Analysing Affirmative Actions From Different Lenses: Insights From Rawls, Dworkin, Young, And Sen

Abstract

The word “Affirmative Action” refers to the positive discrimination done by government institutions for the upliftment of underprivileged people to create equality in society. It is the criteria that recognize that there is an unequal distribution of resources and to create equality in society there is a need for certain kinds of positive discrimination in favor of those who are underprivileged. In different countries this provision is described differently for example in the US it is called ‘affirmative action,’ in Europe it is called ‘positive action’ and in India, it is called ‘affirmative action.’

This paper analyzes the perspective of different political theorists on this issue, including Iris Marion Young, Ashok Acharya, Krishna Menon, and John Rawls. The second part of this paper relates ‘Affirmative Action’ with the concept of justice and tries to understand how this positive discrimination is justified to create a just society.