90 Reviews -' Recensions qui concerne le Québec, les facteurs principaux qui expliquent cette situation sont les suivants: a) le manque de personnel qualifié pour opérer à l'intérieur d'un service de recherche institutionnelle; b) le style administratif des personnes formant la direction d'une institution qui vise à perpétuer la prise de décision basée sur des retombées politiques seulement; et c) l'application d'un vieux principe qui veut qu'une personne ou collectivité non informée des faits soit moins "dangereuse" et plus facile à contrôler. Les auteurs insistent beaucoup sur la nécessité de "dissocier l'analyse institutionnelle de toute volonté de contrôle et de jugement, pour l'associer nettement à une volonté d'amélioration et de développement". Fondamentalement, c'est aussi l'esprit de la recherche institutionnelle; il faut cependant ajouter que cette vue de l'analyse ou recherche institutionnelle est une conception idéalisée de la réalité que la pratique révèle comme un contexte éminemment politique et conflictuel. Conséquemment un équilibre entre les faits et le climat politique est essentiel pour assurer l'applicabilité des résultats de ce genre de recherche. Les documents 2 et 3 résument les règles pratiques pour la mise en route et l'exécution de projets de recherche. Les documents sont succints et généralement dénués de commentaires superflus. Ces documents sont fortement recommandés autant au novice qu'au professionnel expérimenté en analyse ou recherche institutionnelle. Quant au document 4, intitulé "Analyse institutionnelle et "accountability", il traite presqu'entièrement de l'historique et de l'évolution du concept "d'accountability". Les quelques pages mettant ce concept en relation avec l'analyse institutionnelle semblent contredire l'esprit de l'analyse institutionnelle tel qu'exposé dans le document 1. Plus précisément, le document I stipule que l'analyse institutionnelle ne devrait pas être perçue comme un moyen de contrôle alors que le document 4 accepte le concept "d'accountability" comme étant compatible avec la philosophie du CADRE face à l'analyse institutionnelle. Or le concept "d'accountability" est essentiellement basé sur le principe d'une reddition de comptes. Finalement le document 5 est rassurant pour le lecteur car il est un exemple tangible du genre de produit que le CADRE vise à développer dans ses quatre grands objectifs. Cette dernière publication peut s'avérer extrêmement utile pour les collèges désireux de faire le point sur leurs objectifs institutionnels. Il semble que l'applicabilité de cet instrument est justement ce qui en fait son attrait. Puisque le CADRE est un organisme qui ne vit pas comme tel dans un milieu institutionnel il lui faudra être très vigilant pour rester près de la réalité institutionnelle du collège; autrement son influence risque d'être anéantie. Les prochaines années nous diront si le CADRE saura continuer à suivre la direction prise dans le document 5 afin de relever le défi immense qui l'attend. Charles H. Bélanger Bureau de recherche institutionnelle Université de Montréal Jill McCalla Vickers and June Adam, But Can You Type ? Canadian Universities and the Status of Women. A CAUT Monograph Series. New York: Clarke, Irwin & Company Limited in association with the Canadian Association of University Teachers, 1977.142 pp. This publication represents the first in a series of monographs to be brought out over the 91 Reviews -' Recensions next three years as a joint venture of the CAUT and Clarke, Irwin Company Limited, with the purpose of offering "scholarly, yet popular accounts of the various problems facing Canadian universities." The aim is not to present solutions but rather to express the problems in such a way that the Canadian taxpayers can readily understand them and will be prompted to reach their own conclusions. In the words of the general editor, Naomi Griffiths, it is hoped that "the books would.. .burn away the fog surrounding Canadian university life and give people whose contact with the academic world is minimal, enough information to ask questions about what was happening there". Professors Vickers and Adam have initiated the series with what is purported to be a statement of a particular problem — Canadian universities and the status of women — and of another more general one, the relationship between Canadian Universities and Canadian society. They pose the question, do these institutions offer "social and moral leadership", or do they simply "reflect the values of contemporary society?" In so doing, the reader is told, the authors are fulfilling one of the goals of the series: "the demonstration to both academics and non-academics.. .of the close connections that exist between academic life and the rest of the Canadian community." The book, a paper back, contains a three-page preface explaining the origin of the series, a two and a half page "Interpretive Note" by June Adam, 142 pages of text of which almost 40% is devoted to tables, and a four-page index — an easy enough item to tuck in one's pocket for reading on the run. In keeping with the idea of appealing to as wide an audience as possible, the title is a catchy one, although how many non-academics will fully appreciate its irony is a moot point. The cover is also colourful and aptly amusing depicting a cartoon borrowed from a 1971 edition of The New Yorker. The guiding principle of the book, "that Canadian women should have equal status with Canadian [and one may add foreign] men, that they can and should participate fully and equally with men in all spheres of higher education and in the professions for which higher education is a basic preparation.. . , " is one with which no fair-minded person would disagree. Neither is it likely that women in any walk of life would deny that women often discriminate against women, or that every imaginable (and some unimaginable) excuse is used to keep women from realizing their innate and acquired potential. The many myths about women and the way these are used to keep us in our rightful place are convincingly debunked. In truth, examples of gross injustices appear so frequently throughout the text that they begin to sound too much like a broken record. What the discerning reader may quarrel with is the kind of evidence used to support these contentions. Of the 40 tables presented, not one contains data compiled beyond 1969; the same can be said of the authorities quoted. John Porter's The Vertical Mosaic is listed in the footnotes as the 1972 edition which does not alter the fact that the book was published in 1965 and therefore its information is close to fifteen years out of date. Similarly, Bernard Blishen's occupational class scale was designed for the 1950's and Robert Pike's study on "Who Doesn't Get to University and Why? was written at the end of the 1960's for tabling in 1970. While it may be true that some of the same factors apply in 1977, the authors' case would have enjoyed much more credibility if up-to-date statistics had been used. Again, relying so heavily on the 1970 Report of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women in Canada is dangerously parallel to Camille Laurin's tactic of supporting his specious attacks on 'les maudits anglais' with outdated information 92 Reviews - ' Recensions gleaned from the 1967 Report of the Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism. Those who have suffered the indignities and frustrations of discrimination, and continue to do so despite all the gratuitous expressions of concern voiced during International Women's Year, will be disappointed to find the same recital of complaints without the necessary and updated supporting facts and figures. It will be a pity if such weaknesses overshadow the many points that are well taken, such as the call to the universities to make professional and post-graduate education generally more accessible and particularly more hospitable to women, and the insistence that these institutions participate more fully and effectively in continuing education. There is also a justifiable demand that women do more to help themselves by their willingness to assume responsibility and accept the sacrifices that go with it. The authors warn those who are serious about achieving equal status with men to be prepared to change their traditional goal of "economic security" to one of "economic independence." It is encouraging, too, to see laid bare charges against the universities for their blatant exploitation of women as part-time academic drones; of the iniquitous but rarely admitted hiring practice (the "old-boy network") which makes it virtually impossible for anyone, male or female and however well qualified, to obtain desired employment without having first cultivated a well-placed patron, or having pubcrawled with and duly impressed a key person at some national or international conference; of the reluctance of the academic community to change the traditional social patterns which tend to impede the admittance of women on an equal footing with men to the higher ranks of professional or public life. The gloomy conclusion reached by the authors is that the universities are unlikely to enact such changes unless forced to do so by governments which control their purse strings. While acknowledging that such a move is anathema to most academics, including female, the authors assert "that the patterns of societal power will be little altered by books, pious pleas, and tea parties." How the tea parties got into the equation is a mystery ^ but the assertion about the books and pious pleas is indisputable. That being so, one may question the real value of this particular book. Everything in it pertaining to the lowly status of women whether in or out of academe has been repeated elsewhere to the point of tedium. The suggestion that substantial change will come about only as a result of government or public pressure does not hold much promise since the former are among the worst offenders in discriminating against women, and the latter has more recently demonstrated an openly unsympathetic if not hostile attitude towards the academic community. Probably the best that can be hoped for is a gradual change in attitudes of society in general and of the universities in particular. As Dickens long ago asserted, if people behaved decently, the world would be decent. Meanwhile ladies, if we hopé to be taken seriously and if our cries for understanding and fair play are not to be entirely bootless we must continue to try harder, be more competent, and in addition, we must be much more assiduous in presenting our case. Gwendoline Pilkington Ontario Institute for Studies in Education