Volume 7 Number 2 (February 1997), pp. 79-81.

SO ORDERED: MAKING PARTNER THE HARD WAY by Ann Branigar Hopkins. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1996. 395 pp.

Reviewed by Gloria C. Cox, Department of Political Science, The University of North Texas.
 

In SO ORDERED, Ann Branigar Hopkins tells her story of being the plaintiff in an important and high profile sex discrimination suit against Price Waterhouse, one of the largest and best-known accounting firms in the world. The case grew out of the decision within Price Waterhouse to deny partnership status to Hopkins, even though she had worked for the firm for years on important projects. In response to the action of Price Waterhouse, Hopkins decided to quit her job and take legal action on the basis that she was the victim of discrimination. Ultimately she won her suit and became a partner in the corporation by order of the court.

Hopkins attempts to weave together a fairly detailed account of her personal life with the story of her legal struggles. One assumes that she shares such a large amount of information about her personal life to provide a framework for the important and compelling part of her story, the legal battle in which she was engaged over several years from 1984 until 1990. However, there is also the possibility that this book is geared toward two audiences: the casual reader who may identify with a victim of sex discrimination and the scholarly reader who wants to know more about an important sex discrimination case. Unfortunately, neither reader is likely to be completely satisfied by the result.

Hopkins’ case entered the legal system at a propitious time. A question of great legal importance in such a case was whether partnership decisions (such as those in accounting and legal firms) were protected by Title VII. By the time that attorneys filed suit in federal district court on Hopkins’ behalf, the Supreme Court had ruled in HISHON V. KING AND SPALDING that such decisions do fall under Title VII. The HISHON ruling meant that Price Waterhouse would be unable to argue that partnership decisions were immune from the protection of the Civil Rights Act, so the firm would have to defend its partnership decision against Hopkins’ charge of sex discrimination.

Judge Gerhard Gesell presided when Hopkins’ case was heard in District court in Washington, D.C. Since most readers will be somewhat familiar with Judge Gesell’s work, Hopkins’ comments about the judge and her description of him provide one of the most appealing aspects of SO ORDERED. It is clear that Hopkins both admired and feared Gesell whom she describes as an able jurist who could cut through legal rhetoric to get to the heart of the issue before him. The author’s admiration for Judge Gesell comes through every time she discusses his actions regarding her case.

HOPKINS V. PRICE WATERHOUSE rested on two main issues, one belonging to Price Waterhouse, the other to Hopkins. Counsel for Price Waterhouse recognized that the evidence clearly substantiated some degree of sex discrimination on the part of the partners. Given that fact, they simply acknowledged its existence, maintained that sex discrimination was just one factor at work in the partnership decision, and argued that there were other reasons to deny partnership status to Hopkins. Their contention was that, absent any sex discrimination, Hopkins would still have been passed over for partner. Had Price Waterhouse won this point, the company would have prevailed in the suit. Obviously Price Waterhouse lost this legal battle.

The other legal issue, and the one on which Hopkins was ultimately victorious, was the contention of her attorneys that she had been passed over for partner because of gender stereotyping within the company. In short, the voting partners compared Hopkins to a cultural stereotype of how a woman is supposed to conduct herself in the workplace and they decided that Hopkins did not fit that image. Hopkins’ attorneys provided expert evidence that such a stereotype does exist and that women who deviate from the cultural norms it imposes are subject to punishment for straying from those standards. Although Price Waterhouse contested the issue all the way to the Supreme Court, it is noteworthy that the Court accepted the argument that gender stereotyping does exist and that it can create a bias against women in the workplace that is not permissible under Title VII.

SO ORDERED is important reading for those interested in the subject of gender stereotyping in particular and women’s issues in general. In fact, Hopkins could not have found a more sympathetic reader than the reviewer. After all, she and I are about the same age, so we are personally aware of the lesser expectations that society had for women until recently. Moreover, the author demonstrated considerable courage in putting her future on the line against a powerful, respected company.

Nonetheless, SO ORDERED is not a completely satisfying book and Hopkins does not come across as an entirely sympathetic figure. In fact, it would be preferable in my view if SO ORDERED were simply the account of the legal activities on behalf of Hopkins’ partnership with sufficient background to give her story a framework or context. For my tastes, there is far too much information about Hopkins’ early life, from her relationship with parents and grandparents to summer activities. By the time the book gets to the legal issues, many pages have been turned. In fact, Hopkins demonstrates the proclivity to be opinionated at times with gratuitous comments on certain subjects.

More seriously, it seems to me that Hopkins should have dealt somewhere in the book with the accusations leveled against her by Price Waterhouse. She is not stingy with information about her work or the kinds of projects in which she was involved, yet she never provides the reader with any response to the firm’s accusations about her lack of ability to work with others. She admits to using profanity and vulgarity in the workplace, but does not view it as a practice about which she or others should be concerned. The reader is left to wonder if perhaps she was a difficult taskmaster who was not very much liked by those with whom she worked. It would have been preferable for Hopkins to clear up the matter, one way or the other.

SO ORDERED provides a chronicle of what it is like to be part of a landmark discrimination case as it goes from development to filing, through various courts including the Supreme Court, and back to lower courts to comply with the higher court’s ruling. The author ably demonstrates the long delays, the expense incurred, the uncertainty, and the pain of hearing people with whom you have worked testify to what a difficult and unlikeable person you are! While we may admire Hopkins’ boldness, tenacity, and patience, we also might well be discouraged from becoming involved in such a suit on account of what she experienced. Additionally, Hopkins’ accounts of her case tend to focus on legal maneuvering rather than the legal issues themselves. Many readers of SO ORDERED will want to see a more thorough exploration of the legal issues, including the background provided by similar or related cases. Finally, I would be remiss as a reviewer if I failed to point out a problem with this book that is the fault of the editor, not the author. SO ORDERED is in need of expert editing. Some errors are so glaring as to reflect considerable carelessness and lack of attention to detail. Two examples should suffice to make the point: first, in one sentence Hopkins mentions a Par 766 review, then a few lines later it is mislabeled as a Par 776 review; second, late in the book the author makes reference to waiters having concern over "THERE" (sic.) jobs! These two mistakes are simply symptomatic of the poor editing that is apparent throughout this book. The failure of the publisher to provide good editing detracts from the quality of the work.

SO ORDERED is a useful book in that it allows the reader to view an important legal case from the perspective of a key figure whose resolve and courage made it possible. I am sure that among its readers will be not only scholars interested in the development of case law, but also those in the general population who want to know about the personal struggle in which one woman engaged. I have no doubt that it will also be read by quite a few accountants who want to know about an important event that affected the conduct of business in their field!


Copyright 1997