Frederick R. Lynch

Bio: Frederick R. Lynch is an academic researcher from Claremont McKenna College. The author has contributed to research in topics: Affirmative action & Diversity (business). The author has an hindex of 6, co-authored 14 publications receiving 225 citations. Previous affiliations of Frederick R. Lynch include Claremont Colleges & California State University, Los Angeles.

Invisible Victims: White Males and the Crisis of Affirmative Action

Abstract: Introduction: Social Policy by Steamroller Affirmative Action: Legal History and Public Opinion An Affirmative Action Sampler Invisible Victims: Individual Reactions Invisible Victims: Reactions of Co-Wrokers, Friends, and Relatives Invisible Victims: Institutional Responses Affirmative Action and the Mass Media The Spiral of Silence and the New McCarthyism Affirmative Action, the University, and Sociology Elite Recommendation and the Flaws of Affirmative Action Manifest Consequences of Affirmative Action Restructuring Society by Race and Gender: Latent Functions of Affirmative Action Appendixes Index

The Diversity Machine: The Drive to Change the "White Male Workplace"

Abstract: "Diversity" has become the turn-of-the-century buzzword Republican and Democratic leaders ritually chant "diversity is our strength" and corporate CEOs talk about the need to create a "workforce that looks like America" Most corporate mission statements now contain a clause on "valuing differences" and millions of employees have completed-or soon will undergo-some sort of "diversity training" Where did all this come from -and why? Who created diversity programs? How do they differ? How effective are these policies? Can they do more harm than good in organizations and in the wider society?During the past decade, sociologist Frederick R Lynch studied the rise of a social policy movement that has successfully moved multiculturalism from universities and foundations into the courts, mass media, and the American workplace The new diversity policies are future-oriented and market-driven, eclipsing "old" affirmative action debates about overcoming past discrimination against blacksBased on more than six years of field research and hundreds of interviews, Lynch tracks the development and impact of different forms of diversity policies at dozens of consultant gatherings, in the business and professional literature and through in-depth case studies such as the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department and the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor He profiles the major consultants who have powered the diversity machine, analyzes the benefits and drawbacks of various approaches to workplace diversity and provides numerous "you-are-there" samples of workshops, seminars, and conferencesThe book is written for the general reader interested in public-policy issues, social scientists, and others interested in the origins and consequences of workplace diversity policies

Affirmative Action Is Dead; Long Live Affirmative Action

Abstract: Affirmative Action Is Dead; Long Live Affirmative Action. By Faye J. Crosby. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004. 352p. $30.00. Through an informative professional literature review, Faye Crosby intends to educate affirmative action critics and a skeptical public about the real-life operation of and continuing need for a largely misunderstood social policy. Her book's key question is “why does the policy of affirmative action which appears reasonable to many social scientists attract so much negative comment?” (p. 22). Despite confusion with illegal quotas and with the Supreme Court's newly minted diversity justification, Crosby is convinced that social science studies prove that properly implemented affirmative action is largely beneficial and still necessary to overcome overt or subtle in-group prejudice, discrimination, and exclusion.

Social theory and the progressive era

Abstract: Even the mass media have noticed that many of our current societal maladies are basically the same as those faced by Americans at the turn of the century: gross political corruption, corporate arrogance coupled with consumer impotence, environmental pollution and failed conservation, ethnic antagonism, pockets of acute poverty, and urban decay. Such recognition suggests that it is high time that scholars and laymen alike turned with renewed interest to comprehending what transpired during the early 1900's. The first two decades of the twentieth century constitute a crucial period in the development of the United States because, although the processes of urbanization and industrialization had begun well before 1900, it was only after the turn of the century that Americans first recognized and tried to grapple with the structural changes and problems wrought by those twin processes. Indeed, the period roughly spanning the years from 1900 to 1920 has been termed the "Progressive era" because of the extensive amount of thought and action directed at the ill effects of massive urbanization, industrialization, and immigration. It would seem that if we are to deal with these problems today, it would be wise to study how they were confronted yesterday. That is, before we can ask "what is to be done?" in the current context we must first undertake to understand "what has happened before."

How Affirmative Action Became Diversity Management Employer Response to Antidiscrimination Law, 1961 to 1996

Abstract: How did corporate affirmative action programs become diversity programs? During the 1970s, active federal enforcement of equal employment opportunity (EEO) and affirmative action (AA) law, coupled with ambiguity about the terms of compliance, stimulated employers to hire antidiscrimination specialists to fashion EEO/AA programs. In the early 1980s, the Reagan administration curtailed enforcement, but as Philip Selznick's band of early institutionalists might have predicted, EEO/AA program practices had developed an organizational constituency in EEO/AA specialists and thus survived Reagan's enforcement cutbacks. As John Meyer's band of neoinstitutionalists might have predicted, that constituency collectively retheorized antidiscrimination practices through professional returns in terms of efficiency, using the rhetoric of diversity management..

Racism without Racists

Abstract: LIBERALISM: UNMASKING REASONABLE RACISM22 Because of the curious way in which liberalism’s principles are used in the post–civil rights era, other analysts label modern racial ideology “laissez-fare racism” or “competitive racism” or argue that modern racism is essentially a combination of the “American Creed” with antiblack resentment.23 The importance of this frame is evident in that whites use it on issues ranging from affirmative action and interracial friendship and marriage to neighborhood and residential segregation. Because of the pivotal role played by this frame in organizing whites’ racial views, I provide numerous examples below. 13_151_Bonilla_Silva.indb 78 6/27/13 4:46 AM The Central Frames of Color-Blind Racism 79 Rationalizing Racial Unfairness in the Name of Equal Opportunity An archetype of how white students use the notion of equal opportunity in an abstract manner to oppose racial fairness is Sue, a student at SU. When asked if minority students should be provided unique opportunities to be admitted into universities, Sue stated: I don’t think that they should be provided with unique opportunities. I think that they should have the same opportunities as everyone else. You know, it’s up to them to meet the standards and whatever that’s required for entrance into universities or whatever. I don’t think that just because they’re a minority that they should, you know, not meet the requirements, you know. Sue, like most whites, ignored the effects of past and contemporary discrimination on the social, economic, and educational status of minorities. Therefore, by supporting equal opportunity for everyone without a concern for the savage inequalities between whites and blacks, Sue’s stance safeguards white privilege. Sue even used the notion of equal opportunity to avoid explaining why blacks tend to perform worse than whites academically: “I don’t know . . . um, like I said, I don’t see it as a group thing. I see it more as an individual [thing] and I don’t know why as a whole they don’t do better. I mean, as I see it, they have the same opportunity and everything. They should be doing equal.” College students are not the only ones who use this abstract notion of equal opportunity to justify their racial views. For example, Eric, a corporate auditor in his forties, and a very affable man who seemed more tolerant than most members of his generation (e.g., he had dated a black woman for three years, recognized that discrimination happens “a lot” and identified multiple examples, and even said that “the system is . . . is white”), erupted in anger when asked if reparations were due to blacks for the injuries caused by slavery and Jim Crow: “Oh tell them to shut up, OK! I had nothing to do with the whole situation. The opportunity is there, there is no reparation involved and let’s not dwell on it. I’m very opinionated about that!” After suggesting that Jews and Japanese are the ones who really deserve reparation, Eric added, “But something that happened three God-damned generations ago, what do you want us to do about it now? Give them opportunity, give them scholarships, but reparations?” Was Eric just a white with a “principled opposition” to government intervention (see chapter 1 for analysts who make this claim)? This does not seem to be the case since Eric, like most whites, made a distinction between government spending on behalf of victims of child abuse, the homeless, and battered women (whom whites deem as legitimate candidates for assistance) and government spending on blacks (whom whites deem as unworthy candidates for assistance). This finding was consistent 13_151_Bonilla_Silva.indb 79 6/27/13 4:46 AM

On Racial Diversity and Group Decision-Making: Identifying Multiple Effects of Racial Composition on Jury Deliberations

Abstract: This research examines the multiple effects of racial diversity on group decision-making. Participants deliberated on the trial of a Black defendant as members of racially homogeneous or heterogeneous mock juries. Half of the groups were exposed to pretrial jury selection questions about racism and half were not. Deliberation analyses supported the prediction that diverse groups would exchange a wider range of information than all-White groups. This finding was not wholly attributable to the performance of Black participants, as Whites cited more case facts, made fewer errors, and were more amenable to discussion of racism when in diverse versus all-White groups. Even before discussion, Whites in diverse groups were more lenient towards the Black defendant, demonstrating that the effects of diversity do not occur solely through information exchange. The influence of jury selection questions extended previous findings that blatant racial issues at trial increase leniency towards a Black defendant.