In 1961, President John F. Kennedy issued an executive order calling for affirmative action to end discrimination, the first effort of its kind. In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson issued an executive order requiring affirmative action by federal contractors to address disparities in employment based on race, religion, or national origin. In 1968, the order was expanded to include women. (In what follows, I consider only race.)
In the summer of 1963, in a back porch discussion about affirmative action, both Dr. Kenneth Clement, a distinguished Black doctor, and my mother, a mental health worker, supported the idea. I demurred without having to explain that I was no racist; they knew that I was not. I had three objections. One, affirmative action discriminates on the very basis that it proposes to remedy discrimination, namely, race. Two, it is a zero-sum solution; whatever action is affirmative for Blacks is negative for Whites. Three, it would be perceived as unfair and create or increase racial resentment and conflict. Both objected to my alternative: appropriate race-neutral, merit-based or means-based allocation of benefits. Sixty years later, the balance of gain and loss has still not been reckoned. It has possibly enabled the growth of the Black middle class; it has certainly enabled the growth of the racist “base” since 1964, with GOP opposition to most civil rights legislation and its support for the “silent majority” and Trump’s MAGA base.
I was reminded of this discussion when I read Yascha Mounk’s The Identity Trap: A Story of Ideas and Power in Our Time (Penguin Press, 2023). Mounk bases his analysis on traditional liberal universalist assumptions about individual freedoms, political and legal equality, collective self-determination (aka, democracy), among others. He opposes separatism, even if voluntary, by race, sex, gender orientation, religion, and national origin because it promotes in-group versus out-group conflict contrary to the need for respect, empathy, and shared commitments in a democratic society. My views, precisely.
Language often changes though the underlying phenomenon does not or very little. Just as “political correctness” has gone out of fashion, to be replaced by cognates of “woke,” so “affirmative action,” though still in use, has also gone out of fashion, to be eclipsed by “identity politics.” Mounk does not relate identity politics to affirmative action but analyzes the former in ways suitable to the latter. I relate them because both respond to the reality of racial discrimination and its persistent, pernicious effects. They are different in their approaches to discrimination. Affirmative action aims to eliminate discrimination and integrate disadvantaged groups by stressing housing, employment, and education; identity politics, despairing of achieving these goals, supports groups by encouraging self-separated independence from other groups, self-esteem of individuals, and group appreciation of their culture. They are similar in using the political power of identity groups as leverage for distributing social assets to disadvantaged groups to compensate for the effects of discrimination.
We have been here before. Identity politics is a latter-day and all-embracing version of earlier efforts to make membership in minority groups the basis of individual self-respect and group worth. The focus then was, and the emphasis now is, on Blacks. The thrust remains to bring Blacks together, to enable Blacks to isolate themselves from Whites as isolation seems necessary, to celebrate their blackness (“Black Is Beautiful”) and to assert their strength (“Black Power”). The goal of celebrating has been to support the idea of deserving social assets, and the goal of asserting strength has been to seek compensatory distribution of social assets.
Since we have been here before, it makes sense to ask if prospects for change are any better. I have my doubts. For, as a separatist version of affirmative action, identity politics copies past deficiencies and creates new ones. One deficiency is the resurrection of the discredited “separate but equal” doctrine which long justified discrimination, effected segregation, and enabled the unequal distribution of social assets to Blacks.
Another deficiency is the possibly equal applicability of the principle of identity politics to all groups, with the resulting political instability of group-based policies or programs for the distribution of social assets. Political parties favor different constituencies over others and often base decisions on which constituency benefits from the distribution of social assets. Because political power shifts from one party to the other, policies or programs compensating Blacks for the effects of discrimination can be weakened or terminated; they could even be reversed to compensate Whites whose social assets have been reduced by the compensation for Blacks. If current policies and programs supported by the Progressive Left were reversed by the MAGA Right, the Progressive Left would have no principled objection to shifting priorities.
Ultimately, any productive debate would return to the issues involved: among others, availability of housing, fairness in employment, and access to quality education—issues which involve most or all groups. Focusing only on race and racial discrimination makes it hard to recognize that other groups also suffer from poor housing, unfair employment, and poor schools. The reason for suffering is no entitlement; the suffering itself is, or should be, sufficient reason for a reformed distribution of social benefits.
Conceptually, both the Progressive Left and the MAGA Right share the principle of distinguishing among people on the basis of their membership in groups defined by race, sex, gender orientation, religion, national origin, etc. Progressives favor non-Whites in programs for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI); the MAGA base favors Whites and opposes wokeness and DEI. Both political factions incline to bigotry. Both are antisemitic, Progressives on elite campuses, the MAGA base in Charlottesville, VA.
Practically, the Progressive Left and the MAGA Right share some tactics to advance their objectives. One instance: both try to limit free speech or free press to approved content. The Progressive Left, notably on the campuses, is known for a “cancel culture,” whereby speakers of unfashionable or unpopular ideas are not invited or are disinvited, or are heckled; professors or students expressing such ideas in class or in publications are harassed; speech codes are imposed; “safe spaces” are established, and alleged offenders of group-identity standards of acceptable speech or conduct are denied due process in pseudo-judicial hearings. The MAGA Right is equally known for a “cancel culture” of its own, in its efforts to ban books from school or public libraries, to revise curriculums to serve its political ideologies, and to regulate what teachers can discuss, sometimes even in their off-duty communications.
Such parallels point to similar motivations and dispositions. Both the Progressive Left and the MAGA Right seek to impose standards of speech and conduct according to their political ideologies; they do not tolerate dissent or permit discussions of these standards. Both demand a purity of allegiance and conformity in dogma in all particulars. Both regard or define those who disagree with them as variously ignorant or immoral, even evil. The result is personal antagonisms within both camps and between them, which antagonisms make reasonable discussion of basic policy issues difficult, if not impossible.
In today’s political climate, hard-core Progressives and die-hard MAGAs are unlikely to moderate their stances. Extremists on both the Progressive Left and the MAGA Right will continue to place paramount value on group identity based on biological or birthright conditions. Meanwhile, Liberal moderates of the center-left and center-right need to transcend these innate or inherited factors to unite to preserve democratic principles and values. As centrists, they should promote the common humanity and respect the individuality of each of us. The best that can be hoped for is that reasonable, resolute moderates in the middle, people who are aware of the dangers of identity politics and support America’s constitutional democracy suited to a pluralistic society, will have their chance in 2024.
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