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30 Harv. J.L. & Gender 303 (2007)
Tempered Radicals as Institutional Change Agents: The Case of Advancing Gender Equity at the University of Michigan

handle is hein.journals/hwlj30 and id is 307 raw text is: TEMPERED RADICALS AS INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE AGENTS: THE CASE OF ADVANCING GENDER EQUITY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN DEBRA MEYERSON AND MEGAN TOMPKINS* I. INTRODUCTION Much has been written about sources of gender inequality within the workplace. Historically, research has focused on identifying the range of psychological, organizational, and legal processes that contribute to the re- production of workplace inequality.' Among scholars of different disci- plines, there is widespread agreement that these processes persist because they are embedded in and reinforced by everyday codes of behavior, knowl- edge structures, and belief systems that are taken for granted and therefore not held up to scrutiny.2 In other words, gender inequities persist in work- places because the processes that produce them are part of the normal and legitimate workings of contemporary institutions. Institutional theory in organizational scholarship sheds light on how such practices, beliefs, and knowledge structures come to be taken for granted as legitimate and unassailable.' Yet, despite the potential for institu- tional theory to illuminate why processes that produce inequalities persist, * Debra Meyerson is Associate Professor of Education and (by courtesy) Organiza- tional Behavior, Stanford University; Ph.D., Stanford University; M.S., B.S., Massachu- setts Institute of Technology. Megan Tompkins is a Ph.D. candidate at Stanford University; Ed.M., Harvard University; B.A.H., Stanford University. ' See, e.g., Joan Acker, Hierarchies, Jobs, Bodies: A Theory of Gendered Organiza- tions, 4 GENDER & SOC'Y 139 (1990); THE DIFFERENCE DIFFERENCE MAKES: WOMEN AND LEADERSHIP (Deborah L. Rhode ed., 2003); Joanne Martin, The Organization of Ex- clusion: Institutionalization of Sex Inequality, Gendered Faculty Jobs and Gendered Knowledge in Organizational Theory and Research, I ORG. 401 (1994). 2 See Susan Sturm, Second Generation Employment Discrimination: A Structural Ap- proach, 101 COLUM. L. REV. 458 (2001); Robin J. Ely & Debra E. Meyerson, Theories of Gender in Organizations: A New Approach to Organizational Analysis and Change, in 22 RESEARCH IN ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR 103 (Barry M. Staw & Robert I. Sutton eds., 2000); Debra E. Meyerson & Deborah M. Kolb, Moving out of the Armchair: Develop- ing a Framework to Bridge the Gap Between Feminist Theory and Practice, 7 ORG. 553 (2000); RHONA RAPOPORT, LoTrE BAILYN, JOYCE K. FLETCHER & BETTYE H. PRUITT, BE- YOND WORK-FAMILY BALANCE: ADVANCING GENDER EQUITY AND WORKPLACE PERFORM- ANCE (2002). 3 See Paul J. DiMaggio & Walter W. Powell, The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields, 48 AM. Soc. REV. 147 (1983); John W. Meyer & Brian Rowan, Institutionalized Organizations: Formal Struc- ture as Myth and Ceremony, 83 AM. J. Soc. 340 (1977); Elisabeth S. Clemens & James M. Cook, Politics and Institutionalism: Explaining Durability and Change, 25 ANN. REV. Soc. 441 (1999); THE NEW INSTITUTIONALISM IN ORGANIZATIONAL ANALYSIS (Paul J. DiMaggio & Walter W. Powell eds., 1991).

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