沃尔玛应对性别歧视案的措施

1. 沃尔玛应对性别歧视案的措施

沃尔玛打赢性别歧视案，然而反歧视斗争还在继续
译者： JessicaChiang 原作者：Lila Shapiro
发表时间：2012-01-27浏览量：2426评论数：0挑错数：0
过去数年，全球最大的零售商―――美国沃尔玛公司因员工待遇问题一直备受批评，目前更因此而成为美国有史以来最大一起集体诉讼案的被告：美国联邦第九巡回上诉法庭6日批准将7名妇女起诉沃尔玛性别歧视一案升级为集体诉讼，这意味着原告人数将达到160万，她们都是沃尔玛的前任和现任员工。
Sex discrimination is alive and well at Walmart, say lawyers who have interviewed thousands of female employees in the years since Betty Dukes and a handful of others first sued the company alleging widespread gender bias.
自从数年前贝蒂.杜克斯和其他一些员工第一次控告沃尔玛公司存在广泛的性别歧视以来，一些律师采访过成千上万的该公司女员工，他们说，如今性别歧视在沃尔玛依然盛行。
Although the Supreme Court ultimately overturned the Dukes case last summer -- siding with Walmart that the women did not share enough in common to qualify as a class in what would have been the largest class action discrimination suit in history -- plaintiffs' lawyers haven't given up, and neither have the women.
尽管在去年夏天联邦最高法院最终驳回了杜克斯案对沃尔玛的集体诉讼—最高法院支持沃尔玛公司，认为原告并不能证明沃尔玛存在一个总体上的歧视政策,无法在“基于歧视所产生的个体请求权”与“受到同样伤害的一群人的存在”之间架起一个“共同性”的桥梁—然而原告律师并没有放弃继续上诉，这些女员工也没有放弃。
"When we first began investigating, the discrimination described by scores of women was more unvarnished," said Joseph M. Sellers, the lawyer who argued Dukes v. Wal-Mart before the Supreme Court and is forging ahead with this new litigation.
“当我们开始调查此案时，就发现无数的女工对沃尔玛的性别歧视的描述是毫无掩饰的”，约瑟夫.M.塞勒斯在最高法院上说道，他是杜克斯&沃尔玛案的辩护律师，现在正在准备新一轮的上诉。
Sellers and the other plaintiffs' lawyers have not yet been authorized to conduct a new formal investigation into the company's practices. However, based on anecdotal evidence from ongoing interviews with former and current employees, Sellers said that there appears to be more sensitivity in the way issues of gender are spoken about in the Walmart workplace. But in other critical ways, Sellers said the company is still falling short, especially when it comes to fair pay and promotions.
塞勒斯和其他原告律师还没有被授权对沃尔玛公司展开新的正式调查。然而，根据持续进行的对该公司原有和现在职工的采访中得到的证据，赛尔斯说在沃尔玛超市，人们谈到有关性别的话题变得更加敏感谨慎了。但是从其他批判的角度看，该公司仍有不足，尤其是在同工同酬和晋升机会方面。
"Walmart seems much more aware of issues of gender discrimination than when we first talked to the women a decade ago," Sellers said. "But I'm not convinced from the interviews we've had so far that it's been much more successful in solving the problem."
“沃尔玛似乎比十年前当我们首次采访其女职员时更加关注性别歧视问题”，塞勒斯说。他还说，“但是根据到目前我们所有的采访，我还不认为在解决性别歧视问题方面沃尔玛取得了较大的进步。”
In California and Texas, employees from the original complaint, along with more women who have since stepped forward, are filing new suits on the issue. And the number of regional suits is expected to mount in coming months. However, many legal experts think these new suits may share the same fate as the original, in large part as a direct result of the Supreme Court's ruling last June.
在加利福尼亚州和德克萨斯州，一些原始投诉沃尔玛的员工和更多站出来的女员工正在对沃尔玛性别歧视提出新的诉案。在未来数月内，地区性的诉讼数量将继续攀升。然而，许多法律专家认为这些新的诉案命运会和原始诉案一样，主要是由于去年6月份联邦法院的裁决。
Walmart has long denied any wrongdoing. When previously asked about the suit, the company emphasized that its corporate policy forbids discrimination, encourages diversity and ensures fair treatment. However, when contacted last week, Walmart's legal counsel did not emphasize those assertions. Instead, the counsel pointed to the Supreme Court's ruling, saying in these more recent suits, too, the women lack enough in common to call themselves a class.
沃尔玛公司一直都否定自己有任何过错。之前当被问到该案时，该公司一直在强调其公司政策禁止性别歧视，鼓励多元化，并保证同等待遇。然而，在上周的接触中，沃尔玛法律顾问却没有强调这些。相反，这名法律顾问引用联邦最高法院的裁决，称在这些最近的起诉中，这些女职员不具备足够的共同点来进行集体诉讼。
"The plaintiffs' lawyers have failed to come to grips with the Supreme Court's decision," said Theodore J. Boutrous Jr., Walmart's lead counsel. "This Texas complaint does not come close to meeting the requirements for class certification, and relies on the very same discredited theories and arguments that the Supreme Court rejected when it reversed certification of the nationwide class in the Dukes case last June."
“原告律师们无法应付最高法院的裁决”，沃尔玛的首席律师西欧多尔.J.布特罗斯说。“这起德克萨斯诉案无法满足集体诉讼的要求，而且它依据的是去年6月最高法院已驳回的全国性集体诉讼杜克斯案的那些不可信的理论和争论。”
Last week, in Texas, a group of Walmart women filed an expanded class action lawsuit, alleging discrimination against female employees at Texas stores. The complaint was first filed last October on behalf of plaintiff Stephanie Odle, one of the original named plaintiffs in the Dukes case, but now includes six additional named current and former female employees representing a class of more than 50,000 Texan women. The complaint also includes recent instances of discriminatory practices from the past several years. The latest charges lack some of the overt sexism from the original suit, but continue to allege unfair treatment in the workplace.
上周在德克萨斯州，一群沃尔玛女员工提出了一项扩大的集体诉讼，控告沃尔玛公司位于德克萨斯州的超市歧视女员工。这一投诉是在去年10月提出的，以斯蒂芬妮.奥德尔为代表，她是杜克斯案的原始原告人之一，但是，现在这一诉讼包括6名新增的沃尔玛原有和当前女职工，她们代表了德克萨斯超过5万名女职工集体。这一诉讼还包括过去几年沃尔玛公司性别歧视的例子。最近的一些指控没有原始诉讼中的公然歧视女性，但是仍然包括工作场所的不公平待遇。
Back in 2001, for example, one plaintiff involved in the original class action suit testified that she was advised by a male manager to "blow the cobwebs off my makeup and to doll up" if she wanted to advance at the company.
例如，在2001年，一名原始集体诉讼中的原告曾作证称，一名男经理曾建议她，如果想在公司得到晋升机会，那么就“整理一下妆容，把自己打扮得漂漂亮亮”。
But in the Texas suit, the most recent charge of discrimination from plaintiff Pamela Collins, a current Walmart employee in Ennis, Texas, has no such colorful language. Although she came to Walmart with 18 years of retail experience, and despite strong performance reviews, Collins alleges she was passed over for multiple promotions, including once for a much younger male colleague with almost no experience. Collins said she repeatedly called her regional and district managers, leaving messages about her interest in a promotion, but neither manager ever returned her phone calls.
但是在德州诉讼中，最近的关于性别歧视的控告是由帕梅拉.科林斯提出的，她现在是德州爱内斯沃尔玛超市的一名职工，她的控告言语没有如此的藻饰。在进入沃尔玛前，她有18年的零售经验，而且尽管她工作表现出众，还是无数次得不到晋升，其中就有一次，一个远比她年轻毫无工作经验的男同事得到提拔，而她却没有。科林斯说，她曾无数次给地区和区域经理打电话，留言表示自己希望得到晋升，但是没有一个经理给她回电话。
The suit charges ongoing, widespread denial of promotions and equal pay to female employees throughout Texas, and cites many specific examples, such as one employee who says she confronted a district manager back in 2003, (after Betty Dukes filed her initial complaint) when she learned that a less experienced male colleague was earning more. The manager told her, "That's just the way it is. Men always get paid more."
上诉仍在继续，普遍的拒绝让女职工晋升以及男女同工同酬蔓延了整个德州，而且诉讼中还带有许多例子，例如，一个女职员说她在2003年遇到了一位地区经理，（贝蒂.杜克斯首次提出诉讼后）她得知一个比她工作经验少的男同事工资比她还高。这个经理对她说，“事情一直就是这样。男人总是比女人的工资高。”
Another employee was told that there "were already enough female assistant managers, so she would just be made a deli lead," while store managers in Houston and Abilene allegedly justified paying less to female employees on the grounds that the male employees "had families to support," according to the suit. When an employee at the Abilene store complained, her manager reportedly told her she should be "happy with the money she made."
另一个女职员被告知说“已经有足够的女副经理了，因此她只可以做一个熟食区负责人，”然而休斯顿和阿比林的商场经理认为女员工工资少是合情理的，因为男员工“有家要养”，这一诉讼称。阿比林一个女员工抱怨工资少时，据说她经理告诉她“应该对自己所挣的钱满足”。
Last week, Walmart filed a motion to dismiss the California suit, heavily quoting from the Supreme Court's ruling to argue that the plaintiffs still lack enough in common to be considered a class. The Supreme Court ultimately sided with Walmart back in June, ruling as such because the women worked in so many different places and under so many different managers, all of whom have discretion to make decisions regarding pay and promotions.
上周，沃尔玛公司大肆引用最高法院关于原告不具备足够的共同点来进行集体诉讼的裁决，提出要撤销加利福尼亚诉讼。去年6月，最高法院最终站在了沃尔玛公司一边，作出上述裁决，因为这些女员工在不同地方工作，经理也不同，这些经理对于工资和晋升机会有着不同的考虑。
"Respondents wish to sue for millions of employment decisions at once," Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in the lead opinion for the court in the 5-4 decision last June. "Without some glue holding together the alleged reasons for those decisions, it will be impossible to say that examination of all the class members' claims will produce a common answer to the crucial discrimination question."
“原告们希望一次性控告上百万的工作决定”，去年6月，安东尼.斯卡利亚法官在5-4的最后裁决中首先写道。“如果没有统一以致的原因来反抗那些不同的工作决定，那么原告就不具备足够的共同点来进行集体诉讼。”
The same holds true, Walmart argues, in Texas and California. The plaintiffs' lawyers say that these new regional suits are in compliance with the new class action guidelines determined by the Supreme Court last summer, and that they have the evidence to prove there is enough connecting each woman's claims to certify them as a class. But legal experts think that courts will be likely to side with Walmart after the Supreme Court's precedent.
沃尔玛公司称，德克萨斯州和加利福尼亚州的诉讼也是一样的。原告律师说这些新的地区性诉讼与最高法院去年夏天规定的新集体诉讼规则一致，而且他们有证据能证明这些女员工有足够共同点来使她们作为一个集体进行集体诉讼。但是法律专家人认为最高法院还是会站到沃尔玛公司一边。
Brian Fitzpatrick, a law professor at Vanderbilt University who specializes in class actions and just taught a class on Dukes v. Wal-Mart, thinks that the regional class actions are likely to fail for the same reason the nationwide one did: Women at different stores had different managers who made decisions for different reasons.
布莱恩.费兹帕特里克是美国范德堡大学一位专门研究集体诉讼的法学教授，而且正好教授过一堂关于杜克斯&沃尔玛案的课，他认为地区性集体诉讼与全国性集体诉讼容易失败的原因是相同的：女职员所在超市不同，会有不同的经理，而经理会因不同原因作出不同的决定。
"Nothing is crystal clear," Fitzpatrick said, "but if I were a betting man I'd say this suit would fail. It's almost Don Quixote-esque."
“没有任何事是完全透明清楚的”，费兹帕特里克说道，“但是如果打赌的话，我会说这个上诉会失败。因为这几乎是不切实际的。”
Scalia's opinion, Fitzpatrick said, essentially means that a region like Texas is still too large. Because of the way that Walmart is structured, the suits may need to be filed on a much smaller scale: manager by manager.
费兹帕特里克说，斯卡利亚的观点实际上就是，德克萨斯州还是太大了。根据沃尔玛公司的结构，这些诉讼或许需要在更小范围内进行：要一个经理一个经理的告。
Hal Gillespie, the co-lead counsel on the Texas case, is feeling more optimistic. The court in Texas where the suit is filed is in a conspicuously conservative district that has long-viewed class action discrimination suits unfavorably. In Gillespie's mind, the court's ruling actually paved the way for certain class action suits, so long as they followed the outlines laid out by the Supreme Court.
哈尔.吉勒斯皮是德克萨斯案的联合法律顾问，他的观点更为乐观。德州法院很明显是一个保守的地方，他们一直对性别歧视的集体诉讼持反对态度。在吉勒斯皮看来，最高法院的裁决实际上为某些集体诉讼案件铺平了道路，只要这些案件按照最高法院提出的概要去做。
"I think the Supreme Court decision helps by saying that class actions are permitted under certain circumstances," Gillespie said. "It gives us guidelines and we absolutely have to follow those guidelines but that's fine, that's what we have to do all the time."
“我认为最高法院的裁决有好处，因为其中包括在某些场合允许集体诉讼，”吉勒斯皮说。“这个裁决给了我们一些指南，而且我们必须完全遵守这些指南，但是这也不错，因为这正是我们一直要做的。”
But Sellers, another co-lead counsel on the Texas case, acknowledges that the court's ruling was a major blow.
但是德州诉讼案的另一位联合首席法律顾问塞勒斯确认为最高法院的裁决是此案致命的一击。
"It's more difficult and expensive and time consuming," Sellers said. "It's going to consume a lot of resources of the legal system to litigate these cases."
他说：“此案变得更加困难，花费更高，更加耗时。”他还说：“这会耗费大量的法律资源来审理这些案件。”
Class-action suits were previously the best tool a worker had to fight discrimination at work. While individual suits are expensive and can be exceedingly difficult to prove, a class-action vehicle allowed workers to band together to fight the corporate powers that be. If the courts continue to rule in Walmart's favor, it will be a significant blow to working-class Americans, legal experts say.
法律专家说，集体诉讼原来是工人应对工作中歧视的最佳工具。由于个人诉讼花费高，而且很难找证据，集体诉讼可以使工人们团结在一起来反抗公司权力。如果法院继续支持沃尔玛公司，那么这将沉重地打击美国工人阶级。
"As you make it more difficult for people to win in larger groups and require them to file suits based on smaller ones, economically it becomes unfeasible for some people to make their way to court at all," said Ralph Richard Banks, a professor at Stanford Law School who specializes in employment discrimination law. Ultimately, Banks said, this means that, regardless of the merits, "cases go away."
“因为法院使人们更难以集体取胜而且要求他们用小规模的方式提出诉讼，从经济上讲，很多人都无法到法庭提出诉讼”，斯坦福大学法学院教授拉尔夫.理查德.班克斯说道，他专门研究就业歧视法。他说，最终，这将意味着，这种做法无论有多少好处，“公司和企业都不会有官司缠身”。