Asian Americans often are depicted as the nation's model minority, whose self-reliance, educational achievement and financial success offer irrefutable evidence not only of America's vast promise but also of its declining emphasis on race. Consequently, the validity of affirmative action comes to question in regards to and within the Asian community.
The Asian Pacific American (APA) Community, to use the glass ceiling terminology, has become especially divided on this issue. Those against affirmative action have lured Asian Americans by claiming that eliminating affirmative action would increase the Asian American acceptance. They cite examples of Asian American achievement and integration into American society as proof that affirmative action programs are no longer needed and in fact hinder opportunities for "qualified" Asian Americans.
On the other hand, those who are in support of affirmative action stress that America has not yet reached a strictly merit-based, color-blind society and that discrimination still exists in both the admissions and hiring processes. As past beneficiaries of affirmative action, Asian Americans should not retreat from this legacy of the civil rights.
Statistically it seems that Asians are performing pretty well in America. Asian Americans' median family income of $ 43,000 and 42 % college completion rate surpass those of any other racial or ethnic group in the country, including whites. They have an impressive record of entrepreneurship and their devotion to family stability, as measured by the percentage of children from two-parent households, is unmatched.
But Asian American activists are quick to add that their success is not all that it seems. There are huge educational and economic gaps within the diverse Asian American community, with Chinese and Japanese Americans generally better off than those with roots in Southeast Asia.
Also, they note, Asian Americans as a group tend to be better paid because they are better educated. A more careful perusal of the data, however, shows Asian Americans with a college degree earn less than whites with equal educational credentials. Even though APA's have made progress, discrimination and disparity still remain: whites with college degrees make almost 11% more than APA's with the same degrees, and white high school graduates make 26% more than APA high school graduates. In 1989, white doctoral scientists and engineers earned more than 8% more than U.S. born APA's. These statistics show that race still matters. In addition, despite their high educational achievement, Asian Americans comprise only 0.3 % of the senior-level managers in Fortune 1000 companies, receive a tiny share of government contracts, and are underrepresented in a range of jobs, from journalist to college professor.
Many Asian Americans see those disparities as the modern legacy of the discrimination they have faced in this country. Many Americans don't know that the Chinese (or historically referred to as Chinese "coolies") were effectively slave labor in the United States and other areas of the world. They were responsible for building many of the railroads in America as well as those in Japan and Korea. Asians have experienced various forms of discrimination including the Chinese Exclusion Act, which prevented Chinese immigration to the United States for decades. In fact, during the famous Plessy v Ferguson Supreme Court Case, Justice Harlan's famous dissent, in an effort to argue on the behalf of African Americans, cited the Chinese as " a race so different from our own that we do not permit those belonging to it to become citizens of the United States. Persons belonging to it are...absolutely excluded from our country". In addition there were laws banning Japanese ownership of farmland, and the forced internment of Japanese Americans during World War II.
It is the legacy of this discrimination that looms over Asians just as it does over other minority groups. It is the idea that the only real Americans are white and it is this attitude which permits Asians or any other minority group from truly not benefiting from all that America can offer.
Because they are racially and culturally distinctive from the American mainstream, Asian people have widely been seen as unable to be absorbed into American society. According to this view, anything Asian is thus inherently "alien" to America. For decades, Americans have viewed Asian immigrants as "taking" from this country without giving back. Early laws making it difficult for Asians to immigrate and impossible for them to become naturalized citizens reinforced this perception.
Right now, the Asian American community is being used as a wedge group, manipulated as poster children for white conservatives using their case to undo affirmative action. "Because of this", says Frank H. Wu, Assistant Professor at Howard University School of Law, "Asian Americans must re-consider their stance on the issue: Do we want to completely abolish a program from which we ourselves have benefited, without room for reform or fine-tuning? Is the 8% or so increase in school admissions of Asian Americans worth the price of declining admissions for African American and Latino students, while virtually eliminating Native American students? What is "merit" and will abolishing affirmative action obtain it?"