Tagged: reliance on highly subjective decisionamaking

June 5, 2015

“In the nearly forty years since Title VII of the Civil Rights Act was enacted to combat discrimination in employment, we have seen a shift in the ways in which discrimination operates in the workplace. As traditional social norms permitting overt racism and segregation give way to a modern norm of egalitarianism, and as well-defined, hierarchical, bureaucratic structures delineating clear paths for advancement within institutions give way to a globalized workplace of flexible governance and movement between institutions, discrimination often operates in the workplace today less as a blanket policy or discrete, identifiable decision to exclude than as a perpetual tug on opportunity and advancement. It often takes form in a fluid process of social interaction, perception, evaluation, and disbursement of opportunity. It creeps into everyday impressions of worth and assignment of merit on the job, lurking constantly behind even the most honest belief in equality, perpetuating the very injustice that we decry.”

Source: Tristin K. Green. Discrimination in Workplace Dynamics: Toward a Structural Account of Disparate Treatment Theory 38 Harvard Civil Rights — Civil Liberties Law Review 91. 2003.