[roel_v]

"Affirmative action in the US seems to revolve more around not negatively discriminating against women when making hiring decisions,"

Affirmative action is when two people are equally suited for a job/position/benefit, the one from the disadvantaged group (based on sex, ethnic/socioeconomic background, physical impairment, ...) gets it. In more extreme varieties, it means that the one from the disadvantaged group has less strict requirements to fulfill. In a way, a women's quota is a species of the genus affirmative action.