easy to understandinggood grammar
the sociologists’ take on the environment
by chuck laszewski
A common mantra when it comes to studying the environment is
that only a disinterested, dispassionate natural scientist can untan-
gle the natural from the social and thus do things like calculate
carbon emissions or predict climate change.
But to many sociologists, this is precisely the wrong approach.
The sociological approach starts from the assumption that the
natural and the social aren’t separate and distinct, but in fact mutu-
ally created and reproduced.
20 contexts.org
It’s an insight that has profound implications for how all
of us—specialists and citizens alike—understand changes in
our ecosystems and what we choose to do (or not) about them.
Sociologists analyze the environment and a whole host of
environmental issues from a variety of angles. Perhaps the old-
est and most notable contribution of sociology to the many
different studies of the environment is measuring the harm of
environmental degradation and policies on various communi-
ties and populations. What researchers observed many years
ago is powerfully and fundamentally sociological: environmen-
tal problems are not equally distributed in their impact and
consequence.
Sociologists were among the first to unpack the idea that
some communities suffer the harmful effects of environmental
degradation more than others—that people with less influence
or wealth are more likely to bear the brunt of some kind of
hazard. “Environmental racism” is the catchphrase, but the idea
behind it—the unequal impact of environmental degradation on
different social groups—is the core idea on which the environ-
mental justice movement is based.
David Pellow, a sociologist in the ethnic studies depart-
ment at the University of California, San Diego, has written
extensively about environmental racism. Disputes over garbage
collection in Chicago followed the trajectory exactly: While
community activists fought for better recycling programs and
to close landfills in minority neighborhoods,
the politicians, many of whom were
African American or Latino, fought to bring
the landfills, hazardous waste dumps, or
incinerators into the neighborhoods.
The justification always was that it
would increase the tax base and bring jobs
to a depressed area. But as the environmental activists easily
grasped, and as the research bore out, those dirty facilities pro-
duced poor economic results and jobs that were hazardous to
the workers, not to mention a new source of toxic emissions
in the neighborhood, Pellow says.
After numerous reports, some by environmental sociolo-
gists, proved conclusively that landfills, hazardous waste
dumps, and dirty factories were overwhelmingly established
in poor or minority neighborhoods, President Bill Clinton signed
an environmental justice executive order.
While it established an office in the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency, the order and the office unfortunately
provided no enforcement mechanism. There is no evidence
any groups have seen businesses or the government making
concessions on construction locations because of the execu-
tive order, notes Sherry Cable, a sociologist at the University
of Tennessee.
The unique sociological perspective is that environmental
problems aren’t so much the result of misguided leaders or
bad intentions but broader economic forces and social struc-
tures. These are frequent targets of analysis and critique by
environmental sociologists.
Many scholars have called attention to the environmental
problems caused by global economic interests and forces by
studying the institutions, policies, and practices surrounding
them. One large institution causing environmental mayhem is
the World Bank.
Few institutions can match its reach and power. It was
founded to funnel money into projects in developing nations
so as to raise standards of living and the gross national prod-
uct of those recipient nations. Instead, the World Bank often
becomes the paymaster for large projects that do more harm
than good and line the pockets of the already rich or powerful.
Michael Goldman, who studies environmental sociology
at the University of Minnesota, witnessed one such bungled
project while living in western India and working on his
dissertation.
The World Bank had lent money to build canals in the
Thar Desert to bring water to the villages from the Himalayas
in the interest of agricultural production and economic devel-
opment for the region. Bank officials wrote glowing reports
and made movies for European school students showing how
the 700-mile canal irrigated 2 million hectares of land and
turned it green with crops.
In reality, the project was an environmental disaster. Only
the farmers and villagers along the main canal arteries actually
received water, and those areas were controlled by wealthy
city landlords whose profits didn’t even trickle back to the local
communities. Smaller, less well-positioned farmers saw their
crops die. Small sheep farmers were forced off the land, and
the shepherds, traders, and farmers who had lived off the land
there for generations fell into debt.
It was a familiar story for sociologists in certain ways. But
Goldman decided to study the bank itself and its role in creat-
ing such a situation. His timing was good. Environmental and
human rights activists around the world had taken notice of
the bank’s poor record and had begun protesting. Those
demonstrations embarrassed the bank, and its board of direc-
tors announced it would change its approach to development
projects. It would become a better steward of the earth and
work with villages and nations to produce more sustainable
21Spring 2008 contexts
Andrew Szasz studied bottled water and developed a theory
that people protect themselves and their families from contami-
nation rather than society at large. Photo by Jennifer McNulty
Environmental problems aren’t so much the
result of misguided leaders or bad intentions but
broader economic forces and social structures.
projects, the board announced.
But the World Bank’s words, com-
bined with its willingness to work with
environmental organizations, had the per-
verse effect of suddenly allowing projects
into areas such as the Amazon rain forest
and the Mekong River and delta where
they had been previously kept out. The
results were disastrous, Goldman says.
One project he wrote about in his
book Imperial Nature was the construc-
tion of hydroelectric dams on the
Mekong River in Laos. The bank had been
trying to build the dams for years, but
protesters had complained its environ-
mental and social impact assessments
were flawed, performed by the dam-building companies, and
biased toward construction.
To counter that opposition, the World Bank hired environ-
mental groups such as the World Wildlife Fund and the Union
of Concerned Scientists to conduct the studies. However, the
bank made impossible demands, like requiring a fish study that
would have taken years if done properly be completed in three
weeks. Worse, the outside scientists didn’t understand the local
languages, cultures, or political situation.
“It’s the evolution of how critics can be the enablers,”
Goldman says. “So the bank has become more powerful. It’s
the ‘greening’ of the bank, but it has disastrous ecological
effects. These dams provide electricity for Bangkok, and it
floods biodiversity areas, and the money goes to ministries,
not the poor.”
In considering the environmental movement itself, sociologists
study activism and social change—how environmental con-
cerns receive public attention, how activists and organizations
emerge to advocate for new public policies and broader social
change, and the impacts these movements have on policy and
ultimately ecosystems themselves.
We know from sociological research that the citizen-
turned-political-activist in response to environmental insults on
a community tends to follow a well-documented arc. Residents
see pollution and, assuming the government doesn’t know
about it, contact the responsible agency. The government does
nothing and the residents become angry. They organize,
become political players, and continue agitating until they get
action from elected officials and the offending business.
Cable, at the University of Tennessee, documented this
pattern in Middlesboro, Kentucky, where a local tannery was
the source of pollution.
Mobilization here began with women comparing stories
about illnesses in their children and livestock, progressed to
their pushing their husbands to do something about it, and
ultimately being surprised when the govern-
ment didn’t respond. The process culminat-
ed with them attending public meetings,
coordinating transportation to the local hos-
pital for tests to confirm illnesses that could be
related to the pollution, and eventually run-
ning for local public offices.
“They go through an amazing transfor-
mation,” Cable says. “What comes out of it
is political awareness. They say, ‘I am not
going to let it happen to me again.’” People
who take on environmental problems in their
communities begin to recognize other envi-
ronmental problems, and the politics behind
them, and are less likely to ignore them, she
has found.
Analyses like these can help activists and scholars better
understand how to make protests more effective. But such
cases also highlight the challenges—increasingly more com-
plex and abstract these days—standing in the way of broader
movements and change.
For example, Cable explains, mobilizing people to fight
global warming is difficult because of the complexity of the
science involved and how far removed it is from individual,
ordinary citizens. Only scientists and native peoples living near
the Arctic Circle see the polar ice caps melting—it’s not the
same as watching chemicals pour from a pipe into a local creek
or when workers get sick from handling toxic materials.
“The farther it is from the local community, the harder it
is for any of us to grasp,” she says.
Sociologists studying the environment have also empha-
sized two more traditional movement challenges: leadership
and properly framing issues.
Laurel Holland, a sociologist at the University of West
Georgia, has studied the role of organized religion in moving
congregants toward caring about the natural world.
The Moral Majority, organized around issues such as
outlawing abortion, became a powerful force in American
politics and helped elect George W. Bush twice. Now, with the
2006 signing of “Climate Change: An Evangelical Call to
Action” by more than 80 well-known evangelical Christians,
Holland sees the potential for them to turn global warming
into a major issue for their members in the 2008 presidential
election.
The call to action already has moved the discussion among
leaders from the Genesis charge that humans have “dominion”
over the earth to a broader discussion of how humans must be
stewards of the earth as part of caring for other people, Holland
says.
“The first thing you have to do is convince the parish-
ioners it’s God’s will and then get them in action,” she says.
“Talk about it and do it, talk about it and do it. It starts with
22 contexts.org
UC San Diego’s David Pellow has
become active with a group fight-
ing industrial pollution by provid-
ing research about best practices.
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the pastor.”
According to Holland, however, it will take more than min-
isters talking about the problem. She surveyed Presbyterian
churches in Georgia about where they stood on environmental
issues. All claimed to be “green” congregations and said envi-
ronmental concerns were preached from the pulpit.
Holland then collected data from the churches and when
she broke down the statistics one thing became clear: The
churches most actively involved in preventing environmental
damage were those whose ministers were active in environ-
mental organizations such as the Sierra Club. Clearly, this seems
to suggest, movements require not just powerful ideas and
charismatic leadership but also organizations that effectively
get citizens to take action.
The contemporary environmental movement certainly faces
organizational and political challenges (page 14), but Andrew
Szasz, chair of the sociology department at the University of
California, Santa Cruz, adds to that list the ironies and
irrationalities of uncoordinated individual actions by well-mean-
ing consumers.
When Szasz studied the consumption of bottled water,
he found consumers buy it because they’re aware of the dan-
gers of chemicals in our water and food supply. But, they’ve
reacted by protecting themselves and their families, instead of
society at large.
They buy water filters, bottled water,
or organic food and then think they’ve
solved the problem. In his recently pub-
lished book, Shopping our Way to Safety:
How We Changed from Protecting the
Environment to Protecting Ourselves, Szasz
sharply questions this response and com-
pares it unfavorably to building private
bomb shelters in the early 1960s. It’s what
Szasz has termed an “inverted quarantine.”
Unlike the traditional quarantine where the environment
is considered clean and a few sick people have to be kept out
of it, in the inverted quarantine it’s the environment that’s ill
and people who try to remove themselves from it. With the
exception of organic foods, many of the other products con-
sumers buy under the assumption they’re protecting the envi-
ronment aren’t regulated and there’s no way to know if they
have any positive environmental impact whatsoever. What’s
more, protecting individuals’ bodies by purchasing products
isn’t likely to transform them into environmental activists.
“If you think you have fixed the problem with a water
filter, what is the likelihood you will punish a president for veto-
ing the water bill?” Szasz asks. “With bottled water, you are not
likely to go through the larger politicization process. They seem
to care a great deal about the environment but they don’t do
anything about it. They feel distressed and they take the easy
way out, especially if they have disposable income.”
Szasz’s research seems to suggest that when it comes to
global warming, middle-class and wealthy Americans will
simply endeavor to protect their families and themselves. If
they live near the rising oceans, they’ll move farther inland.
They’ll ensure their air conditioners are in good working order.
If drinking water becomes scarce, they’ll move where it’s more
plentiful. If they take any positive environmental actions at all,
it will be individually, such as purchasing a hybrid car or
recycling their garbage.
There may indeed be those, though, who are primed to
take the fight further. The question then becomes whether
they will take up arms and demand that government force
businesses to follow the same rules and guidelines they them-
selves follow to curb environmental degradation.
At the core of sociological conceptions of and contributions
to environmental studies is the premise that the environment
does not exist independent of social life and the human realm.
Sociology is concerned not only with the social consequences
of environmental degradation but also with its social causes.
Sociologists help us understand how human society
impacts natural systems and ecosystems—and vice versa.
“Basically, we tell stories, stories of the interaction between
nature and humans,” Szasz says. The story of how society
mobilizes—or doesn’t—over global warming and other envi-
ronmental challenges is still being written.
One path to ensuring the problems of environmental
23Spring 2008 contexts
Ph
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The World Bank often becomes the paymaster
for large projects that do more harm than good
and line the pockets of the already rich or
powerful.
degradation and racism don’t progress unabated is for sociol-
ogists to get involved in environmental movements and pub-
lic decision-making. Szasz’s work on water consumption is one
example of studying a phenomenon in an effort to call atten-
tion to collective problems. Others are even more engaged.
Pellow, for example, became active in efforts to stem the
tide of industrial pollution by providing research about how to
do things differently. He has been studying the computer and
other high tech industries for years.
One of the most profitable in the
world, the industry has built a “clean”
mythology around itself, in contrast to its
Industrial Age brothers, steel and coal. But
researchers learned from workers and
environmental scientists the industry real-
ly isn’t as clean as it professed to be, Pellow says. In fact, right
from the beginning, they mine the materials they need to manu-
facture cell phones, silicon chips, and computers. Environmen-
tal impacts continue right through the production line where the
toxic chemicals are used for etching and dangerous metals such
as lead have to be handled and disposed of.
The manufacturing of electronics in this country is often
conducted by immigrants who don’t understand English well
and don’t understand what they’re being exposed to, Pellow
found. It’s a global industry, so often the work is shipped to
poorer countries where regulations are non-existent and labor
isn’t organized. And as he noted in his most recent book,
Resisting Global Toxics: Transnational Movements for
Environmental Justice, the toxic wastes from the electronics
industry invariably finds its way into the natural resources of
those same poor countries.
Pellow, however, has become part of the International
Campaign for Responsible Technology, a network of organi-
zations pushing the industry toward safe and sustainable prac-
tices, and an international movement has sprung up around
these issues and this organization.
“We decided to support the efforts of environmental and
labor groups to push the industry,” Pellow says. “We did more
research to point out the good and the bad practices. The
International Campaign for Responsible Technology is led by
environmentalists, worker activists, [and] lawyers. They say a lot
of things are not going well here and we need to change it. I’m
proud to be part of it.”
Chuck Laszewski is a freelance writer and for 25 years was a reporter at the St.
Paul Pioneer Press, where he covered the environment, among other topics. He is
the author of Rock ‘n’ Roll Radical: The Life and Mysterious Death of Dean Reed.
24 contexts.org
“Basically, we tell stories, stories of the interac-
tion between nature and humans,” Szasz says.
half-page
AD
AD
16 contexts.orgPhoto by TheeErin via Creative Commons
When I wrote an article on age discrimination last year, I couldn’t
believe the response: countless emails and at least five phone calls
a week for several months. These communications weren’t coming
from researchers in the field but from workers across the country,
male and female, semi-skilled, skilled, and professional. They shared
stories of age discrimination that they, a spouse, or a parent had
experienced or were currently living through, asked for information
about their rights and what could be done, and thanked me for
bringing light to an issue that “nobody talks about.”
ageism
in the american workplace
by vincent j. roscigno
17winter 2010 contexts
They were and are correct about the neglect of age discrimi-
nation in public dialogue. There is remarkably little coverage in
the popular press and, with a few exceptions, social scientists
who study employment inequality often overlook ageism—a
problem that Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
statistics show is on the rise.
The increase in workplace ageism is due to a host of cul-
tural, demographic, and structural factors: a society increas-
ingly consumed by “youth,” be it in culture, mass media or
medicine; a large and aging baby boomer population, many of
whom will remain in the workforce well into their 70s and 80s;
and current corporate downsizing and globalization pressures
that heighten worker insecurities and vulnerabilities. Social
researchers are now documenting trends in aging workers’
employment prospects and employer stereotyping and discrim-
ination. Using both survey research and first-hand accounts by
victims, they are uncovering the real social and human costs of
age discrimination.
talking with victims
Almost all victims with whom I spoke related tangible costs
to them or a loved one. Many conveyed fear of defaulting on
mortgages or being unable to pay for their children’s college
after being pushed out of their current jobs. Others expressed
anger and insecurity over the loss of affordable health insur-
ance or pension benefits—benefits that they felt were both
earned and owed. Just as prevalent and somewhat surprising
to me in these discussions were the less-tangible, yet deeper
social-psychological and emotional costs that social science
research has established for racial discrimination or sexual
harassment, for instance, but are only now being considered
in relation to older workers.
The first-hand experiences of victims aligned closely with
my own research on the topic. Karen, for instance, told me
about her mother who, several months prior, was pushed out
of her job of 20 years and replaced with a 25 year old. Her
mother felt isolated and helpless. She continues to cry at night,
months later, due to the loss of a job, loss of friends she loved,
and an overarching violation of trust by her employer. “She
thought of her colleagues as her family,” Karen noted, “but now
it is her family that abandoned her like… like she just doesn’t
matter. It killed her inside… It’s still killing her inside.”
Violations of trust, despite a history of hard, dedicated
work and good citizenship, seemed especially poignant. Joe,
a committed maintenance worker, talked with me just as he was
“being pushed out” after 23 years of work. He expressed
anger—anger triggered by violations of a “normative social
contract,” wherein employee dedication and hard work are
met with employer obligation and “making good” on past
promises. “They now don’t want to pay me my pension. I was
a good worker for them and always did everything they asked.
I went out of my way to help train people and make every-
thing run smoothly, so everybody was happy and it was a good
place to work. And now this is what I get, like I never really
mattered to them. It’s just not right.”
age stereotypes at work
Stereotypes—negative generalizations about entire groups
of people—indicate status and inequality that can spur dis-
criminatory behaviors and actions. Although employers may
say they want long-term, experienced, dedicated workers, sur-
vey research tells us they tend to view older workers like Joe and
Karen’s mother as expensive, inflexible, possibly stubborn or
forgetful, and bad for the company image. We also know from
reports and surveys from organizations like the AARP that more
than half of aging workers have either experienced age dis-
crimination on their jobs or witnessed such discrimination
toward others.
Erdman Palmore of the Duke University Center for the
Study of Aging and Human Development reports that 8
4
percent of Americans over 60 years old report one or more
incidents of ageism, including insulting jokes, disrespect, patron-
izing behavior, and assumptions about frailty or ailments. Such
patterns are manifested by a culture consumed with “youth”—
a culture passed to young people through socialization and
then reproduced in institutions and organizations like the work-
place.
Surveys, interviews, and experimental research all uncover
ageism in employment. Classic work by Benson Rosen and
Thomas Jerdee, for example, revealed perceptions of older work-
ers as less responsive, if not resistant, to workplace changes. A
more recent book by social psychologist Todd Nelson confirms
this point, revealing how managers and younger coworkers tend
to view older workers as inflexible, slow, unorganized, difficult,
and expensive to train. Such stereotypes, which sometimes take
a gender-specific character, are notable given that older work-
ers often exhibit greater job commitment, less turnover, and
lower rates of absenteeism than do younger workers.
Contexts,Vol.9,No.1,pp.16-21. ISSN1536-5042,electronic ISSN1537-6052.©2010AmericanSociologicalAssociation.
All rights reserved. For permission to photocopy or reproduce, see http://www.ucpressjournals.com/reprintinfo.asp. DOI:
10.1525/ctx.2010.9.1.16.
Skilled and dedicated workers, older people may be one asset
employers overlook.
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18 contexts.org
No doubt some employers try to protect older workers
from discriminatory treatment in an effort to maintain a well-
trained, highly skilled labor force. Yet an emerging body of
research is finding that employers invoke age stereotypes and
discrimination to help justify cost-savings for the business. This
may be especially true for skilled workers, such as those in
manufacturing, given recent trends in globalization, downsiz-
ing, and corporate restructuring. Indeed, such economic trends
and employers’ responses to them have created a structurally
vulnerable, aging workforce or, as Arne Kalleberg described in
his 2009 Presidential Address to the American Sociological
Association, “precarious work” and “insecure workers.”
economics and vulnerability
There is solid evidence of growing insecurity among all
workers, but perhaps especially among aging workers, begin-
ning in the 1990s and continuing to the present. The United
States has witnessed mass layoffs, declining relative wages, the
growth of part-time and temporary work, and what Robert Val-
letta of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco describes as
an “employer breach of implicit employment arrangements.”
Here, Valletta is referring to the “normative social contract”
described earlier—the expectation that good workplace citizen-
ship and tenure will be rewarded with security and job benefits.
In the face of corporate restructuring and downsizing,
replacing older with younger workers may be seen by some
employers as a cost-savings technique, insomuch as pension
payouts can be circumvented and wages decreased. Moreover,
health benefit payouts can be held in check, and promotions
and on-the-job training opportunities can be reserved for
younger workers who are often seen as cheaper and more
worth the long-term investment. The consequences, particu-
larly for higher skilled older workers, have included significant
job displacement over the past twenty years, involuntary exit
from the labor market, and downward mobility upon re-
employment.
Research on long-term employment by Princeton econo-
mist Henry Farber corroborates such findings, reporting dete-
rioration of jobs in the private sector from 1990 to 2006, with
tenure declining substantially for workers over 40 years of age.
What this means is that older workers are being “displaced”
or pushed out of long-term employment at an even higher rate
than younger workers. This occurs largely through plant clos-
ings and job elimination. Employers have some discretion in
deciding which plants to close and jobs to eliminate, which
can disadvantage older workers who may have higher earn-
ings and more expensive benefits packages.
Though this sort of vulnerability to economic pressure is
not the same as discrimination, there are important overlaps that
suggest they are, in fact, closely related. First, as I found in my
study of age discrimination suits, the very justifications employ-
ers use to discriminate against and push out aging workers are
often “age-neutral” in tone, incorporating rhetoric about “cost-
savings,” “downsizing,” and “restructuring.” This is true even
when no such formal restructuring occurs. Second, the pat-
tern of age discrimination suits nationally closely mirrors more
general worker displacement trends.
Age discrimination complaints to the Equal Employment
Opportunities Commission are increasing rapidly in proportion
to complaints on the basis of race, sex, disability, and religion.
Although formal complaints only capture a sliver of the dis-
criminatory acts occurring in the real world, the data point to
an absolute as well as a relative increase in
age discrimination. The raw number of
case filings, monetary awards for dam-
ages, and percentage of cases settled in
the employee’s favor also show that age
discrimination charges and their serious-
ness are on the rise, paralleling the broader
trends in worker displacement. The costs are multi-dimensional
and serious.
tangible costs, emotional scarring, and injustice
Much age discrimination in the American economy is
linked to being fired, let go, or laid off, often preceded by a
period of outright harassment or unequal terms and condi-
tions of employment (such as being asked to perform tasks
other employees are not asked to do). The consequences can
be numerous and wide-ranging.
There are immediate costs surrounding wage and bene-
fits losses and the need to find new employment. With Sherry
Mong, Reginald Byron, and Griff Tester, I studied both the age
An emerging body of research is finding that
employers invoke age stereotypes and discrimi-
nation to help justify cost-savings.
Displacement rates of long-tenured workers
1981 20052003200119991997199519931991198919871985198
3
Source: Displaced worker supplement, Current Population Survey,
Bureau of Labor Statistics
1
2
3
4
5
6 percent
Age 20-24
Age 25-34
Age 35-44
Age
Age 55 and over
45-54
19winter 2010 contexts
discrimination process and the resulting job security and finan-
cial hardships, based on 120 discrimination cases verified by
state Civil Rights investigators. Consider, for example, the case
of Jim Terry, a shift foreman who was terminated and replaced
by a younger employee just 23 days
prior to his 30-year anniversary with the
company. Jim was cross-trained in sev-
eral areas and could have easily per-
formed any of the duties in his
department. Yet he was terminated for minor “infractions”
when other foremen were not. Consequently, his pension ben-
efits were cut by about $300 per month, and his medical and
life insurance were immediately shut off. Sarah Ray, an African
American executive secretary for a government agency, was
pushed into involuntary retirement after 21 years with her
employer and, like Jim, received only a portion of her pension
as a result: “At 59 years of age I felt desperate because of the
financial situation in our home that I had to do something to
keep money coming. So, at that choice—at that time, I retired
even though that’s not what I wanted to do…”
The push to create and maintain a young workforce due
to stereotypes of aging workers and their assumed higher costs
means that companies may feel pressure to both purge older
workers from their ranks and hire younger rather than older
workers. This two-pronged pressure—in employer biases about
who to purge and who to hire—makes older workers vulner-
able in both the hiring and firing process. They are susceptible
to being pushed out or laid off, to be sure. But once they are
out, they will also expend disproportionate time and energy
seeking re-employment elsewhere.
According to recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statis-
tics, about 65 percent of all displaced workers find gainful
employment within two years of the initial job loss. Workers 55
and older, however, encounter the greatest obstacles and worst
prospects for re-employment. For them, re-employment often
occurs in part-time or temporary work with lower wages and
job benefits. And, as time passes, many give up job searches
and take themselves out of the labor market altogether. As
Sarah Rix of the AARP wrote in Aging and Work: A View from
the United States, labor analysts and advocates for older work-
ers have long been concerned with the extent to which older
workers become discouraged.
Beyond the employment and wage toll, then, age discrim-
ination also brings psychological, social, and emotional costs—
costs that deserve attention. Aging research on employment
disruptions, such as that by Victor Marshall and colleagues,
shows how unplanned job losses bring adverse health effects
for both men and women. My own conversations with victims
also brought out such impacts, especially for social psycholog-
ical well-being and depression. It began with 56 year old Mar-
garet, an administrative assistant, who was terminated without
just cause several months earlier. She described herself as for-
ever “emotionally scarred.” Catching me somewhat off-guard
by that phrase, I asked what she meant, to which she replied,
“I am drained. Besides having to start over and find a new job,
I no longer know who to trust. I lost most of my friends. And
I have little faith left to believe anything an employer might
tell me.”
After our talk, I couldn’t help but revisit the other phone
conversations and email communications I had been having, rec-
ognizing similar emotional currents running well beyond con-
cerns about lost wages, benefits, and newly encountered
economic insecurity. Like Margaret, Joe, and Karen’s mother
quoted earlier, many of those encountering age discrimination
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r
An architect by trade, John Cuningham hopes to keep
working—and contributing—for as long as possible.
A two-pronged pressure makes older workers
vulnerable in both the hiring and firing process.
1997 2005 2007200620042003200119991998 200820022000
5
10
15
20
25
35
40 percent of total charges
Basis of equal employment opportunity charges
30
Race
Religion
Disability
Age
Sex
Source: EEOC
20 contexts.org
were clearly injured by the unexpected nature of what unfolded
and what it meant for their friendships, sense of identity, and
overall sense of fairness. Of course, some sought justice through
the legal system. Many became even more cynical, however,
about what had occurred and about the overarching power
of employers. In an e-mail, Michael, an electrical engineer who
recently went through litigation, wrote:
“That experience has taught me that the legal sys-
tem is no deterrent to the workplace age discrimi-
nation that you have described in your paper.
Litigation takes 4-7 years, the laws regarding age
discrimination are weak, the state and federal agen-
cies set up to protect older workers are effected
[sic] by politics and the same cultural influences you
describe, the legal process ‘rules‘ regarding permis-
sible age discrimination ‘damages’ claims do not
provide adequate deterrence, and older workers
making under $75k (median household income is
~$55k) do not have access to the legal system (on a
‘contingency fee’ basis) because the possible returns
to an attorney are not worth the time (‘the business
of law’).”
Importantly, the people making these comments consid-
ered themselves good, hard-working people and long-term
dedicated employees. They
believed, at some earlier point,
what culture tells us about
employment and effort: namely,
that hard work, commitment,
and dedication are reciprocated.
And according to them, this is
precisely what their employers
claimed to have wanted in
employees. Many were termi-
nated, regardless. Others were
harassed by supervisors and co-
workers. And some were iso-
lated or relegated to
less-desirable, sometimes lower-
paid positions.
That victims of age discrim-
ination experience psychological
stress and emotional scarring
should not come as a surprise
given what we know about the
impact of race and sex discrimination on well-being and how
harassmentandbullyingaffect socialandemotionalhealth.What
is unique about age discrimination, however, is the lack of atten-
tiontothepsychologicalandemotionaldamage itmaycauseand
the long-term sense of injustice and emotional turmoil, if not
outrage, that victims experience when
the “normative social contract” that
bound them to employers is abridged.
To the extent that such a contract still
exists, it is being fundamentally altered if
not altogether dismantled via globaliza-
tion, restructuring, and corporate down-
sizing. This seems to be bolstered by employers’ willingness to
discriminate despite formal federal protections. Aging workers—
all of us, eventually—are a major casualty.
fighting ageism
Current trends—in downsizing, in the aging baby boomer
generation, and in rates of discrimination complaints—cer-
tainly suggest a growing problem. Yet, growing recognition of
the causes, costs, and legal status of age discrimination could
alter this trajectory.
Understanding and appreciating the attitudinal and behav-
ioral dimensions of ageism could well provide the knowledge
base needed to sensitize public and human resource audiences
to aging workers’ true capabilities and their legal right to equi-
table treatment. Social science can play an important role in this
regard by distilling the causes in digestable form and laying bare
the human toll of age discrimination. Employers, for their part,
need not only be held accountable for unfair treatment, but
must also become better informed about the business costs of
Social science can play an important role by
distilling the causes and laying bare the human
toll of age discrimination.
Employers of older workers benefit from the talent and experience of a stable workforce.
Ph
o
to
b
y
B
ill
A
lk
o
fe
r
21winter 2010 contexts
engaging in unfair treatment of older employees. Although
employers may see the purging of older workers as a cost sav-
ing technique, in the process they are losing talent, experience,
and a stable and predictable workforce.
Workplace age discrimination is ultimately illegal, and per-
haps that is where the greatest challenge lies. The Age Discrim-
ination in Employment Act provides aging workers with federal
legal protection against much of the conduct described in this
article, yet age discrimination persists and is likely intensifying.
Lack of knowledge about legal protections and avenues for
recourse is partly to blame. More prominent, however, is limited
corporate accountability and disparities in resources and power
in the legal-judicial process. Such disparities make it difficult
for victims to mount challenges, allowing age discrimination
to go, for the most part, unchecked. Some recent and pro-
posed changes to discrimination law and practice include time
extensions to charge filing, greater resources and investigative
oversight powers for the EEOC and state civil rights commis-
sions, and the removal of damage caps for companies found
guilty of violations. Such reforms would help bring older work-
ers the protections already guaranteed in law—and bring to
light the discrimination that “nobody talks about.”
recommended resources
Arne L. Kallenberg. “Precarious Work, Insecure Workers: Employ-
ment Relations in Transition.” American Sociological Review (2007),
74:1-22. Addresses the implications of recent economic shifts for
worker vulnerabilities and insecurities.
Todd Nelson. Ageism: Stereotyping and Prejudice Against Older
Persons (MIT Press, 2004). An examination of the manifestations
of age stereotypes in our culture.
Erdman B. Palmore. “Research Note: Ageism in Canada and the
United States.” Journal of Cross Cultural Gerontology (2004),
19:41-46. Gives generalizeable statistical data, for both the U.S.
and Canada, on attitudes toward older citizens and the experi-
ences of older persons.
Vincent J. Roscigno, Sherry Mong, Reginald Byron, and Griff Tester.
“Age Discrimination, Social Closure, and Employment.” Social
Forces (2007), 86:313-334. Looks at the dynamics of age discrim-
ination in employment drawing on qualitative content from veri-
fied case files.
Robert G. Valetta. “Declining Job Security.” Journal of Labor Eco-
nomics (1999), 17:S170-197. Provides an overview of increasing
worker insecurity and the changing nature of the employer-
employee relationship.
Vincent J. Roscigno is in the department of sociology at The Ohio State Univer-
sity. He is the author of The Face of Discrinimation: How Race and Gender Impact
Home and Work Lives.
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