A brilliant model of affirmative action

In light of recent US Supreme Court decision on race-based admissions, the Indian model of reservations in both jobs and education holds valuable lessons

Last June, the US Supreme Court ruled, by a majority, that schools in the US cannot make race-based admissions. Many see it as a huge setback to the efforts to rectify historical wrongs through affirmative action for disadvantaged groups.

Some have interpreted the ruling to mean that the highest court in the US sees race-based affirmative action in educational institutions as a bad idea. Others feel vindicated in their belief that affirmative action in any sphere, including the workplace, is bad. Both interpretations are incorrect.

The Court did not go into the moral rights and wrongs of race-based affirmative action. It merely said that race-based affirmative action was unconstitutional, meaning the US Constitution has no provision for such affirmative action. The judgment penned by Chief Justice C J Roberts outlines the broad reasoning underlying the judgment. Both the wording of the US Constitution and the rulings of the Court over time, it appears, permit race as a factor in affirmative action in colleges only in a very limited way.

The Court’s ruling hinges on the Equal Protection Clause in the US Constitution. In the past, the Court has held that this Clause applies “without regard to any differences of race, of color, or of nationality”— it is “universal in [its] application”. In general, race-based affirmative action must be subject to a two-step examination. First, it must further “compelling governmental interests”. Second, it must be “narrowly tailored”, meaning it must serve only to further those interests and not any other purpose.

In the case of universities, the Court has allowed race-based admissions only to further one interest, namely, having a racially diverse student body. Colleges cannot have set quotas for any race. In the case of every applicant, the college must evaluate how exactly that individual’s admission would contribute to student diversity. Even such narrow affirmative action was later subject to the condition that race-based admissions must end at some point. 

The Court ruled that both the University of North Carolina and Harvard College failed these tests. They seem to have set unvarying quotas for race-based admissions. The quotas applied to particular races and not to others without any rationale being articulated for the same. Affirmative action had gone on for more than 20 years since the Court had urged a time limit. 

In principle, the US Congress could amend the Constitution to provide for race-based affirmative action to provide for quotas, as the Indian Constitution does. In today’s mood in the US, that would be quite a challenge though. There is, however, a more interesting question that is worth exploring. Can affirmative action for disadvantaged groups in educational institutions improve social outcomes?  Would that by itself lead to greater social mobility? Most people would say “yes”.

A fascinating book, The Son Also Rises, by an American economist, Gregory Clark, suggests that it is unlikely to. It puts forward the controversial thesis that social status is very substantially determined by one’s genes — nature tends to prevail over nurture. It’s not possible here to do justice to Dr Clark’s thesis. One can at best mention a few crucial points that he makes.

Dr Clark estimates that social mobility across societies has been historically low and continues to be so. These include the United States, the vaunted land of opportunity. Mobility in societies can be measured by using the intergenerational correlation in social status. A correlation of zero means social mobility is high —children can do much better than their parents. A correlation of one means social mobility is absent — parents’ status is everything. Dr Clark estimates the correlation in social status to be as high as 0.75 across a range of societies. An individual’s social status can be substantially predicted knowing the status of his parents.

This is hard to swallow because it goes against the belief that anyone can rise to the top, given sheer hard work, education, nutrition, etc. A good society is one where all are given a shot at success by being provided the necessary educational opportunities and the like. Alas, the evidence on this count is disappointing. The Nordic countries are much better than the US when it comes to providing public goods such as education and health. However, social mobility is not any higher in the Nordic countries.

Dr Clark shows that although social mobility is low, those lower down the social order do tend to catch up over time. But the pace is excruciatingly slow, around 300 years. If we accept that a humane and cohesive society is one where disadvantaged groups do not stay that way for generations, the public policy issue is: What exactly do we do? One answer is redistribution through high levels of progressive taxation as in the Nordic countries. But few others have managed such redistribution. Higher minimum wages could help but that is anathema to the free market champions.

An alternative could be the Indian model of affirmative action. The Indian Constitution initially provided for caste-based quotas for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, and it was later amended to include class-based quotas for Other Backward Classes and Economically Weaker Sections. These quotas apply only to government institutions.

If we want representation at the high table for all social groups, there is no alternative to job reservation. That obviously means reservations in education as well, as individuals have to be equipped for jobs in the first instance. Reservations in education follow reservations in jobs, they may not lead on to superior jobs automatically. The Indian model of affirmative action looks brilliant in light of Dr Clark’s findings.  We have quotas in education as well as in jobs. Since social mobility is low, the decision not to set an end point for reservations is sensible. It appears that the framers of our Constitution understood intuitively that upward mobility for disadvantaged groups would not happen so easily.

America’s affirmative action is much weaker in comparison to ours. Affirmative action in education has been weak (and will become even weaker now) and affirmative action in jobs is even poorer still. The big question that will remain in India is whether reservations in government jobs are enough to provide for the necessary diversity or whether we will need to extend reservations to the private sector.

ttrammohan28@gmail.com