Affirmative Action in the Workplace

1 . Introduction

Humankind has practiced inequality and discrimination for thousands of years . The root cause of discrimination is prejudice , directed against race , nationality , religion , community and sex , which in turn has led to the commitment of some of the greatest crimes against humanity . The concept of equality among humans is of recent origin and does not date back more than the French Revolution . While the concept of equality has gained ground over the last hundred and fifty years , the practice conditioning and mindsets of centuries is difficult to overcome and progress

has occurred in fits and starts . It is pertinent to remember that the holocaust is just about 60 years old and that this horrific act of genocide , involving the massacre of millions of people because of racial prejudice , happened in the lifetime of many of the world 's existing citizens . Prejudice and discrimination exist even today in many parts of the world and emerge in many ways , some subtle and some not so While women have always been and continue to be the victims of prejudice and discrimination , discrimination also affects the lives and prospects of people who belong to communities that have not been able to improve their status or economic conditions because of educational and other opportunities

Ironically , discrimination is alive and strong in the two most vocal member states of the democratic movement , the USA , the world 's most powerful democracy and India , the worlds largest . While the representation of women in the USA in employment and education has grown in the last 50 years , they continue to lag behind men , and the status of African Americans remains significantly inferior to the white population in all welfare indices , be it education , employment , median income or incarceration . In India , the aversion to the girl child has led to widespread illegal female feticide and a sharp drop in the number of females to males . Discrimination also continues to be very strong against people of lower castes and Muslims who lag sharply behind the rest of the population in human welfare indices

Public opinion , disaffection amongst the people discriminated against and social consciousness has led to movements in India and the USA to correct the situation and empower the sections of society subjected to discrimination in the past . This movement , known as Affirmative Action aims to provide opportunities to people of specific communities who have undergone enormous injustices and oppression in the past and continue to inferior lives because of lack of opportunities . Affirmative Action policies seek to redress these injustices by providing such people specific opportunities in education , employment or access to specific facilities like housing . Affirmative Action has exercised emotions and been the subject of intense debate ever since the inception of the concept . While few would be ready to publicly deny that people oppressed in the past deserve to come up in life , a vast body of people feels that Affirmative Action disregards meritocracy and will give rise to reverse discrimination against the better-placed sections of...