Résumé
In 2022, European ports are still gendered masculine spaces, both in the composition of the workforce and in social representations. The feminization of the ports is at a standstill, despite the rhetoric in favor of professional opportunities for women. Based on research conducted in the northern European ports of Le Havre (France) and Felixstowe (United Kingdom), this article analyzes the low feminization of ports based on the concrete practices of public and private port employers. Port employers seek to reduce their workforce: they therefore have an interest in keeping women in small numbers. The first part proposes a literature review on the concept of feminization of work: until now, feminization has been worked on the scale of a few emblematic professions, rather than on the scale of a system of professions. The second part shows that port employers produce employment statistics that eliminate the gender variable: female workers are invisible and their low number is not considered problematic. The third part focuses on the division of port labor according to gender: in the absence of a policy aimed at women, it is the stereotypes and the resistance put up by the workers that organize this division of labor. Women are confined to a limited number of positions (professions peripheral to port activity) and with low responsibilities. The last part shows that the deterioration of salary conditions penalizes women who have recently entered the most masculine port professions.