Under the Same Sun

By: Kasey Henricks

Originally posted at www.theallstate.com

The following is part two of a three-part editorial series discussing affirmative action in the context of the upcoming election. Part two presents a general overview of the current state of U.S. race relations, and part three will provide suggestions and solutions in walking towards racial justice and equality (to be posted 8/6).

2000 Population

The need for affirmative action cannot be fully understood by taking it for face value. Whether you think affirmative action is racial preference or racial opportunity, you should read into the background and current status of U.S. race relations before making a final judgment.

We live in a world where skin color shouldn’t matter, but it does. Race cannot be ignored because race has real consequences. It remains of continuing significance in terms of political, social, cultural, and economic power. That is, U.S. society is arranged by a racial hierarchy.

When I refer to the U.S. as a racial hierarchy, this does not mean all whites are born with a silver spoon in our mouths, nor do I mean all African Americans are poor or unemployed. Much variation exists within each racial group. A racial hierarchy simply refers to the overrepresentation of certain groups at the top and the overrepresentation of other groups at the bottom. To borrow words from “Where Do We Go From Here? Chaos or Community,” the Rev. Martin Luther King’s last book: “Of the good things in life [a minority] has approximately one-half those of whites; of the bad [a minority] has twice of those of whites.”

Education Attainment Levels

King’s words remain relevant today as an overwhelming number of racial disparities permeate U.S. society. In areas of political representation, healthcare access, home ownership, incarceration rates, education access and attainment, poverty, accumulated wealth, earned income, unemployment, and many other unmentioned areas, race determines power and privilege.¹ That is, racial disparities resemble the structure of a pyramid whereas whites stand atop that pyramid and African Americans, Native Americans and Hispanics sit at the bottom, with other groups in between. If race is a trump card, meaning that when pulled out it wins out against all other factors, then that card is definitely white.

HS Graduation and Drop Out Rates

To ignore race would be to ignore something that gets in the way of millions of people’s everyday lives. As writer and speaker Tim Wise points out in “White Like Me,” if you teach yourself not to see color then you’re not likely to see problems associated with race, let alone know how to deal with them when they occur.

The vast array of racial disparities help paint today’s color line. But to achieve a holistic understanding of present race relations, we must revisit the past. As the old say goes: To know where you are, you have to know where you’ve been. Problems rooted in the past do not end in the past. For example, the current problem of the Iraq War will be passed on from George W. Bush to the next president. Problems are inherited, and in regard to race relations, problems are passed on from generation to generation, from grandparent to parent and parent to child. The legacies of slavery and Jim Crow remain alive and well. America’s racial past is one where whites had access to schools, jobs and housing, and these same opportunities were virtually off-limits to racial minorities. With this access, whites were able to accumulate assets and pass them along to younger generations. You can think of this as “affirmative action of old” whereas racial opportunity was protected and provided to the majority group – white folk. On the other hand, the “affirmative action of new” protects and provides racial opportunity to minority groups who have yet to enter an equal playing ground.

Income Levels

For some, past racial discrimination and present racial disparities are not enough to demonstrate the current need for affirmative action. After all, past discrimination does not provide substantial evidence of ongoing discrimination. That is, past discrimination does not prove present discrimination exists. In addition, current racial inequalities merely confirm a relationship between race and disparity, but these correlations do not explain why an African American, Native American or Hispanic is poor, unemployed, uneducated or living on the streets. Correlation is not causation, but these statistical relationships indicate minorities are more likely to be born into disparity. Many opponents of affirmative action remain unconvinced of ongoing racial discrimination. Organizations like the Goldwater Institute, Project 21 and the Manhattan Institute as well as affirmative action critic, Ward Connerly, claim racial discrimination is not a problem in 2008. After all, the age of Obama is upon us. However, recent scholarship paints quite a different picture.

Federal Political Representation

Race remains a salient predictor in terms of access to education and employment and who reaps the benefits of this access. As Stanford University sociologist, Monica McDermott, comments: “Light skin has always been synonymous with privilege and advantage in the United States, and with good reason.” Five recent studies – although many, many more are available – demonstrate when all factors are held equal, whiteness remains a trump card.² These studies control for variables like class, gender, age, education, work experience, neighborhood, criminal record, among others, and put forth identical school and job applicants, except with different racial backgrounds. This means that black, brown, and white applicants of matching backgrounds with the equal credentials and qualifications applied to the same schools and jobs. Each of these studies concluded similar findings: White applicants were found to have greater advantages in terms of accessing education and the job market. Whiteness remains the trump card.

Poverty Levels

Skeptics remain unconvinced. Some argue such studies are merely coincidences since a person’s race cannot legally be asked on an application. However, checking a box for your racial category is not the only way of knowing if someone is white, Hispanic, African American, etc. For instance, if someone attended say Fisk University or Tennessee State University, we know they’re more likely to be African American. If a person is a member of Sigma Delta Pi – a Hispanic honor society – then we know they’re likely to be Hispanic. Then what about names? How many white people do you know with the name Jamal, Tyrone, or Shanita? How about Tito or Maria? But what about the names Emily or Kasey? For the last two, it doesn’t get much whiter than that.

Incarceration and Uninsured Rates

Another common counter-argument contends affirmative action leads to “reverse discrimination” because it promotes race over merit and credentials. These critics argue affirmative action replaces qualified, competent individuals with less qualified and less deserving individuals. However, Michael Brown et al points out in “Whitewashing race,”: “Statistical enforcement of Title VII and affirmative action provide no evidence that they lead to racial balancing or reverse discrimination.”³ That is, if less qualified and less competent individuals are getting the job then we could expect productivity to slip. Harry Holzer, a Georgetown University public policy analyst, and David Neumark, a UC Irvine economist in “Accessing Affirmative Action,” found no conclusive evidence proving a loss of productivity. “There is at this juncture very little compelling evidence of deleterious efficiency effects of affirmative action.” Consistent conclusions have been found in the realm of education. For instance, NYU sociologist, Dalton Conley, points out in “Being Black, Living in Red” that when college graduation rates of African American and white students of the similar socioeconomic status are compared, no racial difference separates the two groups. Once minorities have been provided the opportunity for education or employment they compete just as well as any other racial group.

Unemployment and Home Ownership Rates

In conclusion, a person’s skin color shouldn’t matter. But it does matter because it has real consequences for all of us, whether we are aware of it or not. We, as a society, must not be blind to race, but able to see past race if we are to move forward. This is why affirmative action is needed. It’s a race-conscious policy that seeks to correct and prevent past and present racial injustice.

Given the current status of U.S. race relations, it’s apparent Americans need to renew their promise to racial equality. Affirmative action is no perfect policy, as part three of this series will detail, but it is the antidiscrimination law we have to work with. It needs revision and renewal, but as anthropologist Margaret Mead once wrote: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” Today, affirmative action, and racial justice in general, needs a few committed individuals seeking social change. Speak up and speak out.

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Kasey Henricks is a two time award-winning SouthEast Journalism Conference writer. He currently serves as Editor in Chief and can be reached at jpk.henricks@gmail.com

¹ All data evidencing these racial disparities are provided in the following: Charles Gallagher. (2007). Rethinking the Color Line: Readings in Race and Ethnicity (3^rd ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.

² The five studies referred to include the following:

^a) Marc Bendick Jr. (2007). “Situation Testing for Employment Discrimination in the United States of America.” Dentre d’analyse stratégique – Revue Horizons statégiques, 5, (Juillet), 1-18.

^b) Marianne Bertrand & Sendhil Mullainathan. (2004). “Are Emily and Brendan More Employable than Lakisha and Jamal? A Field Experiment on Labor Market Discrimination.” American Economic Review, 94(4), 991-1013.

^c) George Farkas. (2003). “Racial Disparities and Discrimination in Education: What Do We Know, How Do We Know It, and What Do We Need to Know?” Teachers College Record, 105(6), 1119-1146.

^d) LeeAnn Lodder, Scott McFarland & Dianna White. (2003). Racial Preference and Suburban Employment Opportunities: a Report on ‘Matched Pair’ Tests of Chicago Area Retailers. Legal Assistance Foundation of Metropolitan Chicago.

^e) Devah Pager. (2003). “The Mark of a Criminal Record.” American Journal of Sociology, 108(5), 937-975.

³ Michael Brown, Martin Carnoy, Elliott Currie, Troy Duster, David Oppenheimer, Marjorie Shultz & David Wellman. (2003). Whitewashing Race: The Myth of a Color-Blind Society. Berkeley, California: University of California Press.