Legalizing Gender Inequality: Courts, Markets and Unequal Pay for Women in America (Structural Analysis in the Social Sciences) [Paperback]

Robert L. Nelson (Author), William P. Bridges (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 28, 1999 | ISBN-10: 0521627508 | ISBN-13: 978-0521627504 | Edition: First THUS Edition

Based on case studies of four organizations that were sued for pay discrimination, Legalizing Gender Inequality challenges existing theories of gender inequality within economic, sociological, and legal contexts. The book argues that male-female earnings differentials cannot be explained adequately by market forces, principles of efficiency, or society-wide sexism. Rather it suggests that employing organizations tend to disadvantage holders of predominantly female jobs by denying them power in organizational politics and reproducing male cultural advantages. The book argues that the courts have, by uncritically accepting the market explanation for wage disparity, tended to legitimate and to legalize a crucial dimension of gender inequality.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Legalizing Gender Inequality presents a new organization-centered paradigm for understanding gender-differentials in pay, which promises to turn on its head standard thinking about the relationship between law, markets, and organizations. By offering important new insights into pay equity, gender relations in the workplace, and organization-market relations, Nelson and Bridges make significant contributions to the sociological literatures on gender, law, and organizations." Lauren Edelman, University of California, Berkeley

"Legalizing Gender Inequality provides a truly pathbreaking analysis of how organizations produce pay disparities between the sexes and how the courts legitimate them. Nelson and Bridges' superb scholarship, cogent logic, and accessible style make this book a winner." Barbara Reskin, Harvard University

"Equal Pay for equal work' is a central tenet of our civil rights law, but the principle of 'comparable pay for comparable work' is recognized neither by law nor in the public consciousness. This means on the ground that between-job gender inequality is currently unregulated, because employers have convinced courts that 'the market made us' pay female-dominated jobs less than male-dominated jobs. Legalizing Gender Inequality persuasively refutes this strong-form market-based defense. In penetrating and clear-eyed fashion, the authors re-analyze the four crucial cases that flirted with the possiblity of comparable worth." Ian Ayres, Yale University

"But instead of merely trashing the market, this book concludes that inequality can be produced under pay systems based on either comparable worth or market principles. Rather than using comparable pay as the sole remedy for gender inequality, the authors suggest procedural reforms to improve organizational politics and even consider harnessing the transformative energies of the market. In short, this book eschews the reifying choice between market and non-market forces as causes of inequality and instead develops a more comprehensive organizational theory which better fits the facts which the authors have so painstakingly unearthed." Ian Ayres, Yale University

"...a well-written book about an important topic that is well-argued and empirically grounded." Sara C. Benesh, The Law and Politics Book Review

"The authors raise new questions for theory and research about pay equity." Patti A. Giuffre, Social Forces

"...an unusual and creative approach." Law & Social Inquiry

"The authors are otherwise will qualified to tackle the issue of pay equity. Their findings constitute significant contributions to the field. Graduate students and faculty who focus on complex organizations and pay discrimination issues and plaintiff lawyers will appreciate this book." Gender & Society

"Legalizing Gender Inequality is one of the best recent efforts I have seen to address and analyze policies aimed at achieving gender equailty in paid work." Qualitative Sociology

"Legalizing Gender Equality is essential reading for scholars of social inequality, gender, and sociology of law. The books breaks new ground in a highly polarized debate over pay equity. The results of this compelling study testify to the importantce of mapping variations in gender inequality across different market and organizational contexts." American Journal of Sociology

Book Description

Legalizing Gender Inequality challenges existing theories of gender inequality within economic, sociological, and legal contexts. The book argues that male-female earnings differentials cannot be explained adequately by market forces, principles of efficiency, or society-wide sexism. Rather it suggests that employing organizations tend to disadvantage holders of predominantly female jobs by denying them power in organizational politics and reproducing male cultural advantages. The book argues that the courts have, by uncritically accepting the market explanation for wage disparity, tended to legitimate and to legalize a crucial dimension of gender inequality.

Product Details

• Paperback: 412 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press; First THUS Edition edition (May 28, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521627508
• ISBN-13: 978-0521627504
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #984,997 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #18 in Books > Law > English Law > Employment

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Must-reading on discrimination and labor economics, August 24, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Legalizing Gender Inequality: Courts, Markets and Unequal Pay for Women in America (Structural Analysis in the Social Sciences) (Paperback)

Fascinating reading, darkly hilarious in spots and an important challenge to orthodox labor economics and law--both of which assume that people's pay is set in "the market." As the authors point out, employers defending discrimination suits don't even have to prove this--it's just an assumption of the system. But the authors show that employers only encounter that "market" through intermediaries, the consultants and advisers who tell them what people are paid--and those people have their own biases, interests, and agendas. The authors carefully examine the records in some famous discrimination cases and show how unlikely it was that any "market" required that the maintenance men be paid more than the secretaries. Every labor economist and lawyer should read this book.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars what a great book!, April 15, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Legalizing Gender Inequality: Courts, Markets and Unequal Pay for Women in America (Structural Analysis in the Social Sciences) (Paperback)

This book makes the very important point (based on empirical evidence) that organizational and structural practices can result in pay inequality that becomes attributed to the "market." Further, this becomes "legalized" (or condoned in the american legal system) because the market is reified by judges and thought to be "natural" rather than socially constructed. The authors brilliantly demonstrate how this occurs in 4 organizations. This is why it has won every major award in sociology and law and society.

1 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Good for nobody...unless you're a lawyer or an economist, January 14, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Legalizing Gender Inequality: Courts, Markets and Unequal Pay for Women in America (Structural Analysis in the Social Sciences) (Paperback)

I read this as a requirement for one of my graduate courses in Sociology and to be perfectly honest, a classroom full of well-educated people, open and willing to take in Nelson and Bridges' ideas could not make heads or tails of it, and that includes our professor! It is certainly bogged down with legal jargon which makes a lot of it very difficult and not very interesting to read. The conclusions were muddled and unclear which makes the reader question what the point was in the first place. Additionally, from a feminist's point of view, I have to draw in to question the motivation of two white males in writing a book about gender inequality in the workplace. Anonymity among social scientists has become an outdated relic of the positivist period and particularly in this case, prompts the reader to question what the writers have to hide.