Affirmative Action Reconsidered
Department of Human Sciences
Pima County Community College, Tucson, AZ
We will briefly trace the historical development of affirmative action from its origins in the civil rights movement to current efforts to dismantle race-and gender-based preference programs. Along the way, we will point out the key shifts in philosophical argumentation, law, and constitutional interpretation, and their effects on the theory and praxis of affirmative action. It will be shown that affirmative action evolved from an effort to eliminate race-conscious discrimination to a much more ambitious and very differently grounded project of achieving statistically equal representation through race- and gender-conscious preference programs with numerical targets or outright quotas. The author argues that affirmative action has come to embrace the very principles that the civil rights movement meant to discredit; that it is indefensible in its current form and needs to be refocused on its original mission and principles; and that this rejuvenation has to be par! t of a broader social reform effort directed at achieving what affirmative action has failed to accomplish: genuine educational and economic development of the truly disadvantaged, regardless of race or gender. Saphir can be reached at 714 East 10th Street, #9, Tucson, AZ 85719.
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Introduction
Throughout most of human history people have been treated by societies and governments as members of groups. Assignment of advantage and disadvantage on the basis of immutable characteristics such as race, ethnicity, and sex has been the norm and in many places continues to be. It was in opposition to this group-as-destiny principle of feudalism that Liberalism arose with its promise of individualism grounded in a creed of natural human equality and freedom (Blits and Gottfredson 1990, 9). Liberalism's vision was one of a world where, in the unforgettable words of Martin Luther King, Jr., people would "be judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character" (King 1986, 219). Much of the social history of the United States has been the history of the struggle to make this ideal a reality. While the Founding Fathers obviously fell well short of this goal despite the ringing principles expressed in the Declaration of I! ndependence, they did, in Abraham Lincoln's words "set up a standard maxim for free society, which should be familiar to all, and revered by all; constantly looked to, constantly labored for, and even though never perfectly attained, constantly approximated" (Lincoln 1986, 89).
Almost 200 years later the goal seemed within reach, as the civil rights movement succeeded in its effort to persuade America to match its proclaimed moral principles with concrete deeds: various executive orders and civil rights laws explicitly prohibited discrimination on the basis first of race, ethnicity, and, eventually, sex, establishing an enforcement mechanism and sanctions for noncompliance. America declared war on poverty and resolved to uplift and provide opportunities for the disadvantaged regardless of race or ethnicity. Then something curious happened. Disappointed by what they saw as the glacial pace of social change and socioeconomic progress by minorities, most civil rights leaders and their allies in all three branches of government, especially the executive branch bureaucracy and the federal courts, shifted from the principle of enforcement of colorblind equal opportunity to a color-conscious approach of preferential treatment of minorities and, eventua! lly, women as a temporary measure to speed up progress under the euphemism "affirmative action." Impatience with the hard and tedious work of enforcing equality of opportunity led to an emphasis on numerical equality of results instead. Statistical imbalances in the work force were now seen as prima facie evidence of discrimination, bringing about de facto quotas to effectuate proportional "representation."
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Percentages of federal work contracts are set aside for exclusive bidding by members of groups that have nothing in common except the fact that they are not white males.
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A generation later the underclass is still in dire straits and we find ourselves in a society obsessed as much as ever with group identity. As a result of judicial policymaking, academic advocacy, and the glaring failure of preferential policies to help the most disadvantaged whose condition provided at least some of the moral cover for embarking on such a detour from the basic principles of liberalism, the justification for affirmative action has shifted. Most advocates no longer defend it as "compensation for past discrimination" and "leveling the playing field" but instead hail it for bringing about "diversity" and "representation of minority perspectives." Many no longer pretend that it is temporary and agree with Benjamin Hooks who has said that it should become a permanent fixture in American society (Puddington 1995, 22). The old civil rights vision of a truly integrated, colorblind society has given way not only to a continuing reality but also an ardent advocacy ! of racial and ethnic separatism and a view of the government as the proper arbiter in a racial spoils system that allocates "benign" preferences and "benign" discrimination on the basis of formulae designed by well intentioned social engineers. In accordance with this new vision, university housing is partially segregated into racial or ethnic theme dorms; numerous academic departments are devoted to agendas defined along lines of race, ethnicity, sex, or sexual orientation; students sit among members of their "group" in the dining halls; and some belong to unions and other organizations circumscribed by race or sex, as do many employees in the workplace. Admission to universities is often at least partially determined by group membership, as is hiring, promotion, and sometimes firing at private companies, universities, and in the federal government. We are told that in order to do well, students should be taught by members of their own race, ethnicity, or sex. Percentages o! f federal work contracts are set aside for exclusive bidding by members of groups that have nothing in common except the fact that they are not white males. Congressional districts have been gerrymandered in fantastic shapes for no other reason than to ensure a majority electorate of a certain race or ethnicity. Further examples abound, but it should be obvious that this vision is fundamentally at odds with the basic American creed to which the original civil rights movement appealed.
Some of the most contentious features of this new vision, such as preferential treatment and quotas based on race, ethnicity, or sex or the (reverse-) discrimination such preference inevitably entails as its corollary, have never commanded majority support among either the people at large or any of the groups said to be the beneficiaries of such policies. Affirmative action of this kind is increasingly under public scrutiny and attack from state and federal legislators, governors, and citizen groups pushing for referenda at the state level. Most of the Republican presidential candidates have come out strongly against such policies, while President Clinton after some initial wavering appears set to support their continuation with only cosmetic changes. Most significant, however, at least in the short run, is the fact that the Supreme Court seems to have turned a corner on the issue. While a position of genuine colorblindness does not yet command a majority on the Court, fi! ve of the justices appear likely to permit the continuation of most such policies in only extraordinary circumstances.
