About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline

11 Stan. J. C.R. & C.L. 155 (2015)
Civil Rights 2.0: Encouraging Innovation to Tackle Silicon Valley's Diversity Deficit

handle is hein.journals/stjcrcl11 and id is 167 raw text is: CIVIL RIGHTS 2.0: ENCOURAGING
INNOVATION TO TACKLE SILICON
VALLEY'S DIVERSITY DEFICIT
Richard Thompson Ford*
Silicon Valley suffers from a lack of diversity. Women and minorities are
underrepresented in the high-tech industry generally, but they are particularly
underrepresented in leadership positions in the industry. Yet appeals to
antidiscrimination law as a simple fix fail to recognize an important tension: that
antidiscrimination law has both individual- and group-based premises. The
individual aspect demands that employment decisions be made for good cause
and not simply based on race, gender, or other protected status. The group
aspect, meanwhile, demands adequate representation of women and minority
groups in the workplace. A libertarian ethos that pervades much of Silicon Valley
is at odds with both of these principles, and a conventional civil rights approach
in this context is not only misleading but also a bad strategy for change.
Therefore the law should encourage experimentation in achieving workplace
equity by offering employers making significant measurable improvements in
diversity a safe harbor from discrimination liability.
INTRO D UCTIO N  ........................................................................................... 156
I. ATLAS SHRUGS OFF CIVIL RIGHTS: HIGH-TECH LIBERTARIANISM
AND  ANTIDISCRIMINATION    LAW   .................................................... 159
A. Labor Market 2.0: High-Tech Hiring Practices ......................... 160
B. Radical Libertarianism in the Valley of Atlas ............................ 163
II. INDIVIDUALS AND GROUPS: THE REGULATORY DIALECTIC OF
D ISCRIM INATIO N  ............................................................................. 167
A. Collectivism and Proportional Representation: Individualism
and  U niversal G ood  Cause  ...................................................... 171
B. Principle Leads to Polarization: Disparate Treatment Versus
D isparate  Im pact ...................................................................... 173
C O N CLU SIO N   .............................................................................................. 176
* George E. Osborne Professor of Law, Stanford Law School.

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Contact us for annual subscription options:

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

profiles profiles most