“What is affirmative action? Substantiate theoretical positions on affirmative actions with examples.” (2019)
Affirmative action means deliberate public measures, such as quotas, reserved seats, preferences or targeted outreach, that give historically excluded groups a better share of education, jobs and political office. It moves from formal equality of opportunity towards substantive equality. Its best-known forms are India’s constitutional reservations and race-conscious admissions in the United States.
Theoretical positions
- Compensatory justice: groups that suffered historical wrongs deserve redress. B. R. Ambedkar argued that centuries of caste exclusion made “equal treatment of unequals” unjust. Hence Articles 15(4), 16(4) and 330–332 for SCs and STs.
- Liberal egalitarianism: John Rawls (A Theory of Justice, 1971) held that social institutions should correct undeserved inequalities of birth. Ronald Dworkin (Taking Rights Seriously, 1977) defended preferential admissions as serving a legitimate social goal without violating anyone’s right to equal concern.
- Structural and Weberian view: Frank Parkin’s “usurpationary closure” treats reservations as a way for excluded groups to break the social closure that dominant groups maintain over credentials and offices.
- Meritocratic–functionalist critique: the Kingsley Davis–Wilbert Moore logic ties rewards to talent. On this view quotas misallocate positions. Thomas Sowell (Affirmative Action Around the World, 2004) found that benefits often go to the better-off within target groups.
- Group versus individual rights: André Béteille warned that caste-based quotas may entrench caste identity and damage institutions. Marc Galanter (Competing Equalities, 1984) showed that India balances formal equality against compensatory preference.
- Class-based and Marxist view: caste quotas benefit a small elite and leave the labouring poor untouched. This argument favours economic criteria.
Examples: how courts have settled these positions
| Case | Position vindicated |
|---|---|
| Indra Sawhney (1992): OBC quota upheld with a 50% cap and creamy-layer exclusion | Compensatory justice limited by merit and targeting |
| Janhit Abhiyan (7 November 2022, 3:2): 10% EWS quota (103rd Amendment) upheld | Economic criterion added alongside caste |
| State of Punjab v. Davinder Singh (1 August 2024, 6:1): states may sub-classify SCs, overruling E. V. Chinnaiah (2004) | Benefits must reach the least advantaged within groups |
| SFFA v. Harvard/UNC (29 June 2023): race-conscious admissions struck down | “Colour-blind” individualism over group redress |
The 106th Amendment (2023) reserving one-third of Lok Sabha and Assembly seats for women, effective after the next delimitation, extends the logic to gender.
Conclusion
The theories disagree less about the goal of a society open to talent than about the unit of justice: group, class or individual. India’s trajectory from caste, to caste plus class (EWS), to intra-group targeting (sub-classification) suggests a pragmatic synthesis. The US, by contrast, has retreated to individualism.