From the standpoint of women, the current legal landscape is marked by formal rights and social wrongs. Despite recent progress, males and females have attained equality more in legal status than in daily experience. Women are still dramatically underrepresented in the highest positions of social, economic, and political power. Further, efforts to encourage men to assume traditional female roles have not been successful. Inadequacies of civil rights laws relating to gender equality have several dimensions: indeterminacy of formal entitlements, barriers to their exercise, and limitations on their scope. In many areas of special concern to women, current procedures victimize the victim. In harassment cases, for example, a plaintiff's "sexually provocative" dress or language has been considered relevant in determining whether a defendant's conduct is culpable. Also, despite the passage of legislation protecting the privacy rights of rape victims, intrusive procedures remain common. Barriers women face are compounded by the inequitable distribution of legal services. Women need not only formal entitlements but also concrete recognition of the values they have traditionally sustained. 33 footnotes