Working Together
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The typical workplace is a hotbed of human relationships--of friendships, conflicts, feuds, alliances, partnerships, coexistence and cooperation. Here, problems are solved, progress is made, and rifts are mended because they need to be - because the work has to get done. And it has to get done among increasingly diverse groups of co-workers.At a time when communal ties in American society are increasingly frayed and segregation persists, the workplace is more than ever the site where Americans from different ethnic, religious, and racial backgrounds meet and forge serviceable and sometimes lasting bonds. What do these highly structured workplace relationships mean for a society still divided by gender and race?
Structure and rules are, in fact, central to the answer. Workplace interactions are constrained by economic power and necessity, and often by legal regulation. They exist far from the civic ideal of free and equal citizens voluntarily associating for shared ends. Yet it is the very involuntariness of these interactions that helps to make the often-troubled project of racial integration comparatively successful at work. People can be forced to get along-not without friction, but often with surprising success.
This highly original exploration of the paradoxical nature--and the paramount importance--of workplace bonds concludes with concrete suggestions for how law can further realize the democratic possibilities of working together. In linking workplace integration and connectedness beyond work, Estlund suggests a novel and promising strategy for addressing the most profound challenges facing American society.
Reviews
"... Estlund... offers a wealth of hypotheses presented in a carefully explicated logic. Throughout Working Together , her statements of the propositions affirmed by the available evidence remain modest, while her conscientious analysis of relevant democratic theory and practice underscores the importance of further empirical inquiry."--Perspectives on Politics
"It is not easy piecing together statistical evidence, social science research, and political theory. Professor Estlund gracefully accomplishes this task.... a thought-provoking and scholarly work.... its implications for improving inter-group communications and democracy should serve as a counter-argument in the ongoing debate about unintended results of modern worklife."--New York Law Journal
"Working Together is an original and important book. With eloquent prose, Cynthia Estlund convincingly develops the argument, based on a careful integration of empirical studies and social and political theory, that working together enhances inter-group relations in the long run. Indeed her analysis demonstrates the work place is the most important setting for cooperative interaction among individuals of diverse backgrounds. This book has enormous relevance for students concerned about the future of civil society, and will be widely discussed and cited for many years."--William Julius Wilson, Lewis P. and Linda L. Geyser University Professor, Harvard University
"Working Together shines a bright line on group conflict and cooperation at a fundamental but understudied juncture in American social life: the workplace. Her study combines deep research and careful nuance with bristling insight and an accessible style that should attract a broad audience. For a host of reasons, American social analysts tend to minimize the importance of what happens at the job. Working Together is an important and impressive corrective."--Randall Kennedy
"To reverse America's growing social fragmentation, especially in the context of increasing diversity, will require that we explore and exploit the civic potential of the workplace. Cynthia Estlund's book admirably opens that debate and should be on the 'must read' list of anyone concerned to revitalize American democracy."--Robert D. Putnam, author of Bowling Alone
"What Carol Pateman and Robert Dahl did for workplace democracy 30 years ago, Cynthia Estlund has done for the contemporary workplace as a site of civic engagement. This book will be the touchstone for discussions of the political importance of race and gender integration in employment. Estlund's "constitution of the workplace", her cold-eyed account of the uses and limits of affirmative action and sexual harassment law, her fine-grained understanding of changing work environments, her fresh assessment of unions and alternative forms of worker representation provide important new resources for democratic theorists, legal scholars, and everyone party to the "social capital" debates."--Nancy L. Rosenblum, author of Membership and Morals
About the Author(s)
Cynthia Estlund is a Professor of Law at Columbia University, where she teaches employment, labor, and property law.
