Jean L. Pyle

Jean L. Pyle is Professor Emerita in the Department of Regional Economic and Social Development and a Senior Associate of the Center for Women and Work at UMass Lowell.  An economist by training, she specializes in the overlapping areas of labor, economic development, and policy, with particular attention to gender and diversity issues.

She has published in several different areas of interest.  They include: 

The effects of globalization and global restructuring on women 

“Recasting Our Understanding of Gender and Work During Global Restructuring,” (co-authored by Jean L. Pyle and Kathryn B. Ward), in Volume IV (Globalizing Labour) of Globalization and Economy (I-IV), edited by Paul James and Robert O’Brien.  London:  Sage Publications, pp. 120-144.  (2007).   Originally published in International Sociology, 2003, special issue on Globalization, Gender, and Social Change in the 21st Century. Vol. 18, No. 3, pp. 461-489.

“Globalization, Transnational Migration, and Gendered Care Work:  An Introduction.” Globalizations, Vol. 3, No. 3 (September, 2006), pp. 283-295.

“Globalization and the Increase in Transnational Care Work:  the Flip Side.”  Globalizations, Vol. 3, No. 3 (September, 2006), pp. 297-315.

“Economic Globalization and Gender”, in the International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences, Neil J. Smelser and Paul B. Baltes, eds., Pergamon, an imprint of Elsevier, pp. 4089-4093.  (2002)

 “Sex, Maids, and Export Processing:Gendered Global Production Networks”, in The International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society. Vol. 15, No. 1, pp. 55-76.  (2001)

“Gender, Industrialization, Transnational Corporations and Development: An Overview of Trends and Patterns”, (co-authored) reprinted in From Modernization to Globalization:  Social Perspectives on International Development, Amy Hite and J. Timmons Roberts, eds., Blackwell, pp. 306-327. (2000) (Originally in Women in the Latin American Development Process, 1995, Chris Bose and Edna Acosta-Belen, eds., Temple University Press.)

“Third World Women and Global Restructuring”, in The Handbook of the Sociology of Gender, edited by Janet S. Chafetz, Plenum Publishing, pp. 81-104. (1999)

“Economic Restructuring”, (co-authored), in The Elgar Companion to Feminist Economics, edited by Janice L. Peterson and Margaret Lewis, Elgar Publishing, pp. 289-303. (1999)

 “Women and Employment in Multinationals”, in Women in the Third World: An Encyclopedia of Contemporary Issues, edited by Nelly P. Stromquist, Garland, pp. 341-350. (1998)

Two edited volumes and a mini-symposium exploring the role of the university in promoting sustainable human development:

Globalization, Universities, and Issues of Sustainable Human Development, co-edited with Robert Forrant, Edward Elgar Publishing (2002 & 2003).   This collection examines the role the university as an institution can play in promoting sustainable human development in the context of globalization.

“Globalization, Universities and Sustainable Human Development: A Framework for Understanding the Issues”, (co-authored by Jean L. Pyle and Robert Forrant), in Globalization, Universities and Issues of Sustainable Human Development, Jean L. Pyle and Robert Forrant, eds., Cheltenham, UK & Northampton, MA:  Edward Elgar Press, pp. 3-28

Approaches to Sustainable Development: The Public University in the Regional Economy, co-edited with Robert Forrant, William Lazonick and Charles Levenstein, University of Massachusetts Press (2001).  This book provides new perspectives on how a public university can be an active participant in the process of regional development, with a major focus on the development of university-community collaborations. Both books are outgrowths of the work of the Committee on Industrial Theory and Assessment (CITA) at UMass Lowell.

Globalization, Universities and Sustainable Human Development, (co-authored by Jean L. Pyle and Robert Forrant), Development, Vol. 45, No. 3, pp. 102-106.  (2002)

Factors which support or constrain the effective use of diverse peoples in workplaces in the United States.

“Gendered Work Conditions, Health, and Work Outcomes”, (co-authored by Meg A. Bond, Laura Punnett, Jean L. Pyle, Manuela Cooperman, & Dianne Cazeca).  The Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, Vol. 9, No. 1, pp. 28-45. (2004)

 “Family and Medical Leave Act:  Unresolved Issues”, (co-authored by Jean L. Pyle and Marianne Pelletier).  New Solutions, Vol. 13, No. 4, pp. 353-384.  (2003)

 “Gender And Ethnic Divisions in the U.S. Labor Force”, (co-authored by Jean L. Pyle and Meg Bond) in The IEBM Handbook of Economics, edited  by William Lazonick, International Thomson Publishing Company, pp. 66-74.  (2002). This is also in the IEBM Online. (IEBM is International Encyclopedia of Business and Management) 

 “Diversity Dilemmas at Work”, (co-authored by Jean L. Pyle and Meg Bond) in Journal of Management Inquiry, Vol. 7, No. 3, pp. 252-269. (1998).  

 “The Ecology of Diversity in Organizational Settings:  Lessons from a Case Study”, (co-authored by Jean L. Pyle and Meg Bond) in Human Relations, Vol. 51, No. 5, pp. 589-623. (1998).  

 “Workforce Diversity:  Emerging Interdisciplinary Challenges”, (co-authored by Jean L. Pyle and Meg Bond) in New Solutions, Vol. 7, No. 2, pp. 41-57. (Winter 1997). 

The impact of state policies (employment policies and family and reproductive rights policies) on women's economic roles in Singapore. 

“Economic Development, Housing, and the Family: Is the Singapore Approach a Model?” in Women’s Rights to House and Land: China, Laos, Vietnam, edited by Irene Tinker and Gale Summerfield, Lynne Rienner Publishing, pp. 27-52. (1999).

“Economic History of Women in Singapore”, in The Elgar Companion to Feminist Economics, edited by Janice L. Peterson and Margaret Lewis, Elgar Publishing, pp. 235-245. (1999).

“Women, the Family, and Economic Restructuring: The Singapore Model?” In The Review of Social Economy, Vol. LV, No. 2, pp. 215-223. (Summer 1997).  Reprinted Online on the Harvard School of Public Health Website.  (Feb. 2000).

She is also the author of the book The State and Women in the Economy: Lessons from Sex Discrimination in the Republic of Ireland (State University of New York Press, 1990).

At UMass Lowell, Jean served as Co-Director of the Center for Women and Work (1998-2002) and as Co-Chair of CITA (the Committee for Industrial Theory and Assessment) from 1997-2001, a university wide committee that sponsors the annual Approaches to Sustainable Development workshop every October.  Jean co-developed two graduate courses in RESD: Development Principles for Developing Economies (57.537) with Robert Forrant and Gender Differences at Work (57.504) with Arlene McCormack. 

Jean has worked as a consultant for UNIDO (The United Nations Industrial Development Organization) on gender and development issues and for a regional corporation regarding facilitation of workforce diversity.  She has also linked her teaching and research directly to the region.  She developed and taught the Economic Development leadership course for immigrants and refugees in the Greater Lowell and Lawrence region, under the state-wide CIRCLE program (Center for Immigrant and Refugee Community Leadership Empowerment).

She belongs to professional organizations in a variety of fields.  She is on the editorial board of Globalizations and is an advisory board member for The Women and Gender in Global Perspectives Program at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.  She served on the Board of Directors of the Eastern Economic Association and is a member of the American Economic Association, the International Association for Feminist Economics, the Society for International Development, the American Sociological Association, and the Association for Women's Rights in Development.  She has presented her research at recent annual conferences held by each of these organizations. 

Jean’s current work analyzes the major trends characterizing the recent period of globalization and shows how they have contributed to the rise of several types of work (sex work, domestic service, and production in subcontracting networks for export) that are distinctly gendered, span the globe, and increasingly involve the migration or trafficking of women.  Examining these types of work simultaneously reveals the systemic linkages among the global expansion of production of goods and services, trade, and finance (promoted by multinational corporations and the IMF and World Bank) and the resultant increase of women in gendered labor networks.   She is exploring what is known about the extent of trafficking into these occupations and the strategies that have been developed by the women themselves and policy makers to address the abuses.