scholarly journals When “Best Practices” Win, Employees Lose: Symbolic Compliance and Judicial Inference in Federal Equal Employment Opportunity Cases

2015 ◽  
Vol 40 (04) ◽  
pp. 843-879 ◽  
Author(s):  
Linda Hamilton Krieger ◽  
Rachel Kahn Best ◽  
Lauren B. Edelman

This article provides a new account of employers' advantages over employees in federal employment discrimination cases. We analyze the effects of judicial deference, in which judges use institutionalized employment structures to infer nondiscrimination without scrutinizing those structures in any meaningful way. Using logistic regression to analyze a representative sample of judicial opinions in federal EEO cases during the first thirty‐five years after the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, we find that when judges uncritically use the presence of organizational structures to reason about whether discrimination occurred, employers are much more likely to prevail. This pattern is especially pronounced in opinions written by liberal judges. In light of these findings, we offer recommendations for judges, lawyers, and policy makers—including legal academics—who seek to improve the accuracy and efficacy of employment discrimination adjudications.

2005 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
Stuart Ishimaru

Despite the long history of Asian Americans of fighting for fundamental rights, Asian Americans appear to be less active in complaining about employment discrimination. For example, in 2003, Asian Americans filed proportionally fewer employment discrimination charges with the EEOC than other minority employees. This article examines the factors that create an atmosphere in which Asian Americans do not file as many charges of employment discrimination with the EEOC as one would expect. Also, it explores possible ways to motivate Asian American communities and individuals to engage in and recognize the community’s investment in the equal employment opportunity process. Specifically, it proposes additional outreach and education to Asian Americans to be informed of their rights as well as areas for further research and additional


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sachin S. Pandya ◽  
Marcia McCormick

This paper reviews the U.S. Supreme Court’s opinion in Bostock v. Clayton County (2020). There, the Court held that by barring employer discrimination against any individual “because of such individual’s . . . sex,” Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 also bars employment discrimination because an individual is gay or transgender. The paper then speculates about how much Bostock will affect how likely lower court judges will read other “sex” discrimination prohibitions in the U.S. Code in the same way, in part based on a canvass of the text of about 150 of those prohibitions. The paper also discusses the religion-based defenses that defendants may raise in response under Title VII itself, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, and the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.


Author(s):  
Eric Fenrich

Eric Fenrich studies the efforts of Black activists and NASA to increase minority educational access that would lead to greater participation in the space program. According to Fenrich, the concurrence of the civil rights movement and the American space program reveal the two primary methods by which the advocates in the modern era have sought to advance the interests of African Americans. First, a negative project: the removal of formal barriers to the exercise of rights, more specifically, ending discriminatory practices in Equal Employment Opportunity and education. Second, more positive efforts, such as equal employment opportunities or affirmative action, that place opportunities within the reach of historically disadvantaged people. Fenrich also examines the fallout over James C. Fletcher’s firing of Ruth Bates Harris.


2013 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 438-442 ◽  
Author(s):  
Winfred Arthur ◽  
David Woehr

Within the context of the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and specifically as it pertains to the tenets of Title VII, Lindsey, King, Dunleavy, McCausland, and Jones (2013) state: “This focal article raises and addresses critical issues regarding a yet unanswered question: How can organizational researchers and practitioners contribute to the ultimate goal of eradicating employment discrimination” (p. 391). We argue that in the context of employment testing and selection, at least as per the disparate impact theory of discrimination, this question is the wrong one—certainly as framed by Lindsey et al. To the contrary, instead of holding up the "eradication of employment discrimination" as our ultimate goal, perhaps we should continue to focus on the development, implementation, and support of the best (i.e., most job-related and valid) employment practices possible.


2021 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 312-334
Author(s):  
Kelli Rodriguez Currie

This article provides necessary context to adequately engage in a discussion about transgender and nonbinary individuals, including defined terms. It then provides a brief history of Title IX, articulates the requirements for compliance with the statute, and discusses its application to transgender athletes. Next, this article provides an overview of Title VII of The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the recent statutory analysis of its prohibition on employment discrimination because of sex in Bostock v. Clayton County extends that analysis to the statutory language of Title IX, and summarizes the recent interpretation by the Department of Education applying that analysis to Title IX. The article then discusses the implications of the persistent misgendering of transgender nonbinary athletes and argues that only by allowing all athletes to compete as their true gender will the inclusive goals of Title IX be realized. The article concludes that the requirements for Title IX compliance are not inclusive of transgender nonbinary athletes and contradictory to the prohibition on discrimination on the basis of sex articulated by the statute itself. The article proposes several necessary changes to the language of those requirements for compliance and argues that the Department of Education must make changes in its interpretation toward more inclusive language to truly achieve the goals of Title IX.


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