I do not think that racial or gender diversity is a value. I look at it in Aristotelian terms. For Aristotle, diversity would be a means goal not an end goal. A means goal is something that you do to accomplish something else. Such as money. Money for money sake is not an end goal. What can you do with money by itself? Most end goals result in happiness which you have means goals to give you happiness but happiness itself is not a goal to anything else; thus says Aristotle. Back to diversity. Diversity can be termed a means goal but the problem is a means to what? I think we have to look at what the goal for diversity is, and examine whether goal that is virtuous before we broadly accept diversity as a goal. Do we champion diversity so that we look good to our fellows who remark what fine and tolerant people we are? Do we look to diversity to create job opportunities for particular favored groups of our choosing? If on the other hand, we look to diversity for selecting the best person for a job,, or for a political position, or to allocate limited governmental financial benefits, I would suggest that diversity is not even a good means goal to accomplish those "end" results much less virtuous. At that point it becomes racist which from my perspective is a bad thing.
A very good discussion of the "conversation" that has not been taking place in America for a long time. I would like to add some points:
1. I would not call humans a "communal society." I think that we evolved as "pack animals" in the sense of wolves. Those packs are social and are communities, but there is difference between a herd of American Bison and a wolf pack. The term communal society evokes (at least for me, some of the mindless hive communities among social insects. Humans are individually thinking and adapting, we do not collect in herds. None of that implies that the rest of the essay loses value -- it does not, but it does make a difference when we consider diversity.
2. As Dave discusses, the emphasis on diversity in America today is on what Dr. Scott Page refers to as Identity Diversity -- differences by which we and others identify ourselves; sex, skin color, ethnic ancestry, etc.. Identity diversity, as Dave ably points out, does nothing to contribute to the performance of mission-oriented organizations. In fact, the segmentation of mission-oriented organizations into identity-diverse pieces leads to dysfunction.
3. There are, however, different kinds of diversity -- kind of a diversity of diversities. The one that I think we should be thinking about is diversity of thought, that is cognitive diversity. Dr. Page has done a great deal of research and work in this area and his various books are worth reading. Cognitive diversity is strength as long as organizational leadership understands how to put it to work. Simply assembling a group of people (say aboard of directors with racial and gender diversity) does not gain improved performance any more than assembling flour, chocolate, milk eggs, and sugar will spontaneously lead to the appearance of a chocolate cake. The Second Law of Thermodynamics explicitly states that -- ya gotta irreversibly expend energy to reduce the entropy. Leading a cognitively diverse mission-oriented organization requires leaders who know how to leverage those differences in thinking.
4. If we choose people based on their cognitive diversity and their proven abilities, we will (gasp) almost certainly find ourselves with some women, some people of Asian ancestry, some people of European Ancestry, some people of African Ancestry, and some people who are old or young or LGBTQ.
5. That is not happening today because too many of our young men and women are disadvantaged by a monopolistic public school system that is more focused on the welfare of the teachers than on the performance of the system, and far too many of those disadvantaged young people are "people of color." That leads to a "quality problem" at the age when mission-oriented organizations are looking for quality young people. We cannot "test in" that quality at the end of the K-12 educational process, we must build it in throughout the entire process.
6. Unfortunately, progressive leadership in America today is focusing precisely on "testing in" that quality rather than addressing the root cause of the poor performance of the K-12 educational system. Fix the root cause not the symptom.
Guy, your argumentation plumbs the depths of an important concept. Only the educated (as opposed to those ideologically indoctrinated) have the capacity to follow the important logic you present.
Excellent essay. We tend to affiliate based on values. If diversity is a value, then how would it be evaluated in terms of virtue?
I do not think that racial or gender diversity is a value. I look at it in Aristotelian terms. For Aristotle, diversity would be a means goal not an end goal. A means goal is something that you do to accomplish something else. Such as money. Money for money sake is not an end goal. What can you do with money by itself? Most end goals result in happiness which you have means goals to give you happiness but happiness itself is not a goal to anything else; thus says Aristotle. Back to diversity. Diversity can be termed a means goal but the problem is a means to what? I think we have to look at what the goal for diversity is, and examine whether goal that is virtuous before we broadly accept diversity as a goal. Do we champion diversity so that we look good to our fellows who remark what fine and tolerant people we are? Do we look to diversity to create job opportunities for particular favored groups of our choosing? If on the other hand, we look to diversity for selecting the best person for a job,, or for a political position, or to allocate limited governmental financial benefits, I would suggest that diversity is not even a good means goal to accomplish those "end" results much less virtuous. At that point it becomes racist which from my perspective is a bad thing.
Excellent analysis.
A very good discussion of the "conversation" that has not been taking place in America for a long time. I would like to add some points:
1. I would not call humans a "communal society." I think that we evolved as "pack animals" in the sense of wolves. Those packs are social and are communities, but there is difference between a herd of American Bison and a wolf pack. The term communal society evokes (at least for me, some of the mindless hive communities among social insects. Humans are individually thinking and adapting, we do not collect in herds. None of that implies that the rest of the essay loses value -- it does not, but it does make a difference when we consider diversity.
2. As Dave discusses, the emphasis on diversity in America today is on what Dr. Scott Page refers to as Identity Diversity -- differences by which we and others identify ourselves; sex, skin color, ethnic ancestry, etc.. Identity diversity, as Dave ably points out, does nothing to contribute to the performance of mission-oriented organizations. In fact, the segmentation of mission-oriented organizations into identity-diverse pieces leads to dysfunction.
3. There are, however, different kinds of diversity -- kind of a diversity of diversities. The one that I think we should be thinking about is diversity of thought, that is cognitive diversity. Dr. Page has done a great deal of research and work in this area and his various books are worth reading. Cognitive diversity is strength as long as organizational leadership understands how to put it to work. Simply assembling a group of people (say aboard of directors with racial and gender diversity) does not gain improved performance any more than assembling flour, chocolate, milk eggs, and sugar will spontaneously lead to the appearance of a chocolate cake. The Second Law of Thermodynamics explicitly states that -- ya gotta irreversibly expend energy to reduce the entropy. Leading a cognitively diverse mission-oriented organization requires leaders who know how to leverage those differences in thinking.
4. If we choose people based on their cognitive diversity and their proven abilities, we will (gasp) almost certainly find ourselves with some women, some people of Asian ancestry, some people of European Ancestry, some people of African Ancestry, and some people who are old or young or LGBTQ.
5. That is not happening today because too many of our young men and women are disadvantaged by a monopolistic public school system that is more focused on the welfare of the teachers than on the performance of the system, and far too many of those disadvantaged young people are "people of color." That leads to a "quality problem" at the age when mission-oriented organizations are looking for quality young people. We cannot "test in" that quality at the end of the K-12 educational process, we must build it in throughout the entire process.
6. Unfortunately, progressive leadership in America today is focusing precisely on "testing in" that quality rather than addressing the root cause of the poor performance of the K-12 educational system. Fix the root cause not the symptom.
Guy, your argumentation plumbs the depths of an important concept. Only the educated (as opposed to those ideologically indoctrinated) have the capacity to follow the important logic you present.