Chinese-American Women and Their Experiences

Chinese-American Women and Their Experiences With Discrimination in the Workplace

Case Summary, Methodology, and Literature Review

The Case of Chinese-American Women and Their Experiences with Discrimination in the Workplace: Persevering in the Face of Adversity and Its Price

Analysis using theoretical constructs from the literature review

This analysis concerns the experiences of a professional Chinese-American young woman, "Sue," employed at "Flexco," discussed further below. For the purpose of analysis, I address this question: "What types of experiences did Sue encounter at Flexco that suggested she was being discriminated against as an Asian-American in general and a Chinese woman in particular and are these practices widespread in the American workplace today?

Background and Overview.

The positive manner in which the vast majority of Asian-Americans are treated and viewed by mainstream Americans today is the result of their reputations for hard work, scholarliness, and devotion to their families, as well as federal legislation that eliminated many of the former discriminatory policies that had adversely affected their ability to assimilate effectively into U.S. society. Unfortunately, there are also some lingering negative stereotypes and perceptions concerning Asian-Americans in general and Chinese-Americans in particular that appear to continue to adversely affect the ability of this segment of American society to succeed in many ways. These issues have assumed some new relevance and importance in the 21st century as America becomes an increasingly multicultural society, and this study involves the experiences of a Chinese-American women, "Sue," who finds herself confronted with some baffling episodes at work that cannot be easily dismissed without considering discrimination. To this end, analysis of the case is offered using theoretical constructs identified in the peer-reviewed and scholarly literature concerning the incidence and causes of discrimination in general and its impact on Asian-Americans and Chinese-American women in particular. Three potential alternative solutions to the dilemma identified in the case are presented.

Impact of Discrimination on Asian-Americans.

The extent to which one race has experienced the impact of discrimination in the workplace has largely depended on the extent to which they were perceived by mainstream America as being "others." In this regard, the history of migration for the groups of Asians living in the United States clearly differs by the major periods and conditions of their entry; all of the immigrants that arrived before 1965, though, share a common history of overt racial and ethnic discrimination in the application of immigration and citizenship laws, as well and social and economic practices (Conway, Lien, & Wong, 2004). There have been some steps in the past to address these discriminatory practices on a national level. For example, before the repeal of discriminatory immigration and naturalization laws in 1943, only the U.S.-born generation, the majority of whom were under the voting age, and a very small number of citizens naturalized primarily before the 1882 Exclusion Act, were eligible to vote in U.S. elections (Lien, 2003). According to Conway and his colleagues (2004), "Some of the most blatant forms of exclusion for Asian-Americans were lifted when Congress replaced the racist national origin quota with the hemispheric quota system and created new immigrant preference categories in 1965" (Conway et al., 2004, p. 4).

Following the lifting of these immigration quotas, the explosive growth in the population of Asian-Americans and others seems to have been one of causes for the continuation of past discriminatory practices. In this regard, Wing (2005) points out that, "The U.S. immigration reform of 1965 produced a tremendous influx of immigrants and refugees from Asia and Latin America that has dramatically altered U.S. race relations" (p. 1). Likewise, Chandras, Eddy and Spaulding (1999) report that, "The greatest increase in Asian immigration began with the lifting of restrictive quotas on Asians after the passage of the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965. It is estimated that there were no fewer than 8.5 million Asian and Pacific Islanders residing in the United States in 1994" (p. 239). These rates were twice the number experienced in 1980 and these authors emphasize that Asian and Pacific Islander populations will continue as the fastest growing ethnic group from 9 million in 1992 to a projected 40 million in 2050 (Chandras et al., 1999).

Today, the largest Asian groups in America are: (a) Chinese; (b) Filipinos; - Japanese; (d) Asian Indians, (e) Koreans; and (f) Vietnamese (Chandras et al., 1999). Given these trends, it is reasonable to assume that any perception among mainstream Americans concerning the threat represented by unfettered immigration policies will simply be exacerbated in the years to come. As the war on terrorism grinds its bloody way through the nation's consciousness, mainstream Americans are going to become increasingly wary of "others" among them, and these issues are discussed further below.

This influx of Asian-Americans, particularly in the past few decades, has been regarded as significant today because it created an atmosphere of "we" and "them" among many mainstream American citizens that continues to this day. For example, Wing reports that:

It [immigration of Asian-Americans] was precedent-setting in the racialization of nationality and the incorporation of nationality into U.S. race relations. The racial formation of Asian-Americans was a key moment in defining the color line among immigrants, extending whiteness to European immigrants, and targeting non-white immigrants for racial oppression. Thus nativism was largely overshadowed by white nativism, and it became an important new form of racism.

p. 2)

Likewise, as Takagi (1992) emphasizes, "Race has become a ubiquitous social fact of American life. Issues of race -- racial identity, race relations, and racism -- permeate politics, culture, and even the language with which we speak, read, and write. Traditionally, race relations has been governed by a language of 'us' and 'them'" (p. 1). Furthermore, there are some unique aspects to the manner in which Asian-Americans are perceived by mainstream American society that also sets them apart from other minorities today. For example, as Kim (1998) emphasizes:

In many ways, Asian-Americans are positioned on the in-between - on the cusp, at the interstice, in the buffer zone - of Asia and America, between black and white, between old-timer and newcomer, between mainstreamed and marginalized. Yet the in-between is a precarious and dangerous position to occupy if we are not fully cognizant of where we are and what our position means in the larger picture. (p. 3)

Indeed, this point is also made by Wu (2002) who reports that, "More than anything else that unifies us, everyone with an Asian face who lives in America is afflicted by the perpetual foreigner's syndrome. We are figuratively and even literally returned to Asia and ejected from America" (p. 14).

Today, while high levels of schooling and occupational achievement suggest that Asian-Americans have truly succeeded in American society, this erroneous image as a "model minority" group tends to camouflage both the diversity and the discrimination they continue to encounter on a daily basis in the United States (Kim & Lewis, 1994). These authors suggest that current trends in employment and compensation of Asian-Americans relative to nonminorities clearly demonstrate discrimination and there appears to be a so-called "glass ceiling" firmly in place that keeps Asian-Americans out of the top levels of the public and private sector service, "perhaps by channeling them into professional occupations and away from supervisory authority" (Kim & Lewis, 1994, p. 285). Likewise, Daniel (1997) reports that Asian-Americans routinely experience discrimination within the federal service and suggest that the problem is pervasive and serious. According to Daniel (1997), Asian-Americans comprise 2.6% of the civilian workforce in the United States; however, they constitute less than 1% of municipal officials (Daniel, 1997). Moreover, this author emphasizes that, "There are almost no Asian-American mayors or city/county managers. Only.9% of [executives are] Asian, while 3.5% of the federal workforce and 4.3% of the postal service are Asian. Twenty-seven percent of white men serving the federal government are supervisors, but only 15% of Asian-American men hold such positions. Twelve percent of white women in the federal service hold supervisory positions, compared to only 7% of Asian women" (Daniel, 1997, p. 264).

Notwithstanding the legislative initiatives that have provided a more equitable playing field for Asian-Americans in recent years, the powerful effects of racism and discrimination are not so easily swept aside from the mainstream consciousness. For example, according to Wing (2005):

In recent years it has become a progressive mantra that racial categories are 'socially constructed,' but it is often forgotten that they only achieve full structural and systemic power when they are legally defined and enforced by state power. In the United States, the plethora of both European and African nationalities very early on was subsumed by a legally defined and state sanctioned system of racial categories. (p. 2)

The current percentages of Asian-Americans relative to others in the United States today are illustrated in Table 1 and Figure 1 below.

Table 1.

Demographic composition of the United States (2003 estimate).

Category Percent

White 81.7%

Black 12.9%

Asian 4.2%

Amerindian & Alaska native 1%

Native Hawaiian & Pac. Isl. 0.2%

Source: U.S. Government: CIA World Factbook, 2007.

Figure 1. Demographic composition of the United States (2003 estimate).

Source: Based on tabular data in World Factbook, 2007 (no separate listing is maintained for Hispanics).

From a strictly percentage perspective, it would seem that Asian-Americans do not represent much of a threat at all to mainstream American society, but these mere numbers do not tell the whole story of course. For one thing, Asian-Americans are one of the most diverse and fastest growing groups in the United States today (Hong, Kim & Wolfe, 2005). According to Alvarez and Kimura (2001), studies have documented time and again that, consistent with their historical treatment, Asian-Americans continue to be the targets of racially motivated property vandalism, verbal harassment, theft, physical assaults, and in some instances, homicide; furthermore, other studies have confirmed that a persistent pattern driving anti-Asian violence is the perception of Asian-Americans as foreigners who present an economic, academic, social, and/or cultural threat to the mainstream white majority (Alvarez & Kimura, 2001).

While Sue had not been the victim of any such violent encounter, some of her friends had told her about such experiences and this always concerned her that she might become a victim in the future as well. In fact, these numbers might be even higher because the analysis of the incidence of violence against Asian-Americans is complicated by a number of factors, not the least of which is the manner in which crimes involving them are categorized. For example, Moran (2003) reports that, "In the prototypical image of a hate crime, for example, the victim is attacked by a stranger based on hatred for a social group, the violence is extreme, and the perpetrator gains little of material value as a result. This prototype hampers efforts to define victimization more broadly, for instance, by acknowledging that some bias crimes are opportunistic" (p. 2365). Therefore, violent crimes committed against Asian-Americans may not be identified as a hate crime, even if the criminal involved elects to steal from Asian-Americans rather than whites out of racial antipathy (Moran, 2003).

The research shows that Asian-Americans continue to experience the adverse effects of widespread discrimination as Sue has encountered at Flexco, but these practices may not be well identified or discernible without citing some specific examples and trends concerning where and how these practices play out in other workplace settings across the country today. Based on the types of experiences encountered by Sue at Flexco, Asian-Americans have become increasingly vocal in their demands for equitable treatment in the American workplace. For example, in her study, "Comparing the Voting Participation of Chinese to Other Asian-Americans in Recent U.S. Elections," Lien (2003) reports that in spite of popular images of political complacency and apathy on the part of many Asian-Americans, Chinese-Americans in particular have a long history of participation in the American political process, and for good reason: "In addition to formal participation in elections, they have participated through indirect means such as lobbying, litigation, petitioning, protesting, boycotting, civil disobedience, contacting public officials and the media, and contributing to political campaigns," the author advises (Lien, 2003, p. 1). The compelling reasons behind these heightened levels of political activism have been "rampant legal, political, economic, and social discrimination on the domestic front as well as concerns for the people and welfare of the overseas homeland" (Lien, 2003, p. 1).

Being a "stranger in a strange land" is not without its joys and excitement, but as Sue learned the hard way, it can carry with it some profound implications when culture shock and repeated encounters with discriminatory practices are the norm. Many Asian-Americans, for example, may or may not embrace the individualistic cultural values that are characteristics of American culture (Chan & Henderson, 2005). The manner in which Asian-Americans respond to discriminatory practices may be gauged in part through development processes that are akin to Freud and other developmental psychologists that use stages to describe how people progress through the human condition in another country. For example, citing Helm's 1995 study, "An update on Helms's white and people of color racial identity models," Alvarez and his associates provide five so-called "ego statuses" that are typically employed by minority members in the United States to develop a healthy racial identity:

Conformity, characterized by a trivialization of race as well as a denigration of Asian-Americans and an idealization of whites and white culture;

Dissonance, defined by a sense of confusion or ambivalence about race;

Immersion-Emersion, characterized by a dualistic racial worldview involving an idealization of Asian-Americans and Asian culture;

denigration of whites and white culture; and,

Internalization, defined by a selective re-appraisal of Asian and white Americans and their respective cultures (Alvarez et al., 2001).

From a theoretical perceptive, the authors suggest that each status of identity is characterized by qualitatively unique affective, cognitive, and behavioral reactions to race and racism (Alvarez et al., 2001). Furthermore, the studies of values acculturation/enculturation (i.e., acculturation and enculturation along the cultural values dimension) to date indicate that Asian-Americans that are further removed from immigration (for example, sixth-generation Asian-Americans) will tend to subscribe to European-American cultural values more closely than will Asian-Americans that are recent immigrants (Hong et al., 2005). By contrast, Asian-Americans that are closer to immigration will subscribe to Asian cultural values more strongly than their counterparts who are many generations removed from immigration; these studies also suggest that adherence to these values influences the ways in which Asian-Americans behave, including how they manifest their psychological problems, express their emotions, and seek psychological help (Hong et al., 2005).

In addition, there are some important different constructs of the self between mainstream Americans and Asian-Americans that represent the basis for an understanding of the differences between their respective individualistic and collectivistic cultures. In this regard, Chan and Henderson (2005) define individualism as "the subordination of the goals of the collectivities to individual goals, and a sense of independence and lack of concern for others" (p. 180). By contrast, the authors define collectivism as:

grouping of a diverse array of beliefs and behaviors that fall under seven categories: Consideration of implications (costs and benefits) of one's own decisions and/or actions for other people, sharing of material resources, sharing of nonmaterial resources, susceptibility to social influence, self-presentation and lacework, sharing of outcomes, feeling of involvement in others' lives. (Chan & Henderson, 2005, p. 180)

These concepts mean that although everyone is of course unique, there are some fundamental differences between Asian-Americans and mainstream American concerning temporality, aesthetics, the need to belong to a group and how a person feels about subjugating one's one interests for the greater good that must be taken into account when searching for clues as to why people act the way they do or respond differently to the same motivational initiatives in the workplace. For example, as Ino, Sue and Sue (1990) emphasize, "Deference, the suppression of self-assertion, and passivity are thought to stem from cultural norms and values that emphasize the need for self-control, inhibition of strong feelings, attention to the reactions of others, modesty, respect for authority, and a family or group rather than individual orientation" (p. 156). Not surprisingly, in their study of passivity and self-assertiveness among Chinese-American women, these authors found that, "Chinese-American women behaved as assertively as their Caucasian counterparts" (Ino et al., 1990, p. 160).

Indeed, these different worldviews suggest that people from different cultures simply think about things differently but they can certainly feel the same way about the same things nevertheless. In other words, it is possible for someone from one culture to experience the same events as someone from a different culture and perceive the events is a significantly different fashion, with different responses called for because of these different worldviews, but with a common reaction to the events themselves. It is reasonable to assert that almost everyone finds certain things repugnant, but what should be done about the situation may differ from culture to culture.

When people react in a knee-jerk fashion to preconceptions and stereotypes about others, then, discrimination can take place without any conscious effort being made to do so by the perpetrator. In this regard, Covey emphasizes that, "Discrimination exists in large measure out of concern for self-preservation of identity and comfort. For example, I know what it is like to be female, Caucasian, Irish, Catholic, and able-bodied. I have no idea what it is like to be male or Afro-American or Chinese or Islamic or a wheelchair user" (p. 84). This, of course, does not mean that one person is absolutely right and the other is absolutely wrong when considering the same events and interpreting them differently (far from it); it does mean, though, that in an increasingly multicultural society, people who ignore these fundamental differences do so at their peril.

Unfortunately, there remains a glaring dearth of timely studies on the how different cultures perceive the same circumstances and this type of research is especially needed today because of the rising incidence of discrimination against Asian-Americans in general and Chinese-Americans in particular. The extant studies on racial discrimination in the United States to date have largely focused on other minorities, particularly blacks and have failed to take into account other significant demographic groups such as Asian-Americans. For example, in his study, "Race, Gender, and Authority in the Workplace: Theory and Research," Smith (2002) reports that, "The race and authority literature has largely been restricted to studies of blacks and whites, perhaps because these groups were at the center of civil rights struggles during the 1960s and 1970s. The major findings from this literature extended what was known about consistent patterns of racial disparities along key socioeconomic indicators" (p. 509). According to Smith (2002), some recent case studies of discriminatory practices in the American workplace have been conducted; however, even these studies have been limited to the work experiences of blacks and whites only. "When considering the fact that the number of Latinos will soon equal or eclipse that of blacks, and firm-level analyses of Asian-Americans are at a premium, broader qualitative analyses are needed," the author concludes (Smith, 2002, p. 509).

Nevertheless, the fact remains that race is still an overwhelmingly important issue in America and the manner in which Asian-Americans today are treated is reflective of these long-held patterns of behavior. According to Wu (2002):

Most people don't see the slippery slope leading from governments and companies to nations and peoples and then to races and cultures; it is a swift slide from an overseas group to an American individual by way of the catch-all phrase 'you people,' as in, 'if you people hadn't bombed Pearl Harbor...' The distinction of United States citizenship, seemingly all-important, is blurred away. It is as easy now as it was a century ago to find diatribes about the Chinese government or Japanese companies that speak in terms of China or Japan as monoliths or that conclude 'the Chinese are a military threat" or "the Japanese are an economic threat.' The further proclamations that 'the Chinese are belligerent' or 'the Japanese are devious' don't have a clear stopping point. (p. 2)

These issues have assumed some new relevance following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, where many mainstream Americans are increasingly questioning the presence of "foreigners" in "their" country because of their race, even if these individuals are second- or third-generation (or fourth- or fifth-, for that matter) American citizens. In their study of Asian-Americans in the contemporary era, Conway, Lien and Wong (2004) found that, "Well after the legal status of alien has been shed, no matter what their citizenship, how long they may have resided in the United States or how assimilated they are, the common understanding that Asians are an alien presence in America is still the prevailing assumption in American culture" (p. 222). In fact, on average, four out of every ten respondents from each ethnic group in the survey conducted by Conway and his associates had experienced some type of racial and ethnic discrimination. These authors emphasize that:

It is evident that race cannot be overlooked in research on Asian-Americans and the political system. As a first preference, more Asian-Americans identify with a racialized label ('Asian-American') than as simply 'American' even though most prefer an ethnic-specific label. After given a forced choice, about six in ten profess to identify with the panethnic, racialized label sometime in their life. Furthermore, experiences with racial discrimination and a sense of racial linked fate frequently emerge as relevant in our study. (p. 222)

Indeed, these same powerful forces were at play in the United States following the attack on Pearl Harbor, but Asian-Americans today are not interred in the literal meaning of the word, but are rather still subjected to many of the same long-standing perceptions by mainstream America that have managed to pervade workplaces across the country. A discussion of these issues is provided below.

In a day and age characterized by an increasingly multicultural society, many observers are suggesting that there is no longer any place in American culture for racial categories at all, and the time to consider people as "Americans" rather than a specific subset has long since passed. Unfortunately, people are just people and it would seem reasonable to assume that these same forces will continue to exist in American culture for generations to come unless and until something is done to counter these inexorable processes. Indeed, it would seem that everyone views other people in this way, as "African-Americans," "Chinese-Americans," "Asian-Americans" and so forth without recognizing that the individual is inherently an "American" first and foremost.

Furthermore, because people are in fact just people, it also seems that the ability of Asian-Americans to overcome these barriers to discriminatory practices relates to how many of them there are in a given region because there is in fact "strength in numbers." In this regard, Sue has a slight advantage over her Chinese-American female counterparts in other regions of the country because of the relatively high percentage of Asian-Americans already living her area. These same processes have been shown to play out in real-world settings in this manner as well. For instance, if a specific region of the country happens to have a large concentration of blacks, blacks will be more likely to attain positions of higher authority; likewise, the same holds true for Asian-Americans such as Sue. For example, the results of one study that examined whether the ethnic concentrations of establishments, occupations, and industries influenced the ability of white, black, Hispanic, and Asian men and women to attain authority in the American workplace used data from the Multi-City Survey of Urban Inequality and 1990 decennial census occupational codes. This study, by Elliott and Smith (2001), determined that racial/ethnic concentration among approximate equivalent coworkers at the level of work groups, industries, and occupational sectors has little effect on the chances of minorities accessing positions of authority; however, the study also found that concentration in the form of racial/ethnic matching of supervisors to subordinate work groups exerted a strong and consistent effect among all groups, suggesting that, for some groups at least, authority attainment depends a great deal on the opportunity to supervise largely coethnic work groups.

On the one hand, Asian-Americans even seem to enjoy some advantage over other minorities in the United States by virtue of these same discriminatory practices that could work to Sue's advantage. For example, Elliott and Smith (2001) found that more Asian-Americans occupy positions of authority than do blacks or Hispanics. Furthermore, from a socioeconomic perspective, even though Asian-Americans have been shown to possess higher educational attainment and median family income than non-Hispanic whites and other racial groups in Census 2000 on average, their per capita income of $21,823 was lower than the $24,819 of non-Hispanic whites, and their percentage of persons living below poverty level (13%) was higher than that of non-Hispanic whites (8%) (Conway et al., 2004). According to these authors:

Among major Asian-American groups in 1990, socioeconomic status varies, however. The per capita income of the Vietnamese was less than half of the Japanese; the percentage of persons living below poverty level varied between 6% for Japanese to 28% for Vietnamese Americans; that for college degree holders varied from 17% for Vietnamese to 58% for Asian Indian-Americans. (Conway et al., 2004, p. 9)

While many Chinese-American women such as Sue have made enormous strides in gaining an equitable share of the American pie in recent decades, they remain misrepresented in American popular culture and are rarely the subject of historical works in a cycle that has prevented their being properly recognized by mainstream America (Ling, 1998). Further, Chinese-American women remain stereotyped in American society as being nonconfrontational "exotic and seductive dolls" (Ling, 1998, p. 3). Similarly, Ino, Sue and Sue (1990) note that, "Asian-Americans are typically viewed as quiet, passive, and nonassertive" (p. 155). Likewise, Tzu-Chun (1997) reports that these stereotypes of Chinese-American women also served to reinforce misperceptions about the Chinese-American community in general: "The stereotypes of Chinese-American women as exotic slave girls or sequestered women with bound feet symbolized the moral corruption of the community" (p. 5). According to Ling (1998), though, Chinese-American women may have been the victims of discrimination and prejudice in the past and today, but they are also survivors of hardships and obstacles. Nevertheless, many Chinese-American women remain on the fringes of mainstream society, unable to adequately adapt to their new culture without completely abandoning their old: "Many Chinese-American women remain culturally marginal, feeling that they did not belong to either culture" (Ling, 1998, p. 178).

Although Asian-Americans and Chinese-American women have all made significant socioeconomic progress in the recent decades, this demographic segment of American society continues to suffer from different forms of discrimination and prejudice. Sue's predicament at Flexco is actually a relatively benign example of such discrimination in that she has been allowed to keep her job. With the threat of disciplinary action looming over her head like a sword of Damocles waiting to fall, Sue's position has become untenable and there are countless others like her in the American workplace today. In this regard, Ling suggests that these lingering stereotypical views of Asian-Americans in general and Chinese-American women in particular have made further progress difficult, and in some cases the cures provided by legislative reforms have simply caused them more problems. For instance, Ling points out that:

The model minority stereotype misrepresented their socioeconomic reality and prevented their further advancement. While designed for the protection of ethnic minorities, affirmative action and its practices in many places produced new restrictions for Asian-Americans. Interracial marriage, in which more Chinese and other Asian-American women were involved than their male counterparts, indicated these women's socioeconomic progress. However, Chinese-American women still subjected to racism and sexism in interracial dating and other aspects of their lives. (1998, p. 178)

While it is possible to gain some useful insights into how Asian-Americans in general have experienced life in the United States in recent years, these observations are not necessarily generalizable across the board with all Asian-Americans, particularly Chinese-American women who appear to occupy a special niche in American society by virtue of these long-standing stereotypes and misconceptions concerning their being "nonconfrontational." According to Ling (1998):

The observation and analysis of Chinese-American women's history over the past one-hundred-fifty years indicate that there are commonalities as well as differences between Chinese-American women and other ethnic women. The different experiences of Chinese immigrant women resulting from cultural and physical dissimilarities and racial prejudice and discrimination, however, were significant and distinct (emphasis added). (p. 178)

In sum, then, identifying the unique experiences of Chinese-American women in the workplace today has assumed some new importance in recent years and Sue's dilemma at Flexco in examined in this context further below.

Case Study Methodology

Case Study Dilemma: Chinese-American Women and Their Experiences with Discrimination in the Workplace

Introduction"

The applause was deafening and it was all she could do to keep from crying a little. The audience was on their feet cheering loudly now, and all poor Sue could do was manage a wave and smile. Flexco had just received the coveted Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and Sue felt both vindicated and thrilled. Over the past three years, she had been responsible for making the changes in her organization that had attracted the attention of the media and the NIST alike, and in spite of her initial problems with discrimination at Flexco, Sue was on top of the world. "My mom was right after all," she reflected as she stood to accept the award on behalf of Flexco, "and I know she would be proud of me today."

Long Way from Home"

Sue was a second-generation Chinese graduate student and her mother had just died. Sue was devastated and confused. Between bouts of sobbing, Sue thought about her life in American today. Her father had died several years before and the recent loss of her mother struck Sue very hard. She had contacted her brothers and sisters that were still living in China and had made all of the funeral arrangements for her mother herself, something she had not had to do for her father and something that made her feel very old for all of her 21 years for some reason. In fact, Sue was emotionally exhausted and tried to remember what her mother had last told her, "Everything will be all right," she had told her, "if you just work hard." Sue believed this with all of her heart and as she went to bed that night, she vowed that she would work hard all of her life and make her parents proud of her, no matter how difficult it might be.

The Brick Wall"

Sue slammed the door behind her and threw her coat on the kitchen table and sat down in a huff. She sank down in her chair and put her face in her hands and sighed. She just could not believe that nothing had changed and she was getting nowhere. Another day just like all of the others and Sue wasn't sure what to do, or even if she should do anything at all, but she felt like she had to say or do something or she would just burst. Sue had the credentials, after all, and she didn't understand what was happening at work.

She had worked at Fluxco as a project supervisor for over three years now, and Sue believed that her work record was spotless. Fluxco was an established company that manufactured energy-efficient window systems and Sue thought that she had a good future there. Flexco had a number of far-flung operations in Asia and Europe and Sue was champing at the bit to get in a position where she could help manage these operations. The company had about 3,000 employees in the U.S. And almost 1,500 expatriates working in seven locations abroad (four in Asia and three in Europe). The fact that she could also speak Mandarin and French fluently encouraged her to pursue her ambitions to help manage these operations, and she knew she could do a good job.

From her first day at her new job, Sue had expected to encounter some skepticism about her abilities to do a job that she knew had traditionally been occupied by males at Flexco, but she was determined to take the high road and be a thorough professional in everything she did. Sue dressed modestly and went to great lengths to ensure that all of her interactions with her peers, subordinates and superiors were straightforward, honest and mutually satisfactory. In fact, many of the suggestions Sue had made over the years had been adopted company-wide, and all of the policy and procedure manuals she had written were still in use in the company's far-flung offices around the world. She knew she was doing an outstanding job in her current position, but others kept getting promoted ahead of her and Sue wasn't sure why. At first, Sue had thought perhaps it was because she was a woman, because two men had been promoted ahead of her, but then other women were also promoted ahead of her. After giving it some thought, Sue concluded that her lack of a promotion might be because she was both a woman and Chinese, but because this didn't make any sense to her, she dismissed it at first in search of a logical reason but nothing else seemed to explain these events and Sue was left feeling like she was truly betrayed by her superiors and the system.

Betrayed"

Sue pondered her options about resolving the promotion issue, but nothing seemed viable and her frustration grew on a daily basis. When her former supervisor, Bill, had hired her right out of graduate school, he had assured Sue that if she worked hard and "played by the rules," she would receive a promotion in a couple of years to project supervisor, a step far above her current position as a project manager and one that she had wanted since she had been in school. Unfortunately, Bill had been promoted and transferred to another state shortly after Sue was hired, and none of Bill's promises to Sue had been in writing or communicated to the higher-ups. Bill's last words to Sue were reminiscent of her mother's: "Just keep doing what you're doing, Sue," Bill had told her, "and management will take notice and give you that promotion - I promise."

When she brought the subject or a promotion up with her new supervisor, Elizabeth, Sue was told that there were no promotions available right now anywhere in the company but she would keep Sue in mind for anything that might come up in the future. These assurances, though, might as well have been written on gossamer because months came and went, and even though Sue consistently received outstanding performance ratings, she was never considered for the promotion she wanted, or for that matter, for any positive human resource action. Other employees received awards and bonuses, but Sue was left out in the cold and it was making her crazy. She had considered contacting Bill to see if he could put in a good word for her but dismissed this course of action almost immediately because she did not want to appear to be groveling for what she considered to be rightfully hers already. She was particularly wary of wanting to draw attention to the fact that she believed her "Chinese-ness" had anything to do with adverse human resource policies, but enough is, after all, enough, and Sue decided to take action.

Sue Takes Action"

Armed with the knowledge that she had academic and professional credentials at least as good as the other employees that had been promoted ahead of her, Sue decided to do some research on her own. She quickly learned that her hunches about being discriminated against in her job were not totally unfounded, but rather the practice was fairly commonplace when it comes to Chinese women in the American workplace today. Sue found out from talking with her friends and colleagues that there were no Asians in any positions of real authority at Flexco, even though they represented a sizeable percentage of the company's workforce. More importantly, there were no females in any management positions above Sue's own boss, which suggested to her that there was in fact a glass ceiling in place at Flexco that would inhibit her ability to achieve her professional goals unless changes were made. To help her substantiate these hunches, Sue decided to talk discretely with some other Asian employees about their experiences at Flexco to gather some empirical findings of her own.

These findings certainly rang a bell with Sue, and she knew she was on the right track. Some further investigation determined that there might be some constraints to her advancement at Flexco that were in fact related to her being Asian. Sue knew she was the best at what she did, though, and this made her situation all the more untenable. How could she prove that she deserved a promotion without jeopardizing her current position and future with Fluxco? Sue read that because managers and supervisors are creatures of culture, they tend to react to culturally different people in the same manner as their significant others; as a result, the same types of prejudices that are typically found in a community are acted out in the workplace. This meant that any discriminatory practices at Flexco - if they were in fact real - likely mirrored the attitudes that existed in the communities in which the company competed.

This finding gave Sue much to consider. If these discriminatory practices were so firmly ingrained in the community that they were being acted out in the workplace, what chance did she stand of achieving any real progress with a large concern such as Flexco? In fact, Sue later determined that it is possible to extend this model even further to include the pathology of a community and even the wider American society. These findings were confounded, though, by the fact that Asian-Americans represent one of the fastest-growing segments of the American population today. In fact, there will be almost 10 million Asian-Americans in the U.S. within the next decade, and they already outnumber African-Americans in several states including California, Hawaii and Oregon.

From the outset, Sue recognized that prejudices and discrimination are virtually universal phenomena; in fact, people all over the world find all kinds of reasons (race, ethnicity, religion, language) to discriminate against other people that are different from them and to discriminate in favor of those they consider to be similar to themselves. In this regard, it was determined that some of the major impediments to resolving the fundamental pay equity issues in the United States to date have included these precise societal and cultural barriers.

Road Not Taken"

Deflected is not daunted, and after she recovered from the initial shock of her meeting with Elizabeth, Sue carefully considered her options. Sue was not necessarily meek or timid, but she did not like to cause trouble and any legal remedy would certainly "cause trouble" at work for everyone involved. Nevertheless, she had invested several years of her professional career at Flexco with the legitimate expectation of being promoted as promised early on, she had worked hard and remained a productive employee throughout, and these were years that she simply could not get back, nor could she simply afford to waste them in terms of a career progression strategy. More importantly, there was also the important issue of self-esteem and a sense of justice denied involved that compelled Sue to learn for herself what her rights were in the workplace and what she could reasonably expect from Flexco.

Forearmed"

During her research, Sue learned that although federal antidiscrimination laws are generally concerned with specific acts of individual employers rather than with broad societal tendencies to treat men and women differently and therefore frequently fail to address structural discrimination, such antidiscrimination laws do provide important legal protections for the rights of men and women who encounter different treatment or different work-related outcomes, and these laws have opened a wider range of options for women in the American workplace (Cleveland et al., 2000). Sue determined that, "Laws banning discrimination in schools and the workplace reflect basic ideals about fairness in dealing with each other in a civil society. In a sense, these laws reflect the 'conscience' of society, at least in this particular area" (Cleveland et al., 2000, p. 187). Therefore, it became apparent to Sue that societal context in which she worked played a key role in how she was perceived because of these widely held beliefs concerning men and women which have been shown to significantly affect women's success in the male-dominated workplace (Cleveland et al., 2000).

Based on her research, Sue became convinced that she was being treated unfairly and became determined to resolve this issue or know the reason why. Her friends and colleagues at work enthusiastically supported Sue's research and suggested that she was in fact being discriminated against in her position at Flexco because she was Asian. During her research, Sue learned that there are two important legislative acts that would likely affect her situation with Flexco. The first was the Equal Pay Act of 1963, which Sue learned represented one of the first post-World War II attempts to address gender discrimination in the American workplace. The Equal Pay Act prohibits American employers from paying men and women different rates for "equal work on jobs the performance of which requires equal skill, effort, and responsibility, and which are performed under similar working conditions" (quoted in Cleveland et al., 2000 at p. 191). While the Equal Pay Act addresses the important issue of different pay for men and women, the effects of the act have been constrained by a number of factors. For example, Sue found out that different pay can be given for work that is "equal" if pay inequalities are the result of a seniority system, a merit system, or a system that ties earnings directly to the quantity or quality of production. More generally, pay differentials for male and female workers doing highly similar work are not illegal if it can be shown that they are based on a factor other than sex (Cleveland et al., 2000).

The second piece of legislation that convinced Sue that Flexco was not playing fairly was the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that states that it is illegal for an employer to "fail to hire or discharge an individual, or to discriminate with respect to compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment because of such individual's race, color, gender, religion or national origin" (quoted in Cleveland et al., 2000 at p. 192). The Civil Rights Act addresses discrimination in the workplace in hiring, firing, training, discipline, compensation, benefits, classification, and other terms or conditions of employment for employers that are engaged in interstate commerce and/or who have 15 or more employees; besides covering employees in the United States, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 also covers U.S. citizens working outside of the United States for U.S. employers (Cleveland et al., 2000).

More importantly for her situation, Sue also found out that Title II, known as the Glass Ceiling Act (P.L. 102-166), addressed her specific concerns about the under-representation of women and minorities in management and decision-making positions as well as the ongoing need to remove artificial barriers to advancement in the American workplace (Gibelman, 2003). Sue also learned that the Civil Rights Act provides for the potential payment of compensation and punitive damages in cases of discrimination. "Depending on the size of the organization," Sims (2002) points out, "the allowable damage range is from $50,000 to $300,000 for each instance of violation of the law. Further, punitive damages can be paid if the employer intentionally discriminates against someone or if the employer discriminates with malice or reckless indifference to an individual's federally protected rights" (p. 53).

Sue Takes Action"

By now, Sue had become convinced that she was being singled out at Flexco because she was a Chinese woman, and decided to confront her employers with her "evidence." Sue showed her research to her supervisor and explained that she had been passed up for promotion several times in the past in favor of newer employees, some of whom did not have the same level of credentials as Sue possessed. Her supervisor, Elizabeth, looked over Sue's research and agreed that such abominable behaviors did in fact occur elsewhere in some American workplaces, but she assured Sue that nothing of the sort was allowed at Flexco. Moreover - and much to Sue's surprise --, Elizabeth also told Sue that she had received some reports from other employees that her work was not up to snuff and she had been reported to be causing problems for other departments by not providing her monthly reports on time. At this, Sue was taken aback and tried to explain that her reports had been delayed for the past three months because the input she needed to complete them had not been provided by the business units (all headed by white males) on time, but Elizabeth dismissed her explanations out of hand and told her not to cause any more trouble or her job would be in jeopardy.

Sue was absolutely shocked! As Elizabeth droned on and on about the importance of "being a team player" and "not rocking the Flexco boat," Sue became convinced that something was inherently wrong with this picture and left Elizabeth's office wondering what in the world happened, and wondered if there was any future for her at all at Flexco - or for that matter - anywhere in an American workplace where things could go so very awry. Sue thought about what her mother had told her: "Everything would be all right - if you just work hard." Well, everything wasn't all right and she was uncertain about how to proceed. On the one hand, Sue was not necessarily scared to "rock the Flexco boat," but the other hand, she had much to think about after her meeting with Elizabeth that gave her pause to consider whether she had truly failed in some way at work. In this troubled frame off mind, Sue drifted off to sleep and dreamed of her parents and family still in China.

Potential Alternatives.

Based on the foregoing trends and issues, it is reasonable to assert that Sue would be confronted with three potential alternatives to her dilemma at Flexco:

Accept the Status quo and hope for the best. Sue could simply accept her fate and hope things get better in the future. Indeed, many women in America find themselves trapped in jobs with no prospects for advancement, but the majority of women employed in these types of jobs and regions of the country where these circumstances exist are in the same situation and many also simply resign themselves to accepting the status quo and making the best of it (Hawkesworth, 1997). In fact, in some cases, the status quo - even if it results in disparate treatment of different races - is legal. According to Connolly and Tennant-Burt (1997), "The structure of employment opportunities in some industries will likely continue to perpetuate occupational segregation by gender, and many of the disparities that result are not illegal discrimination by U.S. Or any current international standards" (p. 148). This is certainly an option for Sue, but it fails to address the pressing issues that have been troubling Sue to begin with, and it is doubtful that she would be able to tolerate prolonged exposure to the same circumstances that drove her to seek a change in the first place.

Resign and move on. Many people become fed up with their work and simply decide to move on with their lives with another company or by starting their own. For example, according to Singer (1994), "Often people simply walk away from grievances. Such avoidance is considered by some to be all too common in the United States and to result in uncounted costs in the form of lost business or ruined relationships. At the other extreme are those who resolve differences through weapons or fists" (p. 17). With her credentials, this former extreme option is certainly open to Sue; however, if Sue decided to pursue one of the other alternatives (no. 3 or the recommended alternative described below) discussed below, she would still have the right to continue to seek alternative employment while she was still working for Flexco. For example, Covey (2000) reports that everyone in the U.S. who files a discrimination claim can mitigate their damages by continuing to actively seek other employment opportunities and documenting their employment search efforts.

Step up to the plate and take on Flexco in court. The most drastic of the potential alternatives, Sue could seek legal counsel and prosecute Flexco based on federal antidiscrimination laws that provide important legal protections for the rights of men and women who encounter different treatment or different work-related outcomes. This alternative, though, would provide the most substantive benefits for Sue, assuming that she has exhausted all of her administrative remedies within the company before doing so. Just as importantly, perhaps, Sue would be helping to right a longstanding wrong that affects countless other women in America today. For example, these antidiscrimination laws have also been shown to open a wider range of options for women in the American workplace (Cleveland et al., 2000). While this is the most drastic of the foregoing alternatives, it is also considered the most viable and appropriate at this point in the discussion because it will provide Sue with her legitimate rights and compel Flexco to honor its commitments to her.

Recommendation.

None of the foregoing potential alternatives provide Sue with the answers she really needs to solve her problems at Flexco, but she feels she must do something. Sue gave the matter a lot of thought, and decided she could not accept the status quo and felt she deserved better than having to resign and start all over somewhere else. Based on Sue's lifelong commitment to herself and her mother concerning achieving her goals, as well as her academic and professional credentials, it would not be in her best interests to accept the status quo at Flexco, nor would it behoove Sue to simply forsake all of the hard work and effort that she had already devoted to her position at the company by simply quitting and moving on to another position where she might well encountered the same types of discriminatory practices. On the verge of despair, a friend of Sue's told her about alternative dispute resolution, which provides still another potential - and in this case superior - alternative to Sue's employment predicament at Flexco. Alternative dispute resolution techniques are defined by Beach, Hammer, Hewitt, Kaufman, Kurki, Oppenheimer and Wolf (2000) as "voluntary processes that involve some form of consensus building, joint problem solving, or negotiation - excluding litigation, administrative procedures or arbitration" (p. 17).

This approach appears to be particularly well suited for Sue's situation at Flexco. For example, today, scholars generally agree that there are three major characteristics of conflict:

Conflict is a pervasive element of social life in the workplace; conflicts take place at all levels from the interpersonal to the interorganizational;

Disputes are cultural events, evolving within a framework of rules about what is worth fighting for, what is the normal or moral way to fight, what kinds of wrongs warrant action, and what kinds of remedies are acceptable...these perceptions and conceptions influence behavior in ways which cannot be described as rational choice-making; and,

Dispute behavior, like other aspects of informal social life, contains aspects of both rational and non-rational behavior; it incorporates the dimension of choice as well as habit, convention, and effect (Gleason, 1997, p. 2).

Implementation of Recommendation.

The ability of Sue to successfully overcome the discriminatory practices she has been experiencing at Flexco will be directly related to her persistence and diligence in presenting her case to the arbiter. Based on the foregoing issues concerning the discriminatory practices against some minorities that are apparently widespread at Flexco and the need for action rather than the relative inaction that characterized the other alternatives described above, this recommendation will be implemented in a five-step process as follows:

Implementation Plan for Recommendation.

In order to successful present and defend her case against Flexco in a binding arbitration setting, Sue is going to need to have her "ducks in a row" by following the short-term action steps outlined below.

Short-Term Action Steps. Perhaps the most important thing for Sue to keep in mind as she progresses through her short-term action steps is to ensure that she has completely exhausted all of the administrative remedies available to her at Flexco for resolving the problems she has been experiencing. For this purpose, Sue should have kept careful records concerning any incident involving discriminatory practices and documented any unwarranted adverse human resources action (Covey, 2000). In addition, the human resources policies at Flexco are clear about the company's grievance resolution procedures which stipulate that Sue must ensure that she has taken her case to the highest level within Flexco possible before abandoning her efforts and proceeding with the next steps involved in the short-term in order to ensure her the best possible chance of success at achieving her goals (Zack, 1997). Further, Sue should also begin talking with her friends and coworkers in earnest concerning their personal experiences with discrimination at Flexco and line them up as to their willingness to provide affidavits to that effect if they are needed in whatever alternative is selected.

Assuming that Sue has accomplished the foregoing, the following long-term action steps are recommended.

Long-Term Action Steps.