UC Berkeley

This dissertation uncovers the origins and early development of undergraduate affirmative action at the University of California. In doing so, it adds to the current literature regarding the sources of these efforts. Specifically, while acknowledging the cues and context offered by the Civil Rights Movement and federal policy, this study illustrates the mediating role that local factors played in structuring attention, interpretation, and action. It argues that local sensemaking and strategic action more immediately explains what actors did and when, and that these processes were open-ended with regard to how responsive the university was to the calls and claims of minority groups.

Taking a comparative-historical approach, I consider the unfolding of affirmative action at the Berkeley and Los Angeles campuses of the university. I find that despite facing the same demands, with similar constraints, the campuses interpreted and acted differently. I suggest that the developmental histories, local identities, and dynamics of these institutions help explain these differences, acting as both filter and fodder for local responses to societal issues.

I describe the development of affirmative action as occurring in three stages. The first stage occurred against the backdrop of the nonviolent Civil Rights Movement and calls for integration. Faculty stepped up with efforts to expand the pool of qualified minority students through outreach and summer enrichment programs. In the second stage, federal policy offered legitimacy and financing, prompting administrators to establish formal recruitment and admissions programs. And in the third stage, the campuses restructured their minority admissions programs in response to new militancy and a state budget crisis.

In the first stage, Berkeley faculty were poised to lead the university in this new arena, so the call for integration was filtered through the lens of the university’s elite and selective identity. This shaped preferences for relatively achieved and enculturated black students. UCLA faculty were slower to move, and guilt about their inaction contributed to more flexible interpretations of the university’s identity and role. This shaped an interest in undereducated students. In the second stage, the pacing and content of action was shaped by the strategic action of administrators which was embedded in campus and local struggles to define the programs in terms of student

population and admissions approach. I find that UCLA’s striving for distinction in the university encouraged early uptake, but these same local status concerns encouraged a conservative admissions approach and a “black-brown” program. Berkeley responded later; in response to public relations concerns following the release of data from an ethnic survey. The situation encouraged a flexible admissions approach, a rapid increase in black enrollments, and national renown. In the third stage, state and federal dollars decreased while demands for access increased; Berkeley pursued austerity under the guise of the university’s elite, selective identity, while Los Angeles pursued expansion in the name of research and public service.

In each stage, the campuses drew on the university’s identity in different ways to make sense of their circumstances and justify their pursuits. While Berkeley often acted to protect its autonomy from external influences, Los Angeles chased status and was responsive to these influences. Faced with ambiguity in the third stage, their separate concerns set them on different paths, and Los Angeles would do better on minority admissions despite Berkeley’s initial lead.