Exploring a Research Agenda of the Feminization of the Legal Profession: Theories of Gender and Social Change

This essay suggests that recent work in feminist theory should reorient the questions that are asked about the role of gender in the legal profession. Some use gender as a category of analysis to explore differences that reinforce conventional gendered stereotypes, such as the conceptualization of work and family in lawyering as a "women's issue." Others use conventional sociology of the professions analysis, such as stratification, to measure women's "success" and "satisfaction" in the context of the traditional law firm. By focusing on some recent historical and sociological research on women in the legal and medical professions, the author illustrates how we might ask different questions, not to reify gender differences but to more fully examine the role that gender difference, as socially constructed, might play in the transformation of law practice.     

Legal Problems Involved in the Convergence of Collective and State Farms and the Emergence of a Single Type of Publicly-Owned Agricultural Enterprise

The Party Program adopted by the 22nd CPSU Congress, representing a creative advance of Marxism-Leninism, has defined scientifically the perspectives and courses to be followed to achieve a further sharp rise in agriculture as a prerequisite for the building of a communist society in our country. The CPSU Program points out: "The further advance of the village toward communism will follow the course of development and improvement of both forms of socialist enterprise — collective and state farms." They are both becoming transformed into highly productive and highly profitable forms of enterprise. The economic basis for their development is the continuous growth of the productive forces and improvement in their utilization, improved organization of production and methods of management, a steady rise in labor productivity, and rigorous adherence to the principle that good work and superior results lead to higher pay. On this basis, the collective and state farms will increasingly become enterprises of a communist type in their production relations, the character of the work involved, the living and cultural standards of their personnel. As the building of communism progresses, and as production is improved and increased in volume, "the collective farms will," says the CPSU Program, "come to be agricultural enterprises under general public ownership, by virtue of their economic condition."     

Theorizing waste in abortion and fetal ovarian tissue use.

This article explores the theoretical implications of the concept of waste as it specifically relates to arguments in favour of fetal ovarian tissue use as a source of donor eggs. The author begins by discussing medico-scientific constructions of women's reproductive bodies as wasteful. The article explores the works of Drucilla Cornell on bodily borders, Julia Kristeva on abjection, and Mary Douglas on pollution to develop a nuanced understanding of the relations between waste, women's reproductivity, and abortion in North American mainstream and medico-scientific cultures. This layered reading of waste and abortion deconstructs a significant assumption of arguments in favour of fetal ovarian tissue use as ethical--that such tissue is just "waste." The author suggests that theorizing waste this way may contribute to ethical analyses of uses of other reproductive materials (that is, embryos) that are supported, in part, by an assumption that those materials would otherwise be "wasted."     

VOICE ALTERATIONS

The experience of divorce is difficult for everyone involved. To best help with the legal experience, we need to understand gender differences that affect the process. This article adds to the understanding of that difference by addressing women's development and the female "voice." Women have not been acculturated to the subtle rules of litigation, which are in the male "voice." The authors offer an alternative scenario to add balance to the traditional experience of divorce for women and men and to the divorce process itself.     

Comparing Legal Professions Cross-nationally: From a Professions-centered to a State-centered Approach

Legal occupations vary dramatically from country to country—in scope of activity, education, organization, and institutional setting. This essay proposes to study legal occupations focusing on their relations to the state rather than on their character as "professions." It builds on the recent renaissance of state-centered approaches in the social sciences. A review of the diversity of law work and legal occupations in different countries leads to state-centered conceptualizations that identify institutionally comparable features of law work. A sketch of the European historical background of modern legal professions yields theoretical principles that can inform the proposed approach. Variations in the role of the state and in the relation of lawyers to the state apparatus are then shown to be related to differences between national legal professions. Even where the law is primarily seen as a profession, the character of law work is better understood when related to the state.     

Employee assistance programs: an employer's guide to emerging liability issues

Increasing numbers of employers are implementing employee assistance programs (EAPs) designed to assist employees with personal issues that affect their work performance. Studies show that EAPs can dramatically increase employee productivity, but the benefits from EAPs have been accompanied by a less welcome development: lawsuits filed against employers by employees who allege that they suffered harm in the course of obtaining services through their employers' EAPs. Although the potential for liability will always exist, the employer that adheres to certain guidelines will be able to minimize its risk and make its EAP well worth the investment.     

Affirmative Action in Women's Employment: Lessons from Canada

The use of affirmative action to increase women's representation in employment is recognized under European Community law. The European Court of Justice has identified affirmative action permissible under EC law and what constitutes reverse discrimination, deemed incompatible with the equal treatment principle. Despite these developments, gendered occupational segregation — vertical and horizontal — persists in all member states as evidenced by enduring pay gaps. It is widely argued that we now need national measures which take advantage of the appropriate framework and requisite political will which exists at the European level. Faced with a similar challenge, the Canadian government passed the Employment Equity Act 1986 which places an obligation on federal employers to implement employment equity (affirmative action) by proactive means. Although subject to some criticism, there have been some improvements in women's representation since its introduction. This article assesses what lessons might be learned from Canada's experience.     

Boundaries of Legitimacy: Sex, Violence, Citizenship, and Community in a Local Sexual Economy

Studies of prostitution have overlooked the role of law in constituting the identities and sexual practices of women in the sex trade and defining the boundary between legitimate and illegitimate violence in the sexual economy. Drawing on field work with sex trade participants in a northwestern United States city, this paper explores how the cultural logic of modern liberal law shapes women's identities and interpretations of their actions. In positioning women in the sex trade as "sexual outlaws" to be managed and subjected to the full scope of legal authority, the law simultaneously limits women's citizenship and withdraws its protection. Moreover, in restricting women's ca-pacity to invoke fundamental legal rights, the law effectively sanctions "private" or extralegal forms of discipline and creates a space for violence. Given the paradoxical position these women hold as sexual outlaws on the one hand and frequent victims of physical and sexual assault on the other, I explore how they negotiate consent and resist violence.     

Young Lawyers and Work in the Public Interest

Much of the discussion of the bar's "public interest" effort has centered on the apparent unwillingness of lawyers, including young lawyers, to pursue public interest rather than traditional careers. To the extent that it is agreed that public interest work should be increased, the problem has been viewed as one of supply of lawyers rather than one of demand for their services. In this paper, just the opposite is argued; a variety of evidence is brought forth to suggest that the current public interest effort is limited mainly by the number of jobs available in that sector. In this light, various methods of increasing the funding of the public interest sector, and hence the number of jobs, are reviewed.     

Webster and women's equality

The National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) and the Women's Legal Defense Fund (WLDF) co-authored an "amicus curiae" brief in "Webster." The brief was written for 77 organizations who believe in equality of women. The brief said that constitutional protection of a woman's right to choose is guaranteed by the right to privacy. The brief said that if abortions were illegal, women would not be able to take place in society equally with men. Liberty would be taken away from women. If the state interferes with abortion, the principle of bodily integrity is violated. In "Winston v. Lee," the Supreme Court found that the state could not compel a criminal to undergo an invasive surgical procedure to retrieve a bullet necessary for the state to prosecute with. 1 in 4 women have a cesarean section, which requires a larger incision in the abdomen, and has many risks. Bearing and raising children often puts a damper on women's employment opportunities. Therefore, if the Supreme Court denied women the right to bear children when and where they wanted, women would not have the right to plan their futures. If the Supreme Court were to agree that "interest in potential life outweighs" a woman's tight to procreate autonomously, states could declare all abortions illegal, investigate them to see if they were induced on purpose, and murder women who induced them. Contraceptive devices could be declared illegal. Laws could be used to force women to submit to cesarean sections and other fetal surgery. Pre-viability abortion restrictions should be rejected because they have old-fashioned notions of women's role in society. They reinforce stereotypes. Missouri's law stresses aiding "potential," rather than actual life.     

Women on the edge of crime: Crack cocaine and the changing contexts of street-level sex work in New York City

In this paper, we attempt to examine, engender and contextualize the theses that (i) women's emancipation escalates [women's] crime and violence and (ii) women's drug use escalates [women's] crime and violence, by drawing on ongoing ethnographic fieldwork in relation to women crack smokers and the changing contexts of street-level sex work in New York City. The paper attempts to illustrate how the position of women crack smokers can only be understood by locating their lives, their illicit drug use and their income-generating activities within the context of a specific set of localized socio-economic and cultural developments. We suggest that observations from our research refute the theses that women are becoming more criminal and/or violent in the context of either their consumption of crack cocaine or their alleged emancipation.An earlier version of this paper was presented by the first author at the Joint Meetings, Law and Society Association and Research Committee on the Sociology of Law of the International Sociological Association, Amsterdam, 26–29 June 1991.     

Human rights dynamics of abortion law reform

The legal approach to abortion is evolving from criminal prohibition towards accommodation as a life-preserving and health-preserving option, particularly in light of data on maternal mortality and morbidity. Modern momentum for liberalization comes from international adoption of the concept of reproductive health, and wider recognition that the resort to safe and dignified healthcare is a major human right. Respect for women's reproductive self-determination legitimizes abortion as a choice when family planning services have failed, been inaccessible, or been denied by rape. Recognition of women's rights of equal citizenship with men requires that their choices for self-determination be legally respected, not criminalized.     

Women,Work, and Crime: An International Test of the Emancipation Hypothesis

This study analyzes Interpol statistics on female crime for the 1963–1970 period for a sample of Western nations with the purpose of testing two popular explanations of female criminality. Six measures of female economic participation in society were correlated with female proportional involvement in overall crime rates, theft, fraud, murder, and robbery/burglary.

It was found that women's contribution to the overall arrest rate is neither directly proportional to their employment in the commercial work force, nor to the degree in which their jobs are comparable to those of males. The analysis of the crimes of theft and fraud provided support for the “opportunity” version of emancipation theory. Adler's “aggressive” variant of the emancipation hypothesis was only partly borne out by the data for murder and not supported for robbery and burglary.     

Cosmopolitan Democracy and the Rule of Law

The ongoing process of globalization calls out for novel forms of transnational liberal–democratic decision–making. In this spirit, David Held and a group of interlocutors (especially Daniele Archibugi) propose an ambitious model of "cosmopolitan democracy." Although the proponents of cosmopolitan democracy are right to insist that transnational liberal democracy must avoid the dangers of an excessively centralized world–state, their own efforts to do so ultimately fail. The weaknesses of their ideas about the notion of the "rule of law" generate unforeseen theoretical difficulties for their account. Any transnational network of liberal–democratic governance worth defending will need to do a better job preserving a substantial quotient of traditional rule of law virtues.     

“命”的语义分析与庄子的“安命”哲学

古汉语中“命”这个字有命名、生命、命运三重含义,而中国古代哲学中的“命”的深刻含义也就隐藏在这三重含义及其相互关系之中。“命”是对个人生命存在的限定或规定,是个人与社会环境和生活世界的联合体,关注“命”的问题是庄子思想的重要方面,他主张“安其性命之情”,可以称之为“安命”哲学,其内容包括对语言之“命”的悬置,对生命之“命”的保养,对命运之“命”的安顺。     

Prompt-pay laws: a state-by-state analysis

The following cases are the result of research performed in all state jurisdictions for any cases addressing "prompt pay." Also included is a state survey of prompt-pay statutes.     

论我国《行政许可法》中的信赖保护原则

《行政许可法》在我国第一次以法律的形式确立了“信赖保护原则”,它体现了“诚信政府”的理念,对于提高行政机关及其工作人员诚信意识,实施行政许可行为时言必信、行必果,取信于民具有重要作用。公民、法人或者其他组织因信赖行政机关作出的行政许可决定而从事的活动受到法律保护,没有违法行为,不得撤销。若为公共利益出发,不得不变动行政许可,在相对人无过错时,必须给予信赖相对人财产补偿。对相对人的信赖利益的保护方式主要有两种,即存续保护和财产保护。     

SOCIAL SECURITY RETIREMENT BENEFITS The Last Insult of a Sexist Society

An older, divorcing couple rarely has assets worth more than their Social Security rights. After a house and pension/retirement plans, Social Security is their largest "asset." Yet, it is rarely considered by lawyers, mediators, or the parties themselves. A key point, often missed, is that the working spouse receives twice as much Social Security as the nonworking spouse. For many retiring women, getting half as much Social Security as their ex-husbands is just one more insult from a sexist society. Although a nonworking husband will get the same half, the problem is largely one affecting older women, who earned less on average while they worked and who usually took time off to be with the children while the children were growing up. This article looks at Social Security regulations that make this so and how to avoid this unjust result.     

The Paradox of Complaining: Law, Humor, and Harassment in the Everyday Work World

This article addresses the question of women's seeming rejection of sexual harassment law by refusing to apply the label "sexual harassment" in the face of incidents that would easily qualify as such. Building on the work of Bumiller (1988) and the tradition of sociolegal studies focusing on understanding the power of the law in its everyday context (e.g., Merry 1979; Engel 1987; Sarat and Kearns 1993), this analysis explores the "tactical milieu" in which both hostile work environment sexual harassment and tactics for its resistance are produced. Using in-depth interviews with both women and men, the author explores the ways a particular form of hostile work environment harassment–dubbed "chain yanking"–poaches on the realm of ambiguous humor to effect male group solidarity and women's disempowerment. A common countertactic–"not taking it personal"– is analyzed for its simultaneous power as resistance and unwitting collaboration. The contradictory effects of this tactic-countertactic pairing on the naming and claiming of the harm of sexual harassment are examined, as well as the implications this has for combating sexual harassment in the workplace.