Academic

?One Gender?s Crash?

By Ann Bartow

Deborah Spar, President of Barnard College, writes in the WaPo:

..as the financial debacle unfolds, I can’t help noticing that all the perpetrators of the greatest economic mess in eight decades are, well, men. Specifically, they are rich, white, middle-aged guys, same as the ones who brought us Watergate in the 1970s, the Teapot Dome scandal in the 1920s and, presumably, the fall of Rome.

She notes that “A Catalyst Research study last year found that women make up almost 60 percent of the workforce at Fortune 500 finance and insurance companies but account for only 17.9 percent of corporate officer positions and none of the chief executive positions.” and gives reasons why women might take fewer dangerous risks and more likely to blow whistles on dishonest behavior. Read her who essay here.

Via Frank Pasquale, who observes: “Her insightful piece reminded me of conservative thinker Reihan Salam’s proposal that gun laws recognize differing propensities for violence among men and women:”

The idea of treating women and men differently offends our understanding of gender equality at a deep level. But treating women and men as though they are identical?as though women are as violent, dangerous, and abusive as men?isn?t treating them equally. Rather, it is pretending that ignoring their deep differences is the best policy, even if that means that people will die or suffer as a direct result.

–Ann Bartow

Full post as published by Feminist Law Professors on January 05, 2009 (boomark / email).