Asian Americans and the Shifting Politics of Race

The Dismantling of Affirmative Action at an Elite Public High School

Rowena Robles

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781135503635
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: World History
• Index: History

Asian Americans and the Shifting Politics of Race examines the political and discursive struggles around the dismantling of race-based admissions policies in an elite public high school in San Francisco. The book analyzes the arguments put forth by plaintiffs in and the media's depiction of the case, Brian Ho, Patrick Wong, & Hilary Chen v. SFUSD. The Ho lawsuit, filed by a group of Chinese Americans, challenged race-based admissions policies that were intended to ensure diversity by giving special consideration to African-American and Latino students. Robles argues that the Ho plaintiffs exploited the dominant racial construction of Asian Americans as model minorities to portray themselves as victims of discrimination, and relied on contrasting constructions of Black and Latino students as undeserving and unqualified beneficiaries of affirmative action. The decision in favor of the plaintiffs effectively ended school desegregation, racial balance, and affirmative action in San Francisco. In order to examine the consequences of the Ho decision on student attitudes, Robles spent four years studying and observing the first cohort of students to enter the high school after race was eliminated from admissions considerations.

Chapter One

From Racial Integration to Colorblind Policies

AFFIRMATIVE ACTION AND SCHOOL INTEGRATION— THEIR IDEOLOGICAL MEETING GROUND

Through an analysis of the intersections of education and politics, we can view the nation's shifting discourse around race and racial minority groups. Much of this analysis and history functions within a black and white racial paradigm. While many Asian American scholars dispute the relevance and viability of the black and white paradigm of race, I argue that it is the very dominance of this racial model that has allowed Asian Americans to be situated at either end of the model and has given them the privilege of choosing sides. It has greatly contributed to the shifting meanings of race for Asian Americans, as well as their ability to articulate race.

This chapter analyzes the shifts in policies and changes in discourse that worked to open up a space in which Asian Americans were able to exploit their status as the “Model Minority.” The debates surrounding race-based policies in education merge the issues of merit and the racialization of groups, and is structured by larger political forces that have invoked race and constructed a political rhetoric that allegedly does not consider race—in other words, “colorblindness.” Yet the journey to this current political climate has been wrought by defining and re-defining public education policies that advocate racial equality. In effect, race, and the racialization of minority groups, has consistently acted as an undercurrent to these debates, even under the rubric of alleged colorblindness.

Due to changing political and social contexts, this ideal of racial equality has shifted over time and been co-opted by a neoconservative movement. Those who participated in the Civil Rights Movement in which the Brown¹ decision was won sought the elimination of racial segregation and believed this would lead to greater racial equality. This ideal of racial equality remained one of the major goals of K-12 and higher education policy since Brown, However, the ideal of racial equality has shifted to hold a very different meaning than that propagated by the Brown decision. For example, there is now the widespread notion that any policies that consider race are racially discriminatory. Examining the rise of neoconservative politics and politicians and their ability to transform the core issues of racism and inequality to issues that point to the alleged unfairness of the very policies that were attempting to address these issues demonstrates a shift in discourse. This is most visible in debates around education and education policy.

My objectives in this chapter are to locate the shifts and changes in school desegregation and integration policies in which it changed its focus—from eradicating racial barriers to mandating racial mixing and quotas. In many cases, this has resulted in desegregation being equated to affirmative action. These shifts and changes can be divided into three eras, which I frame as the following: (1) the Moral and Moderate Civil Rights Era—the ending of legalized racial separation through school desegregation; (2) the Modern Civil Rights Era—radical politics of race that addressed structural discrimination and inequality; and, lastly, (3) the Co-optation of Civil Rights—a widespread backlash against any race-conscious remedies.

In viewing some of the historical aspects of desegregation policy through these different Civil Rights eras, I am most concerned with the changing definitions of racism and racial equality. In the first period, the Moral and Moderate Civil Rights era, we can view definitions of racial equality through the “separate is inherently unequal” doctrine that was put forth by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and supported by the Supreme Court Justices in 1954.² They defined racial equality, and, within that particular historical moment, racial equality meant eradicating legalized racial separation. In the ensuing historical periods, we see a continuous struggle to define and redefine racism and racial equality.

During the Modern Civil Rights Era, we can view how both sides of this struggle—those against desegregation and those that supported desegregation and other race-based education policies—achieved notable victories. Within the legal arena, there was a constant tug-of-war between NAACP lawyers, the Supreme Court, and the executive branch of the federal government around how to implement desegregation, how to determine if and when districts should be sanctioned, and attempts to provide clearer legal definitions and direction regarding desegregation policy. In the larger social and political contexts, the social movements in the Modern Civil Rights Era redefined racism and racial inequality. They pointed to how racism and inequality were built into the structure of America, believing that racial equality would only come about if the actual structures of society were changed. To this group of radical activists, integration represented assimilation and stood as a superficial substitute for true racial equality.³ In a broader sense, Derrick Bell describes the incompatibility of Civil Rights law and the reluctance of whites to give up privileges accorded to them by virtue of their race, necessitating a call for more radical definitions of Civil Rights law.⁴ During the same period, a conservative revolution was also brewing that sought to redefine racial equality.

This paradoxical era of disorder, disruption, and concessions lead to the Co-optation of Civil Rights, a period that represents the most dramatic redefinition of racism and racial equality. Within this era, the rhetoric of colorblindness rendered the terms “racism” and “racial equality” debatable and unclear at best. Neoconservatives attempt to render race-consciousness unnecessary and succeed to a large extent. How did desegregation policies in education become equated with unfairness and inequality in the Modern Civil Rights Era? How did neoconservatives rearticulate the issue of desegregation in such a way that it did not appear racist on the surface and gained such widespread support?

The movement toward the Co-optation of Civil Rights is underscored by the significant shift away from group rights toward a focus on the desires and achievements of individuals. While most Civil Rights and entitlement programs focused on group advancement, conservative pundits often cast their renditions of Civil Rights law as unequal when it impinges on the rights of individuals. Accomplishing both within the same society is obviously incompatible.

These different eras put forth different definitions of racial equality and inequality, the stage being public education and the medium—desegregation policy. Desegregation policy⁵ is presently framed as a race-based policy that has little to do with the original goals of Brown v. the Board of Education. The historical trajectory surrounding the changing definitions of desegregation provides us with a lens with which we can view the shifts toward and eventual success of neoconservativism. And through these changes, definitions and constructions of racial equality consistently underscored larger political and social framings. A growing neoconservative movement that propagated colorblindness submerged the original goals of racial equality formulated by the Modern Civil Rights movement.

THE MORAL AND MODERATE CIVIL RIGHTS ERA

The beginning of the Moral and Moderate Civil Rights Era is marked by the events leading up to and preceding the Brown decision in 1954 and ends with the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Through the Brown decision, the Supreme Court attempted to frame racism as illegal and unconstitutional. This decision served as major impetus for the growing Civil Rights Movement. The Supreme Court, along with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), believed that if schools could be desegregated, then so could the rest of society. David Kirp observes that,

If the society as a whole cannot be integrated by law, it is thought, at least the schools can. Schools have … been regarded as a lever to more general social reform: integration in the schools just might catalyze wider change, brought about by a new and more tolerant generation.⁶

It was both a moral and civil rights statement by the courts and a victory won by the NAACP, as well as the larger Civil Rights movement.

African Americans were seen as gaining what they had fought for— namely, the end of legalized segregation. Liberal and progressive whites were satisfied with Brown and school desegregation, and viewed the decision as a symbolic translation of rhetoric into strides toward racial equality. The morality of this decision was difficult to dispute but was still opposed by most white Americans. The ideology that lay behind public schooling coupled with the ideology of the American Dream served to make public school desegregation and, later, integration an enduring public policy issue.

The public schools remained the main avenue through which one could “pull oneself up by one's bootstraps” and acquire financial success and security; however, if this very avenue of mobility remained discriminatory and unequal, the American ideals of democracy and meritocracy were rendered invalid. The conflict between democracy and equality could be viewed as stemming from racial separation in education and solvable through integration. School desegregation and the surrounding conflicts often represented attempts by the federal government and the Supreme Court to remedy and make-up for past injustices; this national strategy focused on explicit non-discriminatory practices with a hope of moving towards the larger goal of racial equality.

The focus on addressing racial discrimination through school desegregation, however, changed as desegregation apparently meant different things to different school districts and people. Some believed that simply allowing students to attend any school they desired satisfied the mandates of Brown. Other districts believed that if racial segregation was never intentional or mandated, then there should be no need to desegregate even if the schools still appeared racially segregated. Throughout its brief history, desegregation has often been a contentious matter.

In spite of the moral significance of the Brown decision and the legal victory for civil rights activists, the aftermath of Brown included massive opposition and low compliance. Desegregated schools and other public facilities were far from the reality, reflecting the racism and discriminatory barriers that still existed in American society. Derrick Bell observes that, “It quickly became apparent that most school districts would not comply with Brown voluntarily; rather, they retained counsel and determined to resist compliance as long as possible.”⁷ For example, Southern school districts mounted great resistance to desegregation. This resistance rose from the parents and community and continued up through different levels of society to the district court system. Gary Orfield describes how this opposition was structurally supported in the South.

Under fierce local political pressure, most Southern federal courts reacted to the vague mandates (of Brown) by delaying desegregation cases for long periods and then, in the end, ordering limited changes. Often these plans amounted to allowing a few black schoolchildren to attend a few grades in white schools, while maintaining a school district's essentially segregated character.⁸

The Southern states were able to mount this campaign of resistance because of the ambiguity in the Supreme Court's orders to desegregate with “all deliberate speed” in the Brown II opinion, which was written one year after the original decision. Brown II signified an attempt by the Supreme Court to encourage districts to implement desegregation; however, according to Yudof, Kirp, and Levin, “(b)ecause the Court placed responsibility for school desegregation in the hands of federal district courts and local school boards, delay in implementation of Brown was inevitable.”⁹ The Northern states were also guilty of resisting the Court's order to desegregate, with “Northern segregation (being) virtually untouched until the mid-1970s.”¹⁰Overall, the landmark Supreme Court decision in Brown did little to change the practice of desegregation throughout the nation.

The resistance to implementing Brown was a reaction to the Moral and Moderate Civil Rights movement, in that this movement attempted wholesale social change through legal channels and non-violent means. While these tactics changed the law, they didn't change the sentiments of avowed racists who did not support the change. This massive resistance and lack of widespread transformation was the precursor for the Modern Civil Rights Era, in which the Moral and Moderate Civil Rights Era gave way to more radical and critical movements as well as a backlash against race-based policies.

THE MODERN CIVIL RIGHTS ERA

The Modern Civil Rights Era encompassed a time that was socially and politically ground...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of Tables
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Chapter One From Racial Integration to Colorblind Policies
• Chapter Two Racialized Politics Surrounding the Battle to Begin, Save, and End Desegregation in San Francisco
• Chapter Three Asian Americans as Victim and Success Stories—A Discursive Analysis of the Ho v. SFUSD Lawsuit
• Chapter Four Student Perceptions of the Racial Caste System at Lowell
• Chapter Five Assessments of Diversity from Different Places within the Racial Caste System
• Chapter Six The Burden of Racial Stereotypes—Examining the Interconnectedness of Achievement, Goal Formation and Race
• Conclusion The Effects of the Shifting Politics of Race
• Notes
• References
• Index