| Abstract: | This article considers change in academe in Sweden and England, focusing on gender equity and the new public management reforms. In drawing on social movement theory, it is argued that public sector agendas in these countries have been affected by the influences of their respective women’s movements as well as by the new public management. The article explores these developments through the experiences of a group of employees whose voices are heard infrequently in the literature, those in middle‐level academic positions in universities who are responsible for delivering change. It is argued that the rational, hierarchical, masculine discourses of the new public management offer challenges to women’s movement supporters, whose influences and responses are examined. It is contended that the use of social movement theory, as a vehicle through which to conceptualize change, offers a number of insights. These are: the contribution made to gender equity by women who are not self‐defined feminists or strongly committed to equal opportunities, known as femocrats; the contribution made by some supportive men to gender equity; and the potential for future collective opposition to the new public management from women’s movements. |
