Tag: affirmative action supreme court
Why affirmative action in American universities had to go
Should citizens be treated differently based on the colour of their skin? Most people would say not, but others insist that they should—if the ends are sufficiently enlightened. Not long after America dismantled over two centuries of slavery and segregation, it embarked on a project of “affirmative action”: legally sanctioned positive discrimination for African-Americans (later expanded to other “under-represented minorities”) who wanted to go to selective universities. At the time, the affront to liberal norms of fairness and equality under the law was assuaged by the fact that the people who stood to benefit had been oppressed. Yet after 50 ... Read more