Panes of the Glass Ceiling
The Unspoken Beliefs Behind the Law's Failure to Help Women Achieve Professional Parity

Explores unspoken beliefs that engender workplace behaviour and legislative/judicial failures that contribute to the “glass ceiling” and workplace inequality.

Kerri Lynn Stone (Author)

9781108446464, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 21 April 2022

257 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.4 cm, 0.351 kg

'A valuable addition to the literature, this thoughtful book should find a home on the shelves of academics, students, advocates, and policy makers alike.' Morgan L. W. Hazelton, Perspectives on Politics

More than fifty years of civil rights legislation and movements have not ended employment discrimination. This book reframes the discourse about the “glass ceiling” that women face with respect to workplace inequality. It explores the unspoken, societally held beliefs that underlie and engender workplace behaviour and failures of the law, policy, and human nature that contribute “panes” and (“pains”) to the “glass ceiling.” Each chapter identifies an “unspoken belief” and connects it with failures of law, policy, and human nature. It then describes the resulting harm and shows how this belief is not imagined or operating in a vacuum, but is pervasive throughout popular culture and society. By giving voice to previously unvoiced – even taboo – beliefs, we can better address and confront them and the problems they cause.

1. “We see you differently than we see men” (but)
2. “We expect you to take your (verbal) punches like a man” (and)
3. “Accept 'locker room' and sexist talk” (but)
4. “You don't operate with full agency” (but)
5. “Women are the downfall of men” (so)
6. “Just be grateful that you're there” (and)
7. “Don't burden us with your (impending) motherhood” (because)
8. “He has a family to support” (and besides…)
9. “Bad people don't do good things, and good people frequently say bad things,” (and employment discrimination plaintiffs can't be fully trusted).

Subject Areas: Gender & the law [LAQG], Politics & government [JP], Gender studies, gender groups [JFSJ]