In Defense Of Affirmative Action [Hardcover]

Barbara R. Bergmann (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 21, 1996

At a time when quotas and preferences are under attack nationwide, Barbara Bergmann courageously show that without the help of affirmative action America will never be able to attain a truly race-blind and sex-blind society, for it is naive to imagine that the abolition of affirmative action will lead to a system based solely on ability. Women and minorities do in fact need assistance in cases where prejudice or habit leads to preference for white males in all openings. Free of the posturing that has so often degraded this debate, In Defense of Affirmative Action is a clarion call to maintain affirmative action as a just and indispensable solution to a chronic problem in American society.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In this brief book, American University economist Bergmann makes a partially convincing defense of affirmative action, focusing on its role in the workplace rather than in university admissions or in the awarding of contracts. While she observes that affirmative action plans involve efforts at outreach and diversity training, she acknowledges that such programs "do have quotalike aspects" and claims that such goals are justifiable, at least for a certain duration. She cites evidence-from statistics and studies using equally qualified white and black "testers"-that employment discrimination remains significant and that we need a systematic program that "pushes" employers to think differently: "The purpose of affirmative action is to supply that push." She offers decent rebuttals of many opponents of affirmative action, noting that we don't have an ironclad adherence to "merit" (what about veterans' preferences?), and that affirmative action based on class rather than race wouldn't be effective. However, a true defense of the policy requires a more nuanced journalistic investigation of how it actually works.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Scientific American

Makes the most persuasive case to date for continuing the project of actively securing fair treatment for women and minorities. . . . Bergmann introduces important new evidence about how decisions to hire and promote are actually made. She resets the terms of the debate. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: Basic Books; First Edition edition (March 21, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0465098339
• ISBN-13: 978-0465098330
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 2.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,776,341 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Deeply troubling, July 31, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: In Defense Of Affirmative Action (Paperback)

I am a great and consistent supporter of A.A. However, as an Indian-American, I have seen serious problems which A.A. presents to Asian-Americans, which economically and educationally priviledged white women pay lip service to but do not confront directly. As a feminist I found most of Bergman's book compelling. Nevertheless, she is so glib in speaking of 'women and minorities', conceptually in tandem, that she feeds the stereotyping conducted by conservative critics of the Left's position on A.A. At some point we, as women of all races, have to confront the genuine problems of classism within the ranks of feminism, especially the white feminist elite. Prop 209 could have been defeated in California, were it not for middleclass white women pre empting the much more urgent protests conducted by minorities. 'Women and minorities' is a useful construct, particularly when addressing political unfairness. But Affirmative Action should *never* be an excuse for the feminist elite (especially academic feminists, who hardly speak for all of us!) to use discrimination as a soap box for their own interests. White women, as well as Asian-American women, are well represented as students in most of prestigious academia; it is in teaching jobs that there are still problems of representation.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars One of the best for her side of the argument, April 28, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: In Defense Of Affirmative Action (Paperback)

This book is a must read for those preparing to defend affirmative action. If you are anti-AA, I suggest you read this, you might find some of your previous conclusions reversed. In all, a good analytical study and conclusion on what AA is and should be.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars discrimination to eliminate discrimination is discrimination, December 12, 2007

By 

Michael A. Scheurich "The Professor" (California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: In Defense Of Affirmative Action (Paperback)

I am amazed after 200 years of achievement in the arena of civil rights that anyone would think that discrimination is a useful tool to end discrimination. I was a strong supporter of affirmative action. But what it claimed it would do and what it actually did were two opposite programs. I soon discovered that hiring policies were not designed to hire the most qualified regardless of race, religion, sex, or age. The hiring policies were designed to hire minorities and women regardless of qualifications. In most cases workers were hired to do repetitive line working jobs and paid minimum wages or less. But as operating costs rose from rework and poor quality control more and more companies farmed out these jobs to foreign nations where labor was even cheaper. Guest workers were then brought in to replace white collar jobs. None of this allowed money to be put back into the economy for American citizens and communities were destroyed as aliens entering the country illegally began taking the jobs away from American workers. Obviously the proponents of AA were from well-to-do families and never cared or even thought about civil rights prior to college. Fresh graduates discovered they could leap out of college and displace a male executive, who took years of working hard earning his job by working his way up the ladder, and grab his job without any experience. Meanwhile American minorities from poor families continue to struggle as jobs were not given them but given to foreign workers entering the country to take advantage of the situation. AA set back the civil rights movement 100 years. Meanwhile young American males, the victims of AA have no future and are underachieving, although you would be hard pressed to find anyone who will admit the fact. Affirmative Action, meant to eliminate discrimination did just the opposite. It not only promoted discrimination against males it implemented laws and programs to make sure males were discriminated against. If a young American male was lucky enough to find an employer who would hire him he would have to work along side a non-English speaking alien who was less qualified to do the job and at the same wage level as his unqualified co-worker who couldn't even understand the instructions for doing the job. In addition the more qualified male was pigeon-holed while the unqualified co-worker received wage increases and promotions. This has not only cost the companies billions in lost profits it has cost the consumers who had to foot the bill passed on to them. In addition to racial discrimination males were discriminated against sexually during the same era and still are. Males are not just discriminated against in work but from the time they begin school up to and throughout most colleges and universities. At home parents were encouraged to discriminate against male children and 'daughters only day' in which daughters (sons were not allowed to participate and a son's day at work was not established) would be taken to spend the day at work with a parent. Statistics given which demonstrated minorities and women were being discriminated against were manipulate to justify the discrimination against males. The jobs of women who worked lower paying temporary or part-time work to supplement family income was included in statistics comparing average wages of men and women as well as the lower starting wages of new employees which were compared to wages of men who had 20+ years of yearly wage increments. Men were no longer bread winners nor loving protectors of the family they were redefined in the most negative way possible as abusers of their spouses and their children. No one dared step forward to dispute these false claims less be terminated in place of employment or be accused of being a sexist or racist. In addition male chivalry took over and many men sided with discrimination against themselves as they had been doing for thousands of years in giving women whatever they asked for while meanwhile his stay-at-home wife who stayed home to care for the children was also being discriminated against by AA proponents.

Government-imposed quotas were explicitly banned in the 1964 Civil Rights Act Nevertheless they immediately spread through the economy. For most of that time, they received eerily little media and even less academic attention. Of some 1,300 papers given at a recent American Sociological Association conference on Race and Ethnic Relations, the topic attracted only one.
The ideal of merit hiring has been subverted by politicized hiring, with white men unable to defend themselves against open discrimination. But quotas bring other problems, including conflict among the "protected classes'' they benefit, and growing racial polarization, particularly as the articulate middle class begins to suffer.

"Race-norming [adjusting test scores to produce racially proportionate results] alone affected millions of people,'' he says. "Many state and local governments did it with their GATBs [General Aptitude Test Batteries, taken by job seekers and supplied to potential employers]. And private testing agencies did it to protect their clients against lawsuits--they called it ''EEO-proofing.'' (The federalEqual Employment Opportunity Commission muscles business into quotas.)

There's incredible denial that quotas did not exist--within weeks of three Supreme Court decisions about them. Orwellian doublethink AA supporters insisted that the 1991 Civil Rights Act did not impose quotas, although its key point was to override the Supreme Court and make work force racial imbalance prima facie evidence of employer discrimination.