4700, RE: Why Affirmative Action? Posted by HoChiGrimm, Wed Jun-25-03 11:12 AM
>Is it admitting defeat; throwing up hands in disgust and >giving up on fixing the dilema at it's root?
No, AFFIRMATIVE ACTION POLICY WAS FORGED OUT OF THE CAULDRON of black insurgency. It was the mobilization of black protest, beginning with the civil rights movement and the ensuing upsurge of black militancy, that engendered the political pressure for the policy initiatives that came to be known as "affirmative action."
Contrary to the lies, AA is not and has never been a hand-out from the U.S. gov. or liberal whites. Rather, it is a by- product of the Black struggle for equality.
>Is is really >helping minorities or is it just another form of classism >keeping elite (whether finanicially or intellectually) >minorities and their issues detached from the rest of their >prospective groups?
Absolutely, positively not!
A plethora of social research indicates that the occupational spheres where blacks have made the most progress -- in government service, in major blue-collar occupations, in corporate management, and in the professions -- are all areas where vigorous affirmative action programs have been in place over the past two decades(Steinberg, 1995).
>Is it a useful tool? If so, is it more of a wedge to get a >foot in the door...or a wedge to create a social schism?
In his book "Turning Back, The Retreat from Racial Justice in American Thought and Policy", Stephen Steinberg (1995) argues that, "affirmative action is the single policy of the post-civil rights era that sought equality, not just as a right and a theory, but as a fact and a result" (p.165).
Nonwhites were unable to rely on good-faith efforts by employers until those efforts were actually enforced by specific "goals and timetables" that gave preference to minority applicants "who met basic qualifications but might not have been hired or promoted without affirmative action mandates" (p.166).
Blacks have made the greatest progress in firms and job sectors where affirmative action has been implemented: in government, in major blue-collar industries, and in cor- porate management and the professions (eBadgett and Hartmann in Economic Perspectives on Affirmative Action).
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