Which best describes the reasoning behind the practice of "affirmative action"?

Affirmative means confirmed, action is to do something (usually with force) so I reason that affirmative action is "Confirmed Force" that's just my guess.

The native americans, spanish, french and americans all name places in our state. the word “arkansas” came from the quapaw indians, by way of early french explorers. at the time of the early french exploration, a tribe of indians, the quapaws, lived west of the mississippi and north of the arkansas river.