Let's debate affirmative action

Great Debates
21

While this is true, those measures are actually distinct from affirmative action, at least technically. It’s an accepted practice to affirmatively try and open up doors to opportunities for everyone equally, thereby creating a diverse environment, but if you try to institute an affirmative action policy and call it a diversity initiative, you might run into trouble (see here for a discussion in the employment context).

It’s much more difficult to justify affirmative action - that is, “those actions appropriate to overcome the effects of past or present practices, policies, or other barriers” - than it is to justify having a diversity policy. For instance, even if your explicit goal is to make your body more diverse, nobody’s going to complain about increasing advertising in urban areas or something like that. But if you specifically set out to ensure that the demographics of your institution will more closely map to some ideally diverse population you’ve envisioned (say by changing admission standards or setting quotas or the like), that’s affirmative action, because ostensibly what you’re doing is saying that absent racial or gender-or-national-origin-based animus, this is the population that would exist, and there’s a fairly narrow line you need to walk to justify that. The difference in practice is pretty clear - increased advertising, while it may be motivated by the hopes for a certain outcome, is much less likely to “unnecessarily trammel the interests of third parties” than something engineered to actually bring the outcome about directly. In the letter case, you have to be prepared to establish that the ill you’re addressing actually exists, and that you’re going to stop addressing it once it’s been addressed.

In other words, while it’s true that a commonly-accepted benefit of affirmative action is increased diversity, it isn’t the case that you can get away with affirmative action on the grounds that it will bring about increased diversity.

22

I’m familiar with the point system used by the U. of Michigan that was at the center of the Gratz vs. Bollinger case. Undergraduate applications earned a certain number of points for SAT scores, high school GPA, and the like. Those earning over 100 points were automatically admitted. Being black or Hispanic was worth 20 points, while being white or Asian was worth none. It sounds like racial discrimination to me. (And the Supreme Court agreed.)

Now there are things that a company or university can do to increase diversity, such as spending extra money to recruit or advertise solely among members of one race. Some people might have a problem with that, but I don’t. However, that’s not what most people I know would call “affirmative action”.

23

Again, this is misleading. Yes, the Supreme Court agreed that it was racial discrimination, but that’s not where the analysis ends; the problem wasn’t that UM was discriminating on the basis of race. It was how. There was racial discrimination in the other UM case, Grutter, as well, but the law school’s racial discrimination was constitutionally OK. If you’re going to use Supreme Court decisions as backup for your position that affirmative action is wrong, we need to acknowledge that the Supreme Court has not held that affirmative action is wrong. There is no reasoned school of thought out there that says that all racial discrimination is an evil and which also believes that affirmative action is good.

24

Funny thing is, though, Asian Americans also suffered historical discrimination. Chinese immigrant laborers were denied the right to move freely and gain the full rights of American citizens. Japanese Americans were herded into internment camps during WWII. And most Asian migrants who arrived in the 19th and early 20th centuries were dirt poor when they arrived.

So the group that suffers the most from affirmative action was, itself, on the lower side of the historical playing field.

I certainly wouldn’t cry any tears if legacy preferences were abolished. But if they don’t get as much attention as affirmative action, I’d guess it’s because their effect on the admissions process is small. Despite stereotype, I’d imagine that most kids of Harvard graduates who go to Harvard are pretty darn smart and could have cut it with or without a special preference. (If there’s any hard data on the topic, I’d be happy to see it.)

25

I don’t know a lot about this subject, what are the other forms of Affirmative action? I’ve always associated it with quotas, but like I said I don’t know a lot about it.

26

I don’t see the difference and it is one of the main criticisms of the distinction between Gratz and Grutter. It seems that the Court (and you apparently) believe that policies which facially allow race to play a factor are bad, but if you simply disguise it and pretend that you aren’t using race, but target “urban areas” or “certain socio-economic groups” which has the effect of helping some racial groups, then it is good. IOW, just lie about what you are doing and it will be okay.

27

They didn’t disguise it and pretend they weren’t using race. The first sentence of the opinion in Grutter is “This case requires us to decide whether the use of race as a factor in student admissions by the University of Michigan Law School (Law School) is unlawful.” The law school said itself it was committed to enrolling a critical mass of underrepresented minority students, specifically "groups which have been historically discriminated against, like African-Americans, Hispanics and Native Americans, who without this commitment might not be represented in our student body in meaningful numbers.”

And that was upheld.

28

My parenthetical comment about the Supreme Court, I realize, does not correctly summarize every ruling on the topic. I don’t care particularly much about how the court rules; I started the thread to discuss the moral and evidence-based arguments for and against affirmative action. In general, I agree with the high-sounding rhetoric we hear from many quarters saying that the government’s treatment of people should be colorblind.

There are things such as Black student groups or Asian American student unions on many campuses. I see no problem with that, since membership is voluntary and their presence has no effect on people who aren’t members. But when race is used to determine hiring or college admissions, whether by quotas or points or any other means, the admission of one person because of his or her race necessarily means denial to another person because of his or her race. That’s what I view as wrong.

29

But students recruited through affirmative action measures are not admitted because of their races. They are admitted because they are qualified for admission, and because from the pool of candidates qualified for admission, the school determined that it would an effort to include members of their particular class. Qualified candidates are denied admissions all the time; it’s a question of which.

Suggesting that another student is being denied because of his race is suggesting, necessarily, that the proper state of things is not to admit minority candidates. That’s what I view as wrong.

30

Right, but the undergrad program in Gratz was struck down even though it is fair to describe it in exactly the same way.

The only difference was that a point value was attributed to race. If you hide it as one of many “holistic” factors, then it is okay. I don’t see the difference other that not making it so visible by having a slot for it on the scorecard.

31

I agree. My broader point was these conversations about affirmative action are not really about affirmative action, they are a proxy to air racial resentment against minorities.

Even if that is true, then that just speaks to the ignorance of most people, not issues with affirmative action. More importantly, what is the practical difference between advertising solely among members of one race, and giving preference in the hiring process?

Then why did you bring it up and appeal to them as some moral authority?

That’s just not true. None of these things are zero-sum, and even if they were, you have not really addressed why you think this is inherently problematic given that qualifications are fairly subjective and arbitrary in most cases.

There is also the issue that no person in the United States has not had their life impacted positively or negatively by their race. Why is it bad when a university attempts to take those aggregate issues in mind when they are evaluating their applicants?

You also completely ignored my other point. Given that White women are the primary beneficiaries of AA, why is your OP all about people of color?

32

It doesn’t suggest that at all. It suggests that if Student A was not admitted because of these “effort[s] to include members of a particular class”, but would have been admitted by a color blind system, then he has been denied admission based upon his race.

33

But there is a difference, and you’re articulating it. You’re just reframing it as a kind of act of dishonesty on the part of the school with no basis for doing so. Maybe you don’t see the difference because you’ve already decided that your opinion is that affirmative action programs true purpose is to put black students into schools they can’t get into on their own, as opposed to, for instance, trying to refashion admission standards in such a way as to be more inclusive. Holistically so, even.

…assuming his admission is the appropriate status quo. Which I decline to do.

34

So now it is “refashion admission standards in such a way as to be more inclusive.” Any words you might want to use or policy implementation to that effect simply means that a person’s race is used to increase his chances of admission to a school, and by definition decrease the chances of admission to an applicant not of the preferred race.

As far as the status quo, I don’t support it either. The legacy system is ridiculous. I don’t care if your grandfather went to school there; maybe your grandfather was smart and you are the village idiot grandson (the general you). That should have no bearing either, but it is simply a stupid admissions standard instead of a constitutionally defective, insidious standard like race.

I’m all for changing the status quo where it needs changed, but to use race, whether openly as in Gratz, or hidden as in Grutter, is wrong.

35

Let’s say Harvard gets 2000 applicants for 500 slots. Let’s also say, the top 1000 would all be outstanding candidates. I don’t have any problem with Harvard, as part of an Affirmative Action program, passing up a couple of white guys in spots 480 to 500 in order to find some qualified minority students between 501 and 1000. The “rankings” are so subjective at that level anyway, it’s nice they can “affirmatively” do something to increase the diversity of the entering class. I say this, by the way, as one of the white guys who got rejected by Harvard (perhaps because they gave “my” spot to a minority applicant), and had to “settle” for another top 10 law school. Don’t cry for guys like me, we do okay.

36

Lemme axe you something…

OK, let’s say it’s wrong. Tomorrow we make it illegal to use race and gender in hiring/admissions.

As a society, how do we redress the “wrongness” of the past? How do we prevent past discrimination from continuing to cascade intergenerationally? Do we just assume that one generation is long enough for us to be even stevens–that existing disparities result solely from individual merit and failure rather than a long legacy of oppression? Or do we simply stop paying lip service to the notion of equality all together? Do we admit that the past was screwed up, but we shrug our shoulders and move on like it never happened?

Anyone with half a brain should know that a generation isn’t long enough to make everything “even stevens”. Where an individual is socioeconomically is highly correlated with where their parents and grandparents were. If your parent was forced to push a broom for a living, then you probably AREN’T going to be a doctor or a lawyer, even with an AA preference. So we don’t have to waste time pretending that we have reached “equality”, because I think all of us recognize that it’s not true.

Given this, are you saying it’s time to ditch the ideal of equal opportunity? AA is only one way of achieving this, true. However, I don’t see any other strategies being implemented on a widescale. Measures to eradicate poverty (raising the minimum wage, creating affordable housing, targeting more money to failing public schools, more social welfare spending, etc.) are constantly met with hostility and screams of “CLASS WARFARE!!!” Another way of redressing past discrimination is to create compensation funds for those who can document how they were harmed from specific government-sanctioned practices (like Massive Resistence here in VA). But then you’ve got all those people who don’t want their taxes going to reparations. Not so the lazy black leeches that are already on welfare can be even lazier. And not so the Oprah Winfries and Michael Jordans can get any richer. How do you redress without preferential treatment?

Do away with AA and you need to come up with another way of makng up for the past. And if you don’t want to make up for the past, you need to stop saying everyone’s given a fair shake.

Most black Americans are not poor, believe it or not. A considerable number of us are actually doing pretty well for ourselves. I’d be curious to know how much of the black middle class owes it’s success to AA. If it’s significant, then I don’t see how anyone can say with a straight face that AA has ben a failure. Perhaps when I get home from work tonight, I’ll see what information I can find.

37

It’s not about doing okay or having an alternative. It’s about basic fairness in the process. We wouldn’t allow a simple sporting event to be decided in a way you are describing. Let’s assume that you are correct and that spot 480 is just as good as spot 520. It’s really a coin flip at that point, so let’s give it to the minority.

What if a college basketball game was won on a last second 3 point shot? We could agree that both teams played pretty much to a tie and that the last shot was just a matter of good fortune. It could have easily been blocked, slipped out of the shooter’s hand, or come up an inch short and bounced off the rim, right? So instead of giving the win to the team that hit the shot, let’s give the win to the team with the most minority members, or the team with the most fans, or the one with the better cheerleading squad, or some other “better” measurement.

We don’t do it because the rules are the rules. Whatever standard Harvard used to rank 480 to 520 was a result of some characteristics that Harvard thought important for admission of students. If they aren’t important, and just become like a coin flip, then let’s change those to something that does matter. Maybe there is nothing that would truly differentiate those students. But in no event should the race of those students be a factor. If equality is to mean anything it should mean that we stop using racial distinctions for favoritism.

Admittedly, this is where I struggle with thoughts on AA. You are absolutely right. But is the solution a simple setaside? Is it knowingly hurting majority children who had nothing to do with this past discrimination?

38

I think you are missing the point that was made about framing. You are only getting hung up on race being a factor, and not the 1000 other things that are in play, because you assume that race is not germane to the discussion, and offers no insight as to how we qualify an individual. Most people who are paid to create systems like this disagree with you. Race is a factor in admissions because race is a factor in life. If one’s race is looked upon favorably by admissions officers, it is pretty much universally looked upon unfavorably in nearly every other facet of life, including ones that affect other admissions criteria (eg. grades, number of AP courses, school quality, etc.). Why is using race an issue, especially if you view the use of race in these circumstances as corrective rather than distortive?

I would add that these wrongs are still pervasive and ongoing.

39

I’m trying to follow you here. So you are saying that if an applicant is black, he likely has worse grades, took fewer AP courses, and went to a crappier high school?

Doesn’t that make the applicant less qualified than someone with better grades, who took more AP courses, and went to a better high school?

Or are we saying that it doesn’t matter, that this applicant should be given a leg up because he had fewer opportunities? If so, then we’ve tossed the merit system aside. We need to treat the reason why he didn’t have these opportunities instead of punishing the applicants who did.

40

But there is no fairness in the process, and there won’t be unless we want to spend far more money to come closer to that ideal. Even absent race, how can you fairly compare two kids from different states, different schools, with different teachers, etc.? Even when you try to use “objective” measures like the SAT or AP scores, that only gives you a snapshot approximation that is far from perfect.

We do all the time. You must not be watching the Olympics. There are, IIRC, 17 events entirely determined by subjective judging. There are figure skating criteria used with titles like, “Utilization of personal and public space” and “Expression of the music’s style, character, rhythm”. Despite these clearly amorphous criteria, the sport seems to function well enough.

We also allow countries with no truly competitive athletes to participate. We do that because Olympic participation, like college admission, is not meant to be some bloodless quantitative exercise. Just consider the alternative if it were. I would guarantee every selective school would primarily be full of foreign born students from India, China, and other SE Asian nations. Not because they are smarter or better qualified, but because of demographics. Would you really be okay with that? Do you think that is what the Standfords of the world should do?

Funny you mention college basketball given that their championship is determined rather arbitrarily in a tournament where teams are selected and seeded based largely on opinion. That is a more apt and appropriate analogue, as an individual game is more akin to a specific grade in a class. Either way, do you see people bitching uncontrollably about the clear biases in the selection process? Do you see people yelling about how Duke is overrated and undeserving o their championships because they never played East Bumfuck State U? More importantly, can you think of a more “fair” way to do it?

Nobody is breaking the rules.

Why? Why is that so much more abhorrent than gender favoritism, or intellectual favoritism, or economic favoritism, or using any other means of rationing?

No, it’s creating a system to correct for their advantages.