When the Arizona Republic announced its support for the anti-affirmative action Proposition 107 last week, it declared in its opinion editorial headline: “Affirmative Action is No Longer Needed.” On Election Day, voters in Arizona will vote on Proposition 107, the so-called Arizona Civil Rights Initiative, which will amend Article II of the state constitution. The language of the initiative reads, in part:
“This state shall not discriminate against or grant preferential treatment to any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education or public contracting.”
This is a creature of Ward Connerly, the former University of California Regent who spearheaded Proposition 209 that ended affirmative action in that state. Similar anti-affirmative action initiatives were passed in Washington State, Michigan and Nebraska.
Ward Connerly and his cohorts in Arizona need to think carefully about the unintended consequences of their initiative: it may harm men. With the declining number of men entering college and graduate programs, affirmative action may be needed for them in the future. In fact, men have benefited from affirmative action in higher education admissions for several years.
Women are the majority of students in colleges and universities and some professional schools both in the U.S. and Canada. Canada’s Globe and Mail reported that the chair of McMasters University Medical School responded to the percentage of women enrolled in the 2002 entering class (76.3 percent) by “rethinking” the admissions criteria. He found that the emphasis on grades and scores led to the overrepresentation of women at the medical school. In response, nonquantitative factors were added such as “community service.” As a result, the percentage of men enrolled “slightly” increased. In francophone Quebec, women are 70 percent of students in medical school.
