Women have never achieved an equal status as men in the history of scientific work. Historical study of women’s roles and participation in the world and Iran shows that there is not a significant distinction between western women and Iranian women’s status in scientific work until the last decades of the nineteenth century.

Before this period, women’s education and role in educational institutions was limited in western societies and Iran, due to the domestic roles and cultural ethics and virtues. In the late nineteenth century, women’s education and role in scientific work developed in most western societies, while there was an education lag for Iranian women. In the contemporary era, women have not yet reached the same place as men in science.

Comparing Iranian, European, and American rates of higher education attendance indicates that rates of female entrance in higher education are similar, and the sexual percentage of women in both undergraduate and postgraduate studies in Iran is nearly equal to many European countries. There is, however, an apparent difference between Iran and west in the rate of placement of women in managerial, educational and collegial positions. Although the same rate of women enter the university as in European countries, in Iran, female faculty members, female members of scientific institutions, female lecturers, and especially women in faculty or university managerial positions are extremely rare, and it shows no significant change by time.

Sociological theories have focused on two factors of women’s participation and external exclusion to explain women’s lower status in knowledge and scientific institutions. By reviewing the empirical evidence, I discuss that in the case of Iran, according to the gap between high rates of female educational achievements and low rates of female placement in formal positions, the external exclusion is the dominant factor.

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