A recent article about women lawyers in China makes it sound like they have all the answers and that women lawyers in the West should learn to listen up. For a variety of reasons, I do not believe this to be the case. It is hard to compare apples and oranges, and this appears to be a classic case.
The observations in The Asian Lawyer, a product of the American Lawyer, titled “A Woman’s Place” sound all too familiar to me and remind me of other comparisons between our country and China on economic issues. Ever since the economic collapse here in 2008, some people have been heralding the Chinese and their economic system as the answer to our woes. High gross national product (GNP) compared to the USA and other strong economic indicators have led some people to say that deregulation like that in China would set our country on a more desirable economic path. According to them, free enterprise unleashed is the answer to our problems. I hear these people in social gatherings and on talk radio, and I have a lot of trouble being convinced of this theory.
For instance, I know that the impressive GNP in China is the result of deregulation that also is responsible for huge environmental problems like pollution and shortage of potable water, as described in an in depth article in the Washington Post titled “China’s Environmental Crisis“ written as long ago as 2008. I also am disturbed by the human rights violations and other societal issues in China and the revelations of rampant greed and graft among the politicians and government officials, as reported continuously on the web site facts and details. com and in a June 8, 2012 article on www.timeout.com.hk. So, the bottom line is that I am not buying what the Chinese are selling—at least in terms of economic theories or, now, theories related to women lawyers. This is an easy “Buy American” moment for me.
The article in Asian Lawyer points out that women are prospering in the profession of law in Hong Kong, and the Chinese model is again being held up with some degree of emulation. The article cites the statistics for women in the law as far more favorable in China than in our country. In Hong Kong, for instance, 46 per cent of the lawyers are women, and 24% of the partners in local law firms are women. That compares to one third of the lawyers in the United States, who are women, and 19% for female partners in law firms here. This all sounds good, but, just as in the economic discussion, you have to look behind the figures.
The cultures and social mores in China and the United States are very different, and some of those differences make it much easier for women professionals to thrive in China. For instance, the cost of child care and domestic help in Hong Kong pales by comparison to the cost for the same services in our country. As the article points out, women professionals in Hong Kong are “rising on the backs of the inexpensive domestic workers,” most of them from Indonesia and the Philippines, who maintain the households of the upwardly mobile women lawyers and raise their children. The article also cites as an additional reason for the success of these women that women in China do not feel guilty about delegating childcare to a domestic worker. The reason given is that so many of these women professionals were themselves raised by nannies in the Chinese culture.
However, I wonder whether there is not more to it. Traditionally, Chinese families consist of multi-generational members living in the same neighborhoods, if not the same houses, as described in an interesting article on Wudauokou on-line magazine (www.wudaokou.com/article/Traditional_Chinese_family, October 22, 2010). As a result, it seems logical that the presence of this extended family would give comfort to a mother leaving her children in the care of domestic workers for much of their upbringing. You undoubtedly have heard the proverb, “It takes a village to raise a child,” and we simply do not have that societal model in most places in our country. American families are typically spread across the country, and multi-generational models are fast disappearing from our experiences in the West.
So, for me the comparisons are hard to make, and I am slow to conclude that China has figured out a better way to solve the problems faced by women lawyers in our country. However, the article also mentions one factor associated with the impressive upward mobility of women lawyers in China that I find compelling. That fact is that a high percentage of senior management roles in Hong Kong are held by women. In other words, the corporate clients are women, and that may mean that those women corporate clients are advocating for gender diversity in their representation, just as they are doing here in the United States. If that is the case, I applaud the efforts. As always, women helping women is a good thing.
As much as I admire the women cited in the article, I am not ready to declare a cure for our ills here in the West. But, I do not overlook the accomplishments of these women, who are high-ranking partners in the Hong Kong offices of firms like Skadden, Sidley Austin, Davis Polk, Clifford Chance, Mayer Brown, Sullivan & Cromwell, Baker McKenzie Paul Weiss and Weil Gotshall. These women have risen to their impressive positions in the last 20 years out of a seriously male-dominated legal system with its roots in English law. At least one of them believes that, “There isn’t much of a glass ceiling [in Hong Kong].” Certainly, that would be a good result, and I hope we can say that in our country one day soon.
You are a lawyer, and one of the things that you have been trained to do is look behind the facts. When you do that, you often see things a little differently. It is good to remember that, especially when things look too good to be true.
