Rights on trial : how workplace discrimination law perpetuates inequality / Ellen Berrey, Robert L. Nelson, and Laura Beth Nielsen.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Berrey, Ellen, author.

Nelson, Robert L., 1952- author.

Nielsen, Laura Beth, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Discrimination in employment--Law and legislation--United States.

Discrimination in employment.

Discrimination in employment--Law and legislation.

United States.

Discrimination in employment--Law and legislation--Economic aspects--United States.

Physical Description:

xiv, 351 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Chicago ; London : The University of Chicago Press, 2017.

Summary:

"On the surface, America's commitment to equal opportunity in the workplace has never been clearer. Virtually every company has antidiscrimination policies in place, and there are laws designed to protect these rights across a range of marginalized groups. But, as Ellen Berrey, Robert L. Nelson, and Laura Beth Nielsen compellingly show, this progressive vision of the law falls far short in practice. When aggrieved individuals turn to the law, the adversarial character of litigation imposes considerable personal and financial costs that make plaintiffs feel like they've lost regardless of the outcome of the case. Employer defendants also are dissatisfied with the system, often feeling “held up” by what they see as frivolous cases. And even when the case is resolved in the plaintiff's favor, the conditions that gave rise to the lawsuit rarely change. In fact, the contemporary approach to workplace discrimination law perversely comes to reinforce the very hierarchies that antidiscrimination laws were created to redress. Based on rich interviews with plaintiffs, attorneys, and representatives of defendants and an original national dataset on case outcomes, Rights on Trial reveals the fundamental flaws of workplace discrimination law and offers practical recommendations for how we might better respond to persistent patterns of discrimination." -- Publisher's website.

Contents:

Introduction : putting rights on trial

Fifty years of employment civil rights

A quantitative analysis of employment civil rights litigation : case characteristics, plaintiff characteristics, and legal outcomes

Workplace wars : the origins of employment civil rights lawsuits in the workplace

Representation and race : finding a lawyer, screening clients, and the production of racial disparities

Representing rights : lawyer-client relationships

Right right, wrong plaintiff : adversarial conflict and the disavowal of discrimination

Win, lose, or draw : perspectives on case outcomes

Stereotyping and the reinscription of race, sex, disability, and age hierarchies

The voices of employment civil rights.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 313-336) and index.

ISBN:

9780226466712

022646671X

9780226466859

022646685X

OCLC:

958781204