2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Gender Development Consequences of Business Globalization
Feb 25, 2008
Janet Spitz
Assoc. Professor
School of Business
The College of St. Rose
432 Western Ave
Albany NY 12203
518 454 2032
spitzj@strose.edu
Alison M. Konrad
Professor of Organizational Behavior
Richard Ivey School of Business
University of Western Ontario
and
Adam Cresko
MBA Student
The College of St. Rose
The authors gratefully acknowledge support for this research from The College of St. Rose and
Temple University. This work has benefited from comments by participants at earlier
presentations at the Center for Citizenship, Race, and Ethnicity Studies at St. Rose, the 7th
Global Conference on Business and Economics in Rome, and the 2008 Allied Social Science
Assoc meetings in New Orleans.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Gender Development Consequences of Business Globalization
ABSTRACT
Cultural malleability from increased global economic activity creates an
opportunity for Business’ ideological preferences for inequality and
patriarchy to increase its influence. Developing nations represent very little
of the world’s wealth at this time, compared to corporations. Among the
bottom 95% of the world’s national and corporate economies, developing
nations hold only some 8 percent of the wealth, leaving them particularly
vulnerable to preferences held by the dominant group. As a result,
individual accomplishments of women in developing regions are likely to
experience both cultural and economic bounds. Explicit language in trade
agreements and other governance documents elucidating gender and other
equality is suggested to be worth actively seeking as a mechanism to limit
gender discrimination and enable the empowerment of women in developing
nations.
Keywords: Values, Ideology, Development, Culture, Gender Empowerment,
Business School, Patriarchy, Management.
JEL Classifications: A13; B50, B54; J7, J16; O15.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
2
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Gender Development Consequences of Business Globalization
1. INTRODUCTION
This paper questions whether uneven economic outcomes of globalization activity at both
the macro and micro levels of analyses are due to differences in pre-market resource
endowment, as is commonly supposed, or to intentional strategies of management. those
who attribute outcomes to resource differences not that countries are more or less
comparatively advantaged, towns or individual people hold more or less education or
wealth, and the like. Attributing outcomes to happenstance consequences of market
exchange leads many to advocate greater allocation of resources to build endowments with
long-run sustainability, including education, particularly for women, to decrease poverty
and increase per capita Gross Domestic Product.
The extreme nature of current differences in resources, however, especially wealth
differences between developing nations and the globalizing businesses that situate certain
of their activities in those locales, means that in the short and medium run, preferences of
the wealthier corporate entities are likely to hold greater sway.
If, however, global business development is driven at least in part by management
decisions tied to an ideological component opposed to equal opportunity or gender parity,
then activities designed to spur gender equality and thus improve indices of human
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
3
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
development (such as empowerment of women) may be opposed; nor can we expect to see
greater investments in education by women attain their expected market rewards.
This research explores aspects of values held by faculty in American Business Schools,
business school cultures more generally, and growth of managers and of globalizing firms
to extend our understanding of gender-related outcomes on a global level through an
integrated business school influence model. We suggest that business values and for-profit
economic activity are inextricably intertwined and visible in business practices and
outcomes both in the domestic and international spheres. We argue that the fact of
globalization creates a malleability in cultural values, where local, national and regional
inhabitants seek to redefine their understanding of the world and their place in it, a
malleability possibly rising to the level of a paradigm shift (Kuhn, 1970). In this context,
economic power wielded by business corporations, fed by business school graduates,
enables them to influence emergent and flexible definitions of appropriate realities to an
extent far greater than in the past (we explore the growing gender wage gap in China as an
example). Under such conditions, efforts to attain more balanced outcomes may need to
directly address and institutionalize values of equality which many of us might otherwise
assume.
2. BUSINESS SCHOOL FACULTY VALUES, COURSEWORK, AND
FOUNDATIONAL LITERATURE.
2a. Business Faculty Values.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
4
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Inequality in outcomes, or opportunity extended differentially to a local population on the
basis of sex or ethnicity, can be understood as an unintended by-product of profit
maximization – it is after all less costly to underpay some employees than it is to
adequately pay everyone and so increase the total wage bill. But differential opportunity
may be intended beyond savings in cost, due to preferences for patriarchy: to the extent
that like-minded (or similarly cultured) managers share certain value preferences, small
patterns in these preferences may accumulate through decision acts to significant
differences over time (Akerlof and Yellen, 1985).
Evidence of such statistically significant, and sometimes large differences in values and
ideologies emerged in an analysis of self-reported beliefs collected from an original,
nationally representative 1999 sample of academics in the U. S. We compared beliefs of
two groups: faculty who self-identified their field as Business Strategy in Schools of
Business, and faculty from Departments of Sociology.
Results shown in Table 1 indicate that significantly more Business Strategy than Sociology
faculty agree that in general, inequality is a good idea at the same time that they are not
particularly concerned with the equality of opportunity necessary to ensure that unequal
outcomes are based on differences in merit. Indeed, more than half of business strategy
faculty respondents disagreed that “one of the big problems in this country is that we don’t
give people an equal chance.” Sharp differences emerged with respect to Sociologists, who
tended to believe that inequality is not generally a good idea, it is a big problem that we
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
5
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
don’t give everyone an equal chance, and that inequality does not necessarily result from
lack of effort.
Business Strategy faculty views are also markedly different from those held by Americans
more generally: Americans accept economic inequality, but only when they are confident
that everyone has an equal chance (Jacobs et al, 2004) so that these different economic
outcomes are merit-based.
Beyond inequality as a value in and of itself, Business Strategy faculty were more likely to
hold sexist views. Significantly more Business Strategy than Sociology faculty agreed that
“There are some professions or types of business that are more suitable for men than
women”, “It is appropriate that men hold most top executive positions” as well as “political
positions” and “Mothers should not work”, among other gender-related views.
Business Strategy faculty were also more likely than Sociologists to hold racist views: “It is
appropriate that most top executive positions are held by white people” as well as “top
political positions”, that “on average African Americans are somewhat less capable of
contribution to economic production than are white people” and racism’s bottom line,
“racial inequality is partly due to African Americans’ lack of an inborn ability to learn.”
Business faculty’s racist views also contrast with those held by the general American
population, 97% of whom believe that people of color should have “as good a chance as
white people to get any kind of job” (Page and Shapiro, 1992).
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
6
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Not all business faculty share these views of course: some of the more extreme ideological
leanings are held by just a small proportion. Nonetheless, they are held by a statistically
significantly greater proportion of business faculty than these same extremist views are
held by faculty in sociology, and at about twice the rate as held by the American public.
Sexism emerged more strongly than did racism: while 5.8% of business strategy faculty
thought white people should hold top political positions, 9% thought those positions should
be held by men, and more supported restricting top executive positions to men than to
whites, a pattern holding significant implications for attainment of women of color. And
16% of Business Faculty agreed that Mothers should not work, a statistic that should make
many of us who look in some detail at patterns of employment and employee treatment in
developing nation production facilities, take note. More generally, the intensive scrutiny
experienced by any candidate wishing to ascend to a top executive or political position
means that even small preferences for men (or whites, or non-mothers) are likely to
significantly influence that top position’s final occupancy selection, an influence seen
throughout business as women occupy some 10 of 500, and 19 of 1000, top executive
positions (Fortune, 2007). This proportion has not changed in many years despite the
presence of many highly skilled, educated, and experienced executive women in the labor
queue.
Faculty in the field of Business Strategy were selected for our sample because they are
more likely than others to teach the capstone strategy courses, “Strategic Management” and
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
7
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
“International Business Management” in Business Schools. Therefore, the beliefs they
carry are among the last and most well-integrated to be imparted to business students.
Faculty values have been argued to impact student learning beyond the actual materials
contained in the class (Lambert, Terenzini, and Lattuca, 2007). However, many other
portions of the business school curriculum also contribute to the business culture thus
comprehensively developed and maintained.
2b. Business School Coursework.
Business courses in human resource management train managers to establish a trail of
condemnatory evaluations against high-performance women designated to be passed over
for promotion in favor of less qualified men, and specify strategies to defend against
unions; business communication courses assign students to write letters firing employees
without cause under employment at will; economics texts specify that Pareto Optimality
can equally well be attained where many are made worse off while few others are made
better, as long as the total sum is not decreased – indeed, they make clear that it is an error
to confuse equity with efficiency; and finance teaches that deep and pervasive debt is a
source of funding no more problematic than equity, even at national levels exceeding many
years’ GDP for projects of dubious contribution.
2c. Business School Foundational Literature.
Graduate business schools, in particular, are powerful shapers of assumptions, conventional
wisdom, and culture (Shiller, 2005). Contemporary business education texts themselves
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
8
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
rest heavily on the paradigm of market exchange described by Pareto (1896; 1966 trans.)
and Marshall (1890), among others. While feminist critiques make clear the value-laden
aspects of this supposedly neutral market exchange, we often fail to recognize their
intentionality. Burnham describes the
…drive for social dominance, for power and privilege, for the position of ruling class, by
the social group or class of the managers [orig. italics] … against the masses, who,
obscurely, are a social force tending against oppression and class rule of any kind; and
against each other for first prizes in the new world…. Comparable processes in history
indicate that it is worked out by … propaganda and ideologies, all under a bewildering
variety of slogans and ostensible motivations” (p. 166, 1941).
This underlying thesis is echoed by Pareto, who suggests
…how a small number of individuals is able, by underhand methods, to get the majority to
pay tribute to the minority. Why does the majority allow itself to be despoiled of its
possessions? First and foremost, it is by ignorance…. There has, of course, to be some
pretext for this appropriation, otherwise – even independently of the loss threatening them
– a certain instinct of equity and justice, existing in all human beings, would spark off
resistance to it. But if a more or less plausible pretext can be found – the degree of
plausibility is not very important – it is pretty well certain that the operation will not
miscarry through any resistance on the part of the despoiled” (Pareto, p. 115, 1896).
We can understand, then, as propagandized plausible pretexts Weber’s (1946) legitimation
of bureaucracy as administrative functionality, Drucker’s (1974) argument that
management is a series of tasks and responsibilities to make work productive and to further
the specific purpose of the firm, and Porter’s (1985) discussion of the challenge of
discerning strategic choice.
Viewing these pretexts in terms of utilizing “opportunism with guile” (Williamson, 1975)
lends a degree of clarity to increasingly unequal and biased global business outcomes.
Business language extolling opportunity for all persons seeps into common American
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
9
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
views that income and wealth disparities are legitimate results of individual differences in
effort and skill; Americans accept inequality overall much more than do people in Europe
(Weakliem, Andersen and Heath, 2003). Globalization’s business rise, and the increase in
business-trained managers, carries forward both the pretext for, and the realities of,
growing economic dominance, and values dominance, of the managerial ruling class.
3. The Rise of Business Globalization, and Business Managers.
3a. The Rise of Business Globalization.
Considerable attention has been paid to the rise of corporations in the last several years,
and one measure of corporate rise gaining use is an integrated composite of the top global
economies by wealth. This composite structure interweaves nations and businesses by their
Gross National Product (purchasing power parity) and gross revenues, respectively, into a
single ordered list.
Charts 1a and 1b show corporate gains in this composite index over time, between 1960
and 2005. Chart 1a shows the numerical proportion of publicly traded corporations to
nations, while Chart 1b shows the wealth value of these two groups over time.
Among the world’s largest 200 economies (solid line), in 1960 publicly traded
corporationsa composed 53% of this group (Chart 1a) but their proportion grew to 68.5%
a
We exclude private firms as we had been unable to gather reliable data for that group; we are in the process
of gathering such data now. Mergers, acquisitions, start-ups and corporate failures mean that a different
group of firms is included in each wave. Similarly, national changes in wealth and even identity cause
different nations to be included in different years.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
10
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
by 2005. Over time, nations take up a smaller and smaller share of the “largest economy”
pie. Among the world’s largest 100 economies (dotted line), corporations grew from 32%
in 1960 to 45% in 2005.
Chart 1b shows a similar story, but by wealth. In the top 200 group (solid line),
corporations at just under 9% controlled only a slice of the wealth in 1960, a slice that
doubled to 20% in 2005. Among the top 100 (dotted line), corporate wealth also doubled
from 5.6% in 1960, to 11.9% in 2005, an outcome of particular note since corporate
revenue is counted also as GDP by the nation where such revenues are reported.
The power that corporations are able to wield by virtue of their wealth becomes more
extreme among the less wealthy, currently developing nations. We extended the economic
list to the top 2,232 in 2005 (that is, the top 2,000 corporations, and as many nations as
there were whose GDPppp at least matched the 2,000th firm – this permitted us to include
232 nations, but left out several more).
To see this power dominance effect, we restricted that 2005 list to the less wealthy bottom
95% of corporations and developing nations, leaving out the top 5% (Charts 2a and 2b).
The power imbalance faced specifically by those developing nations is quite visibly dire in
the bottom 95% of our 2,232 nation-corporation list:
In the bottom 95%, nations hold only a little over 8% of the numerical spots with
corporations holding almost 92% of the positions (Chart 2a).
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
11
The wealth-based power
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
imbalance in this case is equally extreme (Chart 2b), with corporations controlling over
91% of the wealth at almost $18 trillion, compared to the $1.7 trillion resource held by
developing nations. That is, among developing nations, medium- and smaller-sized
businesses wield 10 times the wealth than the nations, given their GDPs, are able to do.
What does this corporate influence mean? For developing nations, it means that their
bargaining power vis-à-vis business is relatively quite weak. Imagine sitting at a
negotiating table where your opponent holds 10 chips to your one: no outcome is likely to
be “fair” in the sense of benefiting each party equally. Those who approach the table with
greater resource endowments will assuredly take more away, and the trade and investment
agreements observable in developing nations attest to that imbalance, with many nations
reaping a tiny fraction of the value of the natural resources or other goods they hold. This
economic corporate dominance also means that related preferences of corporate managers
are likely to be accepted as well.
Even in advanced industrialized nations among the top 5%, where corporate influence
should be least since few corporations wield enough money-power to even enter this
exclusive club, we see extraordinary accommodation by nations to make themselves
“business-friendly”. Such efforts include extensive corporate tax breaks, sharply reduced
prices for utilities, stunted and poorly enforced environmental protections, and generous
corporate welfare, not to mention acceptance of lobbying behavior that imitates bribery and
corruption in all but name.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
12
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Beyond economic imbalance, this corporate influence also suggests the cultural fragility
inherent in a technologically developing people’s emergence as a tentative global player in
the new world order. Such nations and localities tend to welcome the investment,
technology and jobs that globalizing businesses bring. To the extent that businesses carry
forward the values and ideological belief systems solidified in business education, into
situations and places where women’s rights do not already dominate (and no example of
such in developing nations comes to mind), the chance of gendered equal opportunity
either locally or in employment resulting from such business investment, appears small.
Global businesses teach through example that women are fit for employment – just not
employment at the same wages as men, or employment at the top, or employment if they
are mothers.
Even among the top 5%, business preference continues to widen inequality. In the U. S., a
nation possibly the least economically vulnerable to business’ whims due to its $12.5
trillion 2005 GDP and relatively strong labor and environmental laws, wages between
workers and their managers show extraordinary expansion over time. In 2005 the average
CEO pay was 411 times the pay of an average hourly worker, up from 107 times in 1990,
and 42 times in 1980 (Hartman, 2007). This soaring managerial compensation in recent
years may be seen in the rise of the Dow Jones Industrial Average over time, shown in
Chart 3.
At the same time, global inequality has increased, with many employed citizens earning so
little that numerous reports of the consumption of dirt and mud (Katz, 2008) have emerged
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
13
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
among the 51% of the earth’s population living on $2/day or less, or the 21% living on less
than $1/day (World Bank, 2008).
Income inequality overall is tied to gender based wage differences in developing nations as
well, so that preferences for inequality and sexism can be simultaneously fulfilled.
Morrison, Raju, and Sinha (2007) find that wage discrimination persists in developing
nations even where women are on average more educated than men and, moreover, that
larger gender wage differentials are found where there is a larger wage disparity overall.
Large wage disparities, both domestically and internationally, abound. Increased inequality
in the U.S. has led 82 Billionaires to fail to qualify for inclusion into the Forbes 400 richest
U.S. citizens of 946 Billionaires worldwide (Kroll and Fass, 2007), with American income
earners in the top 1% and even the top 10% earning more than they have since the 1920s.
Internationally, wage disparities are even more stark. Many are surprised to learn that
earnings of $47,500/year in 2000 were enough to place that person in the Global top 1% of
income earners, and that this group then owned 40% of the global wealth. Even $25,400/yr
in 2000 placed that wage earner in the Global top 10%, a group owning 85% of the world’s
wealth, while the bottom 50% holds wealth equal to one percent (Milanovic, 2000). What
is average or below average in the U. S. is far above average – indeed, places that person in
the elite – world-wide.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
14
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
3b. The Growth of Business Managers as Value Carriers.
The values of business faculty take effect through the behaviors of business-educated
managers employed in globalizing firms. Chart 4 shows the growth in number of graduates
of Business Schools in the U. S. between 1960 and 2004. Undergraduates with Business
degrees grew from 51,000 in 1960 to 307,000 in 2004, an increase of some 600%. Over
the same period of time, those holding a Master’s of Business Administration, or the MBA
degree, increased from 4,600 to more than 139,000, an increase of 3,000% (NCES, 2007a).
Viewed another way, MBA graduates composed some 11% of all Master’s degreed in the
U.S. in 1970; they composed 24% or almost one-quarter of all U. S. Master’s degrees in
2004 (NCES, 2007b).
Naturally, most of these business school graduates gain employment in business, in many
cases with businesses interested and engaged in transnational expansion. This mechanism
offers one channel for ideological growth. It also offers a favorable channel for carrying
forward the ideological pretext of equal opportunity and meritocracy, to be contrasted with
observed outcomes of global business in developing nations. We explore the case of wagerelated gender development in China, below.
4. THE CASE OF CHINA: ONE EXAMPLE OF GENDER DEVELOPMENT
CONSEQUENCES OF BUSINESS GLOBALIZATION.
The case of China is an interesting one, and compelling both because of its size, and
because before it was opened to a business-oriented market economy, Chinese women
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
15
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
enjoyed broad participation in paid work in nearly all categories of jobs and professions,
not always the case in developing nations.
During the mid-1980s, China began to open its doors to foreign direct investment, at least
to a limited extent. Such investment has grown, and while China is not yet an open market
economy, many global corporations have invested significant amounts in activity there.
Still more businesses subcontract manufacturing tasks to factories in China, so that China’s
contribution to global business today is considerable.
If business brought opportunity in a gender-neutral manner, then one would expect to see
women as well as men taking advantage of the steady wages and work offers associated
with foreign investment and foreign purchase of Chinese-manufactured goods. What we
observe instead, is a growth in the female / male wage differential closely matching the
foreign direct investment rise. That is, global business brought with it not an increased
opportunity for Chinese women, but a discriminatory opportunity structure, biased in favor
of Chinese men.
In 1988, Chinese urban women earned 86 cents for every Chinese urban man’s dollar; by
2004, global business had driven urban women’s wages down to just 76% of the Chinese
man’s dollar (Zhang, Han, Liu and Zhao, 2008). During the same period of time, Foreign
Direct Investment (FDI) in China increased from $3.19 billion in 1988 to $60.63 billion in
2004 (Fung, Iizaka and Tong, 2002; China Embassy, 2006).
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
16
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
2004 saw some 470,000 foreign-funded enterprises in China, not all of which were
completely foreign owned, with $158 billion in new FDI contracts (Blanchard, 2007). By
2005, China’s FDI had increased to $72.4 billion, including 12,639 new foreign-owned
enterprises (US-China Business Council, 2006). There is no question that during the period
of women’s relative economic loss, globalizing businesses grew their influence
enormously. Indeed, by 1999 the 1000 largest multinational corporations were, by some
accounts, responsible for some 80% of global industrial output (Blanchard, 2007).
Because the sample used by Zhang et al lived in cities, it is unlikely that these women
became independently engaged during this period with alternative activities such as
farming. Similarly, it seems unlikely that Chinese urban women suddenly “lost education”
during this period of time more than did Chinese men, although a swelling of urban
population may have decreased average education for urban populations of both genders.
While Zhang et al’s study does not prove that global business discrimination drove this
gender-based wage disparity, it is not obvious what other factor might so contribute,
particularly given demonstrated business preference for patriarchy during a time of
considerable Chinese cultural openness and change.
Shifting cultural acceptance of men’s greater employment rights emerged in Seguino’s
2007 analysis of regional and global trends in gender norms as well. Notably, the Asian
region was unique in showing an increase (from 1990 to 2000) in the proportion of women
agreeing that when jobs are scarce, men have more right to a job than women; Asian men
increasingly agreed with that statement as well (Seguino, 2007). In other regions, such
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
17
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
agreement dropped, suggesting that economic dominance and cultural accommodation are
not always matched.
5. A MODEL OF IDEOLOGICAL SPREAD.
Figure 1 shows a model of ideological influence from business faculty values, through
business school graduates, to globalizing corporations, and on to Countries’ & Regions’
economies, policies, trade agreements, cultures, values & ideologies. While this model
does not mean to imply that national or regional culture and value systems have little
internal cohesivity or strength, it does suggest that the act of economic globalization
renders those regional cultures more permeable than in the past.
Part of this permeability is technological availability of communicative media that attract
especially young members of society, drawing their interest into aspects of culture and
values which those media choose to show, cultural aspects that a large media literature
shows are ordinarily quite consistent with preferences of business (Bagdikian, 2000;
McChesney, 2004; Kilbourne, 1999). Part of the permeability also comes directly from
business activity, both from businesses seeking additional markets, and businesses seeking
production or service facilities. Either way, norms embedded in these firms’ practices are
observed by those residing in globalized regions, and are associated with the wealth, health,
and other assets such businesses represent. Intentionally cultivated values brought by
business are able to take hold through these mechanisms, both formally as claims to be
spreading merit and opportunity, and informally as culturally modeled preferences for
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
18
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
inequality generally, and patriarchy in particular, embodied in gendered business practices
and leadership.
6. CONCEPTUALIZING REALITY FROM DIFFERENCES IN PLACE
The role of culture in women’s ability to build lives that are productive and empowering is
acknowledged by feminists but given perhaps insufficient attention when we choose in
which area to allocate our time. Part of the problem is that of levels of analysis. When
Kanter (1977) noted that workplace expectations, reflecting social culture, constrained
women into roles of mother, sister, daughter, mistress, or “bitch”, or when Chesler (1994),
Faludi (1991) and others point out the externally established limits on what we as
individuals can be seen to do, even as feminists our own response is very often to enlarge
the female labor queue. We encourage more and more young women to become
mathematicians, politicians, scientists, astronauts, and economists, and of course this
activity is not wrong.
The problem is, these skilled young women run into virtually the same shared perceptions,
cultural expectations, and shared understandings of place existing many years ago. Shared
understandings lead to discriminatory behaviors practiced by both women and men that
maintain men’s superior position over women at work (McGinley, 2007).
Only a tiny number of nations, developing or industrialized, have women leaders – and in
even fewer cases did these women ascend independently of a father or husband holding the
office first; nowhere did women occupy governmental seats in proportion to their presence
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
19
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
in the population in 1996 (Seager, 1997), and that representation has not notably changed
since. While overall there are just 20 women CEOs in the Fortune 1000, in Finance,
although there are hundreds, perhaps thousands of skilled and high-ability women, there
are fewer women in strong positions among major financial firms than there were 10 years
ago (Thomas, 2007) and there were very few then. The U. S. has just one high-ability
woman on the Supreme Court, and extraordinarily low numbers of women in Congress and
as Governors of our states. Individual accomplishment matters – but it does not matter
enough.
Commercial media, children’s toys, even honest news reports all maintain and deepen what
is far more potent than implied by the term “media bias.” Recent hate-crime legislation in
the U. S. exemplifies this patriarchal conceptualization of reality that reduces women to the
invisible. Like Title VII of the Civil rights Act, current hate crime legislation recognizes
race, religion, color and national origin but does not extend its protection fully to womenb.
News reports of proposed amendments to hate-crime law all discuss the proposed inclusion
of gays. In fact, the proposed change also identifies gender as a protected category, along
with sexual orientation and gender identity, but the many news stories covering this nowfailed amendment consistently omit mention of sex (AP, 2007).
b
Limitations of the Bennett Amendment to Title VII continue to restrict protection from discrimination on the
basis of sex to that provided in the more limited Equal Pay Act of 1963, a level of protection far below the
extent that protection from discrimination is available in each of the other listed categories. In particular,
employers need only claim, without substantiation, that a woman worker is less productive than comparable
others, in order to pay her less or provide her with less favorable terms and conditions of employment, a tactic
outlawed for discrimination by race, religion, and the other protected categories.
June 22-24, 2008
20
Oxford, UK
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
There are some 10% of the world’s population that is gay; more than 50% are women, and
every time a rape is enacted, a hate crime occurs (Brownmiller, 1975). The
accomplishments of women as individuals cannot, on their own merit, overcome a culture
that socializes both men and women to understand our roles in ways that today mirror
Bardwick and Douvan’s 1971 traditionalist descriptions, renders them invisible (Ospina,
1996), or merely holds small preferences for those in leadership positions to be men.
A cultural group, national, or continental-level preference for men translates into behavior
as managers independently make choices that take sex into account (Bergmann, 1986;
Cockburn, 1991) leading equally educated and equally qualified young MBA female
managers holding preferences for work positions and earnings equal to their young MBA
male counterparts, to experience discriminatory outcomes (Strober,1982; 1990).
Discriminatory choices are made by women managers in decision making roles as well as
managers who are men, particularly where rewards at work are tied to their internalization
of sexist beliefs (Spitz and Konrad, 2001). In general, as Kuiper and Sap (1995) point out,
gender assumptions influence nearly all aspects of economic reasoning.
The structure of business is a model of domination and hierarchy, not partnership. Weekly
pay of $16,918 in 2007 for NYC investment workers (McGeehan, 2007) is only possible
when the number receiving such money is few; average American wages in the same
period were $885. That level of domination with inequality requires serious cultural
backup, not only in widening economic divisions of class, but in an increasingly global
movement to standardize culture that supports domination by sex as normal, just and right
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
21
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
(Eisler, 1987). When successfully implanted, this cultural value pretext set becomes a selfexplaining system where how business thinks is understandable since it is just an extended
version of our own understanding and thoughts (Sekine, 1998): we adopt the business
identity.
Research in developing nations bears this out. Mason and Smith’s (2003) study of social
and individual characteristics in 5 Asian nations leads them to conclude that individual
accomplishments are less important in female empowerment than are cultural expectations
and norms. They argue that changing those community norms and values about
empowering women should be our most important policy focus. Similarly, Kantor (2005)
recognized that improved economic access to credit, capital and other markets through
women’s increased participation in work to earn income is itself not sufficient to alter the
power relations those same women face. Culturally contingent expectations translate into
real economic and behavioral boundaries (Brennan, 2006).
More broadly, while legal categories often reflect historical interaction patterns, individuals
in society also readily internalize these legal bounds, values and inequalities (Mitnick,
2007), limiting women’s progress where gender equality in written governance documents
is excluded.
7. CONCLUSIONS.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
22
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
As economic power continues to favor globalizing business, nations, particularly
developing nations, will – in the absence of conscious institutionalization of egalitarian
values – find their own cultural values and belief systems shaped by the plausible language
and pretexts so necessary to entrenchment and expansion of the managerial ruling class.
Yet we would not end on a note of passive inevitability. Active protests to business
inequality in the U. S. and around the world have grown, and in certain instances people in
nations both developing and industrialized have, over the last 20 or so years, engaged in
institutionalizing exactly these sorts of alternative value systems.
The E. U. remains one of the premier examples of nations, or nation groups, building
explicit value statements into political and social institutions, and governance documents
that, while not wholly invincible, nonetheless go a considerable distance toward
encouraging women’s empowerment (Rubery, 2005) and stemming certain types of valuebased corporate and political activity, and not only the most egregious. Value statements
embracing gender equality, and ensuring minimum labor standards more generally, written
into the E. U. Charter, were at the time derided as a sop to quiet activists – yet the effect of
these gender equity statements on subsequent women’s labor earnings, women’s
occupation of positions of leadership in governments, and on curbing corporate efforts to
disguise extreme inequality as products of democratically induced equal opportunity merit,
is unmistakable.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
23
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
While adoption of value statements such as, for example, Affirmative Action, hardly
eradicates discrimination in and of itself, nonetheless those businesses with Affirmative
Action statements discriminate significantly less than similar businesses without (Konrad
and Linnehan, 1995).
Similarly, developing nation participation in writing treaties and trade agreements results in
language and outcomes notably different over time from global development outcomes in
developing nations without such treaty-writing participation (Smith and Wiest, 2005).
The uneven but remarkable shift in certain Latin American nations offers another example
of policy shifts following the vocalization of values and their placement through language
in political and social institutions, and governance documents. Although business interests
continue to glean record profits within Venezuela, Bolivia, Argentina, Uruguay, and Brazil
(Petras, 2006), the transfer of considerable amounts of land, wealth and opportunity back to
citizen populations can also be observed.
Protecting gender rights, and human rights, will not be done by business, nor is it likely to
enter the cultural ideology of many faculty in Business Schools, unless those holding such
values choose employment in that venue. Contemporary activity of treaty construction, as
well as FDI, offers opportunities for business managers to extend the reach of their cultural
values. At the same time, cultural flexibility and trade agreement construction may be
open to influence from other belief systems as well.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
24
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
We suggest that efforts to introduce specific language mandating gender equality and
representation into governance documents at the local, national, transnational, and regional
levels all be pursued with high priority. Individual-level activity in developing nations to
improve the standing of women through education and increased access to resources, while
effective in reducing poverty and contributing positively to indices of human development,
is in and of itself likely to be insufficient to halt the widespread ideological acceptance of
values used to maintain and expand the inequality necessary to sustain the managerial
ruling class.
Also needed is a change in the socially accepted understandings that legitimate gender bias.
While not an instant cure, gender equality mandates in legal governance documents have
proven themselves surprisingly effective toward this end, visible as diminishing business
ability where such documents exist, to define gendered development consequences as
externalities beyond the scope of economic and business consideration.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
25
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
8. Bibliography.
Akerlof, G. A. and J. L. Yellen. (1985). “Can small deviations from rationality make
significant differences to economic equilibria?” The American Economic Review
75(4):708-720.
Associated Press. (2007). Bill to Include Gays in Hate-Crime Law Fails” December 7,
http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/12/06/congress.hatecrimes.ap/index.html
Bagdikian, B. H. (2000). The Media Monopoly, 6th Ed. Boston: Beacon Press.
Bergmann, B. R. (1986). The Economic Emergence of Women. NY:Basic Books.
Blanchard, J. F. (2007). “China, Multinational Corporations, and Globalization: Beijing
and Microsoft Battle over the Opening of China’s Gates” Asian Perspective 31(3):67-102.
Brennan, D. M. (2006). “Defending the Indefensible? Culture’s Role in the Productive /
Unproductive Dichotomy” Feminist Economics 12(3): 405-425.
Brownmiller, S. (1975). Against Our Will: Men, Women and Rape. NY: bantam Books.
Burnham, J. (1941) The Managerial Revolution. Bloomington: Indiana Univ. Press.
CIA, (1960-2006) “The World Factbook” online and in reference book form,
https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/index.html.
Chesler, P. (1994). Patriarchy: Notes of an Expert Witness. Monroe, ME: Common
Courage Press.
China-Embassy. (2006). “China’s FDI in 2005 Revised to $72.4 Billion”
http://www.china-embassy.org/eng/gyzg/t257288.htm.
Cockburn, C. (1991). In the Way of Women: Men’s Resistance to Sex Equality on
Organizations. Ithaca NY: ILR Press.
Dow Stock Prices (1999) 1917-1999 are from http://averages.dow jones.com/home.html
(accessed 4/3/99).
Dow Stock Prices (2007) 2000-2007.5 Data From:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/hp?s=%5EDJI
Drucker, P. F. (1974). Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices. NY: Harper &
Row.
Eisler, R. (1987). The Chalice and The Blade. SF: HarperCollins.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
26
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Faludi, S. (1991). Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women. NY:
Anchor Books.
Forbes Magazine (2006) 1960-2006. www.forbes.com.
Fortune Magazine (2006) 1960-2006. www.fortune.com
Fortune. (2007). “Fortune 500 2006 Women CEOs”
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500/womenceos/
Fung, K. C., H. Iizaka and S. Tong. (2002) “Foreign Direct Investment in China: Policy,
Trend and Impact” Presented a the international conference on China’s Economy in the
21st Century, Hong Kong.
Groningen Growth and Development Centre, (2007) “Total Economy Database”
http://www.ggdc.net; January.
Hartman, C. (2007). “By the Numbers: the latest and fullest data on income, wealth, CEO
pay” www.demos.org/inequality/numbers.cfm
Jacobs, L. et al (15 authors). (2004). “American Democracy in an Age of Rising
Inequality.” Task force on Inequality and American Democracy, American Political
Science Assoc., www.apsanet.org.
Kanter, R. M. (1977). Men and Women of the Corporation. NY: Basic Books.
Kantor, P. (2005). “Determinants of Women’s Microenterprise Success in Ahmedabad
India: Empowerment and Economics” Feminist Economics 11(3): 63-83.
Katz, J. M. (2008) “Poor Haitians Resort to Eating Dirt”
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hcJ474CjaJGOUznskl4ZgTHdpxUAD8UFQVR00.
Kilbourne, J. (1999) Can’t Buy My Love: How Advertising Changes the Way We Think
and Feel. NY: Touchstone.
Konrad, A. M. and F. Linnehan. (1995). “Formalized HRM structures: Coordinating equal
employment opportunity or concealing organizational practices?” Academy of
Management Journal, 38: 787-820.
Kroll, L. and A. Fass (2007) “Listing the World’s Billionaires 2007”
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17522267.
Kuhn, T. S. (1970). The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 2nd Ed. Chicago: University
of Chicago Press.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
27
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Kuiper, E. and J. Sap. (1995). Out of the Margin: Feminist Perspectives on Economics.
London: Routledge.
Lambert, A. D., P. T. Terenzini, and L. R. Lattuca. (2007). “More than Meets the Eye:
Curricular and Programmatic Effects on Student Learning” Research in Higher Education
48(2):141-168.
Marshall, A. (1890). Principles of Economics. London: MacMillan & Co.
Mason, K. O. and H. L. Smith. (2003). “Women’s empowerment and social context:
Results from five Asian countries” The World Bank Research Series,
http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTEMPOWERMENT/Resources/13323_womens_emp
owerment.pdf
McChesney, R. W. (2004) The Problem of the Media: U. S. Communication Politics in
the 21st Century. NY: Monthly Review Press.
McGeehan, P. (2007). “Surge in Wages on Wall St. in First Quarter Helps Borough” New
York Times Nov. 20.
McGinley, A. C. (2007). “Harassing ‘Girls’ at the Hard Rock: Masculinities in
Sexualized Environments” University of Illinois Law Review 2007:1229-1278.
Measuring Worth, (2007) “Purchasing power of money in the United States from 1774 to
2006” http://www.measuringworth.com/ppowerus/result.php, January.
Milanovic, B. (2000). "True World Income Distribution, 1988 and 1993: First
calculations based on household surveys alone", World Bank Development Research
Group, November 2000, page 30.
Mitnick, E. J. (2007). “Law, Cognition, and Identity” Louisiana Law Review 67:823-869.
Morrison, A., D. Raju and N. Sinha. (2007). “Gender equality, poverty and economic
growth” The World Bank Gender and Development Group, Policy Research Working
Paper 4349, September.
National Center for Educational Statistics, (2007a) “Digest of education statistics 2005 –
Table 277: Degrees in business conferred by degree-granting institutions, by
level of degree and sex of student: Selected years, 1955-56 through 2003-04
http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d05/tables/dt05_277.asp.
National Center for Educational Statistics, (2007b) “Digest of education statistics, 2005 –
Table 250: master's degrees conferred by degree-granting institutions, by
discipline division: Selected years, 1970-71 through 2003-04
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
28
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d05/tables/dt05_250.asp.
Ospina, S. (1996). Illusions of Opportunity: Employee Expectations and Workplace
Inequality. Ithaca NY: Cornell Univ. Press.
Page, B. I. and R. Y. Shapiro. (1992). The Rational Public: Fifty Years of Trends in
American’s Policy Preferences. Chicago: Univ. Chicago Press.
Pareto, V. (1896) “Cours d’economie politique” in Sociology Writings, D. Mirfin trans.,
London: Pall Mall Press, 1966 translation.
Petras, J. (2006). “U. S. – Latin American Relations: Measuring the Rise or Fall of U. S.
Power” Information Clearing House,
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article15464.htm.
Pierce, P. S. (1981). The Dow Jones Averages: 1885-1980. Homewood: Dow Jones-Irwin.
Porter, M.E. (1985) Competitive Advantage. NY: Free Press.
Rubery, J. (2005). “Reflections on Gender Mainstreaming: An Example of Feminist
Economics in Action?” Feminist Economics 11(3): 1-26.
Seager, J. (1997). The State of Women in the World Atlas, 2nd Ed. China: Penguin.
Seguino, S. (2007). “Plus ca Change? Evidence on Global Trends in Gender Norms and
Stereotypes” Feminist Economics 13(2): 1-28.
Sekine, T. T. (1998). “The Dialectic of Capital: A Unoist Interpretation” Science and
Society 62(3): 434-445.
Shiller, R. J. (2005). “How Wall Street Learns to Look the Other Way” NYTimes Feb. 8.
p. A25.
Smith, J. and D. Wiest. (2005). “The Uneven Geography of Global Civil Society:
National and Global Influences on Transnational Association” Social forces 84(2): 621652.
Spitz, J. and A. Konrad. (2001). “Sex v. ideology in Academe: income returns to sexist,
racist, and system defender beliefs” Presented at the Institute for Womens Policy
Research, 6th Womens Policy Research Conference “The Status of Women”
Washington DC June 9.
Strober, M. (1990). “Challenges to human capital theory: Implications for HR managers.”
Industrial Relations 29:214.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
29
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
__________. (1982). “The MBA: Sampe passport for success for women and men?” in P.
Wallace, Women in the Workplace. Boston: Auburn House.
Thomas, L. Jr. (2007). “A Fragile Foothold: The Ranks of Top-Tier Women on Wall St.
Are Shrinking” New York Times December 1, p. C1.
U.S. China Business Council. (2004). “Foreign Investment in China”
https://www.uschina.org/statistics/2005foreigninvestment.html.
Weakliem, D. L., R. Andersen, and A. F. Heath. (2003). “The Directing Power? A
Comparative Study of Public Opinion and Inocme Distribution.” Dept. of Scoiolgoy, Univ.
of CT.
Weber. M. (1946) From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, H.Gerth and C. W. Mills
(eds). NY: Oxford Univ. Press.
Williamson, O. (1975) Markets and Hierarchies. NY: Free Press.
World Bank, (1960-2006) “World development indicators” data online and in reference
book form. http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/DATASTATISTICS/0,,
menuPK:232599~pagePK:64133170~piPK:64133498~theSitePK:239419,00.html.
World Bank (2008) “Poverty: An Overview”
http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/TOPICS/EXTPOVERTY/0,,contentMD
K:20153855~menuPK:373757~pagePK:148956~piPK:216618~theSitePK:336992,00.html.
Zhang, J., J. Han, P. W. Liu, and Y. Zhao. (2008). “Trends in the Gender Earnings
Differential in Urban china, 1988 – 2004” Industrial and Labor Relations Review
61(2):224-243.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
30
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Table 1: Business Faculty Values & Ideology
(Selected Questions, 1999 U. S. National Faculty Survey, Spitz & Konrad)
n=159
Business Strategy
Faculty
Agreement with Inequality:
n=262
Sociology
Faculty
In general, I think inequality is a good idea.
25.8% **
7.9%
One of the big problems in this country is that
we don’t give people an equal chance.
43.4% **
89.7%
Inequality is due to lack of effort on the part of unsuccessful people
42.1% **
14.9%
There are some professions or types of business
that are more suitable for men than women.
5.9%
**
15.6%
It is appropriate that men hold most top executive positions.
6.9%
**
.8%
It is appropriate that men hold most top political positions.
9.0%
**
1.1%
Mothers should not work.
16%
**
6.5%
It is inappropriate for women to try to work in
a man’s field such as construction.
8.8% **
4.2%
I’m not sure it’s such a good idea for women to
be competing fully in the job market.
5.7% **
1.6%
25.5% **
5.3%
2.5% **
1.9%
It is appropriate that most top executive positions are held by white people.
5.0% **
1.5%
It is appropriate that most top political positions are held by white people.
5.8% **
.8%
On average, African Americans are somewhat less capable
of contribution to economic production than are white people.
6.9% **
3.8%
Racial inequality is partly due to African Americans’
lack of an inborn ability to learn.
3.2% **
.4%
Agreement with Sexism:
Women are more suited to housekeeping and child care than are men.
On average, women are somewhat less capable
of contribution to economic production than are men.
Agreement with Racism:
_____
** p < .01
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
31
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Charts 1a and 1b:
Growth in Corporations vs Nations, Top 200 and 100 World Economies, 1960-2005.
Chart 1a:
Top Economies by Numbers
2.5
2
Ratio Companies/Nations
1.5
Top 100 Economies
Top 200 Economies
1
0.5
0
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2005
Year
Chart 1b
Top Economies by Value
0.3
0.25
Ratio Companies/Nations
0.2
Top 100 Economies
Top 200 Economies
0.15
0.1
0.05
0
1960
1970
1980
1990
Year
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
32
2000
2005
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Sources: Forbes, Fortune, Groningen Growth and Development Centre and the Conference Board, Total
Economy Database, http://www.umsl.edu/services/govdocs/wofact2001/index.html, CIA, The Statesman's
Year-Book, World Bank (1960-2006).
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
33
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Charts 2a and 2b.
Bottom 95% of 2000 Corporations and 232 Nations
Chart 2a
Econom ic Dom inance in Num bers:
National GDP vs. Corporate Revenue, 2005 Data.*
Nations (n=174)
8.21%
Business
(n=1946)
91.79%
Chart 2b
Com parative Econom ic Production: Nations vs. Corporations
2005 Data*; top 2000 Corps & all available nations. (in m illions, USD)
Nation's GDP
$1,674,184
(8.51%)
Business
Revenue
$17,991,800
(91.49%)
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
34
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Chart 3.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average over time, 1897 – 2007.
2000-2007.5 Data From: http://finance.yahoo.com/q/hp?s=%5EDJI
Dow Stock Prices 1896-1916 are from Pierce, Phyllis S. The Dow Jones Averages: 18851980. Homewood: Dow Jones-Irwin, 1981.
Dow Stock Prices 1917-1999 are from http://averages.dow jones.com/home.html (accessed
4/3/99).
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
35
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Chart 4.
Change in the number of U. S. Business School Graduates, 1960-2004,
data from NCES, 2007.
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
36
2008 Oxford Business &Economics Conference Program
ISBN : 978-0-9742114-7-3
Spitz, Konrad & Cresko, 2007
Figure 1.
A Model of Ideological Influence Through Business Globalization
Corporations’
Global
Expansion
MBA&
Business
Mgrs
Countries & Regions’
Economies, Policies,
Trade Agreements,
Cultures, Values
& Ideologies
June 22-24, 2008
Oxford, UK
37
Business
Faculty
Ideology &
Values