams do not see are detected. When a clinical trial does not stratify by sex, or when an algorithm is trained with data that overrepresent a profile, the results are, at best, incomplete. At worst, harmful.Let's return to students and their work. The difference between submitting the work and reading the book is that if you haven't read it, it couldn't have changed you at all. Universities and research centers that want to compete in the European space must not only have the equality plan signed; they must be able to demonstrate that their policies work, that the data improves, that culture changes. Not a document saved on the institutional website, but an organization that has changed from within. And this is not achieved by signing a paper. A paper does not make spring. But an institution that truly fulfills it, does.

They write to me, politely, inviting me to a special program on March 8th as a woman writer. "You'll be sharing the table with many powerful women writers like yourself," they tell me, because "powerful" is a term that goes with everything. To be powerful? How frightening. I feel powerless.

Throughout the day, Catalan women dedicate 1.17 hours more to housework and caregiving than men. However, they also bear the burden of planning and organizing everything that needs to be done for the home and family: what to buy, what to cook for dinner, and coordinating pick-up times for children or grandparents. While the gap has narrowed in recent years, this is not because men are becoming more involved in managing household chores, but rather because they have reduced their time spent on these tasks. According to the 2024 Time Use Survey of Catalonia, published this Thursday by the Statistical Institute of Catalonia using European standards, women dedicate 3 hours and 17 minutes daily to these types of tasks, compared to 2 hours for men, "which maintains an inequality of over 64%."

Many women are used to feeling like they're more evil than a plague. And not for killing kittens, or for embezzling public funds. No, no, no. Simply for getting on the nerves of someone who cuts in line at the bakery (she's getting angry again, what does she think she's doing!), for pointing out that it's absurd to have bikinis for girls with tops (she's stirring up trouble again, what does she think she's doing! Let's forget about it and fix things, and from now on, the person who messed up will say it (unfriendly, cruel, conceited, arrogant, insensitive, what does she think she's doing!). For asking for a vacation, a leave of absence, or sick leave, or for someone to do the grocery shopping, or for them to stop harassing us (selfish, unsupportive, dramatic, what does she think she's doing!). Or for getting a divorce or making any major life change (look, what does she think she's doing!).

Gender equality remains a distant goal. This is made clear by the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE): women would have to work 15 months and 18 days to earn what men earn in a year. In other words, on average, women earn only 77% of what men earn. The European Institute confirms what the European Commission already stated: November 17th was the symbolic date on which women in the European Union began to work for free.

Imagine perfectly meticulous plans that draw a sustainable and equitable edifice, but which remain at the foundations and are never built. This has often been the case with equality policy: a magnificent drawing of a building that is never finished, especially in the scientific and academic fields. Now, as the European Commission launches the new Equality Strategy 2026-2030, we are at a decisive moment.

One of the challenges facing local governments—and institutional politics in general—is reversing the historically negligible presence of women in political parties and administrations. Although the number of women on electoral lists and in council and mayoral positions has multiplied over the last decade, significant gaps still exist in the types of responsibilities men and women assume in city councils, and parity has not been achieved in the mayoral positions.

I read the letter published by Quim Morales completely denying the comedian Carlota Palà (Charlie Pee) in Critical (who accused him of sexual and workplace abuse). Regarding workplace treatment, she says that at the beginning of the season she "realized" that another employee was being paid more for the same work. Morales clarifies that, "the months that Joel Díaz reduced his participation in the program, the €600 per month in which his remuneration was reduced was distributed equally among the three collaborators of the program, at the rate of €200 per month. So, although Mrs. Palà earned more than one of these colleagues (5 the same amount as the other collaborators, Mr. Xavier Pérez Esquerdo and Mr. Jordi Ramoneda.

The business world has historically been associated with male leaders in suits and ties. The demand for a greater female presence in management positions has been a topic of theses and proposals from business associations for decades, to the point that parity is increasingly becoming a tool for assessing organizations' corporate policy. Little by little, the situation is improving: according to the latest data from Grant Thornton, Catalonia has 44.2% women in senior positions, the highest rate in Spain. In fact, the percentage recorded by the report this year in Catalonia has increased by 8.2 points compared to last year, placing the Principality 5.8 points above the Spanish average (38.4%). Since theCompaniesWe bring you a selection of 10 influential female executives in the Catalan economy, including established figures and lesser-known profiles.

In an increasingly interconnected world, the concept of collective intelligence has gained relevance, either due to its growing need in complex decision-making or due to its worrying absence in some political, economic and social spheres. According to the MIT Center for Collective Intelligence, it refers to the ability of a group to solve problems and generate knowledge more efficiently than its members separately. As with individual intelligence, it can also be measured. Studies on the collective intelligence quotient (CIQ) have identified various variables that influence a group's ability to solve problems efficiently. These variables include the level of collaboration and communication between members, cognitive diversity, social sensitivity and the degree of inclusion and equality in the participation of people within the group. These same studies have shown that the presence of women significantly increases CIQ, since it favors, among others, social sensitivity and cooperation, key factors for more efficient group decision-making.

Gender inequalities emerge very early. Children are already aware of this at the age of 10 and 11 and have some things to say about it: among their proposals is the end of violence and discrimination (especially sexism and racism), equality between people (including between boys and girls and also at school) and ending aesthetic pressure. This is what they ask for in theChildren's Agenda, a document prepared after consulting more than 5,000 children in Barcelona, ​​​​which includes 11 demands, 30 proposals and more than 100 ideas from children to improve the well-being of children.

The academic world is a reflection of society and the gender bias that exists in all areas is no exception. Also in universities, women have less access to high positions of governance, teaching and research. Women rectors, vice-rectors, deans and researchers are still in the minority, according to the report The Gender Perspective in Teaching in Universities by Xarxa Vives, which includes all public and private universities in Catalonia and some in the Valencian Country.

Recently, the Association of Women Researchers and Technologists (AMIT) has launched the #NoMoreMatildas initiative to increase references to women scientists in school textbooks and thus awaken scientific vocations in girls. What would have happened if Einstein had been a woman? Surely his name would not ring a bell. The credit for his studies would have been claimed by a man. This is what is known as the matilda effect, named after Matilda Joslyn Gage, a women's rights activist. For centuries, science was done without women or taking credit for their advances. Male inertia is strong and continues to produce discrimination and a certain invisibility. There is still, albeit subliminally, a deep-rooted prejudice that research is a man's job. To correct this, the International Day of Women and Girls in Science was established in 2015 and is celebrated every 11 February.