Positive discrimination


  • Reverse discrimination
  • Affirmative racism
  • Preferential discrimination
  • Abuse of affirmative action against discrimination
  • Active prejudice in favour of the underprivileged

Description

Affirmative action (also sometimes called reservations, alternative access, positive discrimination or positive action in various countries' laws and policies) refers to a set of policies and practices within a government or organization seeking to benefit marginalized groups. Historically and internationally, support for affirmative action has been justified by the idea that it may help with bridging inequalities in employment and pay, increasing access to education, and promoting diversity, social equity and redressing alleged wrongs, harms, or hindrances, also called substantive equality. The nature of affirmative-action policies varies from region to region and exists on a spectrum from a hard quota to merely targeting encouragement for increased participation. Some countries use a quota system, reserving a certain percentage of government jobs, political positions, and school vacancies for members of a certain group; an example of this is the reservation system in India. In some other jurisdictions where quotas are not used, minority-group members are given preference or special consideration in selection processes. In the United States, affirmative action by executive order originally meant selection without regard to race but preferential treatment was widely used in college admissions, as upheld in the 2003 Supreme Court case Grutter v. Bollinger, until 2023, when this was overturned in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard. A variation of affirmative action more common in Europe is known as positive action, wherein equal opportunity is promoted by encouraging underrepresented groups into a field. This is often described as being "color blind", but some American sociologists have argued that this is insufficient to achieve substantive equality of outcomes based on race. In the United States, affirmative action is controversial and public opinion on the subject is divided. Supporters of affirmative action argue that it promotes substantive equality for group outcomes and representation for groups, which are socio-economically disadvantaged or have faced historical discrimination or oppression. Opponents of affirmative action have argued that it is a form of reverse discrimination, that it tends to benefit the most privileged within minority groups at the expense of the least fortunate within majority groups, or that—when applied to universities—it can hinder minority students by placing them in courses for which they have not been adequately prepared. In June 2023, the Supreme Court of the United States decided a landmark case, Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, holding race-conscious college admissions processes to be unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment's Equal Protection Clause. The ruling does not explicitly apply to U.S. military academies, and it allows for students' discussion of race to continue to be considered in the context of "how race affected the applicant's life, so long as that discussion is concretely tied to a quality of character or unique ability that the particular applicant can contribute to the university."
Source: Wikipedia

Incidence

Countries with preferential policies have varied enormously in cultural, political, economic and other ways. The groups receiving preferences have likewise varied greatly, from locally or nationally dominant groups in some countries to the poorest and most abject groups in others. The same patterns are however evident. Fraudulent claims of belonging to the preferred group have been widespread and have taken many forms.

Claim

  1. Preferential programmes, even when explicitly defined as temporary, have tended both to persist and to expand in scope. Within the groups designated as recipients of preferential treatment, the benefits have tended to go disproportionately to those already more fortunate. Group polarization has tended to increase in the wake of preferential programmes, with non-preferred groups reacting adversely (including political backlash, mob violence, and civil war).

  2. The belief that group disparities in representation are suspect anomalies that can be corrected by apportioning places on the basis of group membership is an illusion. Every aspect of this belief fails the test of evidence in country after country. The prime moral illusion is that preferential policies compensate for wrong suffered. This belief has been supported only by a thin veneer of emotional rhetoric, seldom examined but often reiterated. Affirmative action has become a test of continuing liberalism among people who know they are backsliding on other issues. Many liberal policies continue to be bound up in the premise that social justice requires special treatment for groups, and many powerful liberal constituencies have an interest in seeing those policies continue, whether or not they serve the goal of equality that was once their stated purpose.


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