Title: Gender: An (Un)useful Category of Prescriptive Negotiation Analysis?*
Abstract: I. IntroductionPractitioners and scholars who desire to bring a agenda to the field of negotiation have almost exclusively embraced an account of theory that grounds gender in male-female distinction. Skills considered benefits or liabilities in successful negotiations are often described, prescribed, and/or analyzed in relation to concepts of masculinity or femininity, and, very often, to attendant male- or female-sexed bodies. The corresponding discourse of gender difference-defined here as a whole system of social meaning that holds the masculine to be different from the feminine1-has to a great extent shaped the boundaries of academic- and practitioner-oriented discussions of women and negotiation. The result positions a reading of negotiation theory as a project to address sex-linked differences, although without necessarily assuming totalizing or biological generalities. Moreover, it often yields the same conclusion: women, writ large, are socially and culturally disadvantaged at the bargaining table. And insofar as this insight bears a reformist goal, it is almost always a project or pedagogy to make women equally-abled in the outcomes they achieve, if not in the processes that get them there.Contemporary feminists engaged in interrogating and affirming from a biological, developmental, social, or psychoanalytical perspective have greatly influenced the development of legal education, dispute resolution, and, as an outgrowth, the feminization of negotiation. Carol Gilligan's foundational work describing how women reason through an ethic of care and connection, rather than through a contest of rights and abstract principles, has played a critical role in shaping relational legal thought.2 Gilligan's theory of morality prompted some scholars to suggest that women could contribute a uniquely feminist flavor to lawyering work and negotiation. For example, in 1985, Carrie Menkel-Meadow predicted that the influx of women into the legal arena could change the very nature of the zero-sum adversarial system.3 In 1988, Catherine Weiss and Louise Melling recommended adding communication-oriented classes to law school curriculums to include women's ways of reasoning and expression.4 In 1992, Linda Stamato proposed that research on gender could help orient contemporary conflict theory away from self-interest and towards alternative ways of thinking about . . . the multiple meanings of 'relationship.'5 In 2001, Kate McCabe described the rise of dispute resolution during the past twenty-five years as the result of an effort to create more women-friendly and women-affirmative forums.6This cultural or relational project to affirm undervalued feminine attributes such as collaboration and embedded subjectivity, has no doubt added to our ability to recognize and explore the potential for human connection and dispute resolution in social and legal institutions. However, in its strongest form, such glorification of values has met with several persistent critiques: (1) it essentializes and reinforces stereotypes that have traditionally disempowered women, with little regard to class, race, or situational power;7 (2) it extols and idealizes qualities arising from women's subordination and thus serves to further entrench their oppression;8 (3) it ignores or even contradicts empirical evidence to the contrary;9 and (4) it maintains a structural system of (heterosexual) masculine and identity that ultimately perpetuates rather than subverts the status quo.10 Such critiques have prompted feminists to articulate more subtle theories and practices that nonetheless continue to embrace gender difference as a project. For example, in the context of legal education, scholar Deborah Rhode has suggested that [a]ny adequate response to gender bias will require a more central role for values traditionally associated with women. …
Publication Year: 2003
Publication Date: 2003-09-01
Language: en
Type: article
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Cited By Count: 3
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