Her promotion was denied and in response, Mushaben began collecting data on the salary discrepancies between men and women faculty members.
Despite presenting evidence that there was a wage gap of between $8,000 and $9,000 for women faculty, Mushaben said she was told that a budget shortfall did not allow adjustments to be made.
[7] She retired from UMSL in 2019,[16] and became affiliated with the BMW Center for German & European Studies of Georgetown University,[17] and an adjunct professor at the Institute for the Study of International Migration, an affiliate of the Georgetown University Law Center in Washington, D.C.[1] Some of Mushaben's works like From Post-War to Post-Wall Generations, examined the meaning of German national identity and how that shaped foreign policy in the Cold War and reunification periods.
She argued that unification ignited new debates on what it means to be German and that the three generations born after World War II had different views on national security and peace.
[20] As a result a push arose to replace career politicians with people more sympathetic to the wants of their constituencies,[21] such as the West German Green Party, which were critical of maintaining the economic status quo.
[23][24] In analyzing women's issues and how they were handled by the government, Mushaben has evaluated the red–green alliance of the Greens and Social Democrats which led the way toward adopting more women-friendly policies in the 1990s and early 2000s.
[25] She has investigated the Muslim population and how it is perceived by some feminists as not compatible with German identity because of issues such as forcing women to wear headscarves or marry.
[32] Yoder stated that Mushaben's expertise in analysis of German politics and society allowed her to examine Merkel's "cautious and consensus-driven" approach to policy, power, and representation through a gendered lens, which transformed the country after the fall of the Berlin Wall.