Affirmative action
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Affirmative action is a policy or a program which gives preference to a minority, or protected group of people with the stated goal of countering past or ongoing discrimination against them. It can take many including priority acceptance for government contracts, education, or employment and/or language training or vocational training.
Purpose
Affirmative action began as a corrective measure[1] for governmental and social injustices against demographic groups that have been said to be subjected to discrimination in areas such as employment and education. The stated goal of Affirmative Action is to sufficiently counter past discrimination such that a strategy will no longer be necessary: the power elite will reflect the demographics of society at large.
Some groups who are targetted for affirmative action are characterized by race, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, or handicap. In India, the focus has mostly been on undoing caste discrimination. In South Africa, the focus has been primarily race-based and, to a lesser extent, sex-based discrimination. When members of targeted groups are actively sought or preferred, the reason given is usually that this is necessary to compensate for advantages that other groups are said to have had (such as through institutional racism or institutional sexism or historical circumstances).
The theory is that a simple adoption of meritocratic principles along the lines of race-blindness or gender-blindness will not suffice to change the situation for several reasons:
- Discrimination practices of the past preclude the acquisition of 'merit' by limiting access to educational opportunities and job experiences.
- Ostensible measures of 'merit' may well be biased toward the same groups who are already empowered.
- Regardless of overt principles, people already in positions of power are likely to hire people they already know, and/or people from similar backgrounds.
Controversy
Proponents of affirmative action generally advocate it either as a means to address past discrimination or to enhance racial, ethnic, gender, or other diversity. [2] They may argue that the end result — a more diversified student body, police-force or other group — justifies the means.
Many claim that it has unintended and undesireable side-effects and that it fails to achieve its goals. They argue that it can act as a form of discrimination, perpetrate new wrongs to counter old ones, and instill a sense of victimhood in the majority. It may increase racial tension and benefit the more privileged people within minority groups (such as middle to upper class blacks) at the expense of the disenfranchised within majority groups (such as poor whites). In the British 2001 Summer Of Violence Riots in Oldham, Bradford, Leeds and Burnley, one of the major complaints voiced in poor white areas was alleged discrimination in council funding which favoured minority areas.
- ^ The history of "affirmative" or "positive" remedies command the wrongdoer to do something. In contrast, "negative" remedies command the wrongdoer not to do something or to stop doing something.
- ^ L. Anita Richardson, What Is the Constitutional Status of Affirmative Action?: Reading Tea Leaves, in ABA Focus on Law Studies, Spring 1998, Volume XIII Number 2, American Bar Association; part of article series "Affirmative Action: A Dialogue on Race, Gender, Equality and Law in America". Accessed online September 7, 2006.