Equal Employment Opportunity in the USA and the Republic of China - Case Study Example

Running Head: Equal Employment Opportunity in China & U.S.A. Name Course Course instructor Date submitted Equal Employment Opportunity in U.S.A. and the Republic of China Introduction Equal employment is a vital aspect of every organisation that yearns to optimize its operations. According to the human resource criteria, employees are the best asset a company can ever have. Based on this allusion, it therefore goes without saying that for these employees to give their very best, there is supposed to be a fertile ground devoid of any discriminative treatments. According to the ILO (2007), discrimination bars people from occupation, denies them jobs altogether or doesn’t reward their merit because of skin colour, sex or social background. These combined give rise to social economic disadvantages making the world to increasingly unequal, insecure and unsafe. As a follow-up to the ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work, the EEOC was implemented as an external forum to foster the rights of employees. As a case study herein we look at the USA and The Peoples Republic of China (P.R.C.), key towering economies that we shall study as a case study herein. Definitions and Theoretical Issues Discrimination means biased treatment or any distinction exclusion or preference made on the basis of gender, height, sex, political opinion, national extraction, socio origin, ethnicity, colour and religious background among others which have the effect of nullifying or impair equality of opportunity (Cooke 2003). On the other hand, Shaffer et al (2000) describes employment discrimination as simply the inability of the personnel involved to manage diversity. According to Shaffer et al (2000) sexual harassment refers to a scenario wherein a lady is compelled or forced to have sex with a man in order to have some requirements put in place, say, get a job. Equal employment opportunity (EEO) is a term that can be use interchangeably with Equality principle, meritocratic principle, reverse discrimination and so forth. E.E.O. means provision of equal opportunity for employment to all persons regardless of their colour, height, gender, religion etc. there exists assorted forms of employment discrimination in both state owned organisation and the private sector. It was as a result of this that in 1964 the launch of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) was unavoidable. EEOC seeks to protect the employees from a discriminative employer. It is a set of legislation aimed at protecting employees from barbaric treatment and an external forum for resolution of employment discrimination disputes, regardless of the basis. According to the EEOC chairperson, Ida Castro, EEOC move swiftly and aggressively to respond to problems of workplace harassment, tabled by both men and women (Karts and Van, 2004). Descriptive Comparative. Several factors of employment discrimination have been evident in both countries. Gender discrimination, age discrimination, religious discrimination, height discrimination inter alia; encapsulate some of the common forms of discrimination evident in both economies. Gender discrimination comes in two different forms, sexual harassment and gender evaluation. In defining sex harassment, we need to take a look at same- sex harassment, sexual stereotyping, and equal opportunity harassment (Same sex harassment, 2000). Based on sexual orientation and in accordance with the Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, it is evident that discrimination based on race, colour, religion, sex and nationality is prohibited. It is therefore a bold face fact that exercising employment discrimination on sexual orientation grounds is a punitive offence. The implementation of this litigation has however not been up to date. Police harassment and brutality have been constant features of the gay and lesbian lifestyle for long. This was particularly pragmatic in degree of police brutality on lesbians and gays working in pubs in the US and China. In some cases bisexuals were less likely to receive negative evaluation compared to the lesbians/ gays. In workplaces, the lifestyle of the lesbians was jam-packed with verbal harassment. Katz and La Van (2004) in a survey have found that between 16 and 46% of gays, lesbians, and bisexuals have experienced some form of employment discrimination based on their sexual orientation. With regard to the EEO Laws in the United States, a commission whose mandate is to ensure observation of law. Normally it is not the duty of the employer to protect the employee. The EEOC is an agency that works strategically to lessen discrimination acts in the future. Moreover studies embody that discrimination lawsuits filed in the federal courts against employers have had positive effects on their workplace conditions, as one study on a supermarkets that faced discrimination lawsuits lead to immediate increases in women and African American presence in management. As a matter of course some factors apply equably in both economies and these can include among others, height/ weight discrimination can also be called heightism, disability discrimination etc. It is associated with people placing high premium on tallness. As a general allusion, being tall is believed to be a characteristic for success, in all spheres of life, sex, economy, social et cetera. As a result, people always want to be associated with tall people if not be tall themselves. Some jobs only favour tall people for example manual labour, professional sports and fashion modelling, military pilots notwithstanding. In the US for instance, according to research findings, heightism is instinctive. To those we look down to, we ascribe low social power and negative traits. Rosenberg puts forward that they enjoy “halo effect” an automatic attribution of positive personality. It is the guiding factor in presidential elections because, since 1896, after President McKinley. Height is also inculcated, with our language being rife with heights’ idioms (Zeng, 2007). Our heightism is pervasive; the awareness regarding discrimination is not in the consciousness of one individual. As a matter of fact heightism is a condition that is experienced by all and sundry and therefore whatever feeling there is in PRC, it is also in China. As such, heightism is experienced in the two countries and the world over. Explanation of Differences Social transformation in the Chinese mainland is a key ingredient for sexual harassment; which constitutes three dimensions, gender harassment, unwanted sexual attention, and sexual coercion. Movement from the planned, controlled economic system to a market system has given rise to loss of administrative control and protection; replacing personal wishes and control of managers, with the majority, about 89%, being male. On educational grounds, 32% of the Chinese mainland women are illiterate compared to 16% in their male counterparts. While the U.S.A. treats anti-employment discrimination law as a pertinent legislative element, China has not fully embraced this in the legislation. From the Statistical Yearbook of China, (1998), Beijing has got 73% of working women having high school degree and 17% having university degree, compared to the prior mainland statistics. Whilst the United States of America treats anti-employment description law as one of the basic legislative acts, China (and Chinese mainland or Beijing), does not have serious legislative implementations .The United States of America on socioeconomic and cultural terms is distinctive in its cultures, economies, and populations. The U.S. is a capitalistic business base with democratic political system and an extensive technological development reflecting a strong western culture. In contrast, Chinese mainland is collectively an eastern culture with socialistic legal and political systems. In the US, women constitute almost half the workforce; according to Shaffer et al, nearly 60% of all the women are employed based on the 1990 census results (Demographic Yearbook, 1994). As a matter of fact, the number of women earning university degrees supersedes that of men. Women working full time earn close to 76% of the wages of men working full time, this is according to the Wall street Journal, 1998. Women in the US are knowledgeable of their right with a long standing legislation of over 40 years. On gender evaluation, Cooke (2005) postulates that based on the Chinese characteristics of gender inequality in management careers against the current political and economic background, the low level in both quantity and hierarchy of women in management. Based on the cultural history of PRC, according to Confucius, society should be ordered in a hierarchical fashion with the ruler at the top and the youngest daughter at the bottom. The doctrine of the “ three obedience” teaches that the duties of the woman in her lifetime is to take care of her father before marriage, her husband after marriage and her son after the demise of the husband (Granrose 2007). Whilst men are designed by cultural values to be the head of the organisation, women have a duty of taking care of communal jobs such as family caretaking. Large well organised collectives and State Owned Enterprises, SOE’s had communal kitchens set aside for women. Women were paid less than men (remuneration discrimination) and were not eligible for bonuses because they couldn’t stay up late since they had domestic works in the house waiting. They had children to take care of, prepare meals and also take care of the elderly relatives as a cultural obligation. This is contrary to the Employment Equity Act (Agocs & Burr, 1996). On retirement grounds, the older women retired earlier than men and often expected to provide childcare services for their daughters-in-laws. This is discriminatory in a sense that this early retirement denies them access to post retirement paid work which is a reserve of the retired men (Cooke, 2003). Women were not as strong as men and they would get married and get children thus they are not able to concentrate on the jobs and need for childcare policy, this will lead to increased cost of hiring since the employer needs to provide medical cover and child care facilities. Besides one child policy was introduced to eliminate domestic maternal role. On organizational hierarchy men move up the ladder of the organisation based on their seniority, attempt by the women counterparts to climb the organizational career ladder is damped by three impediments. These encapsulate the need for a father or husband in position of power, through government “tokenism” policies, and the third is that the woman in question must have talent and impressive accomplishments in their current places of work (Cooke, 2003). Whilst other nations are using the gender disparity as a point of difference, the United States’ Human Resource Management has graduated to a level of perceiving strength in diversity (Agocs & Burr, 1996). Diversity management is the key aspect that the HRM in workplaces employed in the US to celebrate diversity. As a matter of information, gender in itself is a diversity that has to be managed effectively. The US has policy on affirmative action in response to gender discrimination meant to even out gender parity in employment, education inter alia. Employment equity, affirmative action, and diversity management are everyday reality in the US and Canadian labour markets. Taking a look at the history of an American woman, the introduction of affirmative action in the mid-1960’s to early 1970’s served to put the girl child on course. On Age discrimination it has been evident in the Chinese empire of older persons receiving more remuneration than the young employees. This is a recent social development that came with the advent of restructuring. It unveils early retirement in women who are old (Zeng 2007). In the US, however, remuneration is purely vis-à-vis the work done or the performance. In fact young persons are earning far more than older ones because they handle crucial technological areas. The U.S. has several laws at federal level that regulate employment discrimination, although implementation is horrendously differential based on the state. For instance Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1963 meant to prohibit employment discrimination based on race, colour, and religion. Focussing on the women labour rights has a quantitative advantage wherein many women will be employed without a consideration of the qualitative aspect because of the Chinese culture which bases assumptions based on gender. On the other hand, in China, the state has the all the power to enforce equal opportunity policies and is also the implementer of these policies as the largest employer in the country (Cooke, 2003). This made China’s EEO law enforcement a set back, as many authors stated that this is a huge problem in China’s legal system. One paper stated that the intervention of the state in women’s employment has largely focused on protecting women's labour rights and increasing their share in employment quantitatively when at the same time there was little done to ensure the quality of women’s employment and enforcement of laws that protects them (Cooke, 2003). So to sum up this part it is clear that the lack of enforcement mechanism of EEO laws is a serious problem that allows easy discrimination of employees such is the problem in China were as the presence of an agency that enforces the law makes sure that every person has their rights back and also ensure that any sort of discrimination does not happen in the future. Conclusion Conclusively, it is quite evident that the two countries in the case study herein differ primarily because of socio-cultural effects. The USA is more developed than China. It can be seen openly that in the PRC- Peoples Republic of China, the two regions; the mainland China a.k.a. Beijing and Hong Kong and the US are socioeconomically and culturally varied that taking a toll on the morals greatly. Reports such as this should be taken into consideration by the government to ensure litigation updates. Due to the vast nature of the topic of study, this report in itself is not wholesome as there remain other areas of concern. The study can also serve as base knowledge for any prospects to alleviate multifaceted discrimination. References. Cooke, F (2005), “Women’s Managerial Careers in China in a period of reform”. Asia Pacific business review. Vol.11, 2 pg149-162 Cooke, F. L. (2003) Equal opportunities? Women in managerial careers in government organizations in China’, International Journal of Human Resource Management, 14(2), pp. 31–333. Cooke, F. L. (2004) HRM, Work and Employment in China (London: Routledge). Women’s Managerial Careers in China 161 Fuchs, V. (1986) His and Hers: Gender Differences in Work and Income, 1959-1979. Journal Of Labor Economics 4: S245-S272. Katz, M. &Van, L. (2004), Legal Protection from Discrimination Based on Sexual Towers. Orientation: Findings from Litigation. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal. Vol 16. 4 Konrad, A. M., & Linnehan, F. (1995). Race and sex differences in line managers’ reactions to have equal employment opportunity and affirmative action interventions. Group and Organization Management, 20, 409–439 . Korari, K. (1993). Managerial women in the people’s Morrison, A. and Von Glinow, M.A. (1990), “Women and minorities in management”. American psychologist, vol.45, 4p. 200-8. Shaffer, M., Joblin, W, Bell.M, Lau. T and Oguz C (2000) Gender Discrimination and Job-Related Outcomes: A Cross-Cultural Comparison of Working Women in the United States and China. Journal Company; Journal of Vocational Behavior 57, 395–427 (2000) ILO (2007). Economically active population (description of the indicators). Geneva,International Labour Organization (http://laborsta.ilo.org/). Granrose, S.C. (2007) Gender differences in career perceptions in the People’s Republic of China: Development International, vol 12 No. 1 p.13-16 Agocs, C. and Burr, C. (1996) Employment equity, affirmative action and managing diversity: assessing the differences. International Journal of Manpower, vol. 17 No. 4/5 p. 30-45. Zeng, X (2007) Enforcing Equal Employment Opportunities in China. University of Pennsylvania. Vol. 6, no. 4, 2007, pp. 991- 1025 Read More