New research suggests that opponents of affirmative action are usually concerned about their own group’s well-being, and not because they’re racist.
“It may be that someone would support a policy that helps women, Blacks or Latinos, for example, but fears that an affirmative action policy might hurt his group,” says Dr. Brian S. Lowery, the co-author of a series of studies and an associate professor of organizational behavior at Stanford University’s business school.
The studies, recently published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, were conducted by Lowery; Dr. Miguel M. Unzueta from the University of California, Los Angeles; Dr. Eric D. Knowles from UC-Irvine; and Dr. Phillip Atiba Goff from Pennsylvania State University.
In one of the studies, White participants were presented with four affirmative action policies: hiring a minority, even if a White were more qualified; hiring a minority as a “tiebreaker” where two candidates were equally qualified; providing training to minority applicants to help them become better qualified, but not basing hires on race; and focusing on increasing minority applicants, but not basing hires on race.
Lowery found that the more Whites felt the policy helped minorities, the more they were willing to support it — but only when they thought it would not hurt members of their own group.
“It appears from these results that people can separate out the issues of helping minorities and hurting Whites, showing that racism isn’t always the issue,” says Lowery.
What’s missing, he says, is the recognition that, in some situations, one group’s disadvantage is another group’s advantage. Reducing unfair discrimination against Blacks will increase their representation and simultaneously reduce the representation of Whites.
