The elevation of traditionally oppressed minorities also alleviates some of the historical burden placed on American society for their past abuse, in some ways this provides a sort of retrospective reparations for abused minorities. In general Affirmative action has changed the social landscape by allowing the entrance of formerly oppressed minorities to gain entrance into American mainstream society. If on the other hand Affirmative Action did not exist, an entirely different set of circumstances would be true. Since traditionally oppressed minorities are by and large the worst off economically within our society, they will never have the resources to transform their chain of social oppression. This means that an entrenched cycle of poverty would continue to arise within American society, where the poorest sector would also ethnically reflect African-Americans in particular. Without resources to help themselves escape poverty, the minority population would become poorer and poorer, while the majority would become wealthier. The economic disparity and racial disparity will cause even greater estrangement between two social and racial classes. As a result, greater racial tension will build within this country, and greater alienation of traditionally oppressed minorities will occur. The racial hatred and angst on the part...

In the end, America will have two classes of individuals divided by both racial barriers and economic division. If this is allowed to persist over a long period of time, racial tensions may result in such consequences as race related violence and riots such as the LA riots in the aftermath of the Rodney King beating.
Through a careful analysis it becomes evident that Affirmative action should occur because the consequences accorded to it are far more positive than negative, whereas the alternative consequences of having no affirmative action are disastrous. Through this evaluation using the pragmatic method, it should be concluded that we need to continue affirmative action until race is not a significant factor within the economic and social confines of our American society. The fundamental theorem of pragmatism is that the advancement of social systems results in the resonance of truth through pragmatic decision making. The above study of affirmative action through the consequences of its existence demonstrates how the pragmatic method can be an effective tool for evaluating the "truth" and rightful application of current social techniques.