What happens when we base ethical certainties on contingent social norms?
The ethical issues associated with affirmative action and race are highly intractable. The reason for this is that they affect the individual and the collective in a way that may alter their course of life. A university may deny admission to a student because of its affirmative action policy and the student may feel wronged. The feeling may be shared by the race or a social group the student belongs to. Additionally, these issues have become complicated as legal and constitutional questions are entangled with them.
If ethical certainties are based on contingent social norms, it may not be justice. Many social norms that prevailed at times have, in course of time been changed on perception or realisation that they had not been just, slavery for example. It may be necessary for the society and governance to adopt a policy that should sound to the most or majority of its people as just.
Sandel quoted many arguments of John Rawls on these questions. According to John Rawls principles that are chosen for governance would be Just if class, gender, ethnicity, political opinions or religious convictions are not allowed to play any role in determining them. He illustrates this with his thought experiment of choosing from behind a hypothetical veil of ‘ignorance as to our identities.’ He surmises that firstly freedom of speech and religion would be chosen. The second principle that would be chosen, as per him, would be social and economic equality. By social and economic equality he does not mean equal distribution of income but a social principle that would “work to the advantage of the least well-off members of society.” Now that raises a question why an advantage should be given to some whose only qualification is being economically lower than others. Would that really be what would be chosen? This is based on the theory that if uninfluenced by prejudice human nature tries to establish equality. To establish that equality people who are at a disadvantage should be given a break that would help raise their chances of success in a competitive world. And this giving a break may look simple but its implementation turns to be multifaceted. Consider affirmative action based on backwardness. Backwardness may be determined by race. It may be based on an economic backwardness of a social or ethical group even though the ethnic group may not be considered socially backward.
Many who oppose affirmative action argue on several points. Belonging to a race such as African American itself cannot be viewed as a qualification; such a view will simply be discrimination on the grounds of race. Those that support affirmative action put up an argument that these people of African American race were discriminated against for centuries and hence today’s society should compensate for that. This means Whites who would be affected by affirmative action are subjected reverse discrimination which is the same social crime as before. Besides people belonging to today’s majority community were not the ones who committed the crime of racial discrimination of the past. And today’s beneficiaries of affirmative action are not the ones who suffered racial discrimination of the past and hence no advantage is due to them. Another argument against affirmative action is that if a person is given admission to an institute or given a job as an affirmative action, then that person may not be able to perform up to the mark as he may not be competent. However, it is a sound principle that if society has to avoid social unrest it may be necessary to promote diversity in universities or in social positions of power. This requires affirmative action for an extended period of time till there would be apparently no disadvantaged racial groups in the society.
Rawls proposes that we should agree to common responsibility of the society to build a more equal society. Rawls argues that any one intellectually lower or socially at a disadvantageous position should be given a break in such fashion as to enable him to get the ability to compete with higher capable persons. In this he does not consider race as a factor but only morality. Everyone according him should have a truly equitable starting point in a competition. Considering the history of human society which is ridden with social unrest, incidence of violence that broke peace and tranquillity, it may be desirable to work towards such a more equal society by providing affirmative action to the disadvantaged to build a society with least conflict or unrest.
Works cited
Sandel, M. Justice what is the right thing to do. New York: D&M Publishers. 2009. Print.
