Comment by MontyCarloHall
1 day ago
>The conflict is not a disagreement over effectiveness. It's a misalignment between meritocracy and equity.
A lot of proponents of affirmative action will agree with this. They'll explicitly acknowledge that people admitted under AA will be underqualified, due to factors mentioned in the article:
[Minorities] may lack foundational skills (taken for granted in more affluent households and schools) and therefore might require breaks from study, which can lead to dropping out. They might have developed unhelpful habits or attitudes formed in teen years, or a sense of identity tied up with being part of a historically maligned group, affecting confidence and performance. [Affirmative action] does nothing to address these factors.
Said proponents would agree that AA is a failure if assessed strictly by these criteria. However, they would then go on to say that the benefits conferred by an elite education to the current crop of AA beneficiaries lead to future generations of minorities being less likely to experience the aforementioned issues, so after accounting for all future externalities, AA is a net good. As Justice O'Connor famously wrote in Grutter v. Bollinger (2003) [0],
It would be a sad day indeed, were America to become a quota-ridden society, with each identifiable minority assigned proportional representation in every desirable walk of life. But that is not the rationale for programs of preferential treatment; the acid test of their justification will be their efficacy in eliminating the need for any racial or ethnic preferences at all. […] It has been 25 years since Justice Powell first approved the use of race to further an interest in student body diversity in the context of public higher education [California v. Bakke (1978)]. Since that time, the number of minority applicants with high grades and test scores has indeed increased. We expect that 25 years from now, the use of racial preferences will no longer be necessary to further the interest approved today.
That said, it's been almost 25 years since she wrote that (and 50 years since California v. Bakke), and it's debatable whether those future externalities have manifested.
And many against affirmative action will agree that there have been massive historical injustices for certain demographics that have lingering effects. The difference between these two sides is which value they prioritize.
>The difference between these two sides is which value they prioritize.
Yup. Though there is a third option: completely ignore the meritocracy vs. equity zero-sum game and simply argue that demographic-based weighting of applicants is an ineffective way to rectify those historical injustices. It is treating a symptom, not the underlying disease.
> simply argue that demographic-based weighting of applicants is an ineffective way to rectify those historical injustices. It is treating a symptom, not the underlying disease.
Is there any effective way to rectify them or the underlying disease that you'd recommend?
Singapore does the whole "race based quotas for everything" and they have by many metrics, the best standard of living in the entire world.
It turns out that the government forcing racial integration actually works! Being a "quota ridden society" would be good for America.
> Singapore does the whole "race based quotas for everything"
By American constructions of race, almost everyone in Singapore is of the same race.
Even going by genetically objective ethnicity, almost three quarters of people in Singapore are Han Chinese. It's not remotely comparable to the American situation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_in_Singapore
> and they have by many metrics, the best standard of living in the entire world.
As self-reported by people from cultures that happen to share common values. They rate higher on HDI than the US, sure; but so does the UAE, and Slovenia is almost as high. They're unusually wealthy per capita, but so is Ireland (capitalist shell games). And there are a lot of things the average American probably wouldn't like about that society, e.g. the strict rules against littering and the threat of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caning_in_Singapore .