The Enigma of Diversity

Berrey, Ellen

doi:10.7208/chicago/9780226246376.001.0001

Cited by 296 publications

(74 citation statements)

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“…Initial efforts to increase minority recruitment revolved around an alternative path to admissions and financial aid for minority students identified as promising. These efforts were initially justified in terms of a logic of redistribution and creating opportunities for previously marginalized groups (Berrey 2015). In the 1960s and 1970s, Michigan expanded its affirmative action programs and moved away from a model based on personal connections between admissions officers and potential minority applicants in order to streamline the process and further increase minority enrollments.…”

Section: Affirmative Action In College Admissionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In Bakke v. University of California Davis, the Supreme Court ruled that quotas were unconstitutional violations of equal protection, but the somewhat opaque ruling left open the possibility that some forms of affirmative action could be justified. According to Justice Powell's decision, universities might have a constitutionally protected interest in promoting diversity that justified affirmative action even as the Court rejected arguments based on reducing societal inequalities (Berrey 2015).…”

Section: Affirmative Action In College Admissionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Standardizing Biases: Selection Devices and the Quantification of Race

Hirschman¹,

Bosk²

2017

Preprint

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Abstract:Racial inequality persists despite major advances in formal, legal equality. Scholars and policymakers argue that individual biases (both explicit and implicit) combine with subjective organizational decision-making practices to perpetuate racial inequality. The standardization of decision-making offers a potential solution, promising to eliminate the subjectivity that biases consequential decisions. We ask, under what conditions may standardization reduce racial inequality? Drawing on research in science studies and law and society, we argue that standardization must be understood as a heterogeneous practice capable of producing very different outcomes depending on the details of the standard and the organizational infrastructure surrounding its use. We compare "selection devices" -simple quantified tools for making allocation decisions -in undergraduate admissions and child welfare to highlight the complex relationships between race and standardization. Child welfare agencies adopted a colorblind actuarial device that attempted to predict which children were most at risk, and then make decisions based on those predictions. In contrast, the University of Michigan's points system explicitly considered and valued race, with the goal of increasing minority student enrollments in the context of promoting student body diversity. Comparing these cases demonstrates how actuarial standardization practices, including those adopted with the intention of reducing racial inequality, tend to reinforce an unequal status quo by ideologically reconfiguring mutable social structures into immutable individual risk factors. In contrast, non-actuarial practices that explicitly promote racial equality are vulnerable to political challenges, as they violate norms of colorblindness and cannot be defended in terms of their predictive validity.Acknowledgements:

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Section: Affirmative Action In College Admissionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Affirmative Action In College Admissionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Standardizing Biases: Selection Devices and the Quantification of Race

Hirschman¹,

Bosk²

2017

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…In the United States, the typical approach to assessing African-American experiences is through multicultural methods and the language of diversity (Berrey, 2015). In this US approach, AfricanAmerican experiences are understood by adapting European American models in personality and social psychology or through the social construct of diversity that is used in lieu of race.…”

Section: Africentric Psychologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“Born Black and Male”: Counseling leaders’ self-discovery of strengths

Roysircar

Thompson

Boudreau

2016

Counselling Psychology Quarterly

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“…At the individual level, theories of implicit bias or unconscious racism are most prominent (Quillian 2006). At the organizational level, diversity came to be the language through which organizations could talk about race as one of many benign differences (Berrey 2015).…”

Section: The Changing Structures Of Racismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Standardizing Biases: Selection Devices and the Quantification of Race

Hirschman

Bosk

2019

Sociology of Race and Ethnicity

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Racial inequality persists despite major advances in formal, legal equality. Scholars and policymakers argue that individual biases (both explicit and implicit) combine with subjective organizational decision-making practices to perpetuate racial inequality. The standardization of decision making offers a potential solution, promising to eliminate the subjectivity that biases consequential decisions. We ask, under what conditions may standardization reduce racial inequality? Drawing on research in science studies and law and society, we argue that standardization must be understood as a heterogeneous practice capable of producing very different outcomes depending on the details of the standard and the organizational infrastructure surrounding its use. We compare selection devices—simple quantified tools for making allocation decisions—in undergraduate admissions and child welfare to highlight the complex relationships between race and standardization. Child welfare agencies adopted a colorblind actuarial device that attempted to predict which children were most at risk and then make decisions based on those predictions. In contrast, the University of Michigan’s points system explicitly considered and valued race, with the goal of increasing minority student enrollments in the context of promoting student body diversity. Comparing these cases demonstrates how actuarial standardization practices, including those adopted with the intention of reducing racial inequality, tend to reinforce an unequal status quo by ideologically reconfiguring mutable social structures into immutable individual risk factors. In contrast, nonactuarial practices that explicitly promote racial equality are vulnerable to political challenges as they violate norms of colorblindness and cannot be defended in terms of their predictive validity.

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The Enigma of Diversity

Cited by 296 publications

References 0 publications

Standardizing Biases: Selection Devices and the Quantification of Race

Standardizing Biases: Selection Devices and the Quantification of Race

“Born Black and Male”: Counseling leaders’ self-discovery of strengths

Standardizing Biases: Selection Devices and the Quantification of Race

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