I said yes. The logic behind this isn’t easily explained in a few sentences or even paragraphs, but here are a few pointers: Read “the Wisdom of Crowds,” by James Surowiecki, for a fascinating explanation of why diversity is more important than consistent expertise in allowing a group to arrive at good decisions. In a nutshell, the “experts” are all swayed by the same intellectual fashions. Add someone different, give her a chance to speak her mind, take her seriously, and you’ll shed a new light on the problem. This isn’t just about race, of course; it’s about genuine diversity. The book is intriguing and an easy read. He doesn’t claim that crowds are always wise but discusses the conditions that sometimes make them surprisingly able to make accurate predictions. Consider the U.S. military, probably our most successful practitioner of “affirmative action.” The military decided some decades ago that they needed people of color in leadership positions in order to lead the enlisted force successfully and without destructive racial hostility. They spend a lot of money ensuring that their officer corps is racially diverse, and their training programs work very well. They don’t do this because they’re bleeding-heart liberals but because Vietnam taught them something about the dangers of allowing overwhelmingly white officers to lead a force disproportionately composed of people of color. We need diversity, of many sorts, and the lens that makes us see this as a compromise with meritocratic principles is usually a pretty distorted lens. Who decides what “merit” is? Speaking just for myself, I’m cynical about standardized tests, for example, because I’m weirdly good at them; I’ve known since high school that people who know as much about the material as I do won’t do as well on the test. I’ve learned since that they may out-perform me in real-life situations.