Affirmative Action - Essay Example

The principle of affirmative action

Affirmative action (henceforth referred to as “AA”) is defined as “a set of practices undertaken by employers, university admission offices, and government agencies to go beyond nondiscrimination, with the goal of actively improving the economic status of minorities and women with regard to employment, education, and business ownership and growth” (Holzer & Neumark, 469).  The phrase “affirmative action” was introduced by Executive Order 10925.  EO 10925 was issued by U.S. President John F. Kennedy in 1961, which urged employers to actively adopt policies and safeguards against discriminatory practices in their workplace. Four years after, EO 11246 made it mandatory for federal contractors and subcontractors to (1) identify underutilized minorities, (2) assess the availability of minorities, and if available, (3) set goals and timetables to fill vacancies with minorities with the aim of reducing such underutilization. In 1967, EO 11375 extended the benefits of AA to women.

The further expansion of the application of AA was made possible by the U.S. Supreme Court when it promulgated the Bakke decision.  In this case, the Court was asked to rule whether or not it was unconstitutional for universities to give preference for blacks and minorities in admitting applicants for placement because it violated the doctrine of “equal protection of the laws.” The Court ruled that “racial preferences are permissible if their purpose is to improve racial diversity among students, and if they do not stipulate fixed minority quotas but take race into account as one factor among many (Dworkin, 79). 

Today, AA is more widely observed, but as employment prospects and educational placements become more competitive, more people are raising questions about the propriety and fairness of AA.

 In defense of affirmative action

According to the study by Bowen & Bok (cited by Dworkin, 79), the success of racial integration is attributable to AA in education, because it has enabled a higher rate of graduation among African American students, which led to more African American leaders in the industry, professionals, community leaders, and subsequently a more sustained interaction and lasting friendships among the races than would have been otherwise expected. 

The benefits of AA are not in themselves the moral argument; the argument is that where for past centuries racial minorities have been constrained to live in conditions of extreme social and economic disadvantage, it is but right that AA provides for them now an advantage over the majority to make up for the adverse conditions they have been subjected to. The implications are more than merely symbolic, and the effects referred to are more than just economic.  Present-day descendants of slaves and people of color start life from a position of disadvantage in institutionalized society as a result of the limitations imposed on their ancestors. This is known as the “stigma theory” (Soni, 581).  Parents denied an education because of their race will provide little inspiration for their children to conceive of and aspire for such education. 

The moral precept that all people are created equal, to be applied with effect, refers to enabling individuals to be perceived and regarded with the respect of equals.  AA not only provides reparation for the past but more pragmatically speeds up the slow process of transforming social perception.  An African American, or woman, or a person with a disability, are persons who, in aspiring for the opportunities provided by the equality clause, struggle under the weight of social perception which, while not discriminatory per se, tends to manifest in subtle ways of stereotyping that renders the “equality” superficial.  In this manner, AA provides an active catalyst to accelerate the social transformation to true equality.

Critique of affirmative action

Detractors of AA point out that the policy has been implemented by positive and aggressive action “to remove all barriers, however informal or subtle” (Soni, 578) to impose equality among the races, genders, educational backgrounds, ages, physical abilities, and so forth.  Oftentimes, the implementation is too aggressive, so as to constitute a form of “reverse discrimination”  (Soni, 578).  According to Malamud (1), whereas AA is supposed to establish racial (as well as gender and age, among others) equality, the apparent preference for minorities in employment selection and education placement does not eradicate distinction/discrimination among them.  Rather, it enhances racial consciousness, and highlights the differences between the races – it discriminates between them. 

Morally speaking, therefore, there is no difference between the former order of discrimination against minorities and discrimination in favor of minorities – there remains the element of institutionalizing the unfair advantage enjoyed by one group against the other.  It implies that a more capable Caucasian student applicant may be bypassed in favor of a less capable African American student applicant for the same placement.

Thus said, the AA decades-long debate promises to remain highly controversial, and a clear-cut solution acceptable to all is not within sight.