Employment Discrimination

Dr. Barrett offers a two-pronged approach to testing procedures in employee selection. First he describes tests that are most effective in identifying qualified job candidates. Second, he shows how to use them in ways that will produce the desired results while minimizing an adverse impact on minorities, women, or older and disabled workers. Since Title VII of the Civil Rights Act and related laws went into effect, many myths have sprung up with regard to what employers can and cannot do when they hire and promote -- and Barrett explains them here. In doing so, he provides tested, legally sanctioned methods that will not only improve the quality of a company's workforce, but also instill the confidence needed to manage the human resource function ethically and equitably. This is a necessary resource for human resource professionals and in some cases, their attorneys as well.

This volume brings together top scholars in industrial and organizational psychology with social psychologists to explore the research and theory relating to various areas of workplace discrimination. Many of the contributors to this book participated in a conference on workplace discrimination held at Rice University in May 2000. The idea came from the realization that there had been no attempt to bring together the various literatures on the topic. Discrimination and issues of employment diversity are significant topics today in IO psychology, business, and human resource management. This edited volume examines the following components of this important discussion: *how to explain discrimination in organizations; *understanding discrimination against specific groups; and *implications for practical efforts to reduce discrimination. This book brings together, in one volume, a review of the research on discrimination based on race, age, sexual orientation, gender, physical appearance, disability, and personality. In addition, it explores the multilevel antecedents and potential bases for a general model of discrimination in the workplace. While social psychological research and theory have provided invaluable insights, an understanding of discrimination in the workplace and solutions will require incorporating factors at the organizational level in addition to factors at the individual and group levels. Although a definitive model is not reached, the aim of this text is to facilitate future research and theory.

The typical workplace is a hotbed of human relationships--of friendships, conflicts, feuds, alliances, partnerships, coexistence and cooperation. Here, problems are solved, progress is made, and rifts are mended because they need to be - because the work has to get done. And it has to get done among increasingly diverse groups of co-workers. At a time when communal ties in American society are increasingly frayed and segregation persists, the workplace is more than ever the site where Americans from different ethnic, religious, and racial backgrounds meet and forge serviceable and sometimes lasting bonds. What do these highly structured workplace relationships mean for a society still divided by gender and race? Structure and rules are, in fact, central to the answer. Workplace interactions are constrained by economic power and necessity, and often by legal regulation. They exist far from the civic ideal of free and equal citizens voluntarily associating for shared ends. Yet it is the very involuntariness of these interactions that helps to make the often-troubled project of racial integration comparatively successful at work. People can be forced to get along-not without friction, but often with surprising success. This highly original exploration of the paradoxical nature--and the paramount importance--of workplace bonds concludes with concrete suggestions for how law can further realize the democratic possibilities of working together. In linking workplace integration and connectedness beyond work, Estlund suggests a novel and promising strategy for addressing the most profound challenges facing American society.

This volume examines the concept and social phenomenon of discrimination from economic and sociological perspectives. It brings together the work of a wide range of sociologists and economists and provides a spectrum of methodological and ideological views on this highly charged topic. The breadth of topics and approaches offered here include classical Marxist ideas on rivalry among entrepreneurs and among ethnic groups to neo-classical supply-side and human capital factors, as well as demand-side factors such as efficiency wage theories and organizational inertia.

Organizational restructuring and corporate downsizing can have a significant impact on the perceived social responsibility and responsiveness of any firm. This book analyzes the phenomenon by identifying the nature and types of structural or functional relationships that exist between downsizing and organizational performance variables, on the one hand, and organizational social responsiveness on the other. It looks at changes in the use of various restructuring techniques to improve efficiency and effectiveness and the effects of these changes on the organizational citizenship standing in the community. It goes on to add to the understanding of the general phenomenon of downsizing by examining its relationship to the level and pervasiveness of corporate social responsibility.

Samuel Cohn teaches at Texas A&M University.

"Deirdre Royster's moving and engaging study convincingly and uniquely captures racial differences in school to work transition. Her data on and analysis of the differential employment experiences and outcomes of comparable young black and white working class males are very compelling. "Race and the Invisible Hand is an important book that will be widely read and cited."--William Julius Wilson, author of "The Bridge Over the Racial Divide "As acute in its analysis as it is rich in ethnographic detail, Royster's captivating study shows in telling detail how inequalities in the securing of good working class jobs are reproduced in the anything-but-colorblind contemporary United States."--David Roediger, author of "Colored White: Transcending the Racial Past

"An unflinching look at the experiences of young blue collar job-seekers on both sides of America's color line. This book powerfully demonstrates the hidden workings of racial discrimination today."--Chris Tilly, co- author of "Stories Employers Tell: Race, Skill, and Hiring in America

"Timely and challenging, this book exposes race as the key arbiter of employment outcomes for young black and white men. This beautifully written study is absolutely essential for policy makers, educators and researchers."--Mary Romero, author of "Maid in the USA

"An important study. As policymakers keep trying to improve blacks' employment opportunities with new versions of job training programs, Royster shows how irrelevant such efforts are as long as blacks lack access to essential social contacts."--James E. Rosenbaum, author of "Beyond College for All: Career Paths for the Forgotten Half

"A powerful and original empirical account thatpersuasively demonstrates how visible hands invisibly reproduce racial inequality in the blue collar trades. Systematically comparing young black and white men who share the same educational credentials, grades, attendance recor