Devon W. Carbado and Cheryl I. Harris
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780520273436
- eISBN:
- 9780520953765
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520273436.003.0010
- Subject:
- Sociology, Race and Ethnicity
This chapter examines how the end of affirmative action in California functions as a racial project. Using Michael Omi and Howard Winant's conceptualization of racial projects, it considers the ways ...
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This chapter examines how the end of affirmative action in California functions as a racial project. Using Michael Omi and Howard Winant's conceptualization of racial projects, it considers the ways that the principles of “race neutrality” and “race preferences” operate in debates over “anti-preference” initiatives like Proposition 209. It shows how reinterpretation of the meaning of race through veneration of colorblindness led to the redistribution of resources along racial lines. It demonstrates this process through an inventive analysis of hypothetical personal statements written by Barack Obama and Clarence Thomas in their law school applications, arguing that bans on the explicit use of race in law school admissions do not abolish but reorder racial preferences. The chapter also suggests that racial identity can be expressed in different ways and that racial formation occurs not only at the level of social or political structure, but also at the level of identity performance.Less
This chapter examines how the end of affirmative action in California functions as a racial project. Using Michael Omi and Howard Winant's conceptualization of racial projects, it considers the ways that the principles of “race neutrality” and “race preferences” operate in debates over “anti-preference” initiatives like Proposition 209. It shows how reinterpretation of the meaning of race through veneration of colorblindness led to the redistribution of resources along racial lines. It demonstrates this process through an inventive analysis of hypothetical personal statements written by Barack Obama and Clarence Thomas in their law school applications, arguing that bans on the explicit use of race in law school admissions do not abolish but reorder racial preferences. The chapter also suggests that racial identity can be expressed in different ways and that racial formation occurs not only at the level of social or political structure, but also at the level of identity performance.
Karen R. Miller
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781479880096
- eISBN:
- 9781479803637
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479880096.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Economic History
In the wake of the Civil War, many white northern leaders supported race-neutral laws and anti-discrimination statutes. These positions helped amplify the distinctions they drew between their ...
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In the wake of the Civil War, many white northern leaders supported race-neutral laws and anti-discrimination statutes. These positions helped amplify the distinctions they drew between their political economic system, which they saw as forward-thinking in its promotion of free market capitalism, and the now vanquished southern system, which had been built on slavery. But this interest in legal race neutrality should not be mistaken for an effort to integrate northern African Americans into the state or society on an equal footing with whites. During the Great Migration, which brought tens of thousands of African Americans into Northern cities after World War I, white northern leaders faced new challenges from both white and African American activists and were pushed to manage race relations in a more formalized and proactive manner. The result was northern racial liberalism: the idea that all Americans, regardless of race, should be politically equal, but that the state cannot and indeed should not enforce racial equality by interfering with existing social or economic relations. This book examines the formulation, uses, and growing political importance of northern racial liberalism in Detroit between the two World Wars. It argues that racial inequality was built into the liberal state at its inception, rather than produced by antagonists of liberalism. The book shows that our current racial system—where race-neutral language coincides with extreme racial inequalities that appear natural rather than political—has a history that is deeply embedded in contemporary governmental systems and political economies.Less
In the wake of the Civil War, many white northern leaders supported race-neutral laws and anti-discrimination statutes. These positions helped amplify the distinctions they drew between their political economic system, which they saw as forward-thinking in its promotion of free market capitalism, and the now vanquished southern system, which had been built on slavery. But this interest in legal race neutrality should not be mistaken for an effort to integrate northern African Americans into the state or society on an equal footing with whites. During the Great Migration, which brought tens of thousands of African Americans into Northern cities after World War I, white northern leaders faced new challenges from both white and African American activists and were pushed to manage race relations in a more formalized and proactive manner. The result was northern racial liberalism: the idea that all Americans, regardless of race, should be politically equal, but that the state cannot and indeed should not enforce racial equality by interfering with existing social or economic relations. This book examines the formulation, uses, and growing political importance of northern racial liberalism in Detroit between the two World Wars. It argues that racial inequality was built into the liberal state at its inception, rather than produced by antagonists of liberalism. The book shows that our current racial system—where race-neutral language coincides with extreme racial inequalities that appear natural rather than political—has a history that is deeply embedded in contemporary governmental systems and political economies.
