Racism and Sexism in Corporate Life Changing Values in American Business

Feminists are not accustomed to having their case made so persuasively by a man, even a minority man, as it is in this book. His credentials, both academic (Harvard, Berkeley, Yale) and corporate (Bell of Pennsylvania), are impeccable. The book is based on a study designed to look into the overall effect of employment practices on the utilization of management personnel and the perception of the work atmosphere of 4,202 managers at all levels, from supervisor to top brass in ten large corporations. Both sexes and five minority groups blacks, whites, Hispanics, Asians, and native Americans were included. Racism and sexism were defined as a belief in the inherent superiority of whites and males. Today, in the subtler form of neoracism and neosexism, the power to maintain that superiority is institutionalized in traditional practices which, though not designed orginally to discriminate, have retained this result. Fernandez feels that although the combined effects of Equal Employment Opportunities (EEO)/Affirmative Action Programs (AAP) and the accompanying changes in values during the past fifteen years have curbed the white male's power, any limit to their accustomed power, however minute, looks enormous to them so they cry "reverse discrimination." Despite their protests, however, they are not victims of reverse discrimination. They are still far more than equitably represented in management. Although only 37 percent of the population, they hold 95 percent of all management jobs. The corporation is still white male turf. According to the author, however, they no longer have an option about admitting the barbarians at the gate. As a matter of survival they are going to have to come to terms with a new, diverse managerial force, not only as a result of EEO/AAP but also because new styles of management are inevitably going to be called for in postindustrial society. Fernandez invokes what might be called a "cohort theory" of value change. A "new breed" of increasingly vocal workers is coming on the scene, socialized in a different time, with work values quite different from those of the current older, mainly white male "old breed" managers. They no longer unquestioningly accept management decisions; they want some part in them. They want openness and humaneness in management. Fernandez has a number of recommendations for corporations, including: acceptance of diversity in the work scene, recognition of the costs of racism and sexism, special training programs for managers, and immediate sanctions against violations of EEO/AAP guidelines. I read this book in late summer, 1981, when the full weight of that white male