Gender in the Legal Profession: Fitting or Breaking the Mould

H. Graham Rawlinson is a corporate lawyer with the international law
firm Torys in Toronto. He is co-author of The Canadian 100: The 100 Most
Influential Canadians of the 20th Century.

The purpose of this book is clear: to demonstrate that despite the
sudden and significant increase in the number of women practising law in
Canada over the last 20 years, women are still far from equal members of
this elite profession. Brockman relies on 100 interviews with men and
women lawyers called to the bar for three to seven years in British
Columbia to make her point. Her results are interesting, if predictable:
she argues that the way the legal profession is constructed—long
hours, adversarial attitudes, and expectations that women generally
conduct themselves like men—makes it more difficult for women to
thrive as lawyers, and, regrettably, drives some women out of the
profession. Most particularly, the prevailing lack of sympathy for the
domestic responsibilities of junior lawyers—despite the fact that
child care, elder care, and household management continue to mostly be
the responsibilities of women—means that being a successful lawyer and
a woman is a nearly impossible balancing act in many cases. In the end,
the author concludes that women are generally doing their best to “fit
in” to a profoundly male-centred legal culture, but until women
generally are better able to “break the mould,” it will continue to
be difficult to do so.