Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T14:21:51.396Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Tales of Diversity: Lawyers’ Narratives of Racial Equity in Private Firms

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 December 2018

John M. Conley
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article reports on what an interview study of the legal profession has revealed about diversity in private law firms. The study can be fairly described as an accidental research project—more specifically, a professional responsibility course that turned into an empirical study of the legal profession. After ten years of teaching this course, I have accumulated, almost as a byproduct, a significant corpus of qualitative data about lawyers’ lives, the organizations in which they practice, and the legal profession as a whole. The late Rodney Dangerfield said, “I went to a fight and a hockey game broke out.” An apt description of this study might be, “I went to class and a research project broke out.”

Type
Symposium: New Legal Realism
Information
Law & Social Inquiry , Volume 31 , Issue 4 , Fall 2006 , pp. 831 - 853
Copyright
Copyright © American Bar Foundation, 2006 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bodenhausen, Galen D., and Lichtenstein, Meryl. 1987. Social Stereotypes and Information-Processing Strategies: The Impact of Task Complexity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 52:871–82.Google Scholar
Calmore, John O. 1998. Race/ism Lost and Found: The Fair Housing Act at Thirty. University of Miami Law Review 52:1067–1130.Google Scholar
Carbado, Devon W., and Gulati, Mitu. 2000. Discrimination and Inequality Emerging Issues: Working Identity. Cornell Law Review 85:1259–1308.Google Scholar
Carbado, Devon W., and Gulati, Mitu. 2004. Race to the Top of the Corporate Ladder: What Minorities Do When They Get There. Washington and Lee Law Review 61:1645–93.Google Scholar
Chambliss, Elizabeth, and Uggen, Christopher. 2000. Men and Women of Elite Law Firms: Reevaluating Kanter's Legacy. Law & Social Inquiry 25:41–68.Google Scholar
Conley, John M. 2004. How Bad Is It Out There? Teaching and Learning About the State of the Legal Profession in North Carolina. North Carolina Law Review 82:1943–2016.Google Scholar
Conley, John M., and Baker, Scott. 2005. Fall from Grace or Business as Usual? A Retrospective Look at Lawyers on Wall Street and Main Street. Law & Social Inquiry 30 (4):783–821.Google Scholar
Conley, John M., and O'Barr, William M. 1990. Rules Versus Relationships: The Ethnography of Legal Discourse. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Google Scholar
Conley, John M., and O'Barr, William M. 1997. Crime and Custom in Corporate Society: A Cultural Perspective on Corporate Misconduct. Law & Contemporary Problems 60:5–21.Google Scholar
Conley, John M., O'Barr, William M., and Allan Lind, E. 1978. The Power of Language: Presentational Style in the Courtroom. Duke Law Journal 1978:1375–99.Google Scholar
Conley, John M., Turnier, William J., and Rose, Mary R. 2000. The Racial Ecology of the Courtroom: An Experimental Study of Juror Response to the Race of Criminal Defendants. Wisconsin Law Review 2000:1185–1220.Google Scholar
Conley, John M., and Williams, Cynthia A. 2005. Engage, Embed, and Embellish: Theory Versus Practice in the Corporate Social Responsibility Movement. Journal of Corporation Law 31:1–38.Google Scholar
Engel, David M., and Munger, Frank W. Rights of Inclusion: Law and Identity in the Life Stories of Americans with Disabilities. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Google Scholar
Ewick, Patricia, and Silbey, Susan S. 1998. The Common Place of Law: Stories from Everyday Life. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Google Scholar
Ewick, Patricia, and Silbey, Susan S. 1995. Subversive Stories and Hegemonic Tales: Toward a Sociology of Narrative. Law & Society Review 29 (2):197–226.Google Scholar
Fiske, Susan T., and Taylor, Shelley E. 1991. Social Cognition. New York: McGraw Hill. Google Scholar
Holder, Eric H. 2002. The Importance of Diversity in the Legal Profession. Cardozo Law Review 23:2241–51.Google Scholar
Kelly, Michael J. 1994. Lives of Lawyers: Journeys in the Organization of Practice. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press. Google Scholar
Mather, Lynn, McEwen, Craig A., and Maiman, Richard J. 2001. Divorce Lawyers at Work: Varieties of Professionalism in Practice. New York: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar
O'Barr, William M., and Conley, John M. 1992. Fortune and Folly: The Wealth and Power of Institutional Investing. Homewood, IL: Business One Irwin. Google Scholar
Rhode, Deborah L. 1995. Into the Valley of Ethics: Professional Responsibility and Educational Reform. Law & Contemporary Problems 58:139–52.Google Scholar
Seron, Carroll. 1996. The Business of Practicing Law: The Work Lives of Solo and Small-Firm Attorneys. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. Google Scholar
Wade, Cheryl L. 2004. “We Are An Equal Opportunity Employer”: Diversity Doublespeak. Washington and Lee Law Review 61:1541–82.Google Scholar
Wilkins, David B. 1999. The Professional Responsibility of Professional Schools to Study and Teach About the Profession. Journal of Legal Education 49:76–95.Google Scholar
Wilkins, David B. 2004a. From “Separate Is Inherently Unequal” to “Diversity Is Good for Business”: The Rise of Market-Based Diversity Arguments and the Fate of the Black Corporate Bar. Harvard Law Review 117:1548–1614.Google Scholar
Wilkins, David B. 2004b. Doing Well by Doing Good? The Role of Public Service in the Careers of Black Corporate Lawyers. Houston Law Review 41:1–91.Google Scholar
Wilkins, David B., and Gulati, G. Mitu. 1996. Why Are There So Few Black Lawyers in Corporate Firms?: An Institutional Analysis. California Law Review 84:493–618.Google Scholar