Equalizing Access Affirmative Action in Higher Education: India, US, and South Africa

The idea of human equality and the requirement from the state to provide equal opportunity to all lie at the foundation of modern democracy. Focusing on the area of higher education, this volume discusses the notion of 'affirmative action', a generic term covering diverse measures-quotas, special institutions for the underprivileged, extra points on a 'scale of deprivation'-that are employed to ensure equal opportunity. While analysing the situation in India, the volume also compares the debates and policies on affirmative action in India with those in the United States and South Africa. The essays explore the influence of the 'creamy layer' on marginalized groups in a community, the new trends in higher education in India, and the place of the hitherto overlooked disparities of gender, religion, and the urban/rural divide in the discourse on affirmative action. The contributors come from varied disciplines including politics, sociology, law, economics, philosophy, and governance.

Introduction (Zoya Hasan and Martha C. Nussbaum). 1. On the Sites of Remedial Justice: Colleges, Clinics, and the State (Henry S. Richardson). 2. Rethinking Affirmative Action in Admissions to Higher Educational Institutions (Thomas E. Weisskopf). 3. Affirmative Action and the Goals of Education (Martha C. Nussbaum). 4. Affirmative Action and the 'Efficiency Argument' (Prabhat Patnaik). 5. Indian Social Justice Vs. American Affirmative Action and the Case of Higher Education (P.S. Krishnan). 6. Redressing the Colonial/Apartheid Legacy: Social Equity, Redress, and Higher Education Admissions in Democratic South Africa (Saleem Badat). 7. Affirmative Action in Higher Education: The Ambivalent Experience of the United States (Diane P. Wood). 8. How Parliament Discusses Reservations: Examining the Debates on the Central Educational Bill (Rajeev Dhavan). 9. Towards a New Paradigm for Ensuring Universal Access to Quality Education (Jayati Ghosh). 10. Social Justice and Higher Education in India Today: Markets, States, Ideologies, and Inequalities in a Fluid Context (Satish Deshpande). 11. Trapped in an Invisible Present: Muslims and Inequalities in Higher Education (Zoya Hasan). 12. After Reservations: Caste, Institutional Isomorphism, and Affirmative Action in the IITs (D. Parthasarthy). Notes on Contributors.

Zoya Hasan is Professor, Centre for Political Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Martha C. Nussbaum is Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics at the Department of Philosophy, Law School, and Divinity School of the University of Chicago.