ABSTRACT
In modern liberal democracies, we no longer sanction open and explicit discrimination against women. And yet we have not achieved gender equality. Why not? At a first pass, anti-discrimination legislation seems to aim for equal treatment: For so-called “gender-blind” procedures for selecting among candidates for scarce jobs, college admissions spots, and other competitive positions. Critics find this aspiration problematic for many of the same reasons that so-called “race-blind” policy is problematic: Equal treatment against a background of inequality does not yield justice (Kymlicka 2002, MacKinnon 1987).
