Blackwell Reference Online

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As applied to employment situations, discrimination refers to behavior that has the purpose or effect of harming some individuals by virtue of their membership in a protected class. The term “discrimination” therefore legally encompasses a wide range of attitudes, conducts, and processes that produce differential results without appropriate justification. Prohibitions against employment discrimination can exist at all government levels; however, the major antidiscrimination legislation exists at the federal level and applies to both public and private employers. Examples include the Civil Rights Act of 1964 , the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 , and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 . Federal legislation allows state and local governments to expand protections against employment discrimination, so that some regions of the country have defined additional protected classes (e.g., marital status, appearance, sexual orientation ). In general, antidiscrimination law identifies the four models of discrimination: the disparate treatment model, the disparate impact model, the reasonable accommodation model, and the hostile environment model. These models are not so much theories of discrimination as they are models of organizing evidence to prove discrimination – they identify what courts will recognize as illegal discrimination. The models can be used to ... log in or subscribe to read full text