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Accidental Feminism : Gender Parity and Selective Mobility among India’s Professional Elite / Swethaa S. Ballakrishnen.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: Princeton, NJ : Princeton University Press, [2021]Copyright date: ©2021Description: 1 online resource (288 p.) : 3 b/w illus. 8 tablesContent type:
Media type:
Carrier type:
ISBN:
  • 9780691199993
Subject(s): DDC classification:
  • 340.0820954 23
Other classification:
  • online - DeGruyter
Online resources:
Contents:
Frontmatter -- Contents -- Preface. Can Feminism Be Accidental? -- Introduction. The Accidental Emergence of India’s Elite Women Lawyers -- Chapter 1 Foci: Market Liberalization and the Changing Nature of Professional Work -- Chapter 2 Frames: Women Can’t Match Up: The Sticky Assumptions of Gender and Work -- Chapter 3 Firms: Just Like an International Firm: The Advantage of Not Being -- Chapter 4 Facings: My Clients Prefer a Woman Lawyer: New Returns to Essentialism -- Chapter 5 Families: It Is (Not Always) Difficult Once You Have a Family: Work, Life, and Balance -- Chapter 6 Futures: Now What? What Do We Do with the Accidental? -- Appendix. Research Methods: Design, Discipline, Discursive Distance -- Acknowledgments -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index
Summary: Exploring the unintentional production of seemingly feminist outcomes In India, elite law firms offer a surprising oasis for women within a hostile, predominantly male industry. Less than 10 percent of the country’s lawyers are female, but women in the most prestigious firms are significantly represented both at entry and partnership. Elite workspaces are notorious for being unfriendly to new actors, so what allows for aberration in certain workspaces?Drawing from observations and interviews with more than 130 elite professionals, Accidental Feminism examines how a range of underlying mechanisms—gendered socialization and essentialism, family structures and dynamics, and firm and regulatory histories—afford certain professionals egalitarian outcomes that are not available to their local and global peers. Juxtaposing findings on the legal profession with those on elite consulting firms, Swethaa Ballakrishnen reveals that parity arises not from a commitment to create feminist organizations, but from structural factors that incidentally come together to do gender differently. Simultaneously, their research offers notes of caution: while conditional convergence may create equality in ways that more targeted endeavors fail to achieve, “accidental” developments are hard to replicate, and are, in this case, buttressed by embedded inequalities. Ballakrishnen examines whether gender parity produced without institutional sanction should still be considered feminist.In offering new ways to think about equality movements and outcomes, Accidental Feminism forces readers to critically consider the work of intention in progress narratives.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number URL Status Notes Barcode
eBook eBook Biblioteca "Angelicum" Pont. Univ. S.Tommaso d'Aquino Nuvola online online - DeGruyter (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Online access Not for loan (Accesso limitato) Accesso per gli utenti autorizzati / Access for authorized users (dgr)9780691199993

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Preface. Can Feminism Be Accidental? -- Introduction. The Accidental Emergence of India’s Elite Women Lawyers -- Chapter 1 Foci: Market Liberalization and the Changing Nature of Professional Work -- Chapter 2 Frames: Women Can’t Match Up: The Sticky Assumptions of Gender and Work -- Chapter 3 Firms: Just Like an International Firm: The Advantage of Not Being -- Chapter 4 Facings: My Clients Prefer a Woman Lawyer: New Returns to Essentialism -- Chapter 5 Families: It Is (Not Always) Difficult Once You Have a Family: Work, Life, and Balance -- Chapter 6 Futures: Now What? What Do We Do with the Accidental? -- Appendix. Research Methods: Design, Discipline, Discursive Distance -- Acknowledgments -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index

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http://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_16ec

Exploring the unintentional production of seemingly feminist outcomes In India, elite law firms offer a surprising oasis for women within a hostile, predominantly male industry. Less than 10 percent of the country’s lawyers are female, but women in the most prestigious firms are significantly represented both at entry and partnership. Elite workspaces are notorious for being unfriendly to new actors, so what allows for aberration in certain workspaces?Drawing from observations and interviews with more than 130 elite professionals, Accidental Feminism examines how a range of underlying mechanisms—gendered socialization and essentialism, family structures and dynamics, and firm and regulatory histories—afford certain professionals egalitarian outcomes that are not available to their local and global peers. Juxtaposing findings on the legal profession with those on elite consulting firms, Swethaa Ballakrishnen reveals that parity arises not from a commitment to create feminist organizations, but from structural factors that incidentally come together to do gender differently. Simultaneously, their research offers notes of caution: while conditional convergence may create equality in ways that more targeted endeavors fail to achieve, “accidental” developments are hard to replicate, and are, in this case, buttressed by embedded inequalities. Ballakrishnen examines whether gender parity produced without institutional sanction should still be considered feminist.In offering new ways to think about equality movements and outcomes, Accidental Feminism forces readers to critically consider the work of intention in progress narratives.

Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.

In English.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 01. Dez 2022)