Left–right political spectrum

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The left–right political spectrum is a system of classifying political positions, ideologies and parties, from equality on the left to social hierarchy on the right. Left-wing politics and right-wing politics are often presented as opposed, although a particular individual or group may take a left-wing stance on one matter and a right-wing stance on another; and some stances may overlap and be considered either left- or right-wing depending on the ideology. In France, where the terms originated, the Left has been called 'the party of movement' and the Right 'the party of order'. The intermediate stance is called centrism and a person with such a position is a moderate or centrist.

History of the terms

The terms "left" and "right" appeared during the French Revolution of 1789 when members of the National Assembly divided into supporters of the king to the president's right and supporters of the revolution to his left. One deputy, the Baron de Gauville, explained: "We began to recognize each other: those who were loyal to religion and the king took up positions to the right of the chair so as to avoid the shouts, oaths, and indecencies that enjoyed free rein in the opposing camp". However, the Right opposed the seating arrangement because they believed that deputies should support private or general interests but should not form factions or political parties. The contemporary press occasionally used the terms "left" and "right" to refer to the opposing sides.

When the National Assembly was replaced in 1791 by a Legislative Assembly comprising entirely new members, the divisions continued. "Innovators" sat on the left, "moderates" gathered in the centre, while the "conscientious defenders of the constitution" found themselves sitting on the right, where the defenders of the Ancien Régime had previously gathered. When the succeeding National Convention met in 1792, the seating arrangement continued, but following the coup d'état of 2 June 1793 and the arrest of the Girondins the right side of the assembly was deserted and any remaining members who had sat there moved to the centre. However, following the Thermidorian Reaction of 1794 the members of the far-left were excluded and the method of seating was abolished. The new constitution included rules for the assembly that would "break up the party groups". However, following the Restoration in 1814–1815 political clubs were again formed. The majority ultraroyalists chose to sit on the right. The "constitutionals" sat in the centre while independents sat on the left. The terms extreme right and extreme left as well as centre-right and centre-left came to be used to describe the nuances of ideology of different sections of the assembly.

The terms "left" and "right" were not used to refer to political ideology per se, but only to seating in the legislature. After 1848, the main opposing camps were the "democratic socialists" and the "reactionaries" who used red and white flags to identify their party affiliation. With the establishment of the Third Republic in 1871, the terms were adopted by political parties: the Republican Left, the Centre Right and the Centre Left (1871) and the Extreme Left (1876) and Radical Left (1881). The beliefs of the group called the Radical Left were actually closer to the Centre Left than the beliefs of those called the Extreme Left. Beginning in the early twentieth century, the terms "left" and "right" came to be associated with specific political ideologies and were used to describe citizens' political beliefs, gradually replacing the terms "reds" and "the reaction". Those on the Left often called themselves "republicans", while those on the Right often called themselves "conservatives". The words Left and Right were at first used by their opponents as slurs. 

By 1914, the Left half of the legislature in France was composed of Unified Socialists, Republican Socialists and Socialist Radicals, while the parties that were called "Left" now sat on the right side. The use of the words Left and Right spread from France to other countries and came to be applied to a large number of political parties worldwide, which often differed in their political beliefs. There was asymmetry in the use of the terms Left and Right by the opposing sides. The Right mostly denied that the left–right spectrum was meaningful because they saw it as artificial and damaging to unity. However, the Left, seeking to change society, promoted the distinction. As Alain observed in 1931: "When people ask me if the division between parties of the Right and parties of the Left, men of the Right and men of the Left, still makes sense, the first thing that comes to mind is that the person asking the question is certainly not a man of the Left". In British politics, the terms "right" and "left" came into common use for the first time in the late 1930s in debates over the Spanish Civil War. The Scottish sociologist Robert M. MacIver noted in The Web of Government (1947):

The right is always the party sector associated with the interests of the upper or dominant classes, the left the sector expressive of the lower economic or social classes, and the centre that of the middle classes. Historically this criterion seems acceptable. The conservative right has defended entrenched prerogatives, privileges and powers; the left has attacked them. The right has been more favorable to the aristocratic position, to the hierarchy of birth or of wealth; the left has fought for the equalization of advantage or of opportunity, for the claims of the less advantaged. Defence and attack have met, under democratic conditions, not in the name of class but in the name of principle; but the opposing principles have broadly corresponded to the interests of the different classes.

Ideological groupings across the spectrum

Generally, the left-wing is characterized by an emphasis on 'ideas such as freedom, equality, fraternity, rights, progress, reform and internationalism', while the right-wing is characterized by an emphasis on 'notions such as authority, hierarchy, order, duty, tradition, reaction and nationalism'.

Political scientists and other analysts regard the left as including anarchists, communists, socialists, democratic socialists, social democrats, left-libertarians, progressives and social liberals. Movements for racial equality and trade unionism have also been associated with the left.

Political scientists and other analysts regard the Right as including Christian democrats, conservatives, right-libertarians, neoconservatives, imperialists, monarchists, fascists, reactionaries and traditionalists. 

A number of significant political movements—including feminism and regionalism—do not fit precisely into the left-right spectrum. Though nationalism is often regarded as a right-wing doctrine, many nationalists favor egalitarian distributions of resources. There are also "liberal nationalists". Populism is regarded as having both left-wing and right-wing manifestations (see left-wing populism and right-wing populism). Green politics is often regarded as a movement of the left, but in some ways the green movement is difficult to definitively categorize as left or right.

Political parties in the political spectrum

Seating in the 2009 European Parliament
     European United Left–Nordic Green Left (35)
     Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats (184)
     European Greens–European Free Alliance (55)
     Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (84)
     European People's Party (265)
     European Conservatives and Reformists (54)
     Europe of Freedom and Democracy (32)
     Non-Inscrits (27)

Political scientists have observed that the ideologies of political parties can be mapped along a single left–right axis. Klaus von Beyme categorized European parties into nine families, which described most parties. Beyme was able to arrange seven of them from left to right: communist, socialist, green, liberal, Christian democratic, conservative and right-wing extremist. The position of agrarian and regional/ethnic parties varied. A study conducted in the late 1980s on two bases, positions on ownership of the means of production and positions on social issues, confirmed this arrangement.

There has been a tendency for party ideologies to persist and values and views that were present at a party's founding have survived. However, they have also adapted for pragmatic reasons, making them appear more similar. Seymour Martin Lipset and Stein Rokkan observed that modern party systems are the product of social conflicts played out in the last few centuries. They said that lines of cleavage had become "frozen".

The first modern political parties were liberals, organized by the middle class in the 19th century to protect them against the aristocracy. They were major political parties in that century, but declined in the twentieth century as first the working class came to support socialist parties and economic and social change eroded their middle class base. Conservative parties arose in opposition to liberals in order to defend aristocratic privilege, but in order to attract voters they became less doctrinaire than liberals. However, they were unsuccessful in most countries and generally have been able to achieve power only through cooperation with other parties.

Socialist parties were organized in order to achieve political rights for workers and were originally allied with liberals. However, they broke with the liberals when they sought worker control of the means of production. Christian democratic parties were organized by Catholics who saw liberalism as a threat to traditional values. Although established in the 19th century, they became a major political force following the Second World War. Communist parties emerged following a division within socialism first on support of the First World War and then support of the Bolshevik Revolution.

Right-wing extremist parties are harder to define other than being more right-wing than other parties, but include fascists and some extreme conservative and nationalist parties.

Green parties were the most recent of the major party groups to develop. They have mostly rejected socialism and are very liberal on social issues.

These categories can be applied to many parties outside Europe. Ware (1996) asserted that in the United States both major parties were liberal, even though there are left–right policy differences between them.

Usage in Western Europe

In the 2001 book The Government and Politics of France, Andrew Knapp and Vincent Wright say that the main factor dividing the left and right wings in Western Europe is class. The left seeks social justice through redistributive social and economic policies, while the Right defends private property and capitalism. The nature of the conflict depends on existing social and political cleavages and on the level of economic development. Left-wing values include the belief in the power of human reason to achieve progress for the benefit of the human race, secularism, sovereignty exercised through the legislature, social justice and mistrust of strong personal political leadership. To the right, this is regularly seen as anti-clericalism, unrealistic social reform, doctrinaire socialism and class hatred. The Right are skeptical about the capacity for radical reforms to achieve human well-being while maintaining workplace competition. They believe in the established church both in itself and as an instrument of social cohesion, and they believe in the need for strong political leadership to minimize social and political divisions. To the Left, this is seen as a selfish and reactionary opposition to social justice, a wish to impose doctrinaire religion on the population and a tendency to authoritarianism and repression.

The differences between left and right have altered over time. The initial cleavage at the time of the French Revolution was between supporters of absolute monarchy (the Right) and those who wished to limit the king's authority (the Left). During the 19th century, the cleavage was between monarchists and republicans. Following the establishment of the Third Republic in 1871, the cleavage was between supporters of a strong executive on the Right and supporters of the primacy of the legislature on the Left.

Contemporary usage in the United States

The terms left-wing and right-wing are widely used in the United States, but as on the global level there is no firm consensus about their meaning. The only aspect that is generally agreed upon is that they are the defining opposites of the United States political spectrum. Left and right in the U.S. are generally associated with liberal and conservative respectively, although the meanings of the two sets of terms do not entirely coincide. Depending on the political affiliation of the individual using them, these terms can be spoken with varying implications. A 2005 poll of 2,209 American adults showed that "respondents generally viewed the paired concepts liberals and left-wingers and conservatives and right-wingers as possessing, respectively, generally similar political beliefs", but also showed that around ten percent fewer respondents understood the terms left and right than understood the terms liberal and conservative.

The contemporary left in the United States is usually understood as a category that includes New Deal social-liberals (in contrast to traditions of social democracy more common to Western Europe), Rawlsian liberals and civil libertarians, who are often identified with the Democratic Party. There are also leftists who reject many of the platforms of the Democratic Party in favor of more socialist policies. In general, the term left-wing is understood to imply a commitment to egalitarianism, support for social policies that appeal to the working class and multiculturalism. The contemporary center-left usually defines itself as promoting government regulation of business, commerce and industry; protection of fundamental rights such as freedom of speech and freedom of religion (separation of church and state); and government intervention on behalf of racial, ethnic and sexual minorities and the working class.

Relevance of the terms today

Some political scientists have suggested that the classifications of "left" and "right" are no longer meaningful in the modern complex world. Although these terms continue to be used, they advocate a more complex spectrum that attempts to combine political, economic and social dimensions.

A survey conducted between 1983 and 1994 by Bob Altemeyer of Canadian legislative caucuses showed an 82% correlation between party affiliation and score on a scale for right-wing authoritarianism when comparing right-wing and social democratic caucuses. There was a wide gap between the scores of the two groups, which was filled by liberal caucuses. His survey of American legislative caucuses showed scores by American Republicans and Democrats were similar to the Canadian Right and liberals, with a 44% correlation between party affiliation and score.

Norberto Bobbio saw the polarization of the Italian Chamber of Deputies in the 1990s as evidence that the linear left–right axis remained valid. Bobbio thought that the argument that the spectrum had disappeared occurred when either the Left or Right were weak. The dominant side would claim that its ideology was the only possible one, while the weaker side would minimize its differences. He saw the Left and Right not in absolute terms, but as relative concepts that would vary over time. In his view, the left–right axis could be applied to any time period.

Libertarian writer David Boaz argued that terms left and right are used to spin a particular point of view rather than as simple descriptors, with those on the "left" typically emphasizing their support for working people and accusing the right of supporting the interests of the upper class; and those on the "right" usually emphasizing their support for individualism and accusing the Left of supporting collectivism. Boaz asserts that arguments about the way the words should be used often displaces arguments about policy by raising emotional prejudice against a preconceived notion of what the terms mean.

In 2006, British Prime Minister Tony Blair described the main cleavage in politics as not left versus right, but open versus closed. In this model, attitudes towards social issues and globalism are more important than the conventional economic left–right issues: "open" voters tend to be socially liberal, multicultural and in favour of globalism, while "closed" voters are culturally conservative, opposed to immigration and in favour of protectionism. This model has seen increased support following the rise of populist and centrist parties in the 2010s.

Neo-nationalism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Neo-nationalism or new nationalism is a type of nationalism that rose in the mid-2010s in Europe and North America and to some degree in other regions. It is associated with several positions, such as right-wing populism, anti-globalization, nativism, protectionism, opposition to immigration, opposition to Islam and Muslims and Euroscepticism where applicable. According to one scholar, "nationalist resistance to global liberalism turned out to be the most influential force in Western politics" in 2016. Particularly notable expressions of new nationalism include the United Kingdom's EU membership referendum and the election of Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States.

Overview and characteristics

Writing for Politico, Michael Hirsh described new nationalism as "a bitter populist rejection of the status quo that global elites have imposed on the international system since the Cold War ended, and which lower-income voters have decided—understandably—is unfair." Michael Brendan Dougherty wrote in The Week that new nationalism is a "broad nativist revolt" against post-Cold War politics long "characterized by an orthodoxy of free trade, nurturing the service economy, neoliberal trading arrangements, and liberalized immigration policies."

The Economist wrote in November 2016 that "new nationalists are riding high on promises to close borders and restore societies to a past homogeneity." Clarence Page wrote in the Las Vegas Sun that "a new neo-tribal nationalism has boiled up in European politics and to a lesser degree in the United States since the global economic meltdown of 2008," and Ryan Cooper in The Week and researchers with the Centre for Economic Policy Research have linked 21st-century right-wing populism to the Great Recession. According to Harvard political theorist Yascha Mounk, "economic stagnation among lower- and middle-class whites [has been] a main driver for nationalism's rise around the globe." According to religion scholar Mark L. Movesian, new nationalism "sets the nation-state against supranational, liberal regimes like the EU or NAFTA, and local customs and traditions, including religious traditions, against alien, outside trends."

David Brog and Yoram Hazony wrote in National Review that some conservatives view the new nationalism associated with Brexit and Donald Trump as a betrayal of conservative ideology while they see it as a "return". According to conservative commentator Jonah Goldberg, the nationalism associated with Trump is "really little more than a brand name for generic white identity politics."

Writing for The Week, Damon Linker called the idea of neo-nationalism being racist "nonsense" and went on to say that "the tendency of progressives to describe it as nothing but 'racism, Islamophobia, and xenophobia'—is the desire to delegitimize any particularistic attachment or form of solidarity, be it national, linguistic, religious, territorial, or ethnic."

Regarding new nationalism, The Economist said that "Mr Trump needs to realise that his policies will unfold in the context of other countries’ jealous nationalism," and called nationalism itself a "slippery concept" that is "easy to manipulate". They also repeatedly contrasted ethnic nationalism and civic nationalism and implied new nationalism could become "angry" and difficult to control, citing Chinese nationalism as an example.

The new nationalism is closely connected to the rise of populism. A study by Yascha Mounk and Jordan Kyle of 46 populist leaders or parties which have been in power in 33 countries between 1990 and 2018 found that:

• populist governments manage to stay in power longer than non-populist governments: an average of 6 1/2 years versus 3 years;
• only a small minority" of populist governments leave power by the ordinary processes of the country involved, as opposed to impeachment or being forced to resign;
• half of all populist governments altered the country's constitution to make it easier for them to stay in power, for instance by removing term limits for the head of government;
• populist governments were responsible for "democratic backsliding", including a 7% decrease in freedom of the press, an 8% decline in civil liberties protection, and a 12% decrease in political rights;
• 5 of the 13 right-wing populist governments elected since 1990 brought about such backsliding, while 5 of the 15 left-wing populist governments did, effectively disproving the theory that the answer to right-wing populist government is left-wing populist government;
• of the 17 populist governments which came to power since 1990 which cannot easily be labelled as right-wing or left-wing, 5 brought about democratic backsliding, suggesting that populism itself, and not the ideology its connected to, is responsible for the observed effect;
• 40% of the heads of populist governments were indicted for corruption, despite their efforts to impede the investigations;
• on average, populist governments caused their countries to drop five places on the Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index.

Many of the countries in the study had relatively recently transitioned to democracy from authoritarian forms of government, so the results of the study may not necessarily apply to countries such as the United States with a long history of democratic government.

Associated politicians, parties and events

Brazil

The President of Brazil Jair Bolsonaro of the country's Social Liberal Party has been described as a leading new nationalist.

China

China's paramount leader Xi Jinping's (assumed office in 2012) concept of "Chinese Dream" has been described as an expression of new nationalism. His form of nationalism stresses pride in the historic Chinese civilisation, embracing the teachings of Confucius and other ancient Chinese sages, and thus rejecting the anti-Confucius campaign of Mao Zedong.

Egypt

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi (assumed office in 2014), has been described as a new nationalist.

Hong Kong

The Hong Kong nationalism evolved from the localist movement in Hong Kong stresses the distinct Hong Kong identity as opposed to Chinese national identity promoted by the Beijing government and its growing encroachment on the city's management of its own political, economic and social affairs. The localist rhetorics, often mix with the nation's right to self-determination as well as anti-immigration stances against mainland immigrants and tourists, preserving local identity and culture similar to the Western new nationalism.

Hungary

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán (assumed office in 2010), the leader of the ruling Fidesz party, has been described as a new nationalist.

India

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi (assumed office in 2014) and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have been referred to as new nationalist. Modi is a member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a right-wing paramilitary organisation aligned with the BJP, which has also been said to advocate a new nationalist ideology.

Yogi Adityanath, Chief Minister of the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh (assumed office in 2017), has also been identified as a new nationalist. He has been touted as a future Prime Minister of the country.

Israel

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (assumed office in 2009), the leader of the Likud party, has been described both as promoting new nationalism, and as pursuing a foreign policy of close ties with other new nationalist leaders, including Trump, Orbán, Salvini, Putin, Modi, Bolsonaro, Duterte and Sisi.

Domestically, Netanyahu has forged a political alliance with the nationalist Union of Right-Wing Parties.

Italy

Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte (assumed office in 2018), head of the populist coalition Government of Change, and in particular Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister and the League's leader Matteo Salvini, were often described as new nationalists. Salvini has been described by some media outlets as the most powerful politician in the country, and a "de facto prime minister".

Giorgia Meloni, the leader of Brothers of Italy, a party supporting the government on a case-by-case basis, has also been described as a new nationalist.

Japan

The 63rd and current Prime Minister Shinzō Abe (assumed office in 2012), a member of the right-wing organisation Nippon Kaigi, has promoted ideas of new nationalism, as does the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan, which he leads.

Mexico

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (assumed office in 2018) has been described as Neo-nationalist and often dubbed as "Mexican Donald Trump" by the media.

Philippines

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte (assumed office in 2016) has been described as a new nationalist.

Poland

The sixth and current President of Poland Andrzej Duda (assumed office in August 2015) is regularly cited as being a leading figure in the new nationalist movement within Poland. Furthermore, the ruling Law and Justice party, led by Jarosław Kaczyński, promoted nationalist views to win an outright majority in the national elections of 2015 (a feat never before accomplished). Despite not holding a government office, Kaczyński has been described as the figure who makes the "final call" on all major political issues in Poland.

Russia

President of Russia Vladimir Putin (second President of Russia from 2000 to 2008 and fourth President of Russia from 2012) has been labelled a new nationalist. Putin has been described by Hirsh as "the harbinger of this new global nationalism". Charles Clover, the Moscow bureau chief of the Financial Times from 2008 to 2013, wrote a book in 2016 titled Black Wind, White Snow: The Rise of Russia's New Nationalism. Russian nationalist thinker Aleksandr Dugin in particular has had influence over the Kremlin, serving as a adviser to key members of the ruling United Russia party, including now-SVR Director Sergey Naryshkin.

Russia has been accused of supporting new nationalist movements across Europe and in the United States.

Saudi Arabia

The Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohammad bin Salman (assumed office in 2017), has been described by Kristin Diwan of The Arab Gulf States Institute as being attached to a "strong new nationalism". The "new Saudi nationalism" has been used to bolster support for the Kingdom's economic and foreign policies, and represents a shift away from the Kingdom's earlier dependence on religion for legitimacy. Many of the country's foreign policy actions from 2017 onwards, such as its blockade of Qatar and its diplomatic dispute with Canada have been described as motivated by this nationalism. The policies of Mohammad bin Salman's administration have been heavily influenced by his adviser Saud al-Qahtani, who has been described as a "nationalist ideologue" and whose role has been compared to that formerly of Steve Bannon.

Turkey

In 2014, Mustafa Akyol wrote of a new "brand of Turkish neonationalism" promoted by Justice and Development Party (AKP), the country's ruling party, the leader of which is President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (assumed office in 2014). The Turkish "new nationalism" replaces the secular character of traditional forms of Turkish nationalism with an "assertively Muslim" identity.

Devlet Bahçeli, the leader of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), has been described as creating a "new nationalist front" by forming the People's Alliance with Erdoğan's AKP in 2018. The MHP is affiliated with the Grey Wolves paramilitary organisation, which Erdoğan has also expressed support for.

United Arab Emirates

The United Arab Emirates, under the leadership of Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi Mohammed bin Zayed (assumed office in 2004), has been described as propagating a "new Arab nationalism", which replaces the older, leftist form of the Arab nationalist ideology with a more conservative form, through its strong support for the rise of the respective new leaders of Egypt and Saudi Arabia, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and Prince Mohammad bin Salman, as a means of countering Iranian and Turkish influence in the Arab states.

United Kingdom

The 23 June 2016 referendum in the United Kingdom to leave the European Union ("Brexit") has been described as a milestone of new nationalism. Owen Matthews noted similarities in motives for support of the Brexit movement and Trump. He wrote in Newsweek that supporters of both are motivated by "a yearning to control immigration, reverse globalization and restore national greatness by disengaging from the wide, threatening world".

Matt O'Brien wrote of the Brexit as "the most shocking success for the new nationalism sweeping the Western world". Leaders of the Brexit campaign, such as Nigel Farage, the former leader of the eurosceptic UK Independence Party (now of the Brexit Party); former London Mayor Boris Johnson; Vote Leave Co-Convenor Michael Gove; former Brexit Secretary David Davis; and European Research Group chairman Jacob Rees-Mogg, have been called "new nationalists".

United States

Donald Trump's rise to the Republican candidacy was widely described as a sign of growing new nationalism in the United States. A Chicago Sun-Times editorial on the day of the inauguration of Donald Trump called him "our new nationalist president". The appointment of Steve Bannon, the executive of Breitbart News (associated with the alt-right), as White House Chief Strategist, was described by one analyst as arousal of a "new world order, driven by patriotism and a fierce urge to look after your own, a neo-nationalism that endlessly smears Muslims and strives to turn back the clock on free trade and globalization, a world where military might counts for far more than diplomacy and compromise".

In the wake of Trump's election, U.S. Senator Marco Rubio has called for the Republican Party to embrace a "new nationalism" to oppose “economic elitism that has replaced a commitment to the dignity of work with a blind faith in financial markets and that views America simply as an economy instead of a nation."

Other countries

People

The following politicians have all been described in some way as being new nationalists:

Africa

• Hamid Chabat, former Mayor of Fez (2003–2015) and leader of the Moroccan Istiqlal Party
• Uhuru Kenyatta, President of Kenya (assumed office in 2013) and leader of the Jubilee Party of Kenya
• Mmusi Maimane, Leader of the Opposition (South Africa) and party leader of Democratic Alliance
• Herman Mashaba, Mayor of Johannesburg (assumed office in 2016) and member of the Democratic Alliance

Americas

• Mario Abdo Benítez, President-elect of Paraguay (2018–) and candidate from the Colorado Party
• Fabricio Alvarado Muñoz, the candidate from the Costa Rican National Restoration Party in the 2018 presidential election
• Horacio Cartes, former President of Paraguay (2013–2018) and candidate from the Colorado Party
• Iván Duque Márquez, President of Colombia (assumed office in 2018) and candidate from the Democratic Center
• Juan Orlando Hernández, President of Honduras (assumed office in 2014) and candidate from the National Party of Honduras
• Andrés Chadwick, Interior Minister of Chile (2012–2014; 2018–) and member of the Independent Democratic Union
• José Antonio Kast, Member of the Chamber of Deputies of Chile (2002–2018), independent presidential candidate in the 2017 presidential election and leader of Republican Action
• François Legault, Premier of Quebec (assumed office in 2018) and leader of the Canadian Coalition Avenir Québec
• Kellie Leitch, MP and 2017 candidate for the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada
• Jimmy Morales, President of Guatemala (assumed office in 2016) and candidate from the National Convergence Front
• Kevin O'Leary, businessman and 2017 candidate for the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada

Asia-Pacific

• Tony Abbott, former Prime Minister of Australia (2013–2015) and former leader of the Liberal Party of Australia
• Khaltmaagiin Battulga, President of Mongolia (assumed office in 2017) and candidate of the Mongolian Democratic Party
• Prayut Chan-o-cha, Prime Minister of Thailand (assumed office in 2014) and prime ministerial candidate of the Phalang Pracharat Party in the 2019 general election
• Peter Dutton, Home Affairs Minister of Australia (assumed office in 2017) and member of the Liberal Party of Australia
• Park Geun-Hye, former President of South Korea (2013–2017) and former leader of the Saenuri Party
• Kim Jong-Un, Supreme Leader of North Korea (assumed office in 2011) and leader of the Workers' Party of Korea
• Imran Khan, Prime Minister of Pakistan (assumed office in 2018) and leader of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf
• Winston Peters, Deputy Prime Minister of New Zealand (assumed office in 2017) and leader of New Zealand First
• Najib Razak, former Prime Minister of Malaysia (2009–2018) and former leader of Barisan Nasional and the United Malays National Organisation
• Hun Sen, Prime Minister of Cambodia (assumed office in 1998) and leader of the Cambodian People's Party
• Prabowo Subianto, leader of the Great Indonesia Movement Party and candidate in the 2019 presidential election
• Abdulla Yameen, former President of the Maldives (2013–2018) and leader of the Progressive Party of Maldives

Europe

• Santiago Abascal, member of Basque Parliament (2004–2009) and leader of VOX (2014–)
• Andrej Babis, Prime Minister of the Czech Republic (assumed office in 2017) and leader of ANO 2011
• Boyko Borisov, Prime Minister of Bulgaria (assumed office in 2009) and leader of GERB
• Robert Fico, former Prime Minister of Slovakia (2012–2018) and leader of Direction-Social Democracy 
• Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović, President of Croatia (assumed office in 2015)
• Nikola Gruevski, former Prime Minister of Macedonia (2006–2016) and former leader of VMRO-DPMNE
• Norbert Hofer, Transport, Innovation and Technology Minister of Austria (assumed office in 2017) and the candidate from the Freedom Party of Austria in the 2016 presidential election, which he lost by 46.2% to 53.8%
• Janez Janša, former Prime Minister of Slovenia (2012–2013) and leader of the Slovenian Democratic Party
• Panos Kammenos, former Defence Minister of Greece (2015–2019) and leader of the Independent Greeks
• Krasimir Karakachanov, Defence Minister of Bulgaria (assumed office in 2017) and leader of IMRO – Bulgarian National Movement
• Sebastian Kurz, Chancellor of Austria (assumed office in 2017) and leader of the Austrian People's Party
• Marine Le Pen, former leader of the French National Front and candidate in the 2017 presidential election
• Tomio Okamura, leader of the Czech Freedom and Direct Democracy
• Victor Ponta, former Prime Minister of Romania (2012–2015) and former leader of the Social Democratic Party
• Inger Støjberg, Danish Minister for Immigration, Integration and Housing (assumed office in 2015)
• Heinz-Christian Strache, Vice Chancellor of Austria (assumed office in 2017) and leader of the Freedom Party of Austria
• Aleksandar Vučić, President of Serbia (assumed office in 2017) and leader of the Serbian Progressive Party
• Geert Wilders, leader of the Dutch Party for Freedom
• Miloš Zeman, President of the Czech Republic (assumed office in 2013)

Middle East

• Muqtada al-Sadr, leader of the Iraqi Sadrist Movement

Parties

The following parties have all been described in some way as being new nationalist parties:

Asia-Pacific

• One Nation, which holds the balance of power in the Australian Senate (since 2016)

Europe

• Alternative for Germany
• The Danish People's Party, which provides parliamentary support for the governing coalition in Denmark (since 2015)
• The Finns Party, a former member of the governing coalition in Finland (from 2015 until party split in 2017)
• The Dutch Forum for Democracy
• The National Alliance, a member of the governing coalition in Latvia (since 2016)
• The Slovak National Party, a member of the governing coalition in Slovakia (since 2016)
• The Sweden Democrats
• The Swiss People's Party, a member of the governing coalition in Switzerland (since 2003)
• The United Patriots, a member of the governing coalition in Bulgaria (since 2014)
• The Flemish Vlaams Belang

Affirmative action

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Affirmative action, also known as reservation in India and Nepal, positive discrimination / action in the United Kingdom, and employment equity (in a narrower context) in Canada and South Africa, is the policy of promoting the education and employment of members of groups that are known to have previously suffered from discrimination. Historically and internationally, support for affirmative action has sought to achieve goals such as bridging inequalities in employment and pay, increasing access to education, promoting diversity, and redressing apparent past wrongs, harms, or hindrances.

 

The nature of affirmative action policies varies from region to region. Some countries use a quota system, whereby a certain percentage of government jobs, political positions, and school vacancies must be reserved for members of a certain group; an example of this is the reservation system in India. In some other regions where quotas are not used, minority group members are given preference or special consideration in selection processes. In the United States, affirmative action in employment and education has been the subject of legal and political controversy; in 2003, a pair of decisions by the Supreme Court of the United States (Grutter v. Bollinger and Gratz v. Bollinger) permitted educational institutions to consider race as a factor when admitting students while prohibiting the use of quotas. In other countries, such as the UK, affirmative action is rendered illegal because it does not treat all races equally. This approach to equal treatment is described as being "color blind". In such countries, the focus tends to be on ensuring equal opportunity and, for example, targeted advertising campaigns to encourage ethnic minority candidates to join the police force. This is sometimes described as "positive action".

Origins

The term "affirmative action" was first used in the United States in "Executive Order No. 10925", signed by President John F. Kennedy on 6 March 1961, which included a provision that government contractors "take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin". It was used to promote actions that achieve non-discrimination. In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson issued Executive Order 11246 which required government employers to take "affirmative action" to "hire without regard to race, religion and national origin". This prevented employers from discriminating against members of disadvantaged groups. In 1967, gender was added to the anti-discrimination list.

Affirmative action is intended to promote the opportunities of defined minority groups within a society to give them equal access to that of the majority population.

It is often instituted for government and educational settings to ensure that certain designated "minority groups" within a society are able to participate in all provided opportunities including promotional, educational, and training opportunities.

The stated justification for affirmative action by its proponents is that it helps to compensate for past discrimination, persecution or exploitation by the ruling class of a culture, and to address existing discrimination.

Women

Several different studies investigated the effect of affirmative action on women. Kurtulus (2012) in her review of affirmative action and the occupational advancement of minorities and women during 1973-2003 showed that the effect of affirmative action on advancing black, Hispanic, and white women into management, professional, and technical occupations occurred primarily during the 1970s and early 1980s. During this period, contractors grew their shares of these groups more rapidly than noncontractors because of the implementation of affirmative action. But the positive effect of affirmative action vanished entirely in the late 1980s, which Kurtulus says may be due to the slowdown into advanced occupation for women and minorities because of the political shift of affirmative action that started by President Reagan. Becoming a federal contractor increased white women's share of professional occupations by 0.183 percentage points, or 7.3 percent, on average during these three decades, and increased black women's share by 0.052 percentage points (or by 3.9 percent). Becoming a federal contractor also increased Hispanic women's and black men's share of technical occupations on average by 0.058 percent and 0.109 percentage points respectively (or by 7.7 and 4.2 percent). These represent a substantial contribution of affirmative action to overall trends in the occupational advancement of women and minorities over the three decades under the study. A reanalysis of multiple scholarly studies, especially in Asia, considered the impact of four primary factors on support for affirmative action programs for women: gender; political factors; psychological factors; and social structure. Kim and Kim (2014) found that, "Affirmative action both corrects existing unfair treatment and gives women equal opportunity in the future."

Quotas

Law regarding quotas and affirmative action varies widely from nation to nation. Caste-based quotas are used in India for reservation. However, they are illegal in the United States, where no employer, university, or other entity may create a set number required for each race. 

In 2012, the European Union Commission approved a plan for women to constitute 40% of non-executive board directorships in large listed companies in Europe by 2020. In Sweden, the Supreme Court has ruled that "affirmative action" ethnic quotas in universities are discrimination and hence unlawful. It said that the requirements for the intake should be the same for all. The justice minister said that the decision left no room for uncertainty.

National approaches

In some countries that have laws on racial equality, affirmative action is rendered illegal because it does not treat all races equally. This approach of equal treatment is sometimes described as being "color blind", in hopes that it is effective against discrimination without engaging in reverse discrimination. 

In such countries, the focus tends to be on ensuring equal opportunity and, for example, targeted advertising campaigns to encourage ethnic minority candidates to join the police force. This is sometimes described as "positive action".

Africa

South Africa

Apartheid

The apartheid government, as a matter of state policy, favoured white-owned, especially Afrikaner-owned companies. The aforementioned policies achieved the desired results, but in the process they marginalised and excluded black people. Skilled jobs were also reserved for white people, and blacks were largely used as unskilled labour, enforced by legislation including the Mines and Works Act, the Job Reservations Act, the Native Building Workers Act, the Apprenticeship Act and the Bantu Education Act, creating and extending the "colour bar" in South African labour. Then the whites successfully persuaded the government to enact laws that highly restricted the blacks' employment opportunities. 

Since the 1960s the apartheid laws had been weakened. Consequently, from 1975 to 1990 the real wages of black manufacturing workers rose by 50%, while those of whites rose by 1%.

The economic and politically structured society during the apartheid ultimately caused disparities in employment, occupation and income within labour markets, which provided advantages to certain groups and characteristics of people. This in due course was the motivation to introduce affirmative action in South Africa, following the end of apartheid.

Post-apartheid – the Employment Equity Act

Following the transition to democracy in 1994, the African National Congress-led government chose to implement affirmative action legislation to correct previous imbalances (a policy known as employment equity). As such, all employers were compelled by law to employ previously disenfranchised groups (blacks, Indians, and Coloureds). A related, but distinct concept is Black Economic Empowerment.

The Employment Equity Act and the Broad Based Black Economic Empowerment Act aim to promote and achieve equality in the workplace (in South Africa termed "equity"), by advancing people from designated groups. The designated groups who are to be advanced include all people of colour, women (including white women) and people with disabilities (including white people). Employment Equity legislation requires companies employing more than 50 people to design and implement plans to improve the representativity of workforce demographics, and report them to the Department of Labour.

Employment Equity also forms part of a company's Black Economic Empowerment scorecard: in a relatively complex scoring system, which allows for some flexibility in the manner in which each company meets its legal commitments, each company is required to meet minimum requirements in terms of representation by previously disadvantaged groups. The matters covered include equity ownership, representation at employee and management level (up to board of director level), procurement from black-owned businesses and social investment programs, amongst others.

The policies of Employment Equity and, particularly, Black Economic empowerment have been criticised both by those who view them as discriminatory against white people, and by those who view them as ineffectual.

These laws cause disproportionally high costs for small companies and reduce economic growth and employment. The laws may give the black middle-class some advantage but can make the worse-off blacks even poorer. Moreover, the Supreme Court has ruled that in principle blacks may be favored, but in practice this should not lead to unfair discrimination against the others.

Affirmative Action Purpose

As mentioned previously affirmative action was introduced through the Employment Equality Act, 55 in 1998, 4 years after the end of apartheid. This act was passed to promote the constitutional right of equality and exercise true democracy. This idea was to eliminate unfair discrimination in employment, to ensure the implementation of employment equity to redress the effects of discrimination, to achieve a diverse workforce broadly representative of our people, to promote economic development and efficiency in the workforce and to give effects to the obligations of the Republic as a member of the International Labour Organisation.

Many embraced the Act; however some concluded that the act contradicted itself. The act eliminates unfair discrimination in certain sectors of the national labour market by imposing similar constraints on another.

With the introduction of Affirmative Action, Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) rose additionally in South Africa. The BEE was not a moral initiative to redress the wrongs of the past but to promote growth and strategies that aim to realize a country's full potential. The idea was targeting the weakest link in economics, which was inequality and which would help develop the economy. This is evident in the statement by the Department of Trade and Industry, "As such, this strategy stresses a BEE process that is associated with growth, development and enterprise development, and not merely the redistribution of existing wealth". Similarities between the BEE and affirmative action are apparent; however there is a difference. BEE focuses more on employment equality rather than taking wealth away from the skilled white labourers.

The main goal of Affirmative Action is for a country to reach its full potential. This occurrence would result in a completely diverse workforce in economic and social sectors. Thus broadening the economic base and therefore stimulating economic growth.

Outcomes

Once applied within the country, many different outcomes arose, some positive and some negative. This depended on the approach to and the view of The Employment Equality Act and affirmative action. 

Positive: Pre-Democracy, the apartheid governments discriminated against non-white races, so with affirmative action, the country started to redress past discriminations. Affirmative action also focused on combating structural racism and racial inequality, hoping to maximize diversity in all levels of society and sectors. Achieving this would elevate the status of the perpetual underclass and to restore equal access to the benefits of society.

Negative: Though affirmative action had its positives, negatives arose. A quota system was implemented, which aimed to achieve targets of diversity in a work force. This target affected the hiring and level of skill in the work force, ultimately affecting the free market. Affirmative action created marginalization for coloured and Indian races in South Africa, as well as developing and aiding the middle and elite classes, leaving the lower class behind. This created a bigger gap between the lower and middle class, which led to class struggles and a greater segregation. Entitlement began to arise with the growth of the middle and elite classes, as well as race entitlement. Many believe that affirmative action is discrimination in reverse. With all these negatives, much talent started to leave the country. Many negative consequences of affirmative action, specifically the quota system, drive skilled labour away, resulting in bad economic growth. This is due to very few international companies wanting to invest in South Africa.

With these negative and positive outcomes of affirmative action, it is evident that the concept of affirmative action is continually evolving.

Asia

China

There is affirmative action in education for minority nationalities. This may equate to lowering minimum requirements for the National University Entrance Examination, which is a mandatory exam for all students to enter university. Some universities set quotas for minority (non-Han) student intake. Further, minority students enrolled in ethnic minority-oriented specialties (e.g. language and literature programs) are provided with scholarships and/or pay no tuition, and are granted a monthly stipend.

Israel

A class-based affirmative action policy was incorporated into the admission practices of the four most selective universities in Israel during the early to mid-2000s. In evaluating the eligibility of applicants, neither their financial status nor their national or ethnic origins are considered. The emphasis, rather, is on structural disadvantages, especially neighborhood socioeconomic status and high school rigor, although several individual hardships are also weighed. This policy made the four institutions, especially the echelons at the most selective departments, more diverse than they otherwise would have been. The rise in geographic, economic and demographic diversity of a student population suggests that the plan's focus on structural determinants of disadvantage yields broad diversity dividends.

Israeli citizens who are; Women, Arabs, Blacks or people with disabilities are entitled to Affirmative Action in the civil service employment. Also Israeli citizens who are Arabs, Blacks or people with disabilities are entitled for Affirmative Actions are entitled for full University tuition scholarships by the state.

In her study of gender politics in Israel, Dafna Izraeli showed that the paradox of affirmative action for women directors is that the legitimation for legislating their inclusion on boards also resulted in the exclusion of women's interested as a legitimate issue on the boards' agendas. "The new culture of the men's club is seductive token women are under the pressure to become "social males" and prove that their competence as directors, meaning that they are not significantly different from men. In the negotiation for status as worthy peers, emphasizing gender signals that a woman is an "imposter", someone who does not rightfully belong in the position she is claiming to fill." And once affirmative action for women is fulfilled, and then affirmative action shares the element, as Izraeli put it, the "group equality discourse," making it easier for other groups to claim for a fairer distribution of resources. This suggests that affirmative action can have applications for different groups in Israel.

India

Reservation in India is a form of affirmative action designed to improve the well-being of backward and under-represented communities defined primarily by their caste. Reservation in India favors the majority of the population with more than 90% of Indian Citizens eligible for reservation benefits. 59.5% of all college admissions and government jobs are reserved for this 90% majority but they can also compete for the remaining 40.5% unreserved quota as well. Before the year of 2019 only 0.7% of scholarships disbursed by the government were given on the basis of merit, with over 94% of the scholarships given on basis of Reservation instead.

Malaysia

The Malaysian New Economic Policy or NEP serves as a form of affirmative action. Malaysia provides affirmative action to the majority because in general, the Malays have lower incomes than the Chinese, who have traditionally been involved in businesses and industries, but who were also general migrant workers. Malaysia is a multi-ethnic country, with Malays making up the majority of close to 52% of the population. About 23% of the population is of Chinese descent, while those of Indian descent comprise about 7% of the population. 

(See also Bumiputra) The mean income for Malays, Chinese and Indians in 1957/58 were 134, 288 and 228 respectively. In 1967/68 it was 154, 329 and 245, and in 1970 it was 170, 390 and 300. Mean income disparity ratio for Chinese/Malays rose from 2.1 in 1957/58 to 2.3 in 1970, whereas for Indians/Malays the disparity ratio also rose from 1.7 to 1.8 in the same period. The Malays viewed Independence as restoring their proper place in their own country's socioeconomic order while the non-Malays were opposing government efforts to advance Malay political primacy and economic welfare.

Sri Lanka

In 1981 the Standardization policy of Sri Lankan universities was introduced as an affirmative action program for students from areas which had lower rates of education than other areas due to missionary activity in the north and east, which essentially were the Tamil areas. Successive governments cultivated a historical myth after the colonial powers had left that the British had practised communal favouritism towards Christians and the minority Tamil community for the entire 200 years they had controlled Sri Lanka. However, the Sinhalese in fact benefitted from trade and plantation cultivations over the rest of the other groups and their language and culture as well as the religion of Buddhism was fostered and made into mediums for schools over the Tamil language, which did not have the same treatment and Tamils learned English instead as there was no medium for Tamil until near independence. Tamils' knowledge of English and education came from the very American missionary activity by overseas Christians that the British were concerned will anger the Sinhalese and destroy their trading relationships, so they sent them to the Tamil areas instead to teach, thinking it would have no consequences and due to their small numbers. The British sending the missionaries to the north and east was for the protection of the Sinhalese and in fact showed favouritism to the majority group instead of the minorities to maintain trading relationships and benefits from them. The Tamils, out of this random benefit from learning English and basic education excelled and flourished and were able to take many civil service jobs to the chagrin of the Sinhalese. The myth of Divide and Rule is untrue. The 'policy of standardisation' was typical of affirmative action policies, in that it required drastically lower standards for Sinhalese students than for the more academic Tamils who had to get about ten more marks to enter into universities. The policy, were it not implemented would have prevented the civil wars ahead as the policies had no basis and in fact is an example of discrimination against the Tamil ethnic group.

Taiwan

A 2004 legislation requires that, for a firm with 100 employees or more wishing to compete for government contracts, at least 1 per cent of its employees must be Taiwanese aborigines. Ministry of Education and Council of Aboriginal Affairs announced in 2002 that Taiwanese Aboriginal students would have their high-school or undergraduate entrance exams boosted by 33% for demonstrating some knowledge of their tribal language and culture. The percentage of boost have been revised several times, and the latest percentage is 35% in 2013.

Europe

Finland

In certain university education programs, including legal and medical education, there are quotas for persons who reach a certain standard of skills in the Swedish language; for students admitted in these quotas, the education is partially arranged in Swedish. The purpose of the quotas is to guarantee that a sufficient number of professionals with skills in Swedish are educated for nationwide needs. The quota system has met with criticism from the Finnish speaking majority, some of whom consider the system unfair. In addition to these linguistic quotas, women may get preferential treatment in recruitment for certain public sector jobs if there is a gender imbalance in the field.

France

No distinctions based on race, religion or sex are allowed under the 1958 French Constitution. Since the 1980s, a French version of affirmative action based on neighborhood is in place for primary and secondary education. Some schools, in neighborhoods labeled "Priority Education Zones", are granted more funds than the others. Students from these schools also benefit from special policies in certain institutions (such as Sciences Po).

The French Ministry of Defence tried in 1990 to make it easier for young French soldiers of North-African descent to be promoted in rank and obtain driving licenses. After a strong protest by a young French lieutenant in the Ministry of Defence newspaper (Armées d'aujourd'hui), the driving license and rank plan was cancelled. After the Sarkozy election, a new attempt in favour of Arab-French students was made, but Sarkozy did not gain enough political support to change the French constitution. However, some French schools do implement affirmative action in that they are obligated to take a certain number of students from impoverished families.

Additionally, following the Norwegian example, after 27 January 2014, women must represent at least 20% of board members in all stock exchange listed or state owned companies. After 27 January 2017, the proportion will increase to 40%. All appointments of males as directors will be invalid as long as the quota is not met, and monetary penalties may apply for other directors.

Germany

Article 3 of the German Basic Law provides for equal rights of all people regardless of sex, race or social background. There are programs stating that if men and women have equal qualifications, women have to be preferred for a job; moreover, the disabled should be preferred to non-disabled people. This is typical for all positions in state and university service as of 2007, typically using the phrase "We try to increase diversity in this line of work". In recent years, there has been a long public debate about whether to issue programs that would grant women a privileged access to jobs in order to fight discrimination. Germany's Left Party brought up the discussion about affirmative action in Germany's school system. According to Stefan Zillich, quotas should be "a possibility" to help working class children who did not do well in school gain access to a Gymnasium (University-preparatory school). Headmasters of Gymnasien have objected, saying that this type of policy would "be a disservice" to poor children.

Norway

In all public stock companies (ASA) boards, either gender should be represented by at least 40%. This affects roughly 400 companies of over 300,000 in total.

Seierstad & Opsahl in their study of the effects of affirmative action on presence, prominence, and social capital of women directors in Norway found that there are few boards chaired by a woman, from the beginning of the implementation of affirmative action policy period to August 2009, the proportion of boards led by a woman has increased from 3.4% to 4.3%. This suggests that the law has had a marginal effect on the sex of the chair and the boards remain internally segregated. Although at the beginning of our observation period, only 7 of 91 prominent directors were women. The gender balance among prominent directors has changed considerable through the period, and at the end of the period, 107 women and 117 men were prominent directors. By applying more restrictive definitions of prominence, the proportion of directors who are women generally increases. If only considering directors with at least three directorships, 61.4% of them are women. When considering directors with seven or more directorships, all of them are women. Thus, affirmative action increase the female population in the director position.

A 2016 study found no effect of the ASA representation requirement on either valuation or profits of the affected companies, and also no correlation between the requirement and the restructuring of companies away from ASA.

Romania

Romani people are allocated quotas for access to public schools and state universities.

Russia

Quota systems existed in the USSR for various social groups including ethnic minorities (as a compensation of their "cultural backwardness"), women and factory workers. 

Quotas for access to university education, offices in the Soviet system and the Communist Party existed: for example, the position of First Secretary of a Soviet Republic's (or Autonomous Republic's) Party Committee was always filled by a representative of this republic's "titular ethnicity". 

Modern Russia retains this system partially. Quotas are abolished, however, preferences for some ethnic minorities and inhabitants of certain territories remain.

Slovakia

The Constitutional Court declared in October 2005 that affirmative action i.e. "providing advantages for people of an ethnic or racial minority group" as being against its Constitution.

United Kingdom

In the UK, any discrimination, quotas or favouritism due to sex, race and ethnicity among other "protected characteristics" is generally illegal for any reason in education, employment, during commercial transactions, in a private club or association, and while using public services. The Equality Act 2010 established the principles of equality and their implementation in the UK.

Specific exemptions include:

• Part of the Northern Ireland Peace Process, the Good Friday Agreement and the resulting Patten report required the Police Service of Northern Ireland to recruit 50% of numbers from the Catholic community and 50% from the Protestant and other communities, in order to reduce any possible bias towards Protestants. This was later referred to as the '50:50' measure.
• The Sex Discrimination (Election Candidates) Act 2002 allowed the use of all-women shortlists to select more women as election candidates.

In 2019, an employment tribunal ruled that positive discrimination had been directly discriminatory, in a case where a "well prepared white heterosexual male" candidate seeking to join the police was passed over by a police force. The ruling stated that the organization "had used 'positive action' to recruit people with different characteristics, but in a discriminatory way", and that "while positive action can be used to boost diversity, it should only be applied to distinguish between candidates who were all equally well qualified for a role".

North America

Canada

The equality section of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms explicitly permits affirmative action type legislation, although the Charter does not require legislation that gives preferential treatment. Subsection 2 of Section 15 states that the equality provisions do "not preclude any law, program or activity that has as its object the amelioration of conditions of disadvantaged individuals or groups including those that are disadvantaged because of race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability". 

The Canadian Employment Equity Act requires employers in federally-regulated industries to give preferential treatment to four designated groups: Women, persons with disabilities, aboriginal peoples, and visible minorities. Less than one-third of Canadian Universities offer alternative admission requirements for students of aboriginal descent. Some provinces and territories also have affirmative action-type policies. For example, in Northwest Territories in the Canadian north, aboriginal people are given preference for jobs and education and are considered to have P1 status. Non-aboriginal people who were born in the NWT or have resided half of their life there are considered a P2, as well as women and people with disabilities.

United States

The concept of affirmative action was introduced in the early 1960s in the United States, as a way to combat racial discrimination in the hiring process, with the concept later expanded to address gender discrimination. Affirmative action was first created from Executive Order 10925, which was signed by President John F. Kennedy on 6 March 1961 and required that government employers "not discriminate against any employee or applicant for employment because of race, creed, color, or national origin" and "take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin".

On 24 September 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed Executive Order 11246, thereby replacing Executive Order 10925 and affirming Federal Government's commitment "to promote the full realization of equal employment opportunity through a positive, continuing program in each executive department and agency". Affirmative action was extended to women by Executive Order 11375 which amended Executive Order 11246 on 13 October 1967, by adding "sex" to the list of protected categories. In the U.S. affirmative action's original purpose was to pressure institutions into compliance with the nondiscrimination mandate of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Civil Rights Acts do not cover veterans, people with disabilities, or people over 40. These groups are protected from discrimination under different laws.

Affirmative action has been the subject of numerous court cases, and has been questioned upon its constitutional legitimacy. In 2003, a Supreme Court decision regarding affirmative action in higher education (Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 US 244 – Supreme Court 2003) permitted educational institutions to consider race as a factor when admitting students. Alternatively, some colleges use financial criteria to attract racial groups that have typically been under-represented and typically have lower living conditions. Some states such as California (California Civil Rights Initiative), Michigan (Michigan Civil Rights Initiative), and Washington (Initiative 200) have passed constitutional amendments banning public institutions, including public schools, from practicing affirmative action within their respective states. Conservative activists have alleged that colleges quietly use illegal quotas to increase the number of minorities and have launched numerous lawsuits to stop them.

Oceania

New Zealand

Individuals of Māori or other Polynesian descent are often afforded improved access to university courses, or have scholarships earmarked specifically for them. Affirmative action is provided for under section 73 of the Human Rights Act 1993 and section 19(2) of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990.

South America

Brazil

Some Brazilian universities (state and federal) have created systems of preferred admissions (quotas) for racial minorities (blacks and Amerindians), the poor and people with disabilities. There are also quotas of up to 20% of vacancies reserved for people with disabilities in the civil public services. The Democrats party, accusing the board of directors of the University of Brasília for "resurrecting nazist ideals", appealed to the Supreme Federal Court against the constitutionality of the quotas the University reserves for minorities. The Supreme Court unanimously approved their constitutionality on 26 April 2012.

International organizations

United Nations

The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination stipulates (in Article 2.2) that affirmative action programs may be required of countries that ratified the convention, in order to rectify systematic discrimination. It states, however, that such programs "shall in no case entail as a consequence the maintenance of unequal or separate rights for different racial groups after the objectives for which they were taken have been achieved".

The United Nations Human Rights Committee states that "the principle of equality sometimes requires States parties to take affirmative action in order to diminish or eliminate conditions which cause or help to perpetuate discrimination prohibited by the Covenant. For example, in a State where the general conditions of a certain part of the population prevent or impair their enjoyment of human rights, the State should take specific action to correct those conditions. Such action may involve granting for a time to the part of the population concerned certain preferential treatment in specific matters as compared with the rest of the population. However, as long as such action is needed to correct discrimination, in fact, it is a case of legitimate differentiation under the Covenant."

Support

The principle of affirmative action is to promote societal equality through the preferential treatment of socioeconomically disadvantaged people. Often, these people are disadvantaged for historical reasons, such as oppression or slavery. Historically and internationally, support for affirmative action has sought to achieve a range of goals: bridging inequalities in employment and pay; increasing access to education; enriching state, institutional, and professional leadership with the full spectrum of society; redressing apparent past wrongs, harms, or hindrances, in particular addressing the apparent social imbalance left in the wake of slavery and slave laws.

A 2017 study found that affirmative action in the United States "increases the black share of employees over time: in 5 years after an establishment is first regulated, the black share of employees increases by an average of 0.8 percentage points. Strikingly, the black share continues to grow at a similar pace even after an establishment is deregulated. One could argue that this persistence is driven in part by affirmative action inducing employers to improve their methods for screening potential hires."

Polls

According to a poll taken by USA Today in 2005, the majority of Americans support affirmative action for women, while views on minority groups were more split. Men are only slightly more likely to support affirmative action for women; though a majority of both do. However, a slight majority of Americans do believe that affirmative action goes beyond ensuring access and goes into the realm of preferential treatment. More recently, a Quinnipiac poll from June 2009 finds that 55% of Americans feel that affirmative action in general should be discontinued, though 55% support it for people with disabilities. A Gallup poll from 2005 showed that 72% of black Americans and 44% of white Americans supported racial affirmative action (with 21% and 49% opposing), with support and opposition among Hispanics falling between those of blacks and whites. Support among blacks, unlike among whites, had almost no correlation with political affiliation.

A 2009 Quinnipiac University Polling Institute survey found 65% of American voters opposed the application of affirmative action to gay people, with 27% indicating they supported it.

A Leger poll taken in 2010 found 59% of Canadians opposed considering race, gender, or ethnicity when hiring for government jobs.

A 2014 Pew Research Center poll found that 63% of Americans thought affirmative action programs aimed at increasing minority representation on college campuses were "a good thing", compared to 30% who thought they were "a bad thing". The following year, Gallup released a poll showing that 67% of Americans supported affirmative action programs aimed at increasing female representation, compared to 58% who supported such programs aimed at increasing the representation of racial minorities.

Criticism

Critics of affirmative action offer a variety of arguments as to why it is counterproductive or should be discontinued. For example, critics may argue that affirmative action hinders reconciliation, replaces old wrongs with new wrongs, undermines the achievements of minorities, and encourages individuals to identify themselves as disadvantaged, even if they are not. It may increase racial tension and benefit the more privileged people within minority groups at the expense of the least fortunate within majority groups (such as lower-class white people).

Some opponents of affirmative action argue that it is a form of reverse racism, that any effort to cure discrimination through affirmative action is wrong because it, in turn, is another form of discrimination. Some critics claim that court cases such as Fisher v. University of Texas, which held that colleges have some discretion to consider race when making admissions decisions, demonstrate how discrimination occurs in the name of affirmative action.

Some critics of affirmative action argue that that affirmative action devalues the actual accomplishments of people who are chosen based on the social group to which they belong rather than their qualifications, thus rendering affirmative action counterproductive.

Some argue that affirmative action policies create an opportunity for fraud, by encouraging non-preferred groups to designate themselves as members of preferred groups (that is, members of groups that benefit from affirmative action) in order to take advantage of group preference policies.

Critics of affirmative action suggest that programs may benefit the members of the targeted group that least need the benefit, that is those who have the greatest social, economic and educational advantages within the targeted group. Other beneficiaries may be described as wholly unqualified for the opportunity made available through affirmative action. They may argue that at the same time the people who lose the most to affirmative action are the least fortunate members of non-preferred groups.

Another criticism of affirmative action is that it may reduce the incentives of both the preferred and non-preferred to perform at their best. Beneficiaries of affirmative action may conclude that it is unnecessary to work as hard, and those who do not benefit may perceive hard work as futile.

Mismatching

Mismatching is the term given to the supposed negative effect that affirmative action has when it places a student into a college that is too difficult for him or her. For example, according to the hypothesis, in the absence of affirmative action, a student will be admitted to a college that matches his or her academic ability and have a good chance of graduating. However, according to the mismatching hypothesis, affirmative action often places a student into a college that is too difficult, and this increases the student's chance of dropping out. Thus, according to the hypothesis, affirmative action hurts its intended beneficiaries, because it increases their dropout rate.

Evidence in support of the mismatching theory was presented by Gail Heriot, a professor of law at the University of San Diego and a member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, in a 24 August 2007 article published in the Wall Street Journal. The article reported on a 2004 study that was conducted by UCLA law professor Richard Sander and published in the Stanford Law Review. The study concluded that there were 7.9% fewer black attorneys than there would have been if there had been no affirmative action. The study was titled, "A Systemic Analysis of Affirmative Action in American Law Schools". The article also states that because of mismatching, blacks are more likely to drop out of law school and fail bar exams.

Sander's paper on mismatching has been criticized by several law professors, including Ian Ayres and Richard Brooks from Yale who argue that eliminating affirmative action would actually reduce the number of black lawyers by 12.7%. A 2008 study by Jesse Rothstein and Albert H. Yoon confirmed Sander's mismatch findings, but also found that eliminating affirmative action would "lead to a 63 percent decline in black matriculants at all law schools and a 90 percent decline at elite law schools". These high numbers predictions were doubted in a review of previous studies by Peter Arcidiacono and Michael Lovenheim. Their 2016 article found a strong indication that affirmative action results in a mismatch effect. They argued that the attendance by some African-American students to less-selective schools would significantly improve the low first attempt rate at passing the state bar, but they cautioned that such improvements could be outweighed by decreases in law school attendance.

A 2011 study proposed that mismatch can only occur when a selective school possesses private information that, had this information been disclosed, would have changed the student's choice of school. The study found that this is in fact the case for Duke University, and that this information predicts the student's academic performance after beginning college.

A 2016 study on affirmative action in India fails to find evidence for the mismatching hypothesis. In India 90% IIT-Roorkee dropouts are backward caste.