Controversies in Affirmative Action

Controversies in Affirmative Action
Author: James A. Beckman
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 1117
Release: 2014-07-23
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1440800839

An engaging and eclectic collection of essays from leading scholars on the subject, which looks at affirmative action past and present, analyzes its efficacy, its legacy, and its role in the future of the United States. This comprehensive, three-volume set explores the ways the United States has interpreted affirmative action and probes the effects of the policy from the perspectives of economics, law, philosophy, psychology, sociology, political science, and race relations. Expert contributors tackle a host of knotty issues, ranging from the history of affirmative action to the theories underpinning it. They show how affirmative action has been implemented over the years, discuss its legality and constitutionality, and speculate about its future. Volume one traces the origin and evolution of affirmative action. Volume two discusses modern applications and debates, and volume three delves into such areas as international practices and critical race theory. Standalone essays link cause and effect and past and present as they tackle intriguing—and important—questions. When does "affirmative action" become "reverse discrimination"? How many decades are too many for a "temporary" policy to remain in existence? Does race- or gender-based affirmative action violate the equal protection of law guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment? In raising such issues, the work encourages readers to come to their own conclusions about the policy and its future application.

Affirmative Action Around the World

Affirmative Action Around the World
Author: Thomas Sowell
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2004-01-01
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780300107753

An eminent authority presents a new perspective on affirmative action in a provocative book that will stir fresh debate about this vitally important issue

Constructing Affirmative Action

Constructing Affirmative Action
Author: David Golland
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Total Pages: 280
Release: 2011-04-22
Genre: History
ISBN: 0813129982

Between 1965, when President Lyndon B. Johnson defined affirmative action as a legitimate federal goal, and 1972, when President Richard M. Nixon named one of affirmative action’s chief antagonists the head of the Department of Labor, government officials at all levels addressed racial economic inequality in earnest. Providing members of historically disadvantaged groups an equal chance at obtaining limited and competitive positions, affirmative action had the potential to alienate large numbers of white Americans, even those who had viewed school desegregation and voting rights in a positive light. Thus, affirmative action was—and continues to be—controversial. Novel in its approach and meticulously researched, David Hamilton Golland’s Constructing Affirmative Action: The Struggle for Equal Employment Opportunity bridges a sizeable gap in the literature on the history of affirmative action. Golland examines federal efforts to diversify the construction trades from the 1950s through the 1970s, offering valuable insights into the origins of affirmative action–related policy. Constructing Affirmative Action analyzes how community activism pushed the federal government to address issues of racial exclusion and marginalization in the construction industry with programs in key American cities.

Living with Moral Disagreement

Living with Moral Disagreement
Author: Michele S. Moses
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 148
Release: 2016-03-28
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 022634438X

In this book, Michele S. Moses offers a crucial new way for thinking about the affirmative action debate, one that holds up the debate itself as an important emblem of the democratic process. Central to her analysis is the argument that we need to understand disagreements about affirmative action as products of conflicts between deeply held beliefs about race consciousness as either a pernicious political force or a necessary variable in political equality. --Back cover.

Polling Matters

Polling Matters
Author: Frank Newport
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Total Pages: 205
Release: 2004-07-30
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0759511764

From The Gallup Organization-the most respected source on the subject-comes a fascinating look at the importance of measuring public opinion in modern society. For years, public-opinion polls have been a valuable tool for gauging the positions of American citizens on a wide variety of topics. Polling applies scientific principles to understanding and anticipating the insights, emotions, and attitudes of society. Now in POLLING MATTERS: Why Leaders Must Listen to the Wisdom of the People, The Gallup Organization reveals: What polls really are and how they are conducted Why the information polls provide is so vitally important to modern society today How this valuable information can be used more effectively and more...

Affirmative Action

Affirmative Action
Author: John W. Johnson
Publisher: Greenwood
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2009-05-19
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0313338140

Affirmative Action recounts the fascinating history of a civil rights provision considered vital to protecting and promoting equality, but still bitterly contested in the courts—and in the court of public opinion. "Special consideration" or "reverse discrimination"? This examination traces the genesis and development of affirmative action and the continuing controversy that constitutes the story of racial and gender preferences. It pays attention to the individuals, the events, and the ideas that spawned federal and selected state affirmative action policies—and the resistance to those policies. Perhaps most important, it probes the key legal challenges to affirmative action in the nation's courts. The controversy over affirmative action in America has been marked by a persistent tension between its advocates, who emphasize the necessity of overcoming historical patterns of racial and gender injustice, and its critics, who insist on the integrity of color and gender blindness. In the wake of related U.S. Supreme Court decisions of 2007, Affirmative Action brings the story of one of the most embattled public policy issues of the last half century up to date, demonstrating that social justice cannot simply be legislated into existence, nor can voices on either side of the debate be ignored.

Economic Perspectives on Affirmative Action

Economic Perspectives on Affirmative Action
Author: Mary Virginia Lee Badgett
Publisher: University Press of America
Total Pages: 116
Release: 1995
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780819199317

The three scholarly articles that make up this book examine affirmative action in economic terms, measuring and discussing the economic cost of racial discrimination in employment and the economic cost of equal opportunity enacted to combat discrimination and its effects. The short article by Andrew Brimmer, an economist who was the first black governor of the Federal Reserve Board, calculates the financial cost to the nation of racial discrimination in employment, education, and training. Cecilia Conrad's article surveys an array of experts and concludes that the direct financial costs to government and private industry of maintaining affirmative action policies is quite small; she also concludes that the popular perception of a productivity loss caused by affirmative action has little basis in demonstrable fact. Finally, Lee Badgett and Heidi Hartmann examine the many studies that have been done to assess the effectiveness of affirmative action policies in increasing employment and wage opportunities for both women and African Americans; they conclude that such policies have had measurable effects, though they have often been slight.