Social Science History· 2026Q1
Female Inventorship in Nazi Germany and the German Democratic Republic
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- Q1SCImago
- 2026year
Short summary
Female inventors accounted for less than 2% of patents in Nazi Germany, while the German Democratic Republic (GDR) saw its female inventor rate (WIR) rise from below 19% in the 1950s to around 19% in the 1980s due to state policies promoting women's integration into R&D.
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Key points
- Female inventors constituted less than 2% of all patents during the Nazi regime.
- The German Democratic Republic (GDR) had a low female inventor rate (WIR) in the 1950s.
- GDR's WIR increased to about 19% by the 1980s.
- GDR's women's policy, promoting university and R&D integration, is a plausible driver for increased female inventorship.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Abstract
Abstract Based on two newly compiled patent databases, we investigate the role of female inventors in two authoritarian regimes: Nazi Germany and the German Democratic Republic (GDR). We find that the women inventor rate (WIR) was very low under the Nazi regime. Based on the sample of patents used in this article, we estimate that female inventors accounted for less than 2 percent of all patents in this period. This figure reflects the low WIR in previous periods but may be also driven by various policy measures of the Nazi regime. In the GDR, the WIR was even lower in the 1950s, but it increased to about 19 percent in the 1980s. A plausible reason for this development is the GDR’s women’s policy, which, among other things, tried to integrate women into universities and R&D departments of state-owned enterprises, thus promoting female inventorship.
The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Social Science History, 2026 · DOI ↗
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