Critical Public Policy Scholarship and Social Justice

Introduction

Despite significant progress in addressing institutionalized racism and other public policies that operate to the disadvantage of oppressed and marginalized groups, the recent upsurge in race-related incidents across the country underscores the fact that much more remains to be done to eliminate these oppressive and inequitable policies from American society. This paper provides a critical review of assigned readings to assess the extent to which the concepts, assumptions, and arguments they present constitute an example of public policy scholarship. It also offers a critical assessment of the extent to which those arguments reveal the social justice impacts of public policy on groups that are excluded and marginalized. Finally, the paper explains how the argument that minority inclusion programs are ineffective in truly assisting Black women in the oil and gas sector follows from the readings, before summarizing key findings in the conclusion.

Although public policy scholarship can involve a wide array of social, economic, and political issues, Smith and Larimer (2013) maintain that critical public scholarship must be focused on the types of major problems that are currently having a positive or negative impact on society. In this regard, Smith and Larimer (2013) point out that "the research questions at the heart of the subdisciplines that make up the field of policy studies are big ones, with large, real-world consequences. If there is, or ever is going to be, such a thing as a field of policy studies, those important questions have to be pushed to the forefront" (p. 15).

Concepts and Arguments as Critical Public Policy Scholarship

From this perspective, the readings can all be regarded as critical public policy scholarship, given that they were all focused on these types of "important questions." This varied focus and use of different conceptual models to develop a better understanding of public policy issues is highly congruent with the primary goals of engaging in public policy scholarship in the first place. As Smith and Larimer (2013) point out, "Public policy is such a diffuse topic that it is hard to even imagine a single, broad conceptual model that all policy scholars could practically adopt and apply" (p. 16).

The readings made it clear that power can be applied in ways that marginalize women and minorities, including through draconian sentencing laws that have incarcerated a significant percentage of an entire generation of African-American males. For instance, Roberts (2004) reports that "penal institutions have historically been key components of social policy aimed at governing marginal social groups" (p. 1298). Among the several readings, the journal article by Roberts (2004) stands out as an exemplar of public policy scholarship because she specifically focuses on these types of important questions and supports her assertions with hard evidence. A good example can be discerned from her observation that "the extraordinary prison expansion involved young black men in grossly disproportionate numbers. Achieving another historic record, most of the people sentenced to time in prison today are black" (p. 1272).

Indeed, Roberts (2004) stresses that at any given point in time, almost one-third of young African-American males are actively involved with the criminal justice system in some capacity — including incarceration or community-based alternatives such as probation or parole — an increase from a still-alarming one-in-four rate in 1990. Not only does Roberts (2004) provide recent statistical data concerning incarceration rates for African-Americans, she explains how the war on drugs has been used to target this segment of society in ways that have vastly enriched an entire criminal justice apparatus, including private prisons and a growing corps of criminal justice lawyers. For example, Roberts (2004) points out that "the percentage of drug arrests that result in prison sentences has quadrupled, resulting in a prison-building boom the likes of which the world has never seen" (p. 59).

Yet another compelling example of this level of public policy scholarship is the article by Alexander (2010), who reports that following the launch of the ill-conceived war on drugs in the U.S. during the end of the twentieth century, law enforcement authorities failed to receive any training that would help them distinguish drug suspects from ordinary citizens — and the training they did receive "guarantees precisely the opposite" (p. 69). During the thirty-year period in which the war on drugs has been prosecuted, the number of African-American males incarcerated has skyrocketed by more than 1,100%, and it is clear that the purported goals of the war on drugs have operated to unjustly target these minority members. In this regard, Alexander (2010) reports that "nothing has contributed more to the systematic mass incarceration of people of color in the United States than the war on drugs" (p. 69). More troubling, the vast majority of young African-American males have been incarcerated for drug-related crimes only, and fully four-fifths of these were for possession alone (Alexander, 2004).

The implications of these disturbing trends have been profound and far-reaching. The adverse effects of having a significant percentage of African-American males incarcerated or otherwise involved with the criminal justice system extend to their families, friends, and entire communities. The fact that these trends have been allowed to persist for so long — and to become even more pronounced — clearly indicates that additional critical public policy scholarship of this type is required to address underlying causes that extend far beyond sentencing practices.

Some of the other readings made it clear that mainstream American society tends to largely ignore or disregard these types of oppressive public policies, especially those that are longstanding or insidious, particularly when mainstream members are not personally affected by them. It is fairly straightforward to understand how many white Americans might not be especially troubled by the massive incarceration of young Black men whom they already view as a potential threat, and it is even possible to understand how young African-American men can internalize these outcomes as a natural and inevitable part of their lives.

In fact, one of the more perplexing aspects of identifying public policies that result in oppression and inequity is the powerful messages that marginalized segments of society receive throughout their lives concerning their "proper place in society" — messages that eventually subvert the thinking of these groups to the point that they accept these spurious arguments without consciously realizing it. For instance, according to an early essay by Collins (1989), "Black women's everyday acts of resistance challenge two prevailing approaches to studying the consciousness of oppressed groups" (p. 746). The first approach posits that minority groups such as African-American women tend to "identify with the powerful and have no valid independent interpretation of their own oppression" (p. 746). The second approach is even more severe in its assumptions, claiming that oppressed peoples are "less human than their own rulers and, therefore, are less capable of articulating their own standpoint" (p. 747).

This constraint has resulted in a growing sense among marginalized segments of society that they must organize to raise public awareness. For example, according to Crenshaw (1991), "the process of recognizing what was formerly perceived as isolated and individual has characterized the identity politics of African-Americans, other people of color, and gays and lesbians, among others" (pp. 1241–1242). Indeed, even in otherwise enlightened Canadian public policy, laws can operate to oppress marginalized peoples in ways that might not be readily apparent to mainstream society. As Hankivsky and Christoffersen (2008) point out, in a healthcare context, "typical approaches do not systematically incorporate analyses that capture mutually enforcing effects of various social locations and experiences of domination and oppression" (p. 272).

Moreover, Hankivsky and Christoffersen (2008) also emphasize that factors besides race — such as gender — can introduce serious inequalities in public policy. They conclude that "among many women's health researchers, differences between women are merely paid lip service, and a good number of leading experts resist moving forward, in a meaningful way, on the issue of intersecting axes of oppression that affect health" (p. 273). This concept of intersectionality, developed most influentially by Kimberlé Crenshaw, remains central to understanding how multiple systems of disadvantage compound one another in shaping policy outcomes.

Social Justice Impacts on Excluded and Marginalized Groups

The readings were consistent in underscoring the manner in which the social justice impacts of public policy adversely affect marginalized and excluded groups in the United States today. For example, citing the enormous impact of current "lock 'em up and throw away the key" sentencing regimes that inordinately affect African-Americans, Roberts (2004) emphasizes that not only are the inmates being harmed — their friends, families, and communities are being affected by these policies as well. In this regard, Roberts advises that "by damaging social networks, distorting social norms, and destroying social citizenship, mass incarceration serves a repressive political function that contradicts democratic norms and is itself immoral" (p. 1304).

Indeed, even thoughtful and well-intended public policies can have unintended and unexpected consequences for excluded and marginalized groups, and these consequences can become even more severe when there is latitude in the manner in which policies are implemented and administered. As Schneider and Ingram (1997) emphasize, "policies usually serve several different purposes and interests simultaneously and therefore have consequences on several levels. Many of the consequences depend mainly on the meanings and interpretations that constitute the social construction of the policy in value dimensions" (p. 3).

Conclusion

The research showed that critical public policy scholarship must be focused on the important questions that affect society, and from this perspective, all of the readings rose to this standard despite being focused on different issues. It is therefore reasonable to conclude that the concepts, assumptions, and arguments presented in these readings represent legitimate examples of critical public policy scholarship. The research was also consistent in showing that the readings served to reveal the social justice impacts of public policy on excluded and marginalized groups.