IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/unu/wpaper/wp-2023-14.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Does affirmative action address ethnic inequality?: A systematic review of the literature

Author

Listed:
  • Simone Schotte
  • Rachel M. Gisselquist
  • Tharcisio Leone

Abstract

Despite the good intentions behind affirmative action policies to mediate 'horizontal inequalities' between ethnic groups, the evidence on their effectiveness remains open to debate. In this study, we conduct a systematic review of the literature with global scope, to add new clarity on whether positive or negative effects prevail according to the available quantitative evidence and the strength and generalizability of this evidence. Overall, close to two-thirds of the 194 reviewed studies find a dominantly positive effect.

Suggested Citation

  • Simone Schotte & Rachel M. Gisselquist & Tharcisio Leone, 2023. "Does affirmative action address ethnic inequality?: A systematic review of the literature," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2023-14, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    • Handle: RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2023-14
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.wider.unu.edu/sites/default/files/Publications/Working-paper/PDF/wp2023-14-does-affirmative-action-address-ethnic-inequality.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Frances Stewart, 2000. "Crisis Prevention: Tackling Horizontal Inequalities," Oxford Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 28(3), pages 245-262.
    2. Kaletski, Elizabeth & Prakash, Nishith, 2016. "Does Political Reservation for Minorities Affect Child Labor? Evidence from India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 50-69.
    3. Larry L. Howard & Nishith Prakash, 2012. "Do employment quotas explain the occupational choices of disadvantaged minorities in India?," International Review of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 26(4), pages 489-513, August.
    4. Hugh Waddington & Howard White & Birte Snilstveit & Jorge Garcia Hombrados & Martina Vojtkova & Philip Davies & Ami Bhavsar & John Eyers & Tracey Perez Koehlmoos & Mark Petticrew & Jeffrey C. Valentin, 2012. "How to do a good systematic review of effects in international development: a tool kit," Journal of Development Effectiveness, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 4(3), pages 359-387, September.
    5. David Neumark & Harry Holzer, 2000. "Assessing Affirmative Action," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 38(3), pages 483-568, September.
    6. György Molnár, 2017. "Capability building combined with microcredit: the loan alone is insufficient," Journal of Social Entrepreneurship, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 8(3), pages 354-374, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Rachel M. Gisselquist & Min Jung Kim & Simone Schotte & Chinmayi Srikanth, 2024. "Affirmative action around the world: insights from a new dataset (update)," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2024-48, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    2. Simone Schotte & Tharcisio Leone & Rachel M. Gisselquist, 2023. "The impact of affirmative action in India and the United States: A systematic literature review," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2023-15, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Elizabeth Kaletski & Nishith Prakash, 2016. "Affirmative action policy in developing countries: Lessons learned and a way forward," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2016-52, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    2. Prakash, Nishith, 2008. "Improving the Labor Market Outcomes of Minorities: The Role of Employment Quota," MPRA Paper 11010, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Michael Lopesciolo & Daniela Muhaj & Carolina Ines Pan, 2021. "The Quest for Increased Saudization: Labor Market Outcomes and the Shadow Price of Workforce Nationalization Policies," Growth Lab Working Papers 179, Harvard's Growth Lab.
    4. Elizabeth Kaletski & Nishith Prakash, 2016. "Affirmative action policy in developing countries: Lessons learned and a way forward," WIDER Working Paper Series 052, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    5. Sugata Bag & Suman Seth & Barnali Basak, 2023. "Heterogeneous effect of the Indian affirmative action: The role of caste certificates," Working papers 339, Centre for Development Economics, Delhi School of Economics.
    6. Michael Lopesciolo & Daniela Muhaj & Carolina Ines Pan, 2021. "The Quest for Increased Saudization: Labor Market Outcomes and the Shadow Price of Workforce Nationalization Policies," CID Working Papers 132a, Center for International Development at Harvard University.
    7. Najam, Rafiuddin, 2024. "Closing the gap: Effect of a gender quota on women’s access to education in Afghanistan," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 99(C).
    8. Grant H. Lewis, 2017. "Effects of federal socioeconomic contracting preferences," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 49(4), pages 763-783, December.
    9. Elizabeth Kaletski & Nishith Prakash, 2017. "Can Elected Minority Representatives Affect Health Worker Visits? Evidence from India," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(1), pages 67-102, February.
    10. Duclos, Jean-Yves, 2006. "Liberté ou égalité?," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 82(4), pages 441-476, décembre.
    11. Lenyeletse V. Basupi & Claire H. Quinn & Andrew J. Dougill, 2017. "Pastoralism and Land Tenure Transformation in Sub-Saharan Africa: Conflicting Policies and Priorities in Ngamiland, Botswana," Land, MDPI, vol. 6(4), pages 1-17, December.
    12. Zovanga L Kone & Maggie Y Liu & Aaditya Mattoo & Caglar Ozden & Siddharth Sharma, 2018. "Internal borders and migration in India," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 18(4), pages 729-759.
    13. Francisca Antman & Brian Duncan, 2015. "Incentives to Identify: Racial Identity in the Age of Affirmative Action," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 97(3), pages 710-713, July.
    14. Milanovic, Branko, 2013. "The inequality possibility frontier: the extensions and new applications," Comparative Institutional Analysis Working Paper Series 2013:1, Lund University, Comparative Institutional Analysis, School of Economics and Management.
    15. Sarah Cechvala & Brian Ganson, 2024. "Systems Perspectives on Business and Peace: The Contingent Nature of Business-Related Action with Respect to Peace Positive Impacts," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 194(3), pages 523-544, October.
    16. Sáez-Martı´, Maria & Zenou, Yves, 2012. "Cultural transmission and discrimination," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(2), pages 137-146.
    17. Bertrand, Marianne & Hanna, Rema & Mullainathan, Sendhil, 2010. "Affirmative action in education: Evidence from engineering college admissions in India," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(1-2), pages 16-29, February.
    18. Anna Adamecz-Völgyi & Morag Henderson & Nikki Shure, 2023. "The labor market returns to “first-in-family” university graduates," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 36(3), pages 1395-1429, July.
    19. Gyorgy Molnar & Attila Havas, 2019. "Escaping from the poverty trap with social innovation: a social microcredit programme in Hungary," CERS-IE WORKING PAPERS 1912, Institute of Economics, Centre for Economic and Regional Studies.
    20. Mattoussi, Wided & Mattoussi, Foued & Larnaout, Afrah, 2023. "Optimal subsidization for the adoption of new irrigation technologies," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 1126-1141.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2023-14. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Siméon Rapin (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/widerfi.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.