In my Pope Center article today, I review the recent book by Professor Sheryll Cashin, Place, Not Race. There is some good in the book, in particular Cashin's point that the way "affirmative action" works, it merely creates what she calls "optical diversity." She sees little if any benefit in doing that. Alas, she has a different kind of preference in mind, one that would supposedly benefit students who are "segregated" by their socio-economic or geographical "place." She believes that the key to fairness in society is getting "striver" kids into elite colleges.
find her book unpersuasive as well as ungracious, for its many nasty jabs at people who don't like the idea of group preferences at all.
