We Won't Go Back; Making the Case for Affirmative Action

Reviews the original intent of affirmative action policies and argues for their critical role in the health of American society, emphasizing the need for an expanded and more humane version of affirmative action.

Responding to the current wave of affirmative-action backlash, two Georgetown law professors, each proud beneficiaries of the policy, stand as zealous advocates brooking no retreat. ``Our parents taught us that . . . the struggle to make a place at the table for ourselves was also the struggle to free the souls of those who would exclude us,'' write Lawrence (who is African-American) and Matsuda (Japanese-American) of their individual family legacies of political idealism and civil rights activism. The two authors--colleagues who are also married to each other--here form a tireless tag team to continue the relay. They alternate in writing 11 complementary essays that argue for muscular affirmative-action programs as the best tool to end the residual racial, gender, and economic subordination running through our society. As legal scholars, each is a leading proponent of an analytical perspective known as critical race theory, which documents how race, gender, and socioeconomic status shape our social and legal system, as well as our varied individual experiences navigating that system. In this book they acknowledge that overt bigotry has been rejected by our culture, but trace the unconscious prejudices that still prevail and structure access to real opportunity. What today's affirmative-action opponents want to push back, they argue, is the very effort to redistribute opportunity that is essential to dismantling institutionalized privilege of all kinds. The authors earnestly believe that attaining a freer and more just society will benefit everyone and justify the difficulty of a contentious transition. Extending the discussion beyond the combative rhetoric of reverse discrimination and racial preference, Matsuda and Lawrence have written a compassionate call to conscience, imprinted with their inspirational vision of American democracy and complex sense of a national community. But not everyone will buy into their communal vision of justice, which will remain anathema to unreconstructed rugged American individualists. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Law professors Lawrence and Matsuda (Where Is Your Body, and Other Essays, LJ 12/96), a husband-and-wife team, have written a most provocative defense of affirmative action. Until now, much of the current debate has been fueled by conservative scholars of color opposed to affirmative action, such as Dinesh D'Souza (The End of Racism, Free Pr., 1995), Stephen Carter (Reflections of an Affirmative Action Baby, LJ 9/15/91), and Shelby Steele (The Content of Our Character, LJ 8/90). The present work begins with the historical development of affirmative action in the 1960s. For Lawrence and Matsuda, this history is still fresh: while people of color have made some statistical gains in employment and education, they are still locked out of boardrooms, classrooms, and many types of jobs. Affirmative action is necessary, they argue, because America's race and gender divide has not yet healed. Moreover, affirmative action is workable, as their biographies of affirmative action recipients testify. Their work provides some much-needed balance to what has been a lopsidely conservative debate. Highly recommended.?Steven Anderson, Baltimore Cty. Circuit Court Law Lib., Towson, Md.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The husband and wife team of Charles Lawrence, an African American, and Mari Matsuda, a Japanese American, pair up to make the case for affirmative action. As law professors, they analyze affirmative action policy from its turbulent beginning to the current challenges. As they point out in the preface, "a black man and an Asian women sometimes see things differently," yet their collective insight on the issue is the strength of their book. Each chapter includes narratives from beneficiaries of affirmative action along with the authors' personal experiences. The authors look at the debate related to color blindness, meritocracy, feminism, and class. Lawrence and Matsuda have done an excellent job of presenting the facts and have added a humanistic angle that allows one to explore the impact of the policy in the U.S. The book puts forth a strong case that as a society we should not want to regress to a time when such a policy was necessary to provide the liberty and justice a democracy promises. Lillian Lewis