Transforming Affirmative Action Jurisprudence: Applying Eidelson's Theory on the Supreme Court of India

Authors

Sawinder Singh, Adelaide Law School

Abstract

This paper compares the affirmative action jurisprudence developed by the Indian Supreme Court with United States affirmative action jurisprudence in the context of the philosophy of equality developed by Harvard Law School Professor Benjamin Eidelson. It evaluates the potential of Eidelson's claim that if the U.S. Supreme Court accepts his philosophy, it may incrementally allow the Court to adopt a more favorable attitude towards the affirmative action policies. The question raised here is whether Eidelson's approach can provide a constitutionalfoundation capable of giving us a consistently benevolent interpretation of affirmative action policies, as he hoped. This article concludes that, at least in the cases oflndia and the United States, this is highly unlikely. This conclusion is derived from a showing that Eidelson's suggestions to the U.S. Supreme Court have already been adopted and applied by the Indian Supreme Court with little to no effect. To prove this, I extensively engage with Indian equality jurisprudence, comparing and unpacking the legal, philosophical, and moral reasoning given by the supreme courts of India and the United States.

Disciplines

Civil Rights and Discrimination | Comparative and Foreign Law | International Law | Jurisprudence | Law | Law and Race | Law and Society | Legal Remedies | Supreme Court of the United States

Recommended Citation

Sawinder Singh, Transforming Affirmative Action Jurisprudence: Applying Eidelson's Theory on the Supreme Court of India, 5 Cardozo Int’l & Compar. L. Rev. 161 (2021).
Available at: https://larc.cardozo.yu.edu/ciclr/vol5/iss1/6