Affirmative Action for the Future

Diversity instead of race-based affirmative action developed in the United States from the Regents of the University of California v. Bakke decision in 1978 to the present. There have been both objections to this form of affirmative action and defenses of it. Fisher v. University of Texas could decide the future of all race-based affirmative action in the United States. Yet however the Fisher case is decided, there is a form of non-race-based affirmative action that all could find to be morally preferable for the future. A diversity affirmative action program could be designed to look for students who either have experienced racial discrimination themselves or who understand well, in some other way, how racism harms people in the United States, and thus are able to authoritatively and effectively speak about it in an educational context.