The Business of Equality in the Solicitors' Profession
| Date | 01 May 2000 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2230.00274 |
| Published date | 01 May 2000 |
| Author | Clare M.S. McGlynn |
REVIEW ARTICLE
The Business of Equality in the Solicitors’ Profession
Clare M.S. McGlynn*
Hilary Sommerlad and Peter Sanderson,Gender, Choice and Commitment –
Women Solicitors in England and Wales and the Struggle for Equal Status,
Aldershot: Ashgate, 1998, xii + 348 pp, hb £42.50.
In Gender, Choice and Commitment, Hilary Sommerlad and Peter Sanderson
argue that ‘gender remains a principal determinant in the career trajectories of
women solicitors’ (p 4). Whilst to many this would appear to be obvious, the
tragedy is that this is little recognised within the profession itself. Indeed, there
would appear to be a silent conspiracy not to mention gender, let alone feminism,
in any debates within the profession concerning women, paradoxical though this
may seem. The result is a deeply unsatisfactory situation in which the gendered
obstacles in the way of women’s full and equal participation in the profession
remain ‘remarkably durable’ (p 13), but the strategies being adopted by
campaigners seeking to improve women’s status overlook the significance of
gender, focusing instead on what has been termed the ‘business case’ for sex
equality. The ‘business case’ attempts to convince employers that the adoption of
equal opportunity measures will bring economic and efficiency gains to their
businesses, thereby encouraging them to adopt such practices. As argued by
Opportunity 2000, an organisation established in the UK to promote the ‘business’
case for equality, this is not a strategy ‘rooted in a moral or social imperative’, but
in ‘hard commercial facts’.1
In the light of Sommerlad and Sanderson’s study, I argue that the ‘business case’
strategy, as a means by which to improve the status of women solicitors, is wholly
misconceived. It is based on erroneous assumptions about the reasons for women’s
marginalised status and therefore can have only limited effect in eliminating
discrimination. Furthermore, by privileging economic considerations, the business
case may open the way for the removal of existing hard won gains. In order to
develop this argument, the first part of this article will examine Sommerlad and
Sanderson’s analysis of the status of women solicitors. The second and third parts
go on to outline and examine the ‘business case’ strategy and assess whether, in the
light of the arguments made by Sommerlad and Sanderson, it has the potential to
bring about a situation in which women are equal participants in the solicitors’
profession. The final section will conclude by suggesting that those seeking change
ßThe Modern Law Review Limited 2000 (MLR 63:3, May). Published by Blackwell Publishers,
108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.
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* Newcastle Law School, University of Newcastle upon Tyne.
I should like to thank the participants of the 1999 International Institute for the Sociology of Law’s
workshop on ‘A Challenge to Law and Lawyers – Women in the Legal Profession’, held in Onati, Spain,
for their comments on some of the ideas put forward in this article, Ann Sinclair for her invaluable research
assistance and Ian Ward for his helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article. I also gratefully
acknowledge the support of the University of Newcastle upon Tyne Small Grants Panel for funding this
research.
1 Opportunity 2000, Fifth Year Review (London: Opportunity 2000, 1996).
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