Fresh analysis deciphers the metaphors reporters used to explain circle of relatives companies over a thirty-two-year duration (1991-2023). The consequences spotlight a placing paradox: whilst the industry press is dedicated to selling ladies’s management, it perpetuates the illustration of circle of relatives companies that affiliate those organizations with male energy.
Globally, simplest 19% of circle of relatives industry leaders are ladies. In France, 86% of circle of relatives companies are run via males. Those figures expose the endurance of the patriarchal style in those firms, which constitute probably the most common type of group on the earth. The good judgment of succession, particularly, continues to prefer male heirs.
Why do those inequalities persist within the industry international, in spite of tasks via the industry media to advertise larger equality?
In recent times, a number of newsrooms have advocated for gender equality. In France, for instance, Les Echos and Le Parisien followed two charters, in 2019 and 2020, with the purpose of selling interior equality and warding off gender stereotypes of their articles.
To grasp this hole, we analyzed intimately 453 articles on circle of relatives companies printed via Les Echos since 1991, making use of the conceptual metaphor principle of linguists George Lakoff and Mark Johnson.
Metaphors don’t seem to be easy figures of speech: they construction our state of mind, working out and appearing. Unconsciously, they are going to naturalize cultural norms and perpetuate stereotypes. The result of our analysis expose the lifestyles and endurance for thirty years of 4 dominant metaphors: the circle of relatives industry as “conquering the kingdom”, “the building erected”, “the giant that devours” and “the racing machine”.
Maximum not unusual metaphors from 1991 to 2023. Conquering the dominion
Hunter officer on horseback within the assault of the Imperial Guard (1812), via Theodore Géricault. Wikimedia Commons.
Reporters describe circle of relatives companies as “empires” and households as “royal dynasties.” For corporations equivalent to Ferrero, Michelin, Ricard or Fiat, the “heads” of households “rule” as “monarchs”, put on the “crown” and “fight” to make sure the protection or growth in their “fiefdom”.
The son performs the position of “dolphin”, a place historically reserved for males, and might be “enthroned” in step with monarchical regulations and divine proper. Those metaphors give a boost to the patriarchal imaginative and prescient of the circle of relatives industry and naturalize the speculation of the switch of energy from one particular person to every other.
The development was once erected
The Tower of Babel (1563), via Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Wikimedia Commons.
Corporations are described as “buildings” “built” via a “founding father”. Members of the family can “go in”, “live” there or “go out the front door”. They’re represented as “pillars” or “cement” that improve the “structure”.
The following generations are anticipated to “expand” the corporate “floor by floor”. Youngsters compete to “climb the ladder” and succeed in the “top” on the chance of “falling”. Those metaphors confer with the creativeness of the development, the place the corporate is imagined as a vertical, hierarchical area of festival and limitless expansion.
Devouring massive
Saturn Devours One among His Sons (1823), Fancisco Goya. Wikimedia Commons.
The circle of relatives industry is depicted as a “giant”, “colossus” or “juggernaut” that “devours” its “smaller” competition.
This efficiency is accompanied via a suite of metaphors associated with the concept that of weight, searching and predators.
This “heavyweight” with a “rabid appetite” is making ready to “devour” new “prey” even earlier than “digesting” his newest acquisition.
This set of metaphors refers to an imaginary fight for survival wherein leaders attempt for limitless expansion to determine their dominance over their competition.
Racing system
The Chariot Race (1872, element), via Alexander von Wagner. Wikimedia Commons.
Circle of relatives companies are in comparison to “cars” or “racing tanks”. The industry supervisor, the “sole master of the ship”, “takes orders”, he’s “in charge”, “drives” or “pilots” the corporate. If they’re “bright green,” he “speeds up” earlier than “handing over the reins” to his “foal.”
This set of metaphors once more suits into an overly masculine universe, that of racing vehicles, wherein ladies are in large part marginalized.
Renew the metaphors
Regardless of the need to advertise feminine management, the metaphors utilized by the commercial press to explain circle of relatives companies stay anchored within the patriarchal creativeness and naturalize the values of hegemonic masculinity: authority, energy, combativeness.
If this statement highlights the bounds of those representations, it additionally gifts a possibility to boost consciousness of the wish to renew them. With out restricting ourselves to grievance, we inspire reporters and researchers to believe new techniques of describing circle of relatives companies, extra trendy, inclusive and ready to mirror the range and evolution of practices.
