The Story of Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins
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Description
For thousands of law students since 1989, and especially for female law students heading into large law firms, the story of Ann Hopkins and her quest for partnership at the large accounting firm of Price Waterhouse has had a personal resonance that few decisions studied in law school do. The decision has served both as a cautionary tale about the dilemmas and double standards faced by many professional women and as an encouraging story of legal recognition. The Supreme Court, nudged along by a persuasive expert witness and a perceptive trial judge below, seemed to "get it"—to understand something of the unique hurdles faced by women in high-level professional and managerial jobs dominated by men. But what did the Court "get" about Ann Hopkins' case? On one view, what the Court got was the "double bind" that women in Ann Hopkins' position often faced. Women who sought or held jobs branded as male faced the double-edged sword of sex stereotypes: The job demanded stereotypically male behavior—aggressiveness, bravado, toughness. But women who exhibited the stereotypically male traits demanded by the job were penalized for failing to fit stereotypic expectations for their gender-to act like women. Women who conformed to female stereotypes, or who were assumed to fit those stereotypes, did not fit the job; yet women who defied those stereotypes did not fit their gender. In the plurality's words, "[a]n employer who objects to aggressiveness in women but whose positions require this trait places women in an intolerable and impermissible catch 22: out of a job if they behave aggressively and out of a job if they do not. " But did the discrimination lie in the "catch 22" or "double bind"? Or was there actionable discrimination as well in each half of the bind? If the former, the decision captured something distinctive about the dilemma faced by many women in male-dominated jobs, particularly in white collar and professional jobs in which interpersonal skills and relationships were central. Here women often were met not with outright hostility, as in many blue-collar jobs and workplaces, but with a complex social obstacle course. But the "double-bind" version of Price Waterhouse would have relatively little to say on behalf of others-men or women, racial, ethnic, or religious minorities-who experienced one half of the double-bind but not the other. A broader reading of Price Waterhouse would condemn decisionmaking that is tainted by group stereotypes: either by the assumptions about individuals that flow from group stereotypes or by the demands on individuals to conform to stereotypes. In particular, that broader reading has been a linchpin of a generation-long effort to find in Title VII's ban on sex discrimination some basis for the protection of gender nonconformists-gay men and lesbians, "effeminate" men and "masculine" women, transsexuals, and others whose sexual preferences and outward behavior defy conventional gender stereotypes. The fate of Price Waterhouse remained, and remains, in the hands of subsequent courts and Supreme Court majorities. Indeed, the issues that most occupied, and most divided, the Court in Price Waterhouse—which concerned the proper analysis of "mixed motive" cases under Title VII—have been largely superseded by subsequent legislation and caselaw. But the decision is still important for its insights into what counts as an unlawful discriminatory motive under Title VII. A close look at Ann Hopkins' quest for partnership, which is recounted in her memoir, and the Supreme Court's sympathetic account of the hurdles she faced, helps to illuminate the present meaning of the decision.
Source Publication
Employment Discrimination Stories
Source Editors/Authors
Joel Wm. Friedman
Publication Date
2006
Recommended Citation
Estlund, Cynthia, "The Story of Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins" (2006). Faculty Chapters. 443.
https://gretchen.law.nyu.edu/fac-chapt/443
