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Racism without Racists

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Racism without Racists

Color-Blind Racism and the Persistence of

Racial Inequality in America

Fourth Edition

Eduardo Bonilla-Silva

ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC. Lanham • Boulder • New York • Toronto • Plymouth, UK

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Published by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 www.rowman.com

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Copyright © 2014 by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.

ONE MORE TIME Words and Music by SAM COOKE © 1962 (Renewed) ABKCO MUSIC, INC. All Rights Reserved Used by Permission of ALFRED MUSIC

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Bonilla-Silva, Eduardo, 1962– Racism without racists : color-blind racism and the persistence of racial inequality in America / Eduardo Bonilla-Silva.—Fourth edition. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-4422-2054-6 (cloth : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-1-4422-2055-3 (pbk. : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-1-4422-2056-0 (electronic) 1. Minorities—United States—Social conditions. 2. Minorities—United States—Economic conditions. 3. Racism—United States. 4. United States—Race relations. I. Title. E184.A1B597 2014 305.800973—dc23 2013015714

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Printed in the United States of America

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I do not have many real friends. I have plenty of acquaintances, but not many people that I truly trust. In my friendship kingdom, very few are allowed in. To them I dedicate this edition. Their names are irrelevant in mass communications like this one, but they all know who they are. These are the people that are indispensable to me. They all have been there for me during tough times such as the death of my brother, during a recent operation, when I have needed advice on work or life issues, or during the many times I have made mistakes in my life. My blood fam- ily is peculiar, but this, my other family, bonded by love and solidarity, counts as much as my “real” family. At the helm of my nonblood family is the only person who loves me “for real” and all the way, my wife, Mary Hovsepian. Countless people question why we are still together. The an- swer is that my Mary is a truly exceptional person. We have been together twenty-five years and, honestly, it feels like today is still 1988. Mary, I am not the best, but you and I together add to more than two. Thanks for loving me despite my silliness and volatility. I will try to be better to you in the next twenty-five years.

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vii

Acknowledgments ix

Preface to the Fourth Edition xiii

1 The Strange Enigma of Race in Contemporary America 1

2 The New Racism: The U.S. Racial Structure Since the 1960s 25

3 The Central Frames of Color-Blind Racism 73

4 The Style of Color Blindness: How to Talk Nasty about Minorities without Sounding Racist 101

5 “I Didn’t Get That Job Because of a Black Man”: Color-Blind Racism’s Racial Stories 123

6 Peeking Inside the (White) House of Color Blindness: The Significance of Whites’ Segregation 151

7 Are All Whites Refined Archie Bunkers? An Examination of White Racial Progressives 179

8 Are Blacks Color Blind, Too? 199

9 E Pluribus Unum, or the Same Old Perfume in a New Bottle? On the Future of Racial Stratification in the United States 225

10 Race Matters in Obamerica: The Sweet (but Deadly) Enchantment of Color Blindness in Black Face 255

Contents

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viii Contents

11 “The (Color-Blind) Emperor Has No Clothes”: Exposing the Whiteness of Color Blindness 301

Selected Bibliography 317

Index 347

About the Author 363

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ix

The last words my mother told me before I left Puerto Rico in 1984 were: “Son, in the United States you need to walk and behave like a king.” She also told me something to the effect that no matter what the “gringos” said about me, I always had to remember that “I was as good if not better than them.” At the time, I did not understand her advice. Over twenty years later, I fully understand her enormous wisdom. In this coun- try, racial “others” of dark complexion are always viewed as incapable of doing much; we are regarded and treated as secondary actors only good for doing beds in hotels or working in fast-food restaurants. Therefore, my mother’s advice (“walk and behave like a king”) helped me develop the much-needed emotional coraza (shield) to repel all the racial nonsense of “gringolandia” (Frida Kahlo was so right about this country!). Thanks Mami!

This coraza has come in handy in my sociological career, because at every step of the way, I have encountered people who have tried to block my path one way or another. Fortunately, I have also encountered along the way many people who have helped me in this, my second country. And, in truth, my experience with good and generous people has out- weighed that with the bad ones. Many of the former have seen me with- out my coraza and know the real me. At my alma mater (UW–Madison), professors such as Pamela Oliver, Russell Middleton, and Erik Wright were exceedingly generous with me. So were professors Sam Cohn (now my colleague at Texas A&M), Gay Seidman, and Denis O’Hearn, all of whom I served with as a teaching assistant. Wright and Oliver were even kind enough to read and send me feedback on a working paper I wrote

Acknowledgments

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x Acknowledgments

two years after leaving Wisconsin. The paper appeared in 1997 in ASR with the title “Rethinking Racism: Toward a Structural Interpretation.” But the most important sociological force that affected me at Wisconsin was my adviser, Professor Charles Camic. He was the perfect adviser for me. Professor Camic was knowledgeable, kind, savvy, and had an uncanny understanding of the business side of sociology. Then and now, whenever I have a “big (sociological) issue” at hand, he is one of the first people I consult. Thanks, Chas, for being there for me. I hope I am able to repay you in some way.

At Michigan there were a number of colleagues who were very nice to me: Mark Chesler, Julia Adams, Howard Kimeldorf, Muge Gocek, Silvia Pedraza, Jim House, David Williams, and a few others. However, the people who helped me navigate that “peculiar institution” were profes- sors Donald Deskins Jr., Alford Young II, and Carla O’Connor. These three colleagues were more than my colleagues: they were my friends and allies. Thanks Don, Al, and Carla! I hope the sociological gods allow us to work together one more time before our time expires.

At my sociological house, Texas A&M University, almost everyone has helped me. In my first year there, I received more feedback and love than I did at Michigan in five years! Thus, I thank the entire sociology depart- ment at A&M for providing me almost unconditional support. I hope I have not disappointed “y’all.” Also deserving special mention are two former sociological Aggies, professors Benigno Aguirre (University of Delaware) and John Boies of the U.S. Census Bureau. They both enriched my sociological and nonsociological life. I miss having lunch with John and coffee with Benigno! Last but not least at A&M, my three outstanding graduate students, David G. Embrick (whom I owe many, many, many thanks for his steadfast loyalty and hard work), Paul Ketchum, and Karen Glover, helped me with some of the data and analysis and have sup- ported me beyond the call of duty. Thanks for all your help and support, and I hope to read your own books soon!

Other people who have loved me de gratis in sociological Amerikkka are Joe R. Feagin, Hernán Vera, Judith Blau, Tukufu Zuberi, Hayward Hor- ton, Ashley Doane, Gianpaolo Baiocchi, Joane Nagel, Margaret Andersen, Cedric Herring, Abel Valenzuela, Rogelio Saenz, Tyrone A. Forman, Amanda E. Lewis, Walter Allen, Eddie Telles, Michael O. Emerson, Paul Wong, Jose Padin, Veronica Dujon, Carla Goar, William Darity, Geoffrey Ward, Nadia Kim, Ramiro Martinez, Tom Guglielmo, Moon-Kie Jung, and Larry Bobo, among others. I also wish to thank the folks of the As- sociation of Black Sociologists and the ASA Section on Racial and Ethnic Minorities for supporting me over the past five years.

The data for this book were gathered while I was a professor at Michi- gan. I thank all the people involved with the 1997 Survey of Social At-

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Acknowledgments xi

titudes of College Students (Amanda, Tyrone, and all the undergraduate students who helped me out!) and the 1998 Detroit-Area Study (DAS). The 1997 survey was done partly with funding from the ASA-NSF (Na- tional Science Foundation) Fund for the Advancement of the Discipline. The 1998 DAS was done with Michigan funds. However, I want to thank Jim House and Earl Lewis for funding the interview component for the 1998 DAS. Without those interviews, the 1998 DAS would have been just another run-of-the-mill survey on racial attitudes.

A significant amount of the drafting of this book was done while I was a visiting research fellow at the University of Houston Law Center in the fall of 2000, under the auspices of Professor Michael A. Olivas, director of the Institute for Higher Education Law and Governance. Michael gener- ously hosted me when I was still an unproven commodity. Thanks, Mi- chael. I owe you a lot! While I was in Houston, Professor Russell L. Curtis Jr. from the University of Houston Sociology Department provided me shelter and friendship. I will never forget our long discussions on almost every possible subject. Thanks, Russ!

The final drafting of this book was done at Stanford University, where I was invited to spend a year (2002–2003) as a Hewlett research fellow at the Research Institute for Comparative Studies of Race and Ethnicity, headed by Hazel R. Markus and George Fredrickson. I also wish to thank Leanne Issak, Awino Kuerth, and Dorothy Steele for helping me with all my silly problems during my time there.

This book benefited enormously from the incisive review of Professor Margaret Andersen from the University of Delaware. Maggie read this manuscript from beginning to end and made valuable suggestions that helped me make it a better—although still controversial—book. Thanks, Margaret, for doing such a terrific job!

Finally, I want to dedicate this book to five very special people in my life. First, to my brother, Pedro Juan Bonilla-Silva, who passed away in 2002. Pedro, I wish I had been able to tell you how much I love you, but a bit of machismo and a lot of family history prevented me from doing so. I will always regret that. Second, to my father, Jacinto Bonilla. I know I do not say it often, but I respect, admire, and love you. Third, to my sister, Karen Bonilla-Silva, the youngest, wisest, and nicest-looking in the Bonilla-Silva clan. Fourth, to my son, Omar Francisco Bonilla, who transcribed one of the DAS interviews quoted in this book. Omi, know that I love you and am very proud of your scholarly and artistic ac- complishments. Finally, I dedicate this book to the love of my life, Mary Hovsepian. We have marinated our partnership for fifteen years (now, in 2013, twenty-five years) and it is still as sweet and strong as the first day we formalized it. Thanks, Mary. I am eagerly waiting to see what the next fifteen years bring us.

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xiii

I am so lonely tonight If I could only hold you once more If I could only kiss you once If I could only see you one more time, one more time

Sam Cooke, a truly original African American singer, songwriter, and musical innovator, made popular a song in the 1950s entitled “One More Time.” This is a classic love song where the male lover desperately wishes to see his (presumably female) sweetheart “one more time.” In this new edition of Racism without Racists, like in Sam Cooke’s song, I wish to engage my readers on the subject of racism in America “one more time.” (Young readers may not know this popular culture reference, but I hope to inspire you to check out Sam Cooke online. Once you hear Sam Cooke, you will be hooked to his music for life, as he could sing with either a smoky voice or with a velvety, sweet tone. He was “the bomb” and thanks to technology, his image and voice will remain with us forever!)

But why do I need to engage you on this subject “one more time”? Fun- damentally, I need to do so for two sociopolitical reasons and one purely related to this book as an intellectual product. Let me address first the sociopolitical reasons. Since the Obama phenomenon has become larger than life, particularly since his reelection in 2012, I thought there was a need to explain what has happened in the last four years (2008–2012), assess the balance and impact of his reelection, and see if my arguments from four years ago stood the test of history. In the third edition of the book I argued that Obama’s election was not a miracle, but an expected

Preface to the Fourth Edition

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xiv Preface to the Fourth Edition

outcome that reflected the sedimentation of the “new racism” regime that had emerged in the 1970s (for more on this regime, see chapter 2 in this edition). Specifically, I stated that Obama’s election did not represent “racial progress” or signified a rupture with either the racial order or the dominant racial ideology at play in the nation, namely, color-blind rac- ism. This argument was important, as Americans at the time (somewhat less so today) believed Obama’s election had magically taken us to the racial Promised Land of honey and milk.

The second sociopolitical reason for reengaging readers is my belief that it is imperative to explain the coexistence in America of crude and vulgar antiminority sentiment and actions alongside the ideology (and its corresponding behaviors) I label in this book as color-blind racism. To an- ticipate the comments I will offer in chapters 2 and 11, (1) racial orders are never “pure,” as elements of the past (and even of the future) often coexist with the dominant ways of conducting racial business, (2) coercion has always been central to the maintenance of racial domination,1 and (3) de- spite the rise in racist violence, the practices I label as typical of the “new racism” period are still the dominant ones in America (more prevalent and central). On point 1, for example, think about how in the 1930s and 1940s, many of the practices and the ideology that would become central in the new racism period were evident. In Charles Johnson’s book Patterns of Negro Segregation (1943) his interviews with whites reveal how many had already moved from the Jim Crow ideology to the tenets of color-blind racism as well as how many blacks were already talking and behaving as “new negros.”2 In terms of practices, for example, Northern cities had already developed racial ghettoes—a feature that would become central to the way of conducting racial business in the new-racism era. On point 2, as I will suggest in chapters 2 and 11, racist violence by police (from the brutal beatings of Rodney King to the murder of Amadou Diallo) or by “regular white folks” (from the brutal murder of Vincent Chin in the 1980s to the recent murder of Trayvon Martin by an “honorary white” Latino) has remained part of the landscape. This, again, is not surpris- ing, as no system of domination can survive without violence in the last instance. Although as I have argued elsewhere (Bonilla-Silva 2011), suc- cessful domination (racial or otherwise) requires making the dominated believe, participate, and process their standing as normative, as this is the way things are, dominants need not only what Max Weber called the institutional “legitimate monopoly of violence” but also the violence of their masses in case of emergency.3 Nevertheless, despite the ebb and flow of racial violence in the new-racism period—an ebb and flow usually related to the state of the economy in the nation—I maintain that racial domination is still fundamentally maintained through new practices (eco- nomic, political, social, and ideological) and we must focus on this fact if

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Preface to the Fourth Edition xv

we wish to attain racial justice in America. The more we assume that the problem of racism is limited to the Klan, the Birthers, the Tea Party, or to the Republican Party, the less we understand that racial domination is a collective process (we are all in this game) and that the main problem nowadays is not the folks with the hoods, but the folks dressed in suits!

On the matter of this book as an intellectual product, I have been pressed by some users to incorporate a chapter dealing with the new racism, a matter that I mention in the first three editions and that I have addressed elsewhere extensively. I decided that since the book is used by many instructors as the book to address race matters in some courses, their demand was fair. Hence, I have included a chapter in this edition dealing with the new racism. The chapter in this edition is an update from a chapter that appeared in my first book, White Supremacy and Racism in the Post–Civil Rights Era.

Lastly, working on a revision of a book like this is a tedious job and I could not have done it without the able assistance of the “dynamic (sociological) duo,” my two graduate students Victor E. Ray and Louise Seamster. They worked tirelessly to make this a successful revision and they did so during a beautiful yet tough period in their lives: while bring- ing to the world baby Malcolm. I thank both of them for their incredible work and, as usual, if there are any mistakes in the book, it is entirely their fault (okay, this is a joke!).

I hope readers like this new installment of my “sweet baby” (to keep the love-song style of the fifties going) and that, after you read it, you love it hard (if you must love, love hard or do not love at all). If you do not love my new installment, I will nonetheless thank you for listening to me “one more time.”

Eduardo Bonilla-Silva Durham, North Carolina

NOTES

1. Moon-Kie Jung, Joã o H. Costa Vargas, and Eduardo Bonilla-Silva (eds.), State of White Supremacy: Racism, Governance, and the United States (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2011).

2. The term “new negro” was a term popularized during the Harlem Renais- sance, albeit it emerged in the latter part of the twentieth century. It referred to blacks unwilling to submit to Jim Crow regulations. Johnson’s book reveals that by the 1940s many middle-class blacks were ready for drastic change and were behaving accordingly.

3. On the subject of states and racist violence by the masses, see Rob Witte, Rac- ist Violence and the State (London and New York: Longman, 1996).

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1

1

The Strange Enigma of Race in Contemporary America

There is a strange kind of enigma associated with the problem of rac- ism. No one, or almost no one, wishes to see themselves as racist; still, racism persists, real and tenacious

—Albert Memmi, Racism

RACISM WITHOUT “RACISTS”

Nowadays, except for members of white supremacist organizations,1 few whites in the United States claim to be “racist.” Most whites as- sert they “don’t see any color, just people”; that although the ugly face of discrimination is still with us, it is no longer the central factor deter- mining minorities’ life chances; and, finally, that, like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,2 they aspire to live in a society where “people are judged by the content of their character, not by the color of their skin.” More poi- gnantly, most whites insist that minorities (especially blacks) are the ones responsible for whatever “race problem” we have in this country. They publicly denounce blacks for “playing the race card,” for demanding the maintenance of unnecessary and divisive race-based programs, such as affirmative action, and for crying “racism” whenever they are criticized by whites.3 Most whites believe that if blacks and other minorities would just stop thinking about the past, work hard, and complain less (particu- larly about racial discrimination), then Americans of all hues could “all get along.”4

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2 Chapter 1

But regardless of whites’ “sincere fictions,”5 racial considerations shade almost everything in America. Blacks and dark-skinned racial minorities lag well behind whites in virtually every area of social life; they are about three times more likely to be poor than whites, earn about 40 percent less than whites, and have about an eighth of the net worth that whites have.6 They also receive an inferior education compared to whites, even when they attend integrated institutions.7 In terms of housing, black-owned units comparable to white-owned ones are valued at 35 percent less.8 Blacks and Latinos also have less access to the entire housing market because whites, through a variety of exclusionary practices by white real- tors and homeowners, have been successful in effectively limiting their entrance into many neighborhoods.9 Blacks receive impolite treatment in stores, in restaurants, and in a host of other commercial transactions.10 Researchers have also documented that blacks pay more for goods such as cars and houses than do whites.11 Finally, blacks and dark-skinned Latinos are the targets of racial profiling by the police, which, combined with the highly racialized criminal court system, guarantees their over- representation among those arrested, prosecuted, incarcerated, and if charged for a capital crime, executed.12 Racial profiling on the highways has become such a prevalent phenomenon that a term has emerged to describe it: driving while black.13 In short, blacks and most minorities are “at the bottom of the well.”14

How is it possible to have this tremendous degree of racial inequality in a country where most whites claim that race is no longer relevant? More important, how do whites explain the apparent contradiction be- tween their professed color blindness and the United States’ color-coded inequality? In this book I attempt to answer both of these questions. I contend that whites have developed powerful explanations—which have ultimately become justifications—for contemporary racial inequality that exculpate them from any responsibility for the status of people of color. These explanations emanate from a new racial ideology that I label color- blind racism. This ideology, which acquired cohesiveness and dominance in the late 1960s,15 explains contemporary racial inequality as the outcome of nonracial dynamics. Whereas Jim Crow racism explained blacks’ social standing as the result of their biological and moral inferiority, color-blind racism avoids such facile arguments. Instead, whites rationalize minori- ties’ contemporary status as the product of market dynamics, naturally occurring phenomena, and blacks’ imputed cultural limitations.16 For instance, whites can attribute Latinos’ high poverty rate to a relaxed work ethic (“the Hispanics are mañana, mañana, mañana—tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow”)17 or residential segregation as the result of natural tendencies among groups (“Does a cat and a dog mix? I can’t see it. You can’t drink milk and scotch. Certain mixes don’t mix.”).18

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The Strange Enigma of Race in Contemporary America 3

Color-blind racism became the dominant racial ideology as the mecha- nisms and practices for keeping blacks and other racial minorities “at the bottom of the well” changed. I have argued elsewhere that contemporary racial inequality is reproduced through “new racism” practices that are subtle, institutional, and apparently nonracial.19 In contrast to the Jim Crow era, where racial inequality was enforced through overt means (e.g., signs saying “No Niggers Welcomed Here” or shotgun diplomacy at the voting booth), today racial practices operate in a “now you see it, now you don’t” fashion. For example, residential segregation, which is almost as high today as it was in the past, is no longer accomplished through overtly discriminatory practices. Instead, covert behaviors such as not showing all the available units, steering minorities and whites into certain neighborhoods, quoting higher rents or prices to minority appli- cants, or not advertising units at all are the weapons of choice to maintain separate communities.20 In the economic field, “smiling face” discrimina- tion (“We don’t have jobs now, but please check later”), advertising job openings in mostly white networks and ethnic newspapers, and steering highly educated people of color into poorly remunerated jobs or jobs with limited opportunities for mobility are the new ways of keeping minorities in a secondary position.21 Politically, although the civil rights struggles have helped remove many of the obstacles for the electoral participation of people of color, “racial gerrymandering, multimember legislative dis- tricts, election runoffs, annexation of predominantly white areas, at-large district elections, and anti-single-shot devices (disallowing concentrating votes in one or two candidates in cities using at-large elections) have become standard practices to disenfranchise” people of color.22 Whether in banks, restaurants, school admissions, or housing transactions, the maintenance of white privilege is done in a way that defies facile racial readings. Hence, the contours of color-blind racism fit America’s new racism quite well.

Compared to Jim Crow racism, the ideology of color blindness seems like “racism lite.” Instead of relying on name calling (niggers, spics, chinks), color-blind racism otherizes softly (“these people are human, too”); instead of proclaiming that God placed minorities in the world in a servile position, it suggests they are behind because they do not work hard enough; instead of viewing interracial marriage as wrong on a straight racial basis, it regards it as “problematic” because of concerns over the children, location, or the extra burden it places on couples. Yet this new ideology has become a formidable political tool for the mainte- nance of the racial order. Much as Jim Crow racism served as the glue for defending a brutal and overt system of racial oppression in the pre–civil rights era, color-blind racism serves today as the ideological armor for a covert and institutionalized system in the post–civil rights era. And

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4 Chapter 1

the beauty of this new ideology is that it aids in the maintenance of white privilege without fanfare, without naming those who it subjects and those who it rewards. It allows a president to state things such as, “I strongly support diversity of all kinds, including racial diversity in higher education,” yet, at the same time, to characterize the University of Michigan’s affirmation action program as “flawed” and “discrimina- tory” against whites.23 Thus whites enunciate positions that safeguard their racial interests without sounding “racist.” Shielded by color blind- ness, whites can express resentment toward minorities; criticize their morality, values, and work ethic; and even claim to be the victims of “reverse racism.” This is the thesis I will defend in this book to explain the curious enigma of “racism without racists.”24

WHITES’ RACIAL ATTITUDES IN THE POST–CIVIL RIGHTS ERA

Since the late 1950s surveys on racial attitudes have consistently found that fewer whites subscribe to the views associated with Jim Crow. For example, whereas the majority of whites supported segregated neigh- borhoods, schools, transportation, jobs, and public accommodations in the 1940s, less than a quarter indicated they did in the 1970s.25 Similarly, fewer whites than ever now seem to subscribe to stereotypical views of blacks. Although the number is still high (ranging from 20 percent to 50 percent, depending on the stereotype), the proportion of whites who state in surveys that blacks are lazy, stupid, irresponsible, and violent has declined since the 1940s.26

These changes in whites’ racial attitudes have been explained by the survey community and commentators in four ways. First, are they racial optimists. This group of analysts agrees with whites’ common sense on ra- cial matters and believes the changes symbolize a profound transition in the United States. Early representatives of this view were Herbert Hyman and Paul B. Sheatsley, who wrote widely influential articles on the subject in Scientific American. In a reprint of their earlier work in the influential collection edited by Talcott Parsons and Kenneth Clark, The Negro Ameri- can, Sheatsley rated the changes in white attitudes as “revolutionary” and concluded,

The mass of white Americans have shown in many ways that they will not follow a racist government and that they will not follow racist leaders. Rather, they are engaged in the painful task of adjusting to an integrated society. It will not be easy for most, but one cannot at this late date doubt the basic commitment. In their hearts they know that the American Negro is right.27

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The Strange Enigma of Race in Contemporary America 5

In recent times, Glenn Firebaugh and Kenneth Davis, Seymour Lipset, and Paul Sniderman and his coauthors, in particular, have carried the torch for racial optimists.28 Firebaugh and Davis, for example, based on their analysis of survey results from 1972 to 1984, concluded that the trend toward less antiblack prejudice was across the board. Sniderman and his coauthors, as well as Lipset, go a step further than Firebaugh and Davis because they have openly advocated color-blind politics as the way to settle the United States’ racial dilemmas. For instance, Sniderman and Edward Carmines made this explicit appeal in their book, Reaching beyond Race:

To say that a commitment to a color-blind politics is worth undertaking is to call for a politics centered on the needs of those most in need. It is not to ar- gue for a politics in which race is irrelevant, but in favor of one in which race is relevant so far as it is a gauge of need. Above all, it is a call for a politics which, because it is organized around moral principles that apply regardless of race, can be brought to bear with special force on the issue of race.29

The problems with this optimistic interpretation are twofold. First, as I have argued elsewhere,30 relying on questions that were framed in the Jim Crow era to assess whites’ racial views today produces an artificial image of progress. Since the central racial debates and the language used to debate those matters have changed, our analytical focus ought to be dedicated to the analysis of the new racial issues. Insisting on the need to rely on old questions to keep longitudinal (trend) data as the basis for analysis will, by default, produce a rosy picture of race relations that misses what is going on on the ground. Second, and more important, because of the change in the normative climate in the post–civil rights era, analysts must exert extreme caution when interpreting attitudinal data, particularly when it comes from single-method research designs. The research strategy that seems more appropriate for our times is mixed research designs (surveys used in combination with interviews, ethnosur- veys,31 etc.), because it allows researchers to cross-examine their results.

A second, more numerous group of analysts exhibit what I have labeled elsewhere as the racial pesoptimist position.32 Racial pesoptimists attempt to strike a “balanced” view and suggest that whites’ racial attitudes reflect progress and resistance. The classical example of this stance is Howard Schuman.33 Schuman has argued for more than thirty years that whites’ racial attitudes involve a mixture of tolerance and intolerance, of accep- tance of the principles of racial liberalism (equal opportunity for all, end of segregation, etc.) and a rejection of the policies that would make those principles a reality (from affirmative action to busing).34

Despite the obvious appeal of this view in the research community (the appearance of neutrality, the pondering of “two sides,” and this view’s

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“balanced” component), racial pesoptimists are just closet optimists. Schuman, for example, has pointed out that, although “White responses to questions of principle are . . . more complex than is often portrayed . . . they nevertheless do show in almost every instance a positive movement over time.”35 Furthermore, it is his belief that the normative change in the United States is real and that the issue is that whites are having a hard time translating those norms into personal preferences.

A third group of analysts argues that the changes in whites’ attitudes represent the emergence of a symbolic racism.36 This tradition is associated with the work of David Sears and his associate, Donald Kinder.37 They have defined symbolic racism as “a blend of anti-black affect and the kind of traditional American moral values embodied in the Protestant Ethic.”38 According to these authors, symbolic racism has replaced biological rac- ism as the primary way whites express their racial resentment toward minorities. In Kinder and Sanders’s words,

A new form of prejudice has come to prominence, one that is preoccupied with matters of moral character, informed by the virtues associated with the traditions of individualism. At its center are the contentions that blacks do not try hard enough to overcome the difficulties they face and that they take what they have not earned. Today, we say, prejudice is expressed in the language of American individualism.39

Authors in this tradition have been criticized for the slipperiness of the concept of “symbolic racism,” for claiming that the blend of antiblack affect and individualism is new, and for not explaining why symbolic racism came about. The first critique, developed by Howard Schuman, is that the concept has been “defined and operationalized in complex and varying ways.”40 Despite this conceptual slipperiness, indexes of symbolic racism have been found to be in fact different from those of old-fashioned racism and to be strong predictors of whites’ opposition to affirmative action.41 The two other critiques, made forcefully by Lawrence Bobo, have been partially addressed by Kinder and Sanders in their book, Divided by Color. First, Kinder and Sanders, as well as Sears, have made clear that their contention is not that this is the first time in history that antiblack affect and elements of the American Creed have combined. Instead, their claim is that this combination has become central to the new face of rac- ism. Regarding the third critique, Kinder and Sanders go at length to explain the transition from old-fashioned to symbolic racism. Neverthe- less, their explanation hinges on arguing that changes in blacks’ tactics (from civil disobedience to urban violence) led to an onslaught of a new form of racial resentment that later found more fuel in controversies over welfare, crime, drugs, family, and affirmative action. What is missing in this explanation is a materially based explanation for why these changes

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The Strange Enigma of Race in Contemporary America 7

occurred. Instead, their theory of prejudice is rooted in the “process of socialization and the operation of routine cognitive and emotional psy- chological processes.”42

Yet, despite its limitations, the symbolic racism tradition has brought attention to key elements of how whites explain racial inequality today. Whether this is “symbolic” of antiblack affect or not is beside the point and hard to assess, since, as a former student of mine queried, “How does one test for the unconscious?”43

The fourth explanation of whites’ contemporary racial attitudes is as- sociated with those who claim that whites’ racial views represent a sense of group position. This position, forcefully advocated by Lawrence Bobo and James Kluegel, is similar to Jim Sidanius’s “social dominance” and Mary Jackman’s “group interests” arguments.44 In essence, the claim of all these authors is that white prejudice is an ideology to defend white privilege. Bobo and his associates have specifically suggested that be- cause of socioeconomic changes that transpired in the 1950s and 1960s, a laissez-faire racism emerged that was fitting of the United States’ “modern, nationwide, postindustrial free labor economy and polity.”45 Laissez-faire racism “encompasses an ideology that blames blacks themselves for their poorer relative economic standing, seeing it as the function of perceived cultural inferiority.”46

Some of the basic arguments of authors in the symbolic and modern racism47 traditions and, particularly, of the laissez-faire racism view are fully compatible with my color-blind racism interpretation. As these authors, I argue that color-blind racism has rearticulated elements of traditional liberalism (work ethic, rewards by merit, equal opportunity, individualism, etc.) for racially illiberal goals. I also argue like them that whites today rely more on cultural rather than biological tropes to explain blacks’ position in this country. Finally, I concur with most analysts of post–civil rights matters in arguing that whites do not perceive discrimi- nation to be a central factor shaping blacks’ life chances.

Although most of my differences with authors in the symbolic racism and laissez-faire traditions are methodological (see below), I have one central theoretical disagreement with them. Theoretically, most of these authors are still snarled in the prejudice problematic and thus interpret actors’ racial views as individual psychological dispositions. Although Bobo and his associates have a conceptualization that is closer to mine, they still retain the notion of prejudice and its psychological baggage rooted in interracial hostility.48 In contrast, my model is not anchored in actors’ affective dispositions (although affective dispositions may be manifest or latent in the way many express their racial views). Instead, it is based on a materialist interpretation of racial matters and thus sees the views of actors as corresponding to their systemic location. Those at the

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bottom of the racial barrel tend to hold oppositional views and those who receive the manifold wages of whiteness tend to hold views in support of the racial status quo. Whether actors express “resentment” or “hostil- ity” toward minorities is largely irrelevant for the maintenance of white privilege. As David Wellman points out in his Portraits of White Racism, “prejudiced people are not the only racists in America.”49

KEY TERMS: RACE, RACIAL STRUCTURE, AND RACIAL IDEOLOGY

One reason why, in general terms, whites and people of color cannot agree on racial matters is because they conceive terms such as “racism” very differently. Whereas for most whites racism is prejudice, for most people of color racism is systemic or institutionalized. Although this is not a theory book, my examination of color-blind racism has etched in it the indelible ink of a “regime of truth”50about how the world is organized. Thus, rather than hiding my theoretical assumptions, I state them openly for the benefit of readers and potential critics.

The first key term is the notion of race. There is very little formal dis- agreement among social scientists in accepting the idea that race is a so- cially constructed category.51 This means that notions of racial difference are human creations rather than eternal, essential categories. As such, racial categories have a history and are subject to change. And here ends the agreement among social scientists on this matter. There are at least three distinct variations on how social scientists approach this construc- tionist perspective on race. The first approach, which is gaining popular- ity among white social scientists, is the idea that because race is socially constructed, it is not a fundamental category of analysis and praxis. Some analysts go as far as to suggest that because race is a constructed category, then it is not real and social scientists who use the category are the ones who make it real.52

The second approach, typical of most sociological writing on race, gives lip service to the social constructionist view—usually a line in the begin- ning of the article or book. Writers in this group then proceed to discuss “racial” differences in academic achievement, crime, and SAT scores as if they were truly racial.53 This is the central way in which contemporary scholars contribute to the propagation of racist interpretations of racial inequality. By failing to highlight the social dynamics that produce these racial differences, these scholars help reinforce the racial order.54

The third approach, and the one I use in this book, acknowledges that race, as other social categories such as class and gender, is constructed but insists that it has a social reality. This means that after race—or class

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or gender—is created, it produces real effects on the actors racialized as “black” or “white.” Although race, as other social constructions, is un- stable, it has a “changing same”55 quality at its core.

In order to explain how a socially constructed category produces real race effects, I need to introduce a second key term: the notion of racial structure. When race emerged in human history, it formed a social structure (a racialized social system) that awarded systemic privileges to Europeans (the peoples who became “white”) over non-Europeans (the peoples who became “nonwhite”).56 Racialized social systems, or white supremacy57 for short, became global and affected all societies where Europeans extended their reach. I therefore conceive a society’s racial structure as the totality of the social relations and practices that reinforce white privilege. Accordingly, the task of analysts interested in studying racial structures is to uncover the particular social, economic, political, social control, and ideological mechanisms responsible for the reproduction of racial privilege in a society.

But why are racial structures reproduced in the first place? Would not humans, after discovering the folly of racial thinking, work to abolish race as a category as well as a practice? Racial structures remain in place for the same reasons that other structures do. Since actors racialized as “white”—or as members of the dominant race—receive material benefits from the racial order, they struggle (or passively receive the manifold wages of whiteness) to maintain their privileges. In contrast, those de- fined as belonging to the subordinate race or races struggle to change the status quo (or become resigned to their position). Therein lies the secret of racial structures and racial inequality the world over.58 They exist because they benefit members of the dominant race.

If the ultimate goal of the dominant race is to defend its collective interests (i.e., the perpetuation of systemic white privilege), it should sur- prise no one that this group develops rationalizations to account for the status of the various races. And here I introduce my third key term, the notion of racial ideology. By this I mean the racially based frameworks used by actors to explain and justify (dominant race) or challenge (subordinate race or races) the racial status quo. Although all the races in a racialized social system have the capacity of developing these frameworks, the frameworks of the dominant race tend to become the master frameworks upon which all racial actors ground (for or against) their ideological positions. Why? Because as Marx pointed out in The German Ideology, “the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force.”59 This does not mean that ideology is almighty. In fact, as I will show in chapter 7, ideological rule is always partial. Even in periods of hegemonic rule,60 such as the current one, subordinate racial groups develop oppositional views. However, it would be foolish to believe that those who rule a

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society do not have the power to at least color (pun intended) the views of the ruled.

Racial ideology can be conceived for analytical purposes as compris- ing the following elements: common frames, style, and racial stories (details on each can be found in chapters 3, 4, and 5). The frames that bond together a particular racial ideology are rooted in the group-based conditions and experiences of the races and are, at the symbolic level, the representations developed by these groups to explain how the world is or ought to be. And because the group life of the various racially de- fined groups is based on hierarchy and domination, the ruling ideology expresses as “common sense” the interests of the dominant race, while oppositional ideologies attempt to challenge that common sense by pro- viding alternative frames, ideas, and stories based on the experiences of subordinated races.

Individual actors employ these elements as “building blocks . . . for manufacturing versions on actions, self, and social structures” in com- municative situations.61 The looseness of the elements allows users to ma- neuver within various contexts (e.g., responding to a race-related survey, discussing racial issues with family, or arguing about affirmative action in a college classroom) and produce various accounts and presentations of self (e.g., appearing ambivalent, tolerant, or strong minded). This loose character enhances the legitimating role of racial ideology because it allows for accommodation of contradictions, exceptions, and new infor- mation. As Jackman points out about ideology in general, “Indeed, the strength of an ideology lies in its loose-jointed, flexible application. An ideology is a political instrument, not an exercise in personal logic: consistency is rigidity, the only pragmatic effect of which is to box oneself in.”62

Before I can proceed, two important caveats should be offered. First, although whites, because of their privileged position in the racial order, form a social group (the dominant race), they are fractured along class, gender, sexual orientation, and other forms of “social cleavage.” Hence, they have multiple and often contradictory interests that are not easy to disentangle and that predict a priori their mobilizing capacity (Do white workers have more in common with white capitalists than with black workers?). However, because all actors awarded the dominant racial position, regardless of their multiple structural locations (men or women, gay or straight, working class or bourgeois), benefit from what Mills calls the “racial contract,”63 most have historically endorsed the ideas that jus- tify the racial status quo.

Second, although not every single member of the dominant race defends the racial status quo or spouts color-blind racism, most do. To explain this point by analogy, although not every capitalist defends capitalism (e.g., Frederick Engels, the coauthor of The Communist Manifesto, was a

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capitalist) and not every man defends patriarchy (e.g., Achilles Heel is an English magazine published by feminist men), most do in some fashion. In the same vein, although some whites fight white supremacy and do not endorse white common sense, most subscribe to substantial portions of it in a casual, uncritical fashion that helps sustain the prevailing racial order.

HOW TO STUDY COLOR-BLIND RACISM

I will rely mostly on interview data to make my case. This choice is based on important conceptual and methodological considerations. Conceptu- ally, my focus is examining whites’ racial ideology, and ideology, racial or not, is produced and reproduced in communicative interaction.64 Hence, although surveys are useful instruments for gathering general in- formation on actors’ views, they are severely limited tools for examining how people explain, justify, rationalize, and articulate racial viewpoints. People are less likely to express their positions and emotions about racial issues by answering “yes” and “no” or “strongly agree” and “strongly disagree” to questions. Despite the gallant effort of some survey research- ers to produce methodologically correct questionnaires, survey questions still restrict the free flow of ideas and unnecessarily constrain the range of possible answers for respondents.65

Methodologically, I argue that because the normative climate in the post–civil rights era has made illegitimate the public expression of racially based feelings and viewpoints,66 surveys on racial attitudes have become like multiple-choice exams in which respondents work hard to choose the “right” answers (i.e., those that fit public norms). For instance, although a variety of data suggest racial considerations are central to whites’ residen- tial choices, more than 90 percent of whites state in surveys that they have no problem with the idea of blacks moving into their neighborhoods.67 Similarly, even though about 80 percent of whites claim they would not have a problem if a member of their family brought a black person home for dinner, research shows that (1) very few whites (fewer than 10 per- cent) can legitimately claim the proverbial “some of my best friends are blacks” and (2) whites rarely fraternize with blacks.68

Of more import yet is the insistence by mainstream survey researchers’ on using questions developed in the 1950s and 1960s to assess changes in racial tolerance. This strategy is predicated on the assumption that “rac- ism” (what I label here “racial ideology”) does not change over time. If instead one regards racial ideology as in fact changing, the reliance on questions developed to tackle issues from the Jim Crow era will produce an artificial image of progress and miss most of whites’ contemporary racial nightmares.

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Despite my conceptual and methodological concerns with survey research, I believe well-designed surveys are still useful instruments to glance at America’s racial reality. Therefore, I report survey results from my own research projects as well as from research conducted by other scholars whenever appropriate. My point, then, is not to deny attitudinal change or to condemn to oblivion survey research on racial attitudes, but to understand whites’ new racial beliefs and their implications as well as possible.

DATA SOURCES

The data for this book come primarily from two similarly structured proj- ects. The first is the 1997 Survey of Social Attitudes of College Students, based on a convenient sample of 627 college students (including 451 white students) surveyed at a large midwestern university (MU hence- forth), a large southern university (SU), and a medium-sized West Coast university (WU). A 10 percent random sample of the white students who provided information in the survey on how to contact them (about 90 percent) were interviewed (forty-one students altogether, of which sev- enteen were men and twenty-four women and of which thirty-one were from middle- and upper-middle-class backgrounds and ten were from the working class).

Although the data from this study are very suggestive and, I believe, essentially right, the study has some limitations. First, it is based on a convenient, rather than a representative, sample, limiting the capacity for generalizing the findings to the white population at large. Nevertheless, it is worth pointing out that the bias in that sample is in the direction of more racial tolerance, since researchers have consistently found that young, college-educated whites are more likely to be racially tolerant than any other segment of the white population.69 Another limitation of the study is that interviews were conducted only with white respondents. Thus, this data set does not allow us to examine whether or not their views are different from blacks’. Finally, due to budget constraints, the sample was small, albeit large when compared to most interview-based work.70

The second data source for this book is the 1998 Detroit Area Study (DAS). This data set overcomes many of the limitations of the college stu- dents’ data set, since the former is based on a representative sample and includes a significant number of interviews with both white and black re- spondents. The 1998 DAS is a probabilistic survey of four hundred black and white Detroit metropolitan-area residents (323 whites and 67 blacks). The response rate was an acceptable 67.5 percent. As part of this study, 84 respondents (a 21 percent subsample) were randomly selected for in-

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depth interviews (sixty-six were whites and seventeen were blacks). The interviews were race matched, followed a structured interview protocol, were conducted in the respondents’ homes, and lasted about one hour.

The major limitation of the 1998 DAS data set is that the respondents are black and white only. As the United States has become a multiracial society, one has to be concerned about the generalizability of an analysis based on findings on blacks and whites. Although I posit color-blind racism is the general ideology of the post–civil rights era, I realize that a fuller analysis should include the views of other people of color. Thus, I will bring to bear data from other sources in my conclusion to show how other people of color fit into the notion of color-blind racism. On a final note regarding the 1997 Survey of Social Attitudes of College Students and the 1998 DAS, I am well aware that some readers may question their continued validity. However, both survey research as well as interview- based research (e.g., Bush 2004; Gallagher 2002; etc.) done since have pro- duced similar results, thus adding strength to my arguments in this book.

POLITICS, INTERPRETATION, AND OBJECTIVITY

Social scientific research is always a political enterprise. Despite the Enlightenment’s dream71 of pure objectivity, the problems we pose, the theories we use, the methods we employ, and the analyses we perform are social products themselves and to an extent reflect societal contradic- tions and power dynamics. This view has become more acceptable in the social sciences today than it was ten or twenty years ago.72 Accordingly, it is harder for social scientists today to defend sociologist Max Weber’s call for a separation between researcher, method, and data.73

My scholarly goals in this book are to describe the main components of color-blind racism and explain their functions and to use these com- ponents to theorize how future U.S. race relations might look. I hope this effort helps social analysts to get over the present impasse on the nature and meaning of whites’ racial views. Yet, by accomplishing my schol- arly goals, I also hope to attain a much larger and important political goal: uncovering the basic profile of the main ideology reinforcing con- temporary racial inequality. By definition, then, my work is a challenge to post–civil rights white common sense; to the view that race no longer matters; and to anyone who believes that the problems afflicting people of color are fundamentally rooted in their pathological cultures.74 More specifically, I want to advance an argument (the sophisticated nature of color-blind racism), an approach (analyzing racial ideology rather than “prejudice”), and a politics (fighting racial dominatio