the resurgence of group preferences in
societies committed to the equality of
individuals before the law
has been accomplished by claims not only
that these preferences would be
temporary but also that they would be
limited rather than pervasive
that is these programs would supposedly
be limited not only in time but also in
scope with equal treatment policies
prevailing outside the limited domain
where members of particular groups would
be given special help
in india for example a government
minister urging lower university
admissions standards for untouchables
and members of disadvantaged tribes
included the proviso that he was
recommending relaxation for admissions
and not for passing or grading just as
he was for limiting the scope of
preferential treatment so others were
for limiting its duration
as an advocate of reserving certain
numbers of jobs for members of specified
groups in india said
even the staunchest supporters of
reservation exceeded that it is a
transitory provision
it was the leaders of the untouchables
themselves who proposed a 10-year
cut-off for reservations in order to
forestall political opposition and
social conflict
that was in 1949 and the reservations
are still in place today
similar reasoning was applied in the
united states to both employment and
admissions to colleges and universities
initially it was proposed that there
would be special outreach efforts to
contact minority individuals with
information and encouragement to apply
for jobs or college admissions in places
where they might not have felt welcome
before but with the proviso that they
would not be given special preferences
throughout the whole subsequent
processes of acceptance and advancement
much the same rationale appeared in
malaysia and so did the further
extension of preferential treatment
which developed despite this rationale
although grading is supposed to be
without reference to ethnicity all
grades must be submitted to an
evaluation review committee having heavy
melee representation individual faculty
members report various instances when
grades were unilaterally raised
apparently for purposes of ethnic
balance
similar policies and results have also
been achieved in less blatant ways
during the era of the soviet union
professors were pressured to give
preferential grading to central asian
students and what has been called
affirmative grading has also occurred in
the united states in order to prevent
excessive failure rates among minority
students admitted under lower academic
standards
in india such practices have been
referred to as grace marks similar
results can be achieved indirectly by
providing ethnic studies courses that
give easy grades and attract
disproportionately the members of one
ethnic group
this too is not peculiar to the united
states there are maori studies programs
in new zealand and special studies for
melees in singapore
in the job market as well the belief
that special concerns for particular
groups could be confined to an initial
stage proved untenable in practice
initially the term affirmative action
arose in the united states from an
executive order by president john f
kennedy who called for
affirmative action to ensure that the
applicants are employed and that
employees are treated during employment
without regard to race color creed or
national origin
in short there were to be no preferences
or quotas at all just a special concern
to make sure that those who had been
discriminated against in the past would
no longer be discriminated against in
the future and that concrete steps
should be taken so that all and sundry
would be made aware of this
however just as academic preferences
initially limited in scope continued to
expand so did the concept of affirmative
action in the job market
a later executive order by president
lyndon johnson in 1968 contained the
fateful expressions goals and timetables
and representation
these were not yet full-blown quotas for
the 1968 guidelines referred to goals
and timetables for the prompt
achievement of full and equal employment
opportunity
still later another executive order in
1970 by president richard nixon spoke of
results-oriented procedures
and finally in december 1971 yet another
nixon executive order specified that
goals and timetables were meant to
increase materially the utilization of
minorities and women with
underutilization being spelled out as
having fewer minorities or women in a
particular job classification than would
reasonably be expected by their
availability
affirmative action was now a numerical
concept whether called goals or quotas
in a very different society and
governmental system halfway around the
world in pakistan attempts to confine
affirmative action policies within their
initial limits proved equally futile
here preferential policies began in 1949
as an explicitly temporary measure to be
phased out in five to ten years
the principal beneficiaries were to be
the very poor bengalis of east pakistan
who were under represented in business
the professions and the military while
even the administration of east
past the pakist specified cutoff time by
repeated extensions
even after east pakistan seceded to
become the independent nation of
bangladesh in 1971
the preferential policies in pakistan
had sufficient other political
constituencies to continue on after
their principal initial intended
beneficiaries were gone
britain's lord skarman expressed a view
widely held by those initiating
affirmative action in many countries
when he said we can and for the present
must accept the loading of the law in
favor of one group at the expense of
others defending it as a temporary
expedient in the balancing process which
has to be undertaken when and where
there is social and economic inequality
this confident pronouncement however
presupposed a degree of control which
has proved illusory in country after
country
moreover when and where there is social
and economic inequality encompasses
virtually the entire world and virtually
the entire history of the human race
a temporary program to eliminate a
centuries-old condition is almost a
contradiction in terms
equality of opportunity might be
achieved within some feasible span of
time but that is wholly different from
eliminating inequalities of results
even an approximate equality of
representation of different groups in
different occupations institutions or
income levels has been a very rare or
non-existent phenomenon except where
such numerical results have been imposed
artificially by quotas
as a massive scholarly study of ethnic
groups around the world put it when
discussing proportional representation
of ethnic groups few if any societies
have ever approximated this description
another international study of
multi-ethnic societies referred to the
universality of ethnic inequality
and pointed out that these inequalities
are multi-dimensional
all multi-ethnic societies exhibit a
tendency for ethnic groups to engage in
different occupations have different
levels and often types of education
receive different incomes and occupy a
different place in the social hierarchy
a worldwide study of military forces
likewise concluded that
militaries fall far short of mirroring
even roughly the multi-ethnic societies
from which they come
at one time nearly half the pilots in
the malaysian air force came from the
chinese minority
in tsarist russia 40 percent of the
army's high command came from the german
ethnic minority that was only one
percent of the country's population
similar gross disparities in ethnic
representation in occupations industries
and institutions can be found in country
after country around the world and in
century after century
often those over represented in high
level occupations have been minorities
with no power to exclude others but
simply possessing particular skills
germans for example have predominated
among those who created the leading beer
companies in the united states as they
created china's famous qingdao beer and
established breweries in argentina
australia brazil and other countries
similarly jews have predominated in the
manufacturing of clothing in medieval
spain the ottoman empire argentina the
united states and other countries
in short the even representation of
groups that is taken as a norm is
difficult or impossible to find anywhere
while the uneven representation that is
regarded as a special deviation to be
corrected is pervasive across the most
disparate societies
people differ and have per centuries
it is hard to imagine how they could not
differ given the enormous range of
differing historical cultural geographic
demographic and other factors shaping
the particular skills habits and
attitudes of different groups
any temporary policy whose duration is
defined by the goal of achieving
something that has never been achieved
before anywhere in the world could more
fittingly be characterized as eternal
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