Equal opportunity

Equal opportunity, or equality of opportunity, is a controversial[1] decision-making standard[2] without a precise definition[3][4] involving fair choices within the public sphere.[4] While it generally describes “open and fair competition” with equal chances for achieving sought–after jobs or positions[5] as well as an absence of discrimination,[6][5][7] the concept is elusive with a “wide range of meanings.”[8] It is hard to measure, and implementation poses problems[4] as well as disagreements about what to do.[9] It is being applied to increasingly wider areas beyond employment[6][10] including lending, housing, voting rights, and elsewhere.[2]

Contents

The essence of the equality of opportunity is a stipulation that all people should be treated similarly, unhampered by artificial barriers or prejudices or preferences, except when particular “distinctions can be explicitly justified.”[2] The aim is that important jobs should go to those “the most qualified”––persons most likely to perform ably in a given task––and not to go to persons for arbitrary or irrelevant reasons, such as circumstances of birth, upbringing, friendship ties to whoever is in power,[4] religion, sex,[11] ethnicity,[11] race, caste,[5] or “involuntary personal attributes” such as disability, age, or sexual preferences.[5][12] Chances for advancement are open to everybody interested[13] such that they have “an equal chance to compete within the framework of goals and the structure of rules established.”[14] The idea is to remove arbitrariness from the selection process and base it on some “pre-agreed basis of fairness, with the assessment process being related to the type of position,”[4] and emphasizing procedural and legal means.[5][10] It is opposed to nepotism[4] and plays a role in whether a social structure is seen as legitimate.[4][5][15] People with differing political viewpoints see it differently.[16] The concept is debated in different academic fields such as political philosophy, sociology and psychology.

In the classical sense, the equality of opportunity is closely aligned with the concept of equality before the law and ideas of meritocracy.[17]

Generally the terms “the equality of opportunity” and “equal opportunity” are interchangeable, with occasional slight variations: “the equality of opportunity” has more of a sense of being an abstract political concept, while “equal opportunity” is sometimes used as an adjective, usually in the context of employment regulations, to identify an employer, a hiring approach, or law. Equal opportunity provisions have been written into regulations and have been debated in courtrooms.[18] It is sometimes conceived as a legal right against discrimination.[19][20][5] It is an ideal which has become increasingly "widespread"[9] in Western nations during the last several centuries and is intertwined with social mobility, most often with upward mobility rags to riches stories:

The coming President of France is the grandson of a shoemaker. The actual President is a peasant's son. His predecessor again began life in a humble way in the shipping business. There is surely equality of opportunity under the new order in the old nation.
The Montreal Gazette, 1906[21]

Theory of equal opportunity

Outlines of the concept

According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the concept assumes that society is stratified with a diverse range of roles, some of which are more desirable than others.[4] And the benefit of equality of opportunity is to bring fairness to the selection process for the coveted roles in corporations, associations, nonprofits, universities, and elsewhere.[22] There is no "formal linking" between equality of opportunity and political structure, according to one view, in the sense that there can be equality of opportunity in democracies, autocracies, and in communist nations,[4] although it is primarily associated with a competitive market economy[4] and embedded within the legal frameworks of democratic societies.[23] People with different political perspectives see equality of opportunity differently: liberals disagree about which conditions are needed to ensure it; many "old-style" conservatives see inequality and hierarchy in general as a good thing out of a respect for tradition.[24] It can apply to a specific hiring decision, or to all hiring decisions by a specific company, or rules governing hiring decisions for an entire nation. The scope of equal opportunity has expanded to cover more than issues regarding the rights of minority groups, but covers practices regarding "recruitment, hiring, training, layoffs, discharge, recall, promotions, responsibility, wages, sick leave, vacation, overtime, insurance, retirement, pensions, and various other benefits."[22] The concept has been applied to numerous aspects of public life, including accessibility of polling stations,[25] care provided to HIV patients,[26] whether men and women have equal opportunities to travel on a spaceship,[27] bilingual education,[28] skin color of models in Brazil,[29] television time for political candidates,[30] army promotions,[31] admittance to universities,[32] and ethnicity in the United States.[33] The term is interrelated with and often contrasted with other conceptions of equality such as equality of outcome and equality of autonomy.

Basic model

People generally think of equality of opportunity in terms of the rules of a certain society and in situations where there is a certain job to be filled. A call goes out for people to apply for this job. All persons who might be interested in this job learn about it, that is, they are informed in some way that the position is up for grabs. Then, they indicate that they want to apply for this position––all eligible people should have a chance to compete for this job. At this point the evaluation begins––this is the official starting point. The competition is often thought of using the metaphor of a running race.[34] Next, there is a formal process to determine which applicant gets the job, and this selection process should be related to what the job is about, that is, the evaluation should consider the "qualifications deemed relevant to successful performance in a position or program."[5] For example, if a firefighter position is open, then applicants may have to demonstrate their ability to carry a heavy sack up a flight of stairs; if a professor's post is open, then applicants may have to show that they have the requisite degrees. But the process of assigning "individuals to places in the social hierarchy is determined by some form of competitive process."[4] The selection process should not be based on some arbitrary or irrelevant criterion such as religion or skin color, but rather should emphasize "individual abilities and ambition"[5] or, as Martin Luther King, Jr. said in his famous I Have a Dream speech that he hoped his four children would be judged not by the "color of their skin but by the content of their character." [2] Then, from this "starting gate" position, regardless of the particular view of equality of opportunity, applicants are seen as essentially accountable for the results from that point onwards––whether they succeed or fail is up to their own ability at this point.[35] And one applicant gets the job. In a usual conception, equality of opportunity logically implies differing results afterwards, so there is support for the view that equality of opportunity and equality of outcome are philosophically incompatible.

Different types

There are differing senses of what equality of opportunity is and related notions, with slight variations and nuances.[1][36][9][37] What is common to most of the conceptions is that the individual is accountable when the race begins, when the examination or test or review begins, but senses of equality of opportunity differ most essentially on when the race should begin.

Formal equality of opportunity

Formal equality of opportunity,[1] sometimes referred to as the nondiscrimination principle[35] or described as the absence of direct discrimination,[1] or described in the narrow sense as equality of access,[1][38] is characterized by:

  1. Open call. Positions bringing superior advantages should be open to all applicants;[9] job openings should be publicized in advance giving applicants a "reasonable opportunity" to apply. Further, all applications should be accepted.[4]
  2. Fair judging. Applications should be judged on their merits[4] with procedures designed to identify those best–qualified.[9] The evaluation of the applicant should be in accord with the duties of the position; for example, for the job opening of choir director, the evaluation may judge applicants based on musical knowledge rather than some arbitrary criterion such as hair color.[4]
  3. An application is chosen. The applicant judged as "most qualified" is offered the position while others are not. There is agreement that the result of the process is again unequal, in the sense that one person has the position while another does not, but that this outcome is deemed fair on procedural grounds.

The formal approach is seen as a somewhat basic "no frills" or "narrow"[5] approach to equality of opportunity, a minimal standard of sorts, limited to the public sphere as opposed to private areas such as the family, marriage, or religion.[5] What is considered "fair" and "unfair" is spelled out in advance.[39] An expression of this version appeared in The New York Times:

There should be an equal opportunity for all. Each and every person should have as great or as small an opportunity as the next one. There should not be the unfair, unequal, superior opportunity of one individual over another.
—Dr. Leonard Hirshberg, 1917[40]

This sense was also expressed by economists Milton and Rose Friedman in their 1980 book Free to Choose.[41] The Friedmans explained that equality of opportunity was "not to be interpreted literally" since some children are born blind while others are born sighted, but that "its real meaning is ... a career open to the talents."[41] This means that there should be "no arbitrary obstacles" blocking a person from realizing their ambitions, and that "Not birth, nationality, color, religion, sex, nor any other irrelevant characteristic should determine the opportunities that are open to a person -- only his abilities."[41]

A somewhat different view was expressed by John Roemer who used the term nondiscrimination principle to mean that "all individuals who possess the attributes relevant for the performance of the duties of the position in question be included in the pool of eligible candidates, and that an individual's possible occupancy of the position be judged only with respect to those relevant attributes."[35] Matt Cavanagh argued that race and sex shouldn't matter when getting a job, but that the sense of equality of opportunity should not extend much further than preventing straightforward discrimination.[8]

The ideal of a society in which people do not suffer disadvantage from discrimination on grounds of supposed race, ethnicity, religion, sex, sexual orientation is widely upheld as desirable in itself.
—Richard Arneson in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2008[4]

It is a relatively straightforward task for legislators to ban blatant efforts to favor one group over another and encourage equality of opportunity as a result. Japan banned gender-specific job descriptions in advertising as well as sexual discrimination in employment as well as other practices deemed unfair,[42] although a subsequent report suggested that the law was having minimal effect in securing Japanese women high positions in management.[43] In the United States, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued a private test preparation firm, Kaplan, for unfairly using credit histories to discriminate against African Americans in terms of hiring decisions.[18] According to one analysis, it is possible to imagine a democracy which meets the formal criteria (1 through 3) but which still favors wealthy candidates who are selected in free and fair elections.[44]

Substantive equality of opportunity

This term, sometimes called fair equality of opportunity,[9] is a somewhat broader[5] and more expansive concept than the more limiting formal equality of opportunity and it deals with what is sometimes described as indirect discrimination.[1] It goes farther, and is more controversial[5] than the formal variant, and has been thought to be much harder to achieve, with greater disagreement about how to achieve greater equality,[5] and has been described as "unstable",[9] particularly if the society in question is unequal to begin with in terms of great disparity of wealth.[45] It has been identified as more of a left–leaning political position[46] but this is not a hard–and–fast rule. The substantive model is advocated by people who see limitations in the formal model:

Therein lies the problem with the idea of equal opportunity for all. Some people are simply better placed to take advantage of opportunity.
—Deborah Orr in The Guardian, 2009[47]

In the substantive approach, the starting point before the race begins is unfair, since people have had differing experiences before even approaching the competition. The substantive approach examines the applicants themselves before applying for a position, and judges whether they have equal abilities or talents, and if not, then it suggests that authorities (usually the government) take steps to make applicants more equal before they get to the point where they compete for a position, and fixing the before–the–starting point issues has sometimes been described as working towards "fair access to qualifications."[9] It seeks to remedy inequalities perhaps because of an "unfair disadvantage" based sometimes on "prejudice in the past."[10] According to John Hills, children of wealthy and well-connected parents usually have a decisive advantage over other types of children, and he notes that "advantage and disadvantage reinforce themselves over the life cycle, and often on to the next generation" so that successful parents pass along their wealth and education to succeeding generations, making it difficult for others to climb up a social ladder.[48] But so-called positive action efforts to bring an underprivileged person up to speed before a competition begins are limited to the period of time before the evaluation begins; at that point, the "final selection for posts must be made according to the principle the best person for the job," that is, a less qualified applicant should not be chosen over a more qualified applicant.[1] And there are nuanced views too: one position suggested that the unequal results following a competition were unjust if caused by bad luck but just if chosen by the individual, and that weighing matters such as personal responsibility was important; this variant of the substantive model has sometimes been called luck egalitarianism.[9] Still, regardless of the nuances, the overall idea is to give children from less fortunate backgrounds more of a chance,[48] or to achieve at the beginning what some theorists call equality of condition.[1] Writer Ha-Joon Chang expressed this view:

We can accept the outcome of a competitive process as fair only when the participants have equality in basic capabilities; the fact that no one is allowed to have a head start does not make the race fair if some contestants have only one leg.
—Ha-Joon Chang in The Guardian, 2010[49]

In a sense, substantive equality of opportunity moves the "starting point" further back in time. Sometimes it entails the use of affirmative action policies to help all contenders become equal before they get to the starting point, perhaps with greater training, or sometimes redistributing resources via coercion or taxation to make the contenders more equal. It holds that all who have a "genuine opportunity to become qualified" be given a chance to do so. And it is sometimes based on a recognition that unfairness exists, hindering social mobility, combined with a sense that the unfairness should not exist or should be lessened in some manner.[50] One example postulated was that a warrior society could provide special nutritional supplements to poor children, offer scholarships to military academies, and dispatch "warrior skills coaches" to every village as a way to make opportunity substantively more fair.[4] The idea is give every ambitious and talented youth a chance to compete for prize positions regardless of their circumstances of birth.[4]

The substantive position was advocated by Bhikhu Parekh in 2000 in Rethinking Multiculturalism who wrote that "all citizens should enjoy equal opportunities to acquire the capacities and skills needed to function in society and to pursue their self-chosen goals equally effectively" and that "equalising measures are justified on grounds of justice as well as social integration and harmony."[51][1] Parekh argued that equal opportunities included so-called cultural rights which are "ensured by the politics of recognition."[1]

Affirmative action programs usually fall under the substantive category.[5] The idea is to help disadvantaged groups get back to a normal starting position after a long period of discrimination. The programs involve government action, sometimes with resources being transferred from an advantaged group to a disadvantaged one, and these programs have been justified on the grounds that imposing quotas counter-balances the past discrimination[4] as well as being a "compelling state interest" in diversity in society.[5] For example, there was a case in Sao Paulo in Brazil of a quota imposed on the São Paulo Fashion Week to require that "at least 10 percent of the models to be black or indigenous", as a coercive measure to counteract a "longstanding bias towards white models."[29] It does not have to be accomplished via government action; for example, in the 1980s in the United States, President Reagan dismantled parts of affirmative action, but one report in the Chicago Tribune suggested that companies remained committed to the principle of equal opportunity regardless of government requirements.[52] In another instance, upper-middle class students taking the Scholastic Aptitude Test in the United States performed better, since they had had more "economic and educational resources to prepare for these test than others."[5] The test, itself, was seen as fair in a formal sense, but the overall result was seen as nevertheless unfair. In India, the Indian Institutes of Technology found that to achieve substantive equality of opportunity, the school had to reserve 22.5 percent of seats for applicants from "historically disadvantaged schedule castes and tribes."[5][53] Elite universities in France began a special "entrance program" to help applicants from "impoverished suburbs."[5]

Equality of fair opportunity

Philosopher John Rawls offered this variant of substantive equality of opportunity, and explained that it happens when individuals with the same "native talent and the same ambition" have the same prospects of success in competitions.[4][54][55][56] Gordon Marshall offers a similar view with the words "positions are to be open to all under conditions in which persons of similar abilities have equal access to office."[24] An example was given: If two persons X and Y have identical talent but X is from a poor family while Y is from a rich one, then equality of fair opportunity is in effect when both X and Y have the same chance of winning the job.[4] It suggests the ideal society is "classless" without a social hierarchy being passed from generation to generation, although parents can still pass along advantages to their children by genetics and socialization skills.[4] One view suggests that this approach might advocate "invasive interference in family life."[4] Marshall posed this question:

Does it demand that, however unequal their abilities, people should be equally empowered to achieve their goals? This would imply that the unmusical individual who wants to be a concert pianist should receive more training than the child prodigy.
—Gordon Marshall, 1998[24]

Economist Paul Krugman agrees mostly with the Rawlsian approach in that he would like to "create the society each of us would want if we didn’t know in advance who we’d be. [57] Krugman elaborated: "If you admit that life is unfair, and that there’s only so much you can do about that at the starting line, then you can try to ameliorate the consequences of that unfairness."[57]

Level playing field

Some theorists have posed a level playing field conception of equality of opportunity,[4][9] similar in many respects to the substantive principle, (although it has been used in different contexts to describe formal equality of opportunity[10]) and it is a core idea regarding the subject of distributive justice espoused by John Roemer[35][58][59] and Ronald Dworkin[60][61] and others. Like the substantive notion, the level playing field conception goes farther than the usual formal approach.[35] The idea is that initial "unchosen inequalities"––prior circumstances over which an individual had no control but which impact his or her success in a given competition for a particular post––these unchosen inequalities should be eliminated as much as possible, according to this conception. According to Roemer, society should "do what it can to level the playing field so that all those with relevant potential will eventually be admissible to pools of candidates competing for positions.[35] Afterwards, when an individual competes for a specific post, he or she might make specific choices which cause future inequalities––and these inequalities are deemed acceptable because of the previous presumption of fairness.[62] And this system helps undergird the legitimacy of a society's divvying up of roles as a result in the sense that it makes certain achieved inequalities "morally acceptable," according to persons who advocate this approach.[4] This conception has been contrasted to the substantive version among some thinkers, and it usually has ramifications for how society treats young persons in such areas as education and socialization and health care. But this conception has been criticized as well.[63][64][65] Rawls postulated the difference principle which argued that "inequalities are justified only if needed to improve the lot of the worst off, for example by giving the talented an incentive to create wealth."[61][1][24]

Meritocracy

There is some overlap among these different conceptions with the term meritocracy which describes an administrative system which rewards such factors as individual intelligence, credentials, education, morality, knowledge or other criteria believed to confer merit. Equality of opportunity is often seen as a major aspect of a meritocracy.[4][1] One view was that equality of opportunity was more focused on what happens before the race begins, while meritocracy is more focused on fairness at the competition stage.[66]

Moral senses

There is general agreement that equality of opportunity is a good thing for a society (although since this is a value judgement there are many diverse opinions)[24] and is generally viewed as a positive political ideal in the abstract.[4] In nations where equality of opportunity is absent, it can negatively impact economic growth, according to some views; one report in Al Jazeera suggested that Egypt, Tunisia, and other Middle Eastern nations were stagnating economically in part because of a dearth of equal opportunity.[67]. Equal opportunity can confict with the ideas of a meritocracy when individual differences in human abilities are thought to be largely genetic and inherited. Ironing out these conflicts usually leads to great disputes. [68]

Practical considerations

Difficulties with implementation

There is general agreement that programs to bring about certain types of equality of opportunity can be difficult, and that efforts to cause one result often have unintended consequences or cause other problems. There is agreement that the formal approach is easier to implement than the others, although there are difficulties there too.

A government policy that requires equal treatment can pose problems for lawmakers. A requirement for government to provide equal health care services for all citizens can be prohibitively expensive. If government seeks equality of opportunity for citizens to get health care by rationing services using a maximization model to try to save money, new difficulties might emerge. For example, trying to ration health care by maximizing the "quality-adjusted years of life" might steer monies away from disabled persons even though they may be more deserving, according to one analysis.[4][69] In another instance, BBC News questioned whether it was wise to ask female army recruits to undergo the same strenuous tests as their male counterparts, since many women were being injured as a result.[70]

Age discimination can present vexing challenges for policymakers trying to implement equal opportunity.[4][71][72] According to several studies, attempts to be equally fair to both a young and an old person are problematic because the older person has presumably fewer years left to live, and it may make more sense for a society to invest greater resources in a younger person's health.[73][74] Treating both persons equally, while following the letter of the equality of opportunity, seems unfair from a different perspective.

Another difficulty is that it is hard for a society to bring substantive equality of opportunity to every type of position or industry. If a nation focuses efforts on some industries or positions, then people with other talents may be left out. For example, in an example in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, a warrior society might provide equal opportunity for all kinds of people to achieve military success through fair competition, but people with non-military skills such as farming may be left out.[4]

Lawmakers have run into problems trying to implement equality of opportunity. In 2010 in Britain, a legal requirement "forcing public bodies to try to reduce inequalities caused by class disadvantage" was scrapped after much debate, and replaced by a hope that organizations would try to focus more on "fairness" than "equality"; fairness is generally seen as a much vaguer concept than equality,[75] but easier for politicians to manage if they are seeking to avoid fractious debate. In New York City, mayor Ed Koch tried to find ways to maintain the "principle of equal treatment" while arguing against more substantive and abrupt transfer payments called minority set-asides.[76]

Many countries have specific bodies tasked with looking at equality of opportunity issues; in the United States, for example, it is the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission;[18][77] in Britain, there is the Equality of opportunity committee[25] as well as the Equality and Human Rights Commission;[39] in Canada, the Royal Commission on the Status of Women has "equal opportunity as its precept."[78] In China, the Equal Opportunities Commission handles matters regarding ethnic prejudice.[79] In addition, there have been political movements pushing for equal treatment, such as the Women's Equal Opportunity League which in the early decades of the twentieth century, pushed for fair treatment by employers in the U.S.[80] One of the group's members explained:

I am not asking for sympathy but for an equal right with men to earn my own living in the best way open and under the most favorable conditions that I could choose for myself.
—Mrs. Terryberry, 1920, in The New York Times[80]

Difficulties with measurement

The consensus view is that trying to measure equality of opportunity is difficult[66] whether examining a single hiring decision or looking at groups over time.

It is difficult to prove unequal treatment although statistical analysis can provide indications of problems, but it is subject to conflicts over interpretation and methodological issues. For example, a study in 2007 by the University of Washington examined its own treatment of women. Researchers collected statistics about female participation in numerous aspects of university life, including percentages of women with full professorships (23%), enrollment in programs such as nursing(90%) and engineering (18%).[85] There is wide variation in how these statistics might be interpreted. For example, the 23% figure for women with full professorships could be compared to the total population of women (presumably 50%) perhaps using census data,[86] or it might be compared to the percentage of women with full professorships at competing universities. It might be used in an analysis of how many women applied for the position of full professor compared to how many women attained this position. Further, the 23% figure could be used as a benchmark or baseline figure as part of an ongoing longitudinal analysis to be compared with future surveys to track progress over time.[87][84] In addition, the strength of the conclusions is subject to statistical issues such as sample size and bias. For reasons such as these, there is considerable difficulty with most forms of statistical interpretation.

Statistical analysis of equal opportunity has been done using sophisticated examinations of computer databases. An analysis in 2011 by University of Chicago researcher Stefano Allesina examined 61,000 names of Italian professors by looking at the "frequency of last names", doing one million random drawings, and he suggested that Italian academia was characterized by violations of equal opportunity practices as a result of these investigations.[88] The last names of Italian professors tended to be similar more often than predicted by random chance.[88] The study suggested that newspaper accounts showing that "nine relatives from three generations of a single family (were) on the economics faculty" at the University of Bari were not aberrations, but indicated a pattern of nepotism throughout Italian academia.[88]

There is support for the view that often equality of opportunity is measured by the criteria of equality of outcome,[89] although with difficulty. In one example, an analysis of relative equality of opportunity was done based on outcomes, such as a case to see whether hiring decisions were fair regarding men versus women; the analysis was done using statistics based on average salaries for different groups.[90][91] In another instance, a cross-sectional statistical analysis was conducted to see whether social class affected participation in the United States Armed Forces during the Vietnam War; a report in Time Magazine by MIT suggested that soldiers came from a variety of social classes, and that the principle of equal opportunity had worked,[92] possibly because soldiers had been chosen by a lottery process for conscription.

Marketplace considerations

Equal opportunity has been described as a fundamental "basic notion" in business and commerce, and described by economist Adam Smith as a basic economic precept.[2] There has been research suggesting that "competitive markets will tend to drive out such discrimination" since employers or institutions which hire based on arbitrary criteria will be weaker as a result, and not perform as well as firms which embrace equality of opportunity.[4] Firms competing for overseas contracts have sometimes argued in the press for equal chances during the bidding process, such as when American oil corporations wanted equal shots at developing oil fields in Sumatra;[93] and firms, seeing how fairness is beneficial while competing for contracts, can apply the lesson to other areas such as internal hiring and promotion decisions. A report in USA Today suggested that the goal of equal opportunity was "being achieved throughout most of the business and government labor markets because major employers pay based on potential and actual productivity."[90] Fair opportunity practices include measures taken by an organization to ensure fairness in the employment process. A basic definition of equality is the idea of equal treatment and respect. In job advertisements and descriptions, the fact that the employer is an equal opportunity employer is sometimes indicated by the abbreviations EOE or MFDV which stands for Minority, Female, Disabled, Veteran. Analyst Ross Douthat in The New York Times suggested that equality of opportunity depends to a great extent on a rising economy which brings new chances for upward mobility, and he suggested that greater equality of opportunity is more easily achieved during "times of plenty."[94] Efforts to achieve equal opportunity can rise and recede, sometimes as a result of economic conditions or political choices.[95]

History

According to professor David Christian of MacQuarie University, an underlying "big history" trend has been a shift from seeing people as resources to exploit towards a perspective of seeing people as individuals to empower. According to Christian, in many ancient agrarian civilizations, roughly nine of every ten persons was a peasant exploited by a ruling class. In the past thousand years, there has been a gradual movement in the direction of greater respect for equal opportunity, as political structures based on generational hierarchies and feudalism broke down during the late Middle Ages and new structures emerged during the Renaissance. Monarchies were replaced by democracies; kings were replaced by parliaments and congresses. Slavery was abolished generally. The new entity of the nation state emerged with highly specialized parts, including corporations, laws, and new ideas about citizenship, and values about individual rights found expression in constitutions, laws, and statutes.

In the United States, one legal analyst suggested that the real beginning of the modern sense of equal opportunity was in the Fourteenth Amendment which provided "equal protection under the law."[22] The amendment did not mention equal opportunity directly, but it helped undergird a series of later rulings which dealt with legal struggles, particularly by African Americans and later women, seeking greater political and economic power in the growing republic. In 1933, a congressional "Unemployment Relief Act" forbade discrimination "on the basis of race, color, or creed".[22] The Supreme Court's 1954 Brown v Board of Education decision furthered government initiatives to end discrimination.[22] In 1961, President Kennedy signed Executive Order 10925 which enabled a presidential committee on equal opportunity,[22] which was soon followed by President Johnson's Executive Order 11246.[96] The Civil Rights Act of 1964 became the legal underpinning of equal opportunity in employment.[22] Businesses and other organizations learned to comply with the rulings by specifying fair hiring and promoting practices and posting these policy notices on bulletin boards, employee handbooks, and manuals as well as training sessions and films.[22] Courts dealt with issues about equal opportunity, such as the 1989 Wards Cove decision, the Supreme Court ruled that statistical evidence, by itself, was insufficient to prove racial discrimination. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission was established, sometimes reviewing charges of discrimination cases which numbered in the tens of thousands annually during the 1990s.[22] Some law practices specialized in employment law. Conflict between formal and substantive approaches manifested itself in backlashes, sometimes described as reverse discrimination, such as the Bakke case when a white male applicant to medical school sued on the basis of being denied admission because of a quota system preferring minority applicants.[97][5] In 1990, the Americans with Disabilities Act prohibited discrimination against disabled persons, including cases of equal opportunity.[98][99] In 2008, the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act prevents employers from using genetic information when hiring, firing, or promoting employees.[100]

Criticism

There have been various criticisms of equality of opportunity from numerous perspectives and angles, with generally more criticism directed at the substantive approach, although there has been criticism of the formal approach as well. One account suggests that left–leaning thinkers who advocate equality of outcome fault even formal equality of opportunity on the grounds that it "legitimates inequalities of wealth and income."[9] John William Gardner suggested several views: (1) that inequalities will always exist regardless of trying to erase them (2) that bringing everyone "fairly to the starting line" without dealing with the "destructive competitiveness that follows" (3) any equalities achieved will entail future inequalities.[101] Substantive equality of opportunity has led to concerns that efforts to improve fairness "ultimately collapses into the different one of equality of outcome or condition."[9]

There is speculation that since equality of opportunity is only one of sometimes competing "justice norms", there is a risk that following equality of opportunity too strictly might cause problems in other areas.[4][102] A hypothetical example was suggested: suppose wealthier people gave excessive amounts of campaign contributions; suppose, further, that these contributions resulted in better regulations; then, laws limiting such contributions on the basis of equal opportunity for all political participants may have the unintended long term consequence of making political decision-making lackluster and possibly hurting the groups that it was trying to protect.[4] Philosopher John Kekes makes a similar point in his book The Art of Politics: The New Betrayal of America and How to Resist It in which he suggests that there is a danger to elevating any one particular political good––including equality of opportunity––without balancing competing goods such as justice, property rights, and others.[103] Kekes advocated having a balanced perspective, including a continuing dialog between cautionary elements and reform elements.[103] A similar view was expressed in The Economist:

It strikes us as wrong—or not obviously right—that some people starve while others have private jets. We are uncomfortable when university professors earn less, for example, than junior lawyers. But equality appears to pull against other important ideals such as liberty and efficiency.
—in 2000[61]

Economist Paul Krugman sees equality of opportunity as a "non-Utopian compromise" which works and is a "pretty decent arrangement" which varies from country to country.[57] But there are differing views, such as by Matt Cavanagh, who criticised equality of opportunity in his 2002 book Against Equality of Opportunity.[8] Cavanath favored a limited approach of opposing specific kinds of discrimination as steps to help people get greater control over their lives.[104]

Conservative thinker Dinesh D'Souza criticized equality of opportunity on the basis that "it is an ideal that cannot and should not be realized through the actions of the government" and added that "for the state to enforce equal opportunity would be to contravene the true meaning of the Declaration and to subvert the principle of a free society."[105] D'Souza described how his parenting undermined equality of opportunity:

I have a five-year-old daughter. Since she was born ... my wife and I have gone to great lengths in the Great Yuppie Parenting Race. ... My wife goes over her workbooks. I am teaching her chess. Why are we doing these things? We are, of course, trying to develop her abilities so that she can get the most out of life. The practical effect of our actions, however, is that we are working to give our daughter an edge––that is, a better chance to succeed than everybody else's children. Even though we might be embarrassed to think of it this way, we are doing our utmost to undermine equal opportunity. So are all the other parents who are trying to get their children into the best schools...
—Dinesh D'Souza, 2000[105]

D'Souza argued that it was wrong for government to try to bring his daughter down, or to force him to raise up other people's children.[105] But a counterargument is that there is a benefit to everybody, including D'Souza's daughter, to have a society with less anxiety about downward mobility, less class resentment, and less possible violence.[105]

An argument similar to D'Souza's was raised by Nozick in Anarchy, State, and Utopia, who wrote that the only way to achieve equality of opportunity was "directly worsening the situations of those more favored with opportunity, or by improving the situation of those less well-favored."[106] Nozick gave an argument of two suitors competing to marry one "fair lady": X was plain; Y was better looking and more intelligent. If Y didn't exist, then "fair lady" would have married X; but Y exists, so she marries Y. Nozick asks: Does suitor X have a legitimate complaint against Y on the basis of unfairness since Y didn't earn his good looks or intelligence?[34] Nozick suggests that there is no grounds for complaint. Nozick argued against equality of opportunity on the grounds that it violates the rights of property, since the equal opportunity maxim interferes with an owner's right to do what he or she pleases with a property.[4] Property rights were a major component of the philosophy of John Locke, and are sometimes referred to as Lockean rights.[4] The sense of the argument is along these lines: equal opportunity rules regarding, say, a hiring decision within a factory, made to bring about greater fairness, violate a factory owner's rights to run the factory as he or she sees best; it has been argued that a factory owner's right to property encompasses all decision-making within the factory as being part of those property rights. That some people's "natural assets" were unearned is irrelevant to the equation, according to Nozick, and he argued that people are nevertheless entitled to enjoy these assets and other things freely given by others.[24]

Friedrich Hayek felt that luck was too much of a variable in economics, such that one can not devise a system with any kind of fairness when many market outcomes are unintended.[24] By sheer chance or random circumstances, a person may become wealthy just by being in the right place and time, and Hayek argued that it is impossible to devise a system to make opportunities equal without knowing how such interactions may play out.[24] Hayek saw not only equality of opportunity but all of social justice as a "mirage".[24]

Some conceptions of equality of opportunity, particularly the substantive and level playing field variants, have been criticized on the basis that they make assumptions to the effect that people have similar genetic makeups.[4] Other critics have suggested that social justice is more complex than mere equality of opportunity.[4] Robert Nozick made the point that what happens in society can not always be reduced to competitions for a coveted position; in 1974, Nozick wrote that "life is not a race in which we all compete for a prize which someone has established" and that there is "no unified race" and there is not some one person "judging swiftness."[34]

See also

External links

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Laura, Laubeová (2000). "Encyclopedia of The World’s Minorities". Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers. http://instituty.fsv.cuni.cz/~laubeova/anglicky/research/encyclopedia/equal.htm. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "This complex and contested concept often assumes shared meaning that in further exploration proves to be superficial or erroneous. Often, its meaning is reduced only to “avoiding unjust discrimination and prejudice” or “treating everybody the same”." 
  2. ^ a b c d e Paul de Vries (2011-09-12). "equal opportunity". Blackwell Reference. http://www.blackwellreference.com/public/tocnode?id=g9780631233176_chunk_g97814051001378_ss1-15. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "his standard has been used to define fairness in lending, housing, hiring, wage and salary levels, job promotion, voting rights ..." 
  3. ^ Rabe, Johan. 2001. Equality, Affirmative Action, and Justice. Books on Demand. p. 83
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah ai aj ak al Richard Arneson (Aug 29, 2008). "Equality of Opportunity". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/equal-opportunity/. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "(Fall 2008 Edition)" 
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Nicole Richardt, Torrey Shanks (2008). "Equal Opportunity". International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Equal_Opportunity.aspx. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "via Encyclopedia.com" 
  6. ^ a b Carol Kitman (2011-09-12). "equal opportunity". Merriam-Webster Dictionary. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/equal%20opportunity. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "nondiscrimination in employment esp. as offered by an equal opportunity employer -- : a context in which there is no discrimination esp. with regard to sex, race, or social standing <alcoholism has become an equal opportunity disease — Carol Kitman>" 
  7. ^ "equal opportunity". The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (Houghton Mifflin). 2009. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/equal+opportunity. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "Absence of discrimination, as in the workplace, based on race, color, age, gender, national origin, religion, or mental or physical disability" 
  8. ^ a b c Matt Cavanagh (2002). "Against equality of opportunity". Oxford. http://books.google.com/books?id=ol-4VmG9ksgC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22equality+of+opportunity%22&hl=en&ei=6JJpTqycJOrj0QHs5q2SBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CC8Q6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-08. 
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Mark Bevir (editor) (2010). "Encyclopedia of Political Theory". SAGE Publications. http://books.google.com/books?id=wVIoCtB3m74C&pg=PA452&lpg=PA452&dq=%28%22equal+opportunity%22+OR+%22equality+of+opportunity%22%29+encyclopedia&source=bl&ots=fnQS6-e-zj&sig=aqqDT8I6-QXS6PB_QRA7yikAAps&hl=en&ei=cyRuTqrdE6Px0gGVh_zpBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7&ved=0CEgQ6AEwBjgU#v=onepage&q&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "(see pages 452-453) There is widespread agreement that equality of opportunity is a good thing, even a constituent of a just society, but very little consensus on what it requires." 
  10. ^ a b c d "equal opportunity". jrank.org. 2011-09-12. http://www.jrank.org/business/pages/508/equal-opportunity.html. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "... concept of ensuring fair treatment for all employees (or prospective employees) throughout the organization." 
  11. ^ a b Yo Jackson (editor) (2006). "Encyclopedia of multicultural psychology". Sage Publications. ISBN 1-4129-0948-1. http://books.google.com/books?id=_hcurFqnQioC&pg=PA19&lpg=PA19&dq=%28%22equal+opportunity%22+OR+%22equality+of+opportunity%22%29+encyclopedia&source=bl&ots=YScb3k2Qxk&sig=qp9qdtBUzpomLQzIwr0eGQEhm0o&hl=en&ei=XUNuTrvnEef50gHcjJHYBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCEQ6AEwADgo#v=onepage&q&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "(page 19) Affirmative action aims to ensure, not to undercut, true equality of opportunity for all ethnicities and both genders." 
  12. ^ "equal opportunity". Princeton University. 2008. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/equal+opportunity. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "(thesaurus) equal opportunity - the right to equivalent opportunities for employment regardless of race or color or sex or national origin" 
  13. ^ "equal opportunity". Collins English Dictionary. 2003. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/equal+opportunity. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "the offering of employment, pay, or promotion equally to all, without discrimination as to sex, race, colour, disability, etc." 
  14. ^ John W. Gardner (1984). "Excellence: Can we be equal and excellent too?". Norton. ISBN 0-393-31287-9. http://books.google.com/books?id=liE59woX624C&pg=PA46&dq=%22equality+of+opportunity%22&hl=en&ei=QBxqTqTfLeLv0gG27byuCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CDAQ6AEwATge#v=onepage&q=%22equality%20of%20opportunity%22&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "(see page 47)..." 
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  16. ^ Ricardo Paes de Barros. Francisco H. G. Ferreira, Jose R. Molinas Vega, and Jaime Saavedra Chanduvi (2009). "Measuring inequality of opportunity in Latin America and the Caribbean". Palgrave Macmillan and the World Bank. ISBN 978-0-8213-7745-1. http://books.google.com/books?id=ABHXr54-XXUC&pg=PA32&dq=%22equality+of+opportunity%22&hl=en&ei=QBxqTqTfLeLv0gG27byuCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCkQ6AEwADge#v=onepage&q=%22equality%20of%20opportunity%22&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "page xvii" 
  17. ^ Young, Michael (1963) [1958]. The Rise of the Meritocracy. Great Britain: Penguin Books. p. 129. ISBN 1560007044. http://books.google.com/books?id=e_rTyIMJR9kC. Retrieved 2011-01-12. 
  18. ^ a b c STEVEN GREENHOUSE (December 21, 2010). "E.E.O.C. Sues Kaplan Over Hiring". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/22/business/22kaplan.html. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "Sending a sharp warning to employers nationwide, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued the Kaplan Higher Education Corporation on Tuesday, accusing it of discriminating against black job applicants through the way it uses credit histories in its hiring process...." 
  19. ^ Gerald N. Hill and Kathleen T. Hill (2011-09-08). "equal opportunity". The Free Dictionary. http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Equality+of+opportunity. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "equal opportunity 1) n. a right supposedly guaranteed by both federal and many state laws against any discrimination in employment, education, housing or credit rights due to a person's race, color, sex (or sometimes sexual orientation), religion, national origin, age or handicap...." 
  20. ^ "equal opportunity". Merriam-Webster. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/equal%20opportunity. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "nondiscrimination in employment esp. as offered by an equal opportunity employer" 
  21. ^ from The Montreal Gazette (January 20, 1906). "Equal Opportunity". The New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F60F13FD3B5A12738DDDA90A94D9405B868CF1D3. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "The coming President of France is the grandson of a shoemaker. ..." 
  22. ^ a b c d e f g h i Boyd Childress (2011-09-12). "Equal Opportunity". Encyclopedia of Business. http://www.enotes.com/biz-encyclopedia/equal-opportunity. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "Equal opportunity refers to the equality of access to jobs, promotions, and other opportunities in corporations, associations and nonprofit organizations." 
  23. ^ John Michael Jenkins, J. J. J. Pigram (editors) (2005). "Encyclopedia of leisure and outdoor recreation". Routledge. ISBN 0-203-67317-4. http://books.google.com/books?id=aNM4HnqDbAgC&pg=PA141&lpg=PA141&dq=%28%22equal+opportunity%22+OR+%22equality+of+opportunity%22%29+encyclopedia&source=bl&ots=R3yUF_QKXa&sig=fSTKOc07GqrKZpFijgUulB_nizA&hl=en&ei=XUNuTrvnEef50gHcjJHYBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=10&ved=0CFcQ6AEwCTgo#v=onepage&q&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "(page 141) It is difficult to imagine a democratic society that did not enshrine the principle in its legal framework." 
  24. ^ a b c d e f g h i GORDON MARSHALL (1998). "Social justice". Encyclopedia.com. http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O88-justicesocial.html. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "... John Rawls's famous ‘difference principle’, which asserts that inequalities in the distribution of scarce goods (power, money, access to healthcare, or whatever) are justified only if they serve to increase the advantage of the least favoured groups in society (see his A Theory of Justice, 1972)" 
  25. ^ a b staff writers (21 September 2010). "Equality of opportunity committee". BBC. http://news.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/hi/wales/newsid_9019000/9019507.stm. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "Equality of opportunity committee -- Social Justice and Local Government Minister Carl Sargeant told the equality of opportunity committee that there has been a slow, but marked, improvement in accessibility of polling stations." 
  26. ^ staff writers (30 November 2009). "The Royal College of Nursing has called for an increase in the number of specialist nurses working with HIV patients.". BBC News. http://news.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/hi/wales/newsid_8386000/8386264.stm. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "The equality of opportunity committee were gathering evidence for their inquiry into discrimination against people living with HIV by healthcare professionals and providers." 
  27. ^ TAKAO IKEUCHI and KAORI SAITO (April 17, 2010). "Space mom wants equal opportunity for all". Japan Times. http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20100417f3.html. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "The couple, who were at one point driven almost to divorce, recently published books on their experiences, calling for the creation of a society that does not require one partner to sacrifice his or her dreams for the other." 
  28. ^ ROBERT GARCIA (August 18, 1989). "Bilingual Education Means Equal Opportunity (letter to the editor)". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/1989/08/18/opinion/l-bilingual-education-means-equal-opportunity-513289.html. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "We must accept others with different backgrounds and cultures, learn from them, and give them an equal opportunity to succeed." 
  29. ^ a b c "Brazil fashion week goes equal opportunity". The Daily Telegraph. June 20, 2009. http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/lifestyle/news/brazil-fashion-week-goes-equal-opportunity/story-e6frf00r-1225737622432. Retrieved 2011-09-08. 
  30. ^ Howard Klieman (2011-09-12). "EQUAL TIME RULE: U.S. Broadcasting Regulatory Rule". Museum of Broadcast Communications. http://www.museum.tv/eotvsection.php?entrycode=equaltimeru. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "Simply put, a station which sells or gives one minute to Candidate A must sell or give the same amount of time with the same audience potential to all other candidates for the particular office." 
  31. ^ "Army Promotion Process Is Held Unconstitutional by U.S. Judge". The New York Times. March 5, 2002. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/05/us/army-promotion-process-is-held-unconstitutional-by-us-judge.html. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "A federal judge ruled today that the Army's equal opportunity promotion process is unconstitutional and allowed a retired lieutenant colonel who is white to continue with a lawsuit that contends the policy denied him advancement." 
  32. ^ "Illiterate Americans (opinion)". The New York Times. September 14, 1993. http://www.nytimes.com/1993/09/14/opinion/illiterate-americans.html. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "... Only in the last 20-odd years, for instance, have colleges and universities become truly serious about increasing the diversity of their student bodies. ..." 
  33. ^ CELIA W. DUGGER (February 29, 1992). "U.S. Study Says Asian-Americans Face Widespread Discrimination". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/1992/02/29/us/us-study-says-asian-americans-face-widespread-discrimination.html. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "Asian-Americans, who make up the fastest-growing minority in the nation, face widespread discrimination in the workplace and are often victims of racially motivated harassment and violence, the United States Commission on Civil Rights said ...." 
  34. ^ a b c Robert Nozick (1974). "Anarchy, State, and Utopia". Basic Books. ISBN 0-465-00270-6. http://books.google.com/books?id=hAi3CdjXlQsC&pg=PA235&dq=%22equality+of+opportunity%22&hl=en&ei=QBxqTqTfLeLv0gG27byuCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CDUQ6AEwAjge#v=onepage&q=%22equality%20of%20opportunity%22&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "(page 235:) The model of a race for a prize is often used in discussions of equality of opportunity." 
  35. ^ a b c d e f John E. Roemer (1998). "Equality of Opportunity (book title)". Harvard College. ISBN 0-674-25991-2. http://books.google.com/books?id=2LfA_KjvOAsC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22equality+of+opportunity%22&hl=en&ei=6JJpTqycJOrj0QHs5q2SBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCoQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "(see pages 1, 2," 
  36. ^ Barbara Bagihole, Equal Opportunities and Social Policy: Issues of gender, race and disability, (pp. 183-184, 37-39)London: Longman, 1997
  37. ^ Mark Bevir (editor) (2010). "Encyclopedia of Political Theory". SAGE Publications. http://books.google.com/books?id=wVIoCtB3m74C&pg=PA452&lpg=PA452&dq=%28%22equal+opportunity%22+OR+%22equality+of+opportunity%22%29+encyclopedia&source=bl&ots=fnQS6-e-zj&sig=aqqDT8I6-QXS6PB_QRA7yikAAps&hl=en&ei=cyRuTqrdE6Px0gGVh_zpBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7&ved=0CEgQ6AEwBjgU#v=onepage&q&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "one classification scheme is: (1) fair equality of opportunity (ie substantive) (2) luck egalitarianism (3) libertarianism (ie formal)." 
  38. ^ Cashmore, Ellis, Dictionary of Race and Ethnic Relations, London: Routledge, 1996
  39. ^ a b Research Machines (2009). "equal-opportunity policy". Farlex. http://encyclopedia.farlex.com/equal-opportunity+policy. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "Plan of action that spells out what constitutes unfair discrimination in order to guide employment practices and to ensure that an organization is working within the legislation on equal pay, and sex and race discrimination..." 
  40. ^ Dr. LEONARD K. HIRSHBERG (December 30, 1917). "What "Equal Opportunity to All" Really Means". The New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F10710F6355E11738DDDA90B94DA415B878DF1D3. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "There should be an equal opportunity for all. Each and every person should have as great or as small an opportunity as the next one. There should not be the unfair, unequal, superior opportunity of one individual over another."..." 
  41. ^ a b c Milton Friedman, Rose D. Friedman (1980). "Free to choose: a personal statement". Harcourt. http://books.google.com/books?id=F5z1B5SwGUEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22milton+friedman%22+%22free+to+choose%22&hl=en&ei=UY5pTobyCqTi0QGat8ngBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CD0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=equality%20of%20opportunity&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "Its real meaning is perhaps best expressed by the French expression ... a career open to the talents. No arbitrary obstacles should prevent people from achieving those positions ..." 
  42. ^ AKEMI NAKAMURA ((uncertain)). "New equal opportunity law called a start". Japan Times. http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn19990331a4.html. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "The original law, which took effect in 1986, r... the revised law bans gender-specific job descriptions in ads, as well as sexual discrimination in employment, deployment, promotion and job training at the workplace." 
  43. ^ MARTIN FACKLER (August 6, 2007). "Career Women In Japan Find A Blocked Path, Despite Equal Opportunity Law". The New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9906E3DC1430F935A3575BC0A9619C8B63&pagewanted=all. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "Since the Equal Employment Opportunity Law was passed in 1985, women ... have had much less success reaching positions of authority ... only 10.1 percent, though Japan's 27 million working women made up nearly half of its work force. By contrast, women held 42.5 percent of managerial jobs in the United States..." 
  44. ^ Christiano, Thomas, 1996, The Rule of the Many: Fundamental Issues in Democratic Theory, Boulder: Westview Press
  45. ^ Daron Acemoglu (Jan. 23, 2011). "How does inequality matter? (letter to the editor)". The Economist. http://www.economist.com/economics/by-invitation/guest-contributions/economic_power_begets_political_power. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "equality of opportunity may be harder to achieve in an unequal society..." 
  46. ^ "Socialism And Social Democracy". Encyclopedia69.com. http://www.encyclopedia69.com/eng/d/socialism-and-social-democracy/socialism-and-social-democracy.htm. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "Social democrats believe that equality of opportunity requires governmental regulation of private property and family rights to ensure that equality of opportunity is meaningful." 
  47. ^ Deborah Orr (5 November 2009). "The problem with equal opportunity for all: Some people are better placed to take advantage of equal opportunity in our schools". The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/nov/05/equal-opportunity-education. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "Therein lies the problem with the idea of equal opportunity for all. Some people are simply better placed to take advantage of opportunity..." 
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  49. ^ Ha-Joon Chang (30 August 2010). "We lost sight of fairness in the false promise of wealth: Acceptance of inequality rests on assumptions that 'free markets' make us all richer in the end. Growth figures tell it differently". The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/30/fairness-inequality-free-market-growth. Retrieved 2011-09-08. 
  50. ^ Paul Krugman (January 10, 2011). "Economics and Morality". The New York Times. http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/10/economics-and-morality/. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "...Access to good schools, good health care, and job opportunities depends on lot on choosing the right parents." 
  51. ^ Parekh, Bhikhu, Rethinking Multiculturalism. Cultural Diversity and Political Theory, pp. 210–211, 240, London: Macmillan Press, 2000
  52. ^ Carol Kleiman (January 19, 1986). "Equal Opportunity: It`s Good Business". Chicago Tribune. http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1986-01-19/news/8601050619_1_affirmative-action-equal-opportunity-human-resource-directors. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "The Reagan administration is dismantling affirmative action and equal employment opportunity enforcement. Yet, many companies seem still to have a real commitment to the concept of nondiscrimination: ... They said they would do so regardless of government requirements." 
  53. ^ KANTA MURALI (February 01 - 14, 2003). "The IIT Story: Issues and Concerns". Frontline. http://www.flonnet.com/fl2003/stories/20030214007506500.htm. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "Frontline -- Volume 20 - Issue 03 -- The IITs currently have no reserved quotas except 15 per cent reservation of seats for S.C.s and 7.5 per cent reservation for S.T.s, who are admitted on the basis of "relaxed criteria, and a very small number of seats for physically handicapped persons and children of defence or paramilitary personnel killed or disabled in action." 
  54. ^ John Rawls (1971). "A Theory of Justice". Harvard College. http://books.google.com/books?id=tUEO9SuNG1oC&pg=PA83&dq=%22equality+of+opportunity%22&hl=en&ei=QBxqTqTfLeLv0gG27byuCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&ved=0CEQQ6AEwBTge#v=onepage&q=%22equality%20of%20opportunity%22&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-08. 
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  56. ^ Rawls, John, 2001, Justice as Fairness: A Restatement, ed. by Erin Kelly, Cambridge, Harvard University Press.
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  63. ^ Anderson, Elizabeth, 1999, "What Is the Point of Equality?", Ethics 109, pp. 287-337.
  64. ^ Pogge, Thomas W., 2000, "Justice for People with Disabilities: the Semiconsequentialist Approach," in Leslie Pickering Francis and Anita Silvers. eds., Americans with Disabilities: Exploring Implications of the Law for Individuals and Institutions, New York and London: Routledge, pp. 34-53.
  65. ^ Buchanan, Allen, Brock, Dan W., Daniels, Norman, and Wikler, Daniel, 2000, From Chance to Choice--Genetics and Justice, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, chapters 3, 4 and 7.
  66. ^ a b Ricardo Paes de Barros. Francisco H. G. Ferreira, Jose R. Molinas Vega, and Jaime Saavedra Chanduvi (2009). "Measuring inequality of opportunity in Latin America and the Caribbean". Palgrave Macmillan and the World Bank. ISBN 978-0-8213-7745-1. http://books.google.com/books?id=ABHXr54-XXUC&pg=PA32&dq=%22equality+of+opportunity%22&hl=en&ei=QBxqTqTfLeLv0gG27byuCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCkQ6AEwADge#v=onepage&q=%22equality%20of%20opportunity%22&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "(page 32 Box 1.1) But Roemer proposes an important distinction between meritocracy and equality of opportunity. ... equality of opportunity implies leveling the playing field before any competition takes place. Meritocracy is equivalent to a nondiscriminatory approach at the competition stage..." 
  67. ^ "Exaggerated hopes for Mideast prosperity?". Al Jazeera. 24 Mar 2011. http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/03/2011321124926433486.html. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "Tunisia: Advances without equal opportunity ... Despite substantial economic gains, the average figures concealed the extensive corruption, suppression, and high unemployment, especially among youth. Left out of the recent prosperity were many rural and urban poor, including small businesses. ... Egypt: Stagnation without equal opportunity ..." 
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  76. ^ Edward I. Koch (February 20, 1989). "Equal Opportunity - Without Minority Set-Asides". The New York Times: Opinion. http://www.nytimes.com/1989/02/20/opinion/equal-opportunity-without-minority-set-asides.html. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "The constructive response to this sweeping decision is to reaffirm the principle of equal treatment, rethink the reasons for set-aside programs and, mindful of the imperative for color-blind policies, implement a different type of economic set-aside program." 
  77. ^ ROBIN FINN (October 5, 2007). "An Equal Opportunity Enemy of Bias". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/05/nyregion/05lives.html. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "... Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ... a workplace free of discrimination that becomes a reality for everybody regardless of race, gender or disability is my mission.”" 
  78. ^ Peter Bregg (Feb. 3, 1967). "Equality First: The Royal Commission on the Status of Women". CBC Digital Archives. http://archives.cbc.ca/politics/rights_freedoms/topics/86/. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "The Royal Commission on the Status of Women, called by Prime Minister Pearson in February 1967, held the notion of equal opportunity as its precept. ..." 
  79. ^ Timothy Chui (2010-06-18). "EOC: Discrimination cases warrant special tribunal". China Daily. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/hkedition/2010-06/18/content_9986601.htm. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "The Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC) ... Our close to 14 years of operation tells us there is a need for a simplified process for adjudication equal opportunity cases. ..." 
  80. ^ a b "WOMEN'S WORK LIMITED BY LAW; Equal Opportunity League Fighting Legislation Which Restricts Their Hours of Labor A Case In Point.". The New York Times. January 18, 1920. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F10A10FB395B11728DDDA10994D9405B808EF1D3. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "... The Women's Equal Opportunity League, representing more than 20,000 women, is actively engaged in the campaign." 
  81. ^ "Job Description: EQUAL OPPORTUNITY PROGRAMS ASSISTANT". City of Phoenix. 2011-09-16. http://phoenix.gov/employment/descrip/code/07050.html. Retrieved 2011-09-16. "... (job description:) Performs statistical research and analysis (required knowledge...) Statistical analysis and research methods." 
  82. ^ "1690 Equal Opportunity Specialist". Missouri State University. 2011. http://www.missouristate.edu/human/jobdescriptions/21180.htm. Retrieved 2011-09-16. "Skills: ... Strong quantitative and statistical analysis skills are required. ... Experience with data collection and statistical analysis is preferred." 
  83. ^ "Affirmative Action Program -- IV. Utilization Analyses/Workforce Analyses". Colorado State University. 2010. http://oeo.colostate.edu/affirmative-action.aspx. Retrieved 2011-09-16. "Note: Colorado State university keeps separate counts for each type of position for these categories: Total Employees, Total Males, Total Females, White Non-Hispanic Males, African American/Black Males, Asian American Males, Native American Males, Hispanic Males, Other Males, White Non-Hispanic Females, African American/Black Females, Asian American Females, Hispanic Females, Native American Females, Other Females" 
  84. ^ a b "General: Guidelines to Policy Implementation". Aberystwyth university. 21 December 2004. http://www.aber.ac.uk/en/hr/equalopp/equal-opportunities-diversity-policy/implementation-general/. Retrieved 2011-09-16. "Aberystwyth University will assemble statistical information concerning the composition of its staff and student body to establish the current baseline position for appropriate action and comparison with the relevant demographic indicators." 
  85. ^ Ben Schock (December 4, 2007). "Study Finds Women Underrepresented In Some Fields". The Daily of the University of Washington. http://dailyuw.com/news/2007/dec/04/study-finds-women-underrepresented-in-some-fields/. Retrieved 2011-09-16. "The study notes that women are genuinely equitably represented as compared to men... In one extreme comparison, women hold 90 percent of the School of Nursing degrees, while women hold only 18 percent of the School of Engineering degrees. ... Among the faculty, women comprise only 23 percent of professors ..." 
  86. ^ (UW) President's Advisory Committee on Women (2007). "Term Definitions". University of Washington. http://depts.washington.edu/pacw/reports/women2007/terms.shtml. Retrieved 2011-09-16. "Utilization analysis – These data are calculated based on the comparative hiring pool. Numbers come from U.S. census data..." 
  87. ^ Marcia Killien (2007). "PACW's 2007 Report on Women at UW --- Executive Summary". Univ. of Washington. http://depts.washington.edu/pacw/reports/women2007/execSummary.shtml. Retrieved 2011-09-16. "We recommend that a report on women at the University of Washington be repeated at periodic (e.g., bi-annual) intervals to track progress towards goals." 
  88. ^ a b c d staff writer; Stefano Allesina (researcher) (August 3, 2011). "Italian academia is a family business, statistical analysis reveals". The University of Chicago Medical Center. http://www.uchospitals.edu/news/2011/20110803-nepotism.html. Retrieved 2011-09-16. "By comparing the frequency of last names among more than 61,000 professors in medicine, engineering, law, and other fields, University of Chicago researcher Stefano Allesina found the pattern to be incompatible with unbiased, equal opportunity hiring. ... At the University of Bari, nine relatives from three generations of a single family are on the economics faculty, several newspapers reported last year. ..." 
  89. ^ Anne Phillips (2004). "Defending Equality of Outcome". Journal of Political Philosophy. pp. 1–19. http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/533/. Retrieved 2011-07-15. 
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  96. ^ "The Executive Order 11246". United States Department of Labor. 2011-09-12. http://www.dol.gov/compliance/laws/comp-eeo.htm. Retrieved 2011-09-12. "The Executive Order 11246 (E.O 11246) ... requires covered contractors to take affirmative action to ensure that equal opportunity is provided in all aspects of their employment." 
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  103. ^ a b Collin May (book reviewer) John Kekes (author of book) (June 22, 2009). "Review: "The Art of Politics: The New Betrayal of America and How to Resist It"". c2c Journal. http://www.c2cjournal.ca/blog-articles/view/review-the-art-of-politics-the-new-betrayal-of-america-and-how-to-resist-it. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "Kekes contrasts what he calls the “balanced view” with the ideological. Unlike the ideological perspective with its reduction of politics to a single moral imperative, the balanced view recognizes a plurality of goods, weighed and measured with each other on the political level within a defined political community." 
  104. ^ AGAINST EQUALITY OF OPPORTUNITY | Matt Cavanagh | Review by The Spectator
  105. ^ a b c d Timothy Noah (Oct. 10, 2000). "Dinesh D'Souza vs. "Equality of Opportunity"". Slate Magazine. http://www.slate.com/id/1006238/. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "(review of D'Souza's book The Virtue of Prosperity) Equal opportunity seems like a logical fulfillment of the equality principle in the Declaration of Independence..." 
  106. ^ Robert Nozick (1974). "Anarchy, State, and Utopia". Basic Books. ISBN 0-465-00270-6. http://books.google.com/books?id=hAi3CdjXlQsC&pg=PA235&dq=%22equality+of+opportunity%22&hl=en&ei=QBxqTqTfLeLv0gG27byuCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CDUQ6AEwAjge#v=onepage&q=%22equality%20of%20opportunity%22&f=false. Retrieved 2011-09-08. "(page 235:) There are two ways to attempt to provide such equality: by directly worsening the situations of those more favored with opportunity, or by improving the situation of those less well-favored."