The Policy Question: Diverse Worldwide Practices

Abstract

This chapter is engaged in a descriptive and evaluative research based on the implementation of affirmative action plans worldwide. The descriptive part, including identification of structural mechanisms of the various countries and the historical grounds which explain, wholly or in part, the national attitude towards affirmative action, presents the policy landscape in America (the US, Canada, and Brazil); Europe (European Union, France, Germany, the UK, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, the Netherlands, Austria, Ireland, Greece, Nordic countries and Russia); Asia (India and China); Africa (Nigeria and South Africa) and Oceania (Australia and New Zealand). A separate section is devoted to universal and regional international conventions, especially the European Convention on Human Rights. The evaluative part constitutes a comparative analysis of syntheses and antitheses of the affirmative action policies worldwide. It includes an assessment of the variables favouring the launching of such policies, both structural, i.e. federal, former colonial, social welfare and multi-ethnic states and material, i.e. institutional acknowledgment, (constitution, statute, custom, and convention), the domains of application (education, politics, economy and labour) and designated groups (racial, ethnic or religious minorities, women). The chapter finally casts light upon the political identity of affirmative action, as a right/left, conservative/progressive tool, identifying but also probing beneath political agendas and statutes of political parties that might sometimes use the policy merely for political gains.