The Equal Rights Amendment as Status Politics

Abstract

A basic explanation of orientation toward the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) is assessed in this paper. Conflicting orientations toward ERA areshown to stem from perceptions that broader personal values, and those concerning gender and parental roles, are in undesirable competition with alternative values in contemporary society. The data, drawn from a metropolitan sampling of adults, confirm the utility of the perspective in accounting for who supports and who opposes the amendment. This paper puts forth and tests a basic explanation of orientation toward the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA). The presence of intense feelings, both among those who support the issue and those who oppose it, is shown to stem from a basic clash of values. At a more general level, this involves the perception that broader personal values are threatened; at a more specific level, this centers around the definition and legitimacy of gender and parental roles. Such cultural conflict falls under the rubric of status politics in the sociological literature. It arises when a set of established values appears out of joint with changing social conditions. When carried out in the political arena, this type of conflict represents an attempt to assert the cultural dominance and desirability of one set of values over the other. Hence, the perspective provides a framework for explaining why conflicts of this kind emerge and, of particular interest to us here, gives an account of the correlates associated with orientation toward ERA. Status Politics and the Equal Rights Amendment The proposed Equal Rights Amendment states simply, Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by *Address correspondence to the author, Department of Sociology, University of Oklahoma,