Affirmative Action

Paper Summary:

This paper takes a look at the concept of affirmative action. The paper reports that affirmative action was first used by President John F. Kennedy during 1961 in his call for action towards greater equality in terms of federal contracting. The paper goes on to say that the President instructed contractors to take "affirmative action" to ensure that applicants be treated equally regardless of race, creed or sex. The paper goes on to discuss some of the problems that affirmative action policies create and concludes that, because of these problems, it is time to terminate affirmative action policies.

From the Paper:

"It has been mentioned above that affirmative action policies such as point and quota systems emphasize rather than redress issues of unfairness and racial discrimination. Awarding any favoritism to persons because of their skin color is discriminatory. This has negative effects on both the favored and the disfavored. Persons who are favored for their minority status could be made to feel that they have not achieved their respective positions for their merits or talents. They may as a result doubt their ability to perform well, and concomitantly in actual fact not perform well because of this feeling. This is reinforced by the resentment experienced from disfavored groups who feel that their rights have been violated."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Andre, Claire, Velasquez, Manuel & Mazur, Tim. "Affirmative Action: Twenty-five Years of Controversy". Issues in Ethics, v. 5, n. 2, Summer 1992. http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/iie/v5n2/affirmative.html
• Brunner, Borgna. "Bakke and Beyond: A History and Timeline of Affirmative Action". Pearson Education, 2000-2005. http://www.infoplease.com/spot/affirmative1.html
• Fullinwider, Robert. "Affirmative Action". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2005. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/affirmative-action/
• Schulman, Miriam. "Affirmative Action or Negative Action". Issues in Ethics, v. 7 n. 3, Fall 1996. http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/iie/v7n3/affirmative.html
• Wilcher, Shirley J. "The History of Affirmative Action Policies" first published in Motion Magazine, October 12, 2003. Americans for a Fair Chance, Washington, D.C., 1995-2006. Available online: http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/aahist.html

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