Capitalism Vs.

Racism
Lubricate the gears of capital. -Kenji Yeoh

***Capitalism***

1nc
Afropessimism is not radical pessimism is a predictable response to
postmodern capitalism and is a crucial part of the system
Eagleton 95 (Terry Eagleton Distinguished Professor of English Literature at Lancaster University, Professor of Cultural
Theory at the National University of Ireland, In defense of history: Where do postmodernists come from?, Monthly Review, vol. 3
no. 47 (July 1995), pp. 59-70 // JJ)
Imagine a radical movement that had suffered an emphatic defeat. So emphatic, in fact, that it seemed unlikely to resurface for the
length of a lifetime, if at all. As time wore on, the beliefs of this movement might begin to

seem less false or ineffectual than simply irrelevant. For its opponents, it would be less a
matter of hotly contesting these doctrines than of contemplating them with something
of the mild antiquarian interest one might have previously reserved for Ptolemaic cosmology or the scholasticism of
Thomas Aquinas. Radicals might come to find themselves less overwhelmed or outargued than simply washed up, speaking a language so quaintly out of tune with their era that, as with the
language of Platonism or courtly love, nobody even bothered any longer to ask whether it was true. What would be the
likely response of the left to such a dire condition? Many, no doubt, would drift either cynically or
sincerely to the right, regretting their earlier views as infantile idealism. Others might keep the faith purely out of habit, anxiety, or
nostalgia, clinging to an imaginary identity and risking the neurosis that that may bring. A small clutch of left triumphalists,
incurably hopeful, would no doubt carry on detecting the stirrings of the revolution in the faintest flicker of militancy. In others,
the radical impulse would persist, but would be forced to migrate elsewhere. One can imagine that the ruling

assumption of this period would be that the system was, at least for the moment,
unbreachable; and a great many of the left's conclusions could be seen to flow
from this glum supposition. One might expect, for example, that there would be an upsurge of
interest in the margins and crevices of the system--in those ambiguous,
indeterminate places where its power seemed less secure. If the system could not
be breached, one might at least look to those forces which might momentarily
transgress, subvert, or give it the slip. There would be, one might predict, much celebration of the marginal-but this would be partly making a virtue out of necessity, since the left would itself have been rudely displaced from the
mainstream, and might thus come, conveniently enough, to suspect all talk of centrality

as suspect. At its crudest, this cult of marginality would come down to a

simpleminded assumption that minorities were positive and majorities
oppressive . Just how minorities like fascist groups, Ulster Unionists, or the international bourgeoisie fitted into this picture
would not be entirely clear. Nor is it obvious how such a position could cope with a previously marginal movement--the ANC, for
example--becoming politically dominant, given its formalist prejudice that dominance was undesirable as such. The
historical basis for this way of thinking would be the fact that political movements
that were at once mass, central, and creative were by and large no longer in
business. Indeed, the idea of a movement that was at once central and subversive would now appear something of a
contradiction in terms. It would therefore seem natural to demonize the mass, dominant, and consensual, and romanticize
whatever happened to deviate from them. It would be, above all, the attitude of those younger dissidents who had nothing much,
politically speaking, to remember, who had no actual memory or experience of mass radical politics, but a good deal of experience
of drearily oppressive majorities. If the system really did seem to have canceled all opposition to itself, then it would not

be hard to generalize from this to the vaguely anarchistic belief that system is
oppressive as such. Since there were almost no examples of attractive political systems around, the claim
would seem distinctly plausible. The only genuine criticism could be one launched
from outside the system altogether; and one would expect, therefore, a certain
fetishizing of "otherness" in such a period. There would be enormous interest in
anything that seemed alien, deviant, exotic, unincorporable, all the way from aardvarks to Alpha
Centauri, a passion for whatever gave us a tantalizing glimpse of something beyond the logic of the system altogether. But this
romantic ultra-leftism would coexist, curiously enough, with a brittle pessimism--

for the fact is that if the system is all-powerful, then there can be by definition nothing beyond it, any more than there can be
anything beyond the infinite curvature of cosmic space. If there were something outside the system, then it would be entirely
unknowable and thus incapable of saving us; but if we could draw it into the orbit of the system, so that it could gain some effective
foothold there, its otherness would be instantly contaminated and its subversive power would thus dwindle to nothing. Whatever
negates the system in theory would thus be logically incapable of doing so in practice. Anything we can understand can by
definition not be radical, since it must be within the system itself; but anything which escapes the system could be heard by us as
no more than a mysterious murmur. Such thinking has abandoned the whole notion of a system

which is internally contradictory--which has that installed at its heart which can potentially undo it.
Instead, it thinks in the rigid oppositions of "inside" and "outside," where to be on
the inside is to be complicit and to be on the outside is to be impotent . The typical
style of thought of such a period, then, might be described as libertarian
pessimism--libertarian, because one would not have given up on the dream of
something quite other than what we have; pessimism, because one would be much
too bleakly conscious of the omnipotence of law and power to believe that such a
dream could ever be realized. If one still believed in subversion, but not in the existence of any flesh-and-blood
agents of it, then it might be possible to imagine that the system in some way subverted itself, deconstructed its own logic, which
would then allow you to combine a certain radicalism with a certain skepticism. If the system is everywhere, then it would seem,
like the Almighty himself, to be visible at no particular point; and it would therefore become possible to believe, paradoxically
enough, that whatever was out there was not in fact a system at all. It is only a short step from claiming that the system is too
complex to be represented to declaring that it does not exist. In the period we are imagining, then, some

would no doubt be found clamoring against what they saw as the tyranny of a real
social totality, whereas others would be busy deconstructing the whole idea of totality and claiming that it existed only in
our minds. It would not be hard to see this as, at least in part, a compensation in theory for the fact that the social totality was
proving difficult to crack in practice. If no very ambitious form of political action seems for the moment possible, if so-called
micropolitics seem the order of the day, it is always tempting to convert this necessity into a virtue--to console oneself with the
thought that one's political limitations have a kind of objective ground in reality, in the fact that social "totality" is in any case just
an illusion. ("Metaphysical" illusion makes your position sound rather more imposing.) It does not matter if there is no political
agent at hand to transform the whole, because there is in fact no whole to be transformed. It is as though, having mislaid the
breadknife, one declares the loaf to be already sliced. But totality might also seem something of an illusion because there would be
no very obvious political agent for whom society might present itself as a totality. There are those who need to grasp how it stands
with them in order to be free, and who find that they can do this only by grasping something of the overall structure with which
their own immediate situation intersects. Local and universal are not, here, simple opposites or theoretical options, as they might
be for those intellectuals who prefer to think big and those more modest academics who like to keep it concrete. But if some of
those traditional political agents are in trouble, then so will be the concept of social totality, since it is those agents' need of it that
gives it its force. Grasping a complex totality involves some rigorous analysis; so it is not surprising that such strenuously
systematic thought should be out of fashion, dismissed as phallic, scientistic, or what have you, in the sort of period we are
imagining. When there is nothing in particular in it for you to find out how you stand--if you are a professor in

Ithaca or Irvine, for example--you can afford to be ambiguous, elusive, deliciously

indeterminate. You are also quite likely, in such circumstances, to wax idealistthough in some suitably new-fangled rather than tediously old-fashioned sense. For one primary way in which we know the world
is, of course, through practice; and if any very ambitious practice is denied us, it will not be long before we catch ourselves
wondering whether there is anything out there at all. One would expect, then, that in such an era a belief in reality as something
that resists us ("History is what hurts," as Fredric Jameson has put it) will give way to a belief in the "constructed" nature of the
world. This, in turn, would no doubt go hand in hand with a full-blooded "culturalism" which underestimated what men and
women had in common as material human creatures, and suspected all talk of nature as an insidious mystification. It would

tend not to realize that such culturalism is just as reductive as, say, economism or
biologism. Cognitive and realist accounts of human consciousness would yield ground to various kinds of pragmatism and

relativism, party because there didn't any longer seem much politically at stake in knowing how it stood with you. Everything
would become an interpretation, including that statement itself. And what would also gradually implode, along with reasonably
certain knowledge, would be the idea of a human subject "centered" and unified enough to take significant action. For such
significant action would now seem in short supply; and the result, once more, would be to make a virtue out of necessity by singing
the praises of the diffuse, decentered, schizoid human subject--a subject who might well not be "together" enough to topple a bottle
off a wall, et alone bring down the sate, but who could nevertheless be presented as hair-raisingly avant garde in contrast to the
smugly centered subjects of an older, more classical phase of capitalism. To put it another way: the subject as producer (coherent,
disciplined, self-determining) would have yielded ground to the subject as consumer (mobile, ephemeral, constituted by insatiable
desire). If the "left" orthodoxies of such a period were pragmatist, relativist, pluralistic, deconstructive, then one might well see
such thought-forms as dangerously radical. For does not capitalism need sure foundations, stable identities, absolute authority,
metaphysical certainties, in order to survive And wouldn't the kind of thought we are imagining put the skids under all this The
answer, feebly enough, is both yes and no. It is true that capitalism, so far anyway, has felt the need to underpin its authority with
unimpeachable moral foundations. Look, for example, at the remarkable tenacity of religious belief in North America. On the other
hand, look at the British, who are a notably godless bunch. No British politician could cause anything other than acute
embarrassment by invoking the Supreme Being in public, and the British talk much less about metaphysical abstractions like
Britain than those in the United States do about something called the United States. It is not clear, in other words, exactly how

much metaphysical talk the advanced capitalist system really requires; and it is certainly true that its relentlessly secularizing,
rationalizing operations threaten to undercut its own metaphysical claims. It is clear, however, that without

pragmatism and plurality the system could not survive at all. Difference,
"hybridity," heterogeneity, restless mobility are native to the capitalist mode of
production, and thus by no means inherently radical phenomena. So if these ways
of thinking put the skids under the system at one level, they reproduce its logic at
another. If an oppressive system seems to regulate everything, then one will naturally look around for some enclave of which
this is less true--some place where a degree of freedom or randomness or pleasure still precariously survives. Perhaps you might
call this desire, or discourse, or the body, or the unconscious. One might predict in this period a quickening of interest in
psychoanalsis--for psychoanalysis is not only the thinking person's sensationalism, blending intellectual rigor with the most lurid
materials, but it exudes a general exciting air of radicalism without being particularly so politically. If the more abstract questions
of state, mode of production, and civil society seems for the moment too hard to resolve, then one might shift one's political
attention to something more intimate and immediate, more living and fleshly, like the body. Conference papers entitled "Putting
the Anus Back into Coriolanus" would attract eager crowds who had never heard of the bourgeoisie but who knew all about
buggery. This state of affairs would no doubt be particularly marked in those societies which in any case lacked strong socialist
traditions; indeed, one could imagine much of the style of thought in question, for all its suspiciousness of the universal, as no
more than a spurious universalizing of such specific political conditions. Such a concern with bodiliness and sexuality would
represent, one imagines, an enormous political deepening and enrichment, at the same time as it would signify a thoroughgoing
displacement. And no doubt just the same could be said if one were to witness an increasing obsession with language and culture-topics where the intellectual is in any case more likely to feel at home than in the realm of material production. One might
expect that some, true to the pessimism of the period, would stress how
discourses are policed, regulated, heavy with power, while others would proclaim
in more libertarian spirit how the thrills and spills of the signifier can give the slip
to the system. Either way, one would no doubt witness an immense linguistic inflation, as what appeared no longer

conceivable in political reality was still just about possible in the areas of discourse or signs or textuality. The freedom of text or
language would come to compensate for the unfreedom of the system as a whole. There would still be a kind of utopian vision, but
its name now would be increasingly poetry. And it would even be possible to imagine, in an "extremist" variant of this style of
thought, that the future was here and now--that utopia had already arrived in the shape of the pleasurable intensities, multiple
selfhoods, and exhilarating exchanges of the marketplace and the shopping mall. History would then most certainly have come to
an end--an end already implicit in the blocking of radical political action. For if no such collective action seemed generally possible,
then history would indeed appear as random and directionless, and to claim that there was no longer any "grand narrative' would
be among other things a way of saying that we no longer knew how to construct one effectively in these conditions. For this kind of
thought, history would have ended because freedom would finally have been achieved; for Marxism, the achievement of freedom
would be the beginning of history and the end of all we have known to date: those boring prehistorical grand narratives which are
really just the same old recycled story of scarcity, suffering, and struggle.

Slavery is a uniquely bad lens for modern oppressionour ev is

comparativetheir fixation suppresses class inquiry and exports a
USA-centric historical narrative
Dave Hill, teaches at Middlesex University and is Visiting Professor of Critical Education Policy and Equality Studies at the
University of Limerick, Ireland. Culturalist and Materialist Explanations of Class and "Race", Cultural Logic 2009
http://clogic.eserver.org/2009/Hill.pdf

One of two major tenets of CRT that Cole (2008a, b, 2009; see also Cole and Maisuria (2007, 2009)) critically examine is CRTs

idea that the concept of white supremacy better expresses oppression in contemporary societies based on
race than does the concept of racism. Cole and Maisuria (and Cole) argue that Critical Race Theory
homogenises all white people together in positions of class power and privilege, which, of course,
is factually incorrect, both with respect to social class inequality in general, and, as will be shown
in later in this paper, with reference to xenoracialization. Cole and Maisuria (2007) continue, it is
certainly not white people as a whole who are in this hegemonic position, nor white people as a whole
who benefit from current education policy, or any other legislation. Indeed the white working class, as part of the
working class in general, consistently fares badly in the education system. Cole (2008a) notes that, in
focusing on issues of color and being divorced from matters related to capitalist requirements
with respect to the labour market, CRT is ill-equipped to analyse the discourse of xenoracism and
processes of xenoracialization. McGary (1999:91) points out that Black people have been used in ways that
white people have not. Youngs (2001) comment (with which I and Cole and Maisuria would concur) is that

McGarys observation may be true, but it does not mean that whites have not also been used.
Young continues, yes, whites may be used differently, but they are still used because that is the logic of
exploitative regimes people are used, that is to say, their labor is commodified and exchanged for profit. Young
continues, in his critique of McGary, that such a view disconnects black alienation from other social
relations; hence, it ultimately reifies race, and, in doing so, suppresses materialist inquiries
into the class logic of race. That is to say, the meaning of race is not to be found within its own
internal dynamics but rather in dialectical relation to and as an ideological justification of the
exploitative wage-labor economy. Critical Race Theory, and other similar theories of race salience, such as (Molefi
Kete Asante, and of Paul Gilroy (2001), critiqued in Young, 2006) are understandable, as Leonardo (2004) notes, in the USA, as a
salient subjective lens and understanding/analysis of felt (and indeed, of course, actual and widespread) oppression. As Leonardo
(2004), Young (2006), Cole and Maisuria (2007), and Cole (2008b) note, Critical Race Theory, just as earlier

theories such as that of Fanon and Negritude, do draw into the limelight, do expose and represent black
experience, humilation, oppression, racism. But they collude, just as much as race equivalence theorists such as
Michael W. Apple, in super-elevating subjective consciousness of one aspect of identity and
thereby occluding the (raced and gendered) classessential nature of capitalism and the
labour-capital relation. As such it seeks social democratic reformism, the winning of equal rights and
opportunities within a capitalist (albeit reformed) economy and society. As Young (2006) puts it, unlike
many commentators who engage race matters, I do not isolate these social sites and view race as a local
problem, which would lead to reformist measures along the lines of either legal reform or a cultural-ideological
battle to win the hearts and minds of people and thus keep the existing socioeconomic
arrangements intact . . . the eradication of race oppression also requires a totalizing
political project: the transformation of existing capitalism a system which produces
difference (the racial/gender division of labor) and accompanying ideological narratives that justify the
resulting social inequality. Hence, my project articulates a transformative theory of race a theory that reclaims
revolutionary class politics in the interests of contributing toward a post-racist society. Critical Race Theory seems
analytically flawed, to be based on the category error of assigning race as the primary form of
oppression in capitalist society, and to be substantially situationally specific to the USA,
with its horrific experience and legacy of slavery. It also seems to me to be a form of left radical
United States imperialist hegemonizing, that is, of USA-based academics projecting
on to other countries those experiences and analyses and policy perspectives that
derive most specifically from the USA experience of slavery and its contemporary
effects. I am very much aware of the existence and horrors of racism in, for example, Britain and Europe in general.18
Notwithstanding those horrors, the Critical Race Theory analysis would appear to have less significance and applicability in, for
example, Western and Eastern Europe, or, for example, India, Pakistan, and Nepal, than in the USA.

Capitalism continues to cause modern day slavery, causes millions of

systemic deaths from poverty and environmental destruction and
dehumanizes the working class around the world
McLaren 4, Distinguished Fellow Critical Studies @ Chapman U and UCLA urban schooling
prof, and Scatamburlo-DAnnibale, associate professor of Communication U Windsor, 4
(Peter and Valerie, Class Dismissed? Historical materialism and the politics of difference,
Educational Philosophy and Theory Vol. 36, Issue 2, p. 183-199, MM)
For well over two decades we have witnessed the jubilant liberal and conservative pronouncements of the demise of socialism.
Concomitantly, history's presumed failure to defang existing capitalist relations has been

read by many self-identified radicals as an advertisement for capitalism's inevitability. As a result,

the chorus refrain There Is No Alternative, sung by liberals and conservatives, has been
buttressed by the symphony of post-Marxist voices recommending that we give
socialism a decent burial and move on. Within this context, to speak of the promise of Marx and socialism may
appear anachronistic, even nave, especially since the post-al intellectual vanguard has presumably demonstrated the folly of doing
so. Yet we stubbornly believe that the chants of T.I.N.A. must be combated for they offer as a fait accompli, something which
progressive Leftists

should refuse to accept namely the triumph of capitalism and its

political bedfellow neo-liberalism,

which have worked together to naturalize suffering,

undermine collective struggle, and obliterate hope. We concur with Amin (1998), who claims that
such chants must be defied and revealed as absurd and criminal, and who puts the challenge we face
in no uncertain terms: humanity may let itself be led by capitalism's logic to a fate of
collective suicide or it may pave the way for an alternative humanist project of
global socialism. The grosteque conditions that inspired Marx to pen his original critique of
capitalism are present and flourishing. The inequalities of wealth and the gross imbalances of power that
exist today are leading to abuses that exceed those encountered in Marx's day (Greider, 1998,
p. 39). Global capitalism has paved the way for the obscene concentration of wealth in fewer and fewer hands
and created a world increasingly divided between those who enjoy opulent affluence and those who
languish in dehumanizing conditions and economic misery. In every corner of the globe, we are witnessing
social disintegration as revealed by a rise in abject poverty and inequality. At the current historical
juncture, the combined assets of the 225 richest people is roughly equal to the annual income of the poorest 47 percent of the world's
population, while the combined assets of the three richest people exceed the combined GDP of the 48 poorest nations (CCPA, 2002,
p. 3). Approximately 2.8 billion peoplealmost half of the world's populationstruggle in desperation to

live on less than two dollars a day (McQuaig, 2001, p. 27). As many as 250 million children are
wage slaves and there are over a billion workers who are either un- or under-employed.
These are the concrete realities of our timerealities that require a vigorous class analysis , an
unrelenting critique of capitalism and an oppositional politics capable of
confronting what Ahmad (1998, p. 2) refers to as capitalist universality. They are realities that require

something more than that which is offered by the prophets of difference and post-Marxists who would have us relegate socialism to
the scrapheap of history and mummify Marxism along with Lenin's corpse. Never before has a Marxian

analysis of capitalism and class rule been so desperately needed. That is not to say that everything
Marx said or anticipated has come true, for that is clearly not the case. Many critiques of Marx focus on his
strategy for moving toward socialism, and with ample justification; nonetheless
Marx did provide us with fundamental insights into class society that have held
true to this day. Marx's enduring relevance lies in his indictment of capitalism which continues to wreak havoc in the lives of

most. While capitalism's cheerleaders have attempted to hide its sordid underbelly, Marx's description of capitalism as the sorcerer's
dark power is even more apt in light of contemporary historical and economic conditions. Rather than jettisoning

Marx, decentering the role of capitalism, and discrediting class analysis, radical
educators must continue to engage Marx's oeuvre and extrapolate from it that which
is useful pedagogically, theoretically, and , most importantly, politically in light of the challenges
that confront us. The urgency which animates Amin's call for a collective socialist vision
necessitates, as we have argued, moving beyond the particularism and liberal pluralism that
informs the politics of difference. It also requires challenging the questionable

assumptions that have come to constitute the core of contemporary radical theory,
pedagogy

and politics. In

terms of effecting change, what is needed is a cogent

understanding of the systemic nature of exploitation and oppression based on the

precepts of a radical political economy approach (outlined above) and one that incorporates Marx's notion of
unity in difference in which people share widely common material interests. Such an understanding extends
far beyond the realm of theory, for the manner in which we choose to interpret and explore the social world, the
concepts and frameworks we use to express our sociopolitical understandings,
are more than just abstract categories. They imply intentions, organizational
practices, and political agendas. Identifying class analysis as the basis for our
understandings and class struggle as the basis for political transformation implies something quite
different than constructing a sense of political agency around issues of race, ethnicity,
gender, etc. Contrary to Shakespeare's assertion that a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, it should be clear that
this is not the case in political matters. Rather, in politics the essence of the flower lies in the name by

which it is called (Bannerji, 2000, p. 41). The task for progressives today is to seize the
moment and plant the seeds for a political agenda that is grounded in historical
possibilities and informed by a vision committed to overcoming exploitative conditions. These seeds, we would argue,
must be derived from the tree of radical political economy. For the vast majority of people today
people of all racial classifications or identities, all genders and sexual
orientationsthe common frame of reference arcing across difference, the concerns and aspirations
that are most widely shared are those that are rooted in the common experience of everyday life
shaped and constrained by political economy (Reed, 2000, p. xxvii). While post-Marxist
advocates of the politics of difference suggest that such a stance is outdated, we would
argue that the categories which they have employed to analyze the social are now losing
their usefulness, particularly in light of actual contemporary social movements. All over the globe, there
are large anti-capitalist movements afoot. In February 2002, chants of Another World Is Possible became the
theme of protests in Porto Allegre. It seems that those people struggling in the streets havent read
about T.I.N.A., the end of grand narratives of emancipation, or the decentering of
capitalism. It seems as though the struggle for basic survival and some semblance of human dignity in the mean streets of the
dystopian metropoles doesnt permit much time or opportunity to read the heady proclamations emanating from seminar rooms. As
E. P. Thompson (1978, p. 11) once remarked, sometimes experience walks in without knocking at the door, and announces deaths,
crises of subsistence, trench warfare, unemployment, inflation, genocide. This, of course, does not mean that

socialism will inevitably come about, yet a sense of its nascent promise animates
current social movements. Indeed, noted historian Howard Zinn (2000, p. 20) recently pointed out that after
years of single-issue organizing (i.e. the politics of difference), the WTO and other anticorporate capitalist protests signaled a turning point in the history of movements
of recent decades, for it was the issue of class that more than anything bound everyone together.
History, to paraphrase Thompson (1978, p. 25) doesnt seem to be following Theory's script. Our vision is informed by Marx's
historical materialism and his revolutionary socialist humanism, which must not be conflated with liberal humanism. For left
politics and pedagogy, a socialist humanist vision remains crucial, whose fundamental features

include the creative potential of people to challenge collectively the circumstances

that they inherit. This variant of humanism seeks to give expression to the pain, sorrow and degradation of the oppressed,
those who labor under the ominous and ghastly cloak of globalized capital. It calls for the transformation of those conditions that
have prevented the bulk of humankind from fulfilling its potential. It vests its hope for change in the

development of critical consciousness and social agents who make history, although not
always in conditions of their choosing. The political goal of socialist humanism is, however, not a resting in difference but rather
the emancipation of difference at the level of human mutuality and reciprocity. This would be a step forward for the discovery or
creation of our real differences which can only in the end be explored in reciprocal ways (Eagleton, 1996, p. 120). Above all else,

the enduring relevance of a radical socialist pedagogy and politics is the centrality
it accords to the interrogation of capitalism. We can no longer afford to remain indifferent to the horror
and savagery committed by capitalist's barbaric machinations. We need to recognize that capitalist
democracy is unrescuably contradictory in its own self-constitution. Capitalism and
democracy cannot be translated into one another without profound efforts at manufacturing empty idealism. Committed
Leftists must unrelentingly cultivate a democratic socialist vision that refuses to forget the

wretched of the earth, the children of the damned and the victims of the culture of silencea task which requires more than
abstruse convolutions and striking ironic poses in the agnostic arena of signifying practices. Leftists must illuminate the little
shops of horror that lurk beneath globalizations shiny faade; they must challenge

the true evils that are

manifest in the tentacles of global capitalism's reach. And, more than this, Leftists must search
for the cracks in the edifice of globalized capitalism and shine light on those
fissures that give birth to alternatives. Socialism today, undoubtedly, runs against the
grain of received wisdom, but its vision of a vastly improved and freer
arrangement of social relations beckons on the horizon. Its unwritten text is
nascent in the present even as it exists among the fragments of history and the shards of distant memories. Its potential
remains untapped and its promise needs to be redeemed.

Class is a key starting pointnot to obscure intersecting inequalities,

but to historicize them and address the engines of mass immiseration
Taylor 11 [Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, on the editorial board of the International Socialist Review and a doctoral student in
African American Studies at Northwestern University; Race, class and Marxism, SocialistWorker.org,
http://socialistworker.org/2011/01/04/race-class-and-marxism]

Marxists believe that the potential for that kind of unity is dependant on battles and struggles against racism today. Without a commitment by revolutionary organizations in the
here and now to the fight against racism, working-class unity will never be achieved and the revolutionary potential of the working class will never be realized. Yet despite all the

Marxism has been maligned as, at best, "blind" to

combating racism and, at worst, "incapable" of it. For example, in an article published last summer, popular
commentator and self-described "anti-racist" Tim Wise summarized the critique of "left activists" that
he later defines as Marxists. He writes: [L]eft activists often marginalize people of color by operating from a framework of extreme class
evidence of this commitment to fighting racism over many decades,

reductionism, which holds that the "real" issue is class, not race, that "the only color that matters is green," and that issues like racism are mere "identity politics," which should
take a backseat to promoting class-based universalism and programs to help working people. This reductionism, by ignoring the way that even middle class and affluent people
of color face racism and color-based discrimination (and by presuming that low-income folks of color and low-income whites are equally oppressed, despite a wealth of evidence
to the contrary) reinforces white denial, privileges white perspectivism and dismisses the lived reality of people of color. Even more, as we'll see, it ignores perhaps the most
important political lesson regarding the interplay of race and class: namely, that the biggest reason why there is so little working-class consciousness and unity in the Untied
States (and thus, why class-based programs to uplift all in need are so much weaker here than in the rest of the industrialized world), is precisely because of racism and the way
that white racism has been deliberately inculcated among white working folks. Only by confronting that directly (rather than sidestepping it as class reductionists seek to do) can
we ever hope to build cross-racial, class based coalitions. In other words, for the policies favored by the class reductionist to work--be they social democrats or Marxists--or even

Wise accuses Marxism of: "extreme class

reductionism," meaning that Marxists allegedly think that class is more important than race;
reducing struggles against racism to "mere identity politics"; and requiring that
struggles against racism should "take a back seat" to struggles over economic
issues. Wise also accuses so-called "left activists" of reinforcing "white denial" and "dismiss[ing] the lived
reality of people of color"--which, of course, presumes Left activists and Marxists
to all be white. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - What do Marxists actually say? Marxists argue that
capitalism is a system that is based on the exploitation of the many by the few.
Because it is a system based on gross inequality, it requires various tools to divide the majority-racism and all oppressions under capitalism serve this purpose. Moreover, oppression is used to justify and "explain"
unequal relationships in society that enrich the minority that live off the majority's labor. Thus, racism developed initially to
explain and justify the enslavement of Africans--because they were less than human and undeserving of liberty and freedom.
Everyone accepts the idea that the oppression of slaves was rooted in the class relations of exploitation under
that system. Fewer recognize that under capitalism, wage slavery is the pivot around which all
other inequalities and oppressions turn. Capitalism used racism to justify plunder, conquest and slavery, but as Karl Marx pointed
out, it also used racism to divide and rule--to pit one section of the working class against another and thereby blunt class consciousness. To claim, as Marxists do,
that racism is a product of capitalism is not to deny or diminish its importance or impact in American
society. It is simply to explain its origins and the reasons for its perpetuation. Many on the left today talk about
to come into being, racism and white supremacy must be challenged directly. Here,

class as if it is one of many oppressions, often describing it as "classism." What people are really referring to as "classism" is elitism or snobbery, and not the fundamental

it is popular today to talk about various oppressions,

including class, as intersecting. While it is true that oppressions can reinforce and
compound each other, they are born out of the material relations shaped by
capitalism and the economic exploitation that is at the heart of capitalist society. In other
organization of society under capitalism. Moreover,

words, it is the material and economic structure of society that gave rise to a range of ideas and ideologies to justify, explain and help perpetuate that order. In the United States,

Marx himself was well aware of the

centrality of race under capitalism. While Marx did not write extensively on the question of slavery and its racial impact in societies specifically, he
did write about the way in which European capitalism emerged because of its pilfering, rape and destruction, famously writing: The discovery of
gold and silver in America, the extirpation, enslavement and entombment in mines of the aboriginal
population, the beginning of the conquest and looting of the East Indies, the turning of Africa into a
warren for the commercial hunting of Black skins, signalized the rosy dawn of the era of capitalist
production. He also recognized the extent to which slavery was central to the world economy. He wrote: Direct slavery is just as much the pivot of bourgeois
racism is the most important of those ideologies. Despite the widespread beliefs to the contrary of his critics, Karl

industry as machinery, credits, etc. Without slavery you have no cotton; without cotton you have no modern industry. It is slavery that has given the colonies their value; it is the
colonies that have created world trade, and it is world trade that is the pre-condition of large-scale industry. Thus slavery is an economic category of the greatest importance.
Without slavery North America, the most progressive of countries, would be transformed into a patriarchal country. Wipe out North America from the map of the world, and you
will have anarchy--the complete decay of modern commerce and civilization. Cause slavery to disappear and you will have wiped America off the map of nations. Thus slavery,
because it is an economic category, has always existed among the institutions of the peoples. Modern nations have been able only to disguise slavery in their own countries, but
they have imposed it without disguise upon the New World. Thus, there is a fundamental understanding of the centrality of slave labor in the national and international
economy. But what about race? Despite the dearth of Marx's own writing on race in particular, one might look at Marx's correspondence and deliberations on the American Civil
War to draw conclusions as to whether Marx was as dogmatically focused on purely economic issues as his critics make him out be. One must raise the question: If Marx was

If Marx was truly an economic

reductionist, he might have surmised that slavery and capitalism were incompatible, and simply
reductionist, how is his unabashed support and involvement in abolitionist struggles in England explained?

waited for slavery to whither away. W.E.B. Du Bois in his Marxist tome Black Reconstruction, quotes at length a letter penned by Marx as the head

of the International Workingmen's Association, written to Abraham Lincoln in 1864 in the midst of the Civil War: The contest for the territories which opened the epoch, was it
not to decide whether the virgin soil of immense tracts should be wedded to the labor of the immigrant or be prostituted by the tramp of the slaver driver? When an oligarchy of
300,000 slave holders dared to inscribe for the first time in the annals of the world "Slavery" on the banner of armed revolt, when on the very spots where hardly a century ago
the idea of one great Democratic Republic had first sprung up, whence the first declaration of the rights of man was issued...when on the very spots counterrevolution...maintained "slavery to be a beneficial institution"...and cynically proclaimed property in man 'the cornerstone of the new edifice'...then the working classes of
Europe understood at once...that the slaveholders' rebellion was to sound the tocsin for a general holy war of property against labor... They consider it an earnest sign of the
epoch to come that it fell to the lot of Abraham Lincoln, the single-minded son of the working class, to lead his country through the matchless struggles for the rescue of the

Not only was Marx personally opposed to slavery and actively

organized against it, but he theorized that slavery and the resultant race discrimination that flowed from
it were not just problems for the slaves themselves, but for white workers who were constantly under the threat of losing work to slave labor. This
enchained race and the Reconstruction of a social order.

did not mean white workers were necessarily sympathetic to the cause of the slaves--most of them were not. But Marx was not addressing the issue of consciousness, but
objective factors when he wrote in Capital, "In the United States of America, every independent movement of the workers was paralyzed as long as slavery disfigured a part of the
Republic. Labor cannot emancipate itself in the white skin where in the Black it is branded." Moreover, Marx understood the dynamics of racism in a modern sense as well--as a
means by which workers who had common, objective interests with each other could also become mortal enemies because of subjective, but nevertheless real, racist and
nationalist ideas. Looking at the tensions between Irish and English workers, with a nod toward the American situation between Black and white workers, Marx wrote: Every
industrial and commercial center in England possesses a working class divided into two hostile camps, English proletarians and Irish proletarians. The ordinary English worker
hates the Irish worker as a competitor who lowers his standard of life. In relation to the Irish worker he feels himself a member of the ruling nation and so turns himself into a
tool of the aristocrats and capitalists of his country against Ireland, thus strengthening their domination over himself. He cherishes religious, social and national prejudices
against the Irish worker. His attitude is much the same as that of the "poor whites" to the "niggers" in the former slave states of the USA. The Irishman pays him back with
interest in his own money. He sees in the English worker at once the accomplice and stupid tool of the English rule in Ireland. This antagonism is artificially kept alive and
intensified by the press, the pulpit, the comic papers, in short by all the means at the disposal of the ruling classes. This antagonism is the secret of the impotence of the English
working class, despite its organization. It is the secret by which the capitalist maintains its power. And that class is fully aware of it. Out of this quote, one can see a Marxist

capitalism promotes
economic competition between workers; second, that the ruling class uses racist ideology to divide
workers against each other; and finally, that when one group of workers suffer oppression, it
negatively impacts the entire class.
theory of how racism operated in contemporary society, after slavery was ended. Marx was highlighting three things: first, that

Our alternative is pedagogy of historical materialism - the

affirmatives pessimism disables resistance and critical thought by
cedeing ground to the totalizing forces of neoliberalism. Intellectuals
should insist on the viability of universal projects organized around
elements of common humanity - like class
Ellen Meiksins Wood, PhD Poli Sci UCLA , Member Royal Society of Canada, What is the Postmodern Agenda? in In

defense
of history 1997
At any rate, we are living in a historical moment that more than any other demands a
universalistic project. This is a historical moment dominated by capitalism, the most
universal system the world has ever knownboth in the sense that it is global and in the sense
that it penetrates every aspect of social life and the natural environment. In dealing with
capitalism, the postmodernist insistence that reality is fragmentary and therefore accessible
only to fragmentary knowledges is especially perverse and disabling. The social reality of
capitalism is totalizing in unprecedented ways and degrees. Its logic of commodification,
accumulation, profit-maximization, and competition permeates the whole social order; and an
understanding of this totalizing system requires just the kind of totalizing
knowledge that Marxism offers and postmodernists reject. Opposition to the capitalist
system also requires us to call upon interests and resources that unify, instead of
fragmenting, the anticapitalist struggle. In the first instance, these are the interests and
resources of class, the single most universal force capable of uniting diverse emancipatory
struggles; but in the final analysis, we are talking about the interests and resources of our
common humanity, in the conviction that, for all our manifold differences, there are certain
fundamentally and irreducibly common conditions of human well-being and self-fulfillment
which capitalism cannot satisfy and socialism can. For people on the left, and especially for a
younger generation of intellectuals and students, the greatest appeal of postmodernism is its
apparent openness, as against the alleged closures of a totalizing system like Marxism. But
this claim to openness is largely spurious. The problem is not just that postmodernism
represents an ineffectual kind of pluralism which has undermined its own foundations. Nor is it
simply an uncritical but harmless eclecticism. There is something more serious at stake. The
openness of postmodernisms fragmentary knowledges and its emphasis on difference are

purchased at the price of much more fundamental closures. Postmodernism is, in its
negative way, a ruthlessly totalizing system which forecloses a vast range of
critical thought and emancipatory politics and its closures are final and decisive.
Its epistemological assumptions make it unavailable to criticism, as immune to critique
as the most rigid kind of dogma (how do you criticize a body of ideas that a priori rules out
the very practice of rational argument?). And they precludenot just by dogmatically rejecting
but also by rendering impossiblea systematic understanding of our historical moment, a
wholesale critique of capitalism, and just about any effective political action. If postmodernism
does tell us something, in a distorted way, about the conditions of contemporary capitalism, the
real trick is to figure out exactly what those conditions are, why they are, and where we go
from here. The trick, in other words, is to suggest historical explanations for those
conditions instead of just submitting to them and indulging in ideological
adaptations. The trick is to identify the real problems to which the current intellectual
fashions offer falseor nosolutions, and in so doing to challenge the limits they impose
on action and resistance. The trick is to respond to the conditions of the world today not as
cheerful (or even miserable) robots but as critics. "(13-14)

Our alternative subsumes your criticism Marxs view of racialized

capitalism shuns colorblind criticism, solves racism
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 35-37, 2009//SRSL)

Social class, I would argue, albeit massively racialized (and gendered) is the
system upon which the maintenance of capitalism depends (Kelsh and Hill, 2006, Hill, 2007b,
Hill, 2008b, 2009c). It is possible, though extremely difficult because of the multiple
benefits accruing to capital of racializing workers (not least forcing down labor
costs), and the unpaid and underpaid labor ofwomen as a whole, to imagine a
capitalist world of 'racial' (and gender) equality. It is not logically possible for
capitalism to exhibit social class equality (see Kelsh and Hill, 2006; see also Hill, 2007b; Hill et al., 2008;
Kelsh et al., 2009). Without the extraction ofsurplus value from the labor ofworkers,
capi- talism cannot exist (Marx, 1887; see the appendix to chapter 8 ofthis volume). There are four caveats I need to
add to this fore-fronting ofsocial class. of 'will:-= m a n ifes:.3 the con:::'. ism beccc (and ge:: First, I fully agree with
Critical Race Theorists (e.g., Gotanda, 1995; Delgado and Stefancic, 2001, pp. 21-23) that we should
reject 'color blindness',14 the belief that 'one should treat all persons equally,
without regard to their race' (Delgado and Stefancic, 2001, p. 144). As Delgado and Stefancic explain: Critical
race theorists ... hold that color blindness will allow us to redress only extremely
egregious racial harms, ones that everyone would notice and con- demn. But if
racism is embedded in our thought processes and social struc- tures as deeply as
many crits believe, then the 'ordinary business' ofsociety-the routines, practices,
and institutions that we rely on to effect the world's work- will keep minorities in
subordinate positions. Only aggressive, color-conscious efforts to change the way
things are will do much to ameliorate misery (Delgado and Stefancic, 2001, p. 22). Second, I agree with
David Roediger (2006, p. 3) that Left commentators are wrong to announce the end of Du
Bois's 'century of the color line' (e.g., Gilroy, 2000; Patterson, 2000, cited in Roediger, 2006, p. 4). Paul Gilroy
(e.g., 2004) has more recently expressed a somewhat over-optimistic in my view belief in multicultural
'conviviality'. As I will argue in chapter 3 of this volume, one of CRT's strengths is
its insistence of the all-pervasive existence of racism in the world. Third, while I
totally reject the views ofthose contemporary Left theorists (e.g., Apple, 2005, 2006) which
promote the idea that 'race' and class are equivalent (for a Marxist critique, see, for example, Kelsh
and Hill, 2006), I would insist that arguments made that, because of the centrality of class, the Left

should not concern itselfwith issues ofracism are fundamentally flawed. Thus, I
believe that Adolph Reed's arguments that '[a]s a political strategy, exposing
racism is wrongheaded, and at best an utter waste of time', and that '[racism] is
the political equivalent ofan appendix' to social class (Reed, 2005a; see also Reed, 2005b) are
extremely dangerous and not conducive to progressive struggle. Fourth, my critique ofCRT
accords with that ofDarder and Torres (2004) (misleadingly lumped together with Reed by Roediger, 2006, p. 4) in two major
respects. The first is that, as I indicated earlier in this chapter,

it is my view that 'race' is a social construct

and has no scientific validity. The sec- ond, as I will argue later in this chapter, is that the Marxist
concept ofracial- ization provides a more convincing explanation of racism than
CRT notions of 'white supremacy', and is necessary in order to understand the
multiple manifestations of racism and their relat.ionship to modes of production.
In the context of these multiple manifestations, the debate between class or rac- ism becomes
redundant, in that for Marxists the struggle is against racialized (and gendered)
capitalism.

Ocean Timeframe
Alt is try or die We only have 5 years, cap cant reform and is the
root cause of oceanic harms
Stone 6/25/14 (John, Staff Writer, Socialism or your money back, Our Dying Oceans,
http://socialismoryourmoneyback.blogspot.com/2014/06/our-dying-oceans.html//JC)

The world's oceans face irreparable damage from climate change and overfishing,
with a five-year window for intervention, The Global Oceans Commission, an environmental group
says in a report. Environmental nonprofits and governmental bodies are starting to recognize the
insufficient protections offered by systems like the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea
(UNCLOS), which aims to regulate portions of the ocean but cannot actually enforce

any laws. 64 percent

healthy ocean is a key to our wellbeing," said Jose Maria Figueres, co-chair and former president of Costa Rica. "Unless we turn the tide
on ocean decline within five years, the international community should consider
turning the high seas into an off-limits regeneration zone until its condition is
restored." Failure to reverse the decline of the ocean's ecosystems would be an
"unforgivable betrayal of current and future generations," said David Miliband, co-chair and
former British foreign secretary. The health of the oceans is a serious concern, and unfortunately it is not the
only environmental concern. Global capitalism, a blight that cannot be adequately
reformed or regulated.
of the ocean is currently outside of any national jurisdiction. "A

Its try or die the oceans present the greatest threat to human existence because
of capitalist intrusion into our ocean eco-systems. Only organizationally
abandoning capitalism can solve
IPR 13 Socialist Organization dedicated to the world betterment (Party for Socialism and
Liberation: The pillaging of the Earths oceans,
http://www.independentpoliticalreport.com/2013/06/party-for-socialism-and-liberation-thepillaging-of-the-earths-oceans/, May 31, //JC)
The oceans of the world are vast and deep. They cover 71 percent of the Earths surface and contain 97 percent of the planets water.
The oceans seem boundless in water, marine life and energy to sustain the planets life and atmosphere. But the oceans are

experiencing profound stress, due to escalating factors directly related to capitalist production
and the degradation of the environment. Alarming reports by marine scientists have been sounding the
danger to the worlds oceans and the need for urgent action. The International Programme on the State
of the Ocean (IPSO) warns that massive marine extinction already may be underway due to rapidly
worsening stresses on marine ecosystems. But, as capitalisms search for profits intensifies, the
devastation of the oceans is only accelerating. Three main stresses global warming,
acidification of the oceans, and decreased oxygen have led to such declines in many of
the marine ecosystems that the conditions have met or surpassed worst-case scenarios predicted
in the first decade of this 21st century. IPSO stated in 2011, [W]e now face losing marine species and entire marine
ecosystems, such as coral reefs, within a single generation. Unless action is taken now, the
consequences of our activities are at a high risk of causing, through the combined effects of climate change, overexploitation,
pollution and habitat loss, the next globally significant extinction event in the ocean. It is notable
that the

occurrence of multiple high intensity stressors has been a prerequisite for

all the five global extinction events of the past 600 million years. Such a

catastrophe would, needless to say, affect humanity and all life on Earth. Yet capitalists have rejected in

international forums even basic accords to limit the exploitation of the oceans or to slow down the belching of fossil fuels into the
environment. By far the biggest abuser of the environment is the United States. Global warming and CO2 The massive use of fossil
fuels, deforestation and resulting accumulations of carbon dioxide (CO2) wreak perhaps the greatest environmental damage on the
oceans. Yet, of all Earths ecosystems, the oceans have been the least studied and monitored. The Pacific Marine Environment
Laboratory at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration estimates that 22 million metric tons of CO2 are added to the
oceans every day. The result is acidification. With increased acid, whole species from phytoplankton to algae to corals to
crustaceans to all types of mollusks, including oysters and clams are threatened because the acid hampers or prevents their ability
to form shells by their natural process of calcification. Coral reefs are being killed by bleaching due to the rise in ocean temperatures.
In just the last three years, there have been total die-offs of oysters in the Pacific Northwest, Marylands Chesapeake Bay and
Floridas Panhandle region due to acidification and changed salinity. As each species is interlinked with and dependent on another,
there is a cascading effect with the death of any life form. At the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, CO2 in the atmosphere was
an estimated 228 parts per million. The New York Times reported this month that it has now reached 400 ppm. The first global 50
ppm increase took 175 years, while the second took just 30 years. The French Academy of Sciences National Committee on Global
Change predicts the saturation could reach 700 ppm of CO2 in the earths atmosphere by 2100. Conglomerates strip oceans
resources Before the high-technology development of giant fishing trawlers and massive industrial exploitation of the ocean, seafood
delicacies like shrimp, oysters and salmon were not as easily harvested in the United States and developed countries. Those sea
organisms could reproduce at a sustainable rate. Today, in the United States, Europe, Japan and other industrialized countries,
seemingly limitless amounts of seafood are available. Starting in the 1980s, advertising that accompanied the great rise in industrial
fishing and globalized trade, led to a great increase in production and consumption. But the availability of all-you-can-eat lobster,
shrimp and salmon comes at a high price, far beyond what one pays in a restaurant or grocery bill. For example, it takes five to eight
pounds of fish to produce one pound of farmed salmon. The extensive 2012 State of the World Fisheries and Aquaculture report
of the UNs Food and Agriculture Organization, FAO, shows that only 13 percent of the worlds fisheries the natural giant reserves
in the oceans are exploited at a level that assures reproduction at a positive rate. About 57 percent of the fisheries are fully
exploited, meaning they are at their maximum rate before sustainability is affected, while 30 percent are over-exploited. The
latter means a net loss in the population. Thus, overfishing has severely impacted 87 percent of the worlds fisheries.
Underdeveloped countries in Africa see their ocean fisheries exploited, often illegally or through unscrupulous contracts signed by
governments with foreign fishing corporations. Lacking technology, the peoples of those countries cannot benefit from their own
regions resources. With a worldwide system of planning and cooperation based on socialist economic principles, oceanic scientists,
environmentalists and governments could abide by agreements to limit fishing. This way the fisheries could recover and provide for
the long term. Wipe out one species, then another The jack mackerel is just one example of how, under capitalism, the corporations
wipe out one species after another in the search for maximum profits. Jack mackerel in the South Pacific was recently targeted after
other major fish species declined. It now faces total demise. From an average yearly catch of 5 million tons by industrial fishers off
the coast of Chile in the 1990s, it dropped to 700,000 tons in 2010. A chilling Jan. 25, 2012, New York Times article, In Mackerel
Plunder, Hints of a Fish Collapse, stated that European vessels caught only 2,261 tons in 2011, down 98 percent from their 111,000
tons in 2009. The article quoted eminent oceanographer Daniel Pauly, who described the situation of jack mackerel in the southern
Pacific as a dramatic indication of the ecosystem as a whole. This is the last of the buffaloes, he said. When theyre gone,
everything will be gone. Norwegian, Dutch, Chilean, Russian, Chinese and other super-trawlers are scrambling for the remaining
jack mackerel, but scientists warn that a five-year ban is needed to have any hope of saving them. That is unlikely to happen. Tuna
has become highly prized for sushi and other seafood products. Now five of eight species, especially the Atlantic, Pacific and
Southern Bluefin, are extremely endangered and face extinction unless harvesting them actually is halted. But several attempts to
ban its exploitation have failed because of the bigger importers and producers. The decline in any one species in turn affects the
viability of other species, and the overall effect is magnified. Oceans, the Earths circulatory system Weather in all its forms
seasons, storms, snow and rain originates and is driven by the oceans. The differences in temperatures and ocean salt levels
generate continuous currents and air circulation. The water that comes down from the skies to nourish life, the winds that cool and
warm the land, these result from the oceans circulation, known as thermohaline circulation. The major and continuing changes in
salt content and CO2 levels, plus warmer ocean temperatures, are creating more intense weather storms on the one hand, and the
quickening rate of ice melt. The number of Category 4 and 5 hurricanes nearly doubled from the 1970s to the 2000s, from 50 every
five years to 90 every five years. More than 100 million people live within three feet of average sea level. The poorest populations are
the most vulnerable to global habitat changes, warming, and rising sea levels. Environmentalists, oceanographers and other
scientists frequently meet in conferences and publish analytical papers to warn about the urgent need for corporate restraint and
environmental recovery policies. They provide critically essential knowledge and data. For the average person, knowledge and a
more conscious personal environmental lifestyle are important. But all these environmentalist practices cant

put a sufficient dent in the rapacious action of the capitalists. The situation is
indeed dire. But it is not a time to despair. It is a time to educate, to organize and to
fight against capitalisms destruction of the earth. And more urgent than ever is the
need for revolutionary struggle and a socialist system to save the planet. It is not
rhetoric, it is reality.

Cap Links
Boom
Eagleton, Distinguished Professor of English Literature at Lancaster University, Professor of
Cultural Theory at the National University of Ireland and Distinguished Visiting Professor of
English Literature at The University of Notre Dame, 1997
(Terry, Where do Postmodernists Come from? in In defense of history)

Imagine a radical movement that had suffered an emphatic defeat. So emphatic, in fact, that it
seemed unlikely to resurface for the length of a lifetime, if at all. As time wore on, the beliefs of this movement might begin to
seem less false or ineffectual than simply irrelevant. For its opponents, it would be less a matter of hotly contesting these doctrines than of
contemplating them with something of the mild antiquarian interest one might have previously reserved for Ptolemaic cosmology or the
scholasticism of Thomas Aquinas. Radicals

might come to find themselves less overwhelmed or outargued than simply washed up, speaking a language so quaintly out of tune with their era that, as with the language of
Platonism or courtly love, nobody even bothered any longer to ask whether it was true. What would be the likely response
of the left to such a dire condition? Many, no doubt, would drift either cynically or sincerely to the right, regretting their
earlier views as infantile idealism. Others might keep the faith purely out of habit, anxiety, or nostalgia, clinging to an imaginary identity and
risking the neurosis that that may bring. A small clutch of left triumphalists, incurably hopeful, would no doubt carry on detecting the stirrings of
the revolution in the faintest flicker of militancy. In others, the radical impulse would persist, but would be forced to migrate elsewhere. One can
imagine that the

ruling assumption of this period would be that the system was, at least for the moment,
unbreachable ; and a great many of the lefts conclusions could be seen to flow from this glum
supposition. One might expect, for example, that there would be an upsurge of interest in the
margins and crevices of the systemin those ambiguous, indeterminate places where its power seemed less secure. If the
system could not be breached, one might at least look to those forces which might
momentarily transgress , subvert, or give it the slip. There would be, one might predict, much celebration of
the marginalbut this would be partly making a virtue out of necessity, since the left would itself have been rudely
displaced from the mainstream, and might thus come, conveniently enough, to suspect all talk of centrality as suspect. At its crudest, this cult
of marginality would come down to a simpleminded assumption that minorities were
positive and majorities oppressive. .Just how minorities like fascist groups, Ulst 6 Unionists, or the international bourgeoisie
fitted into this picture would not be entirely clear. Nor is it obvious how such a position could cope with a previously marginal movementthe
ANC, for examplebecoming p0]jtj cally dominant, given its formalist prejudice that dominance was undesirable as such. The

historical
basis for this way of thinking would be the fact that politicai movements that were at once
mass, central, and creative were by and large no longer in business. Indeed, the idea of a movement that
was at once central and subversive would now appear something of a contradiction in terms. It would therefore seem natural
to demonize the mass dominant, and consensual, and romanticize whatever happened to
deviate from them. It would be, above all, the attitude of those younger dissidents who had
nothing much, politically speaking, to remember, who had no actual memory or experience
of mass radical politics, but a good deal of experience of drearily oppressive majorities. If the
system really did seem to have canceled all opposition to itself, then it would not be hard to generalize from this to the vaguely anarchistic belief
that system is oppressive as such. Since there were almost no examples of attractive political systems around, the claim would seem distinctly
plausible. The

only genuine criticism could be one launched from outside the system altogether;

and one would expect, therefore, a certain fetishizing of otherness in such a period . There
would be enormous interest in anything that seemed alien, deviant, exotic, unincorporable, all the way from aard- varks to Alpha Centauri, a
passion for whatever gave us a tantalizing glimpse of something beyond the logic of the system altogether. But

this romantic ultraleftism would coexist, curiously enough, with a brittle pessimism for the fact is that if the system
is all-powerful, then there can be by definition nothing beyond it, any more than there can be anything beyond
the infinite curvature of cosmic space. If there were something outside the system, then it would be entirely unknowable and thus incapable of
saving us; but if we could draw it into the orbit of the system, so that it could gain some effective foothold there, its otherness would be instantly

contaminated and its subversive power would thus dwindle to nothing. Whatever

negates the system in theory would

thus be logically incapable of doing so in practice. Anything we can understand can by definition not be radical,
since it must be within itself; but anything which escapes the system could be heard by thC ^no more than a mysterious murmur. llS ,S.| thinking
has abandoned the whole notion of a system which is nally contradictorywhich has that installed at its heart which can '!lter tially undo it.
Instead, it thinks in the rigid oppositions of inside and u tside where to be on the inside is to be complicit and to be on the outside to be
impotent. The

typical style of thought of such a period, then, might be described as libertarian

pessimismlibertarian, because one would not have given up on the dream of something quite other than what we have; pessimism,
because one would be much too bleakly conscious of the omnipotence of law and power to
believe that such a dream could ever be realized. If one still believed in subversion, but not in the existence of any
flesh-and-blood agents of it, then it might be possible to imagine that the system in some way subverted itself, deconstructed its own logic, which
would then allow you to combine a certain radicalism with a certain skepticism. If the system is everywhere, then it would seem, like the
Almighty himself, to be visible at no particular point; and it would therefore become possible to believe, paradoxically enough, that whatever was
out there was not in fact a system at all. It is only a short step from claiming that the system is too complex to be represented to declaring that it
does not exist. In the period we are imagining, then, some

would no doubt be found clamoring against what

they saw as the tyranny of a real social totality, whereas others would be busy
deconstructing the whole idea of totality and claiming that it existed only in our minds. It
would not be hard to see this as, at least in part, a compensation in theory for the fact that the social totality was proving difficult to crack in
practice. If

no very ambitious form of political action seems for the moment possible, if so-called
is always tempting to convert this necessity into a virtueto
console oneself with the thought that ones political limitations have a kind of objective
ground in reality, in the fact that social totality is in any case just an illusion.
(Metaphysical illusion makes your position sound rather more imposing .) It does not
matter if there is no political agent at hand to transform the whole, because there is in fact no whole to be
transformed. It is as though, having mislaid the breadknife, one declares the loaf to be already sliced. But totality might also
seem something of an illusion because there would be no very obvious political agent for
whom society might present itself as a totality. There are those who need to grasp how it stands with them in order to
micropolitics seem the order of the day, it

be free, and who find that they can do this only by grasping something of the overall structure with which their own immediate situation
intersects. Local and universal are not, here, simple opposites or theoretical options, as they might be for those intellectuals who prefer to think
big and those more modest academics who like to keep it concrete But if some of those traditional political agents are in trouble, then so will be
the concept of social totality, since it is those agents need of it that gives it its force. Grasping a complex totality involves some rigorous
analysis; so it is not surprising that such strenuously systematic thought should be out of fash- x ion, dismissed as phallic, scientistic, or what
have you, in the sort of period Cf J we are imagining. When

there is nothing in particular in it for you to find

out how you standif you are a professor in Ithaca or Irvine, for example you can afford to be
ambiguous, elusive, deliciously indeterminate. You are also quite likely, in such circumstances, to wax
idealistthough in some suitably newfangled rather than tediously old-fashioned sense. For
one primary way in which we know the world is, of course, through practice; and if any very ambitious practice is denied us, it will not be long
before we catch ourselves wondering whether there is anything out there at all. One would expect, then, that in such an era a belief in reality as
something that resists us (History is what hurts, as Fredric Jameson has put it) will give way to a belief in the constructed nature of the world.

This, in turn, would no doubt go hand in hand with a full-blooded culturalism which underestimated what men and women had in common as material human creatures, and suspected all
talk of nature as an insidious mystification. It would tend not to realize that such culturalism is just as reductive as, say, econo- mism or
biologism. Cognitive and realist accounts of human consciousness would yield ground to various kinds of pragmatism and relativism, partly
because there didnt any longer seem much politically at stake in knowing how it stood with you. Everything would become an interpretation,
including that statement itself. And what

would also gradually implode, along with reasonably certain knowledge, would
be the idea of a human subject centered and unified enough to take significant action. For
such significant action would now seem in short supply; and the result, once more, would be to
make a virtue out of necessity by singing the praises of the diffuse, decentered, schizoid human subjecta
subject who might well not be together enough to topple a bottle off a wall, let alone
bring down the state, but who could nevertheless be presented as hair-raisingly avantgarde in trast to the smugly centered subjects of an older, more classical phase c0 pitalism. To put it another way:
the subject as producer (coherent, disciplined, self-determining) would have yielded ground to the subject
as consumer (mobile, ephemeral, constituted by insatiable desire). If the left orthodoxies of such a period were pragmatist, relativist,
pluralistic, deconstructive, then one might well see such thought-forms as dangerously radical. For does not capitalism need sure foundations,

stable identities, absolute authority, metaphysical certainties, in order to survive? And wouldnt the kind of thought we are imagining put the
skids under all this?The answer, feebly enough, is both yes and no. It is true that capitalism, so far anyway, has felt the need to underpin its
authority with unimpeachable moral foundations. Look, for example, at the remarkable tenacity of religious belief in North America. On the other
hand, look at the British, who are a notably godless bunch. No British politician could cause anything other than acute embarrassment by
invoking the Supreme Being in public, and the British talk much less about metaphysical abstractions like Britain than those in the United States
do about something called the United States. It is not clear, in other words, exactly how much metaphysical talk the advanced capitalist system
really requires; and it is certainly true that its relentlessly secularizing, rationalizing operations threaten to undercut its own metaphysical claims.
It is clear, however, that without pragmatism and plurality the system could not survive at all. Difference,

hybridity, heterogeneity, restless mobility are native to the capitalist mode of production, and thus by no
means inherently radical phenomena. So if these ways of thinking put the skids under the
system at one level, they reproduce its logic at another. If an oppressive system seems to
regulate everything, then one will naturally look around for some enclave of which this is
less truesome place where a degree of freedom or randomness or pleasure still
precariously survives. Perhaps you might call this desire, or discourse, or the body, or the unconscious. One
might predict in this period a quickening of interest in psychoanalysisfor psychoanalysis is
not only the thinking persons sensationalism, blending intellectual rigor with the most lurid materials, but it
exudes a general exciting air of radicalism without being particularly so politically. If the
more abstract questions of state, mode of production, and civil society seem for the
moment too hard to resolve, then one might shift ones political attention to something
more intimate and immediate, more living and fleshly, like the body . Conference papers entitled Putting
the Anus Back into Coriolanus would attract eager crowds who had never heard of the bourgeoisie but who knew all about buggery. This state
of affairs would no doubt be particularly marked in those societies which in any case lacked strong socialist traditions; indeed, one could imagine
much of the style of thought in question, for all its suspiciousness of the universal, as no more than a spurious universalizing of such specific
political conditions. Such

a concern with bodiliness and sexuality would represent, one imagines, an enormous
political deepening and enrichment, at the same time as it would signify a thoroughgoing displacement. And no doubt just
the same could be said if one were to witness an increasing obsession with language and
culturetopics where the intellectual is in any case more likely to feel at home than in the
realm of material production. One might expect that some, true to the pessimism of the period,
would stress how discourses are policed, regulated, heavy with power, while others would proclaim in
more libertarian spirit how the thrills and spills of the signifier can give the slip to the system. Either way, one would no doubt
witness an immense linguistic inflation, as what appeared no longer conceivable in political
reality was still just about possible in the areas of discourse or signs or textuality. The
freedom of text or language would come to compensate for the unfreedom of the system as a
whole. There would still be a kind of utopian vision, but its name now would be
increasingly poetry. And it would even be possible to imagine, in an extremist variant of this style of thought, that the future was
here and nowthat utopia had already arrived in the shape of the pleasurable intensities, multiple selfhoods, and exhilarating exchanges of the
marketplace and the shopping mall. History

would then most certainly have come to an endan end already

implicit in the blocking of radical political action. For if no such collective action seemed
generally possible, then history would indeed appear as random and directionless, and to
claim that there was no longer any grand narrative would be, among other things, a way
of saying that we no longer knew how to construct one effectively in these conditions. For this
kind of thought, history would have ended because freedom would finally have been achieved; for Marxism, the achievement of freedom would
be the beginning of history and the end of all we have known to date: those boring prehisto- rical grand narratives which are really just the same
old recycled story of scarcity, suffering, and struggle. (17-22)

Afropessimism
Afropessimism is not radical pessimism is a predictable response to
postmodern capitalism and is a crucial part of the system
Eagleton 95 (Terry Eagleton Distinguished Professor of English Literature at Lancaster University, Professor of Cultural
Theory at the National University of Ireland, In defense of history: Where do postmodernists come from?, Monthly Review, vol. 3
no. 47 (July 1995), pp. 59-70 // JJ)
Imagine a radical movement that had suffered an emphatic defeat. So emphatic, in fact, that it seemed unlikely to resurface for the
length of a lifetime, if at all. As time wore on, the beliefs of this movement might begin to

seem less false or ineffectual than simply irrelevant. For its opponents, it would be less a
matter of hotly contesting these doctrines than of contemplating them with something
of the mild antiquarian interest one might have previously reserved for Ptolemaic cosmology or the scholasticism of
Thomas Aquinas. Radicals might come to find themselves less overwhelmed or outargued than simply washed up, speaking a language so quaintly out of tune with their era that, as with the
language of Platonism or courtly love, nobody even bothered any longer to ask whether it was true. What would be the
likely response of the left to such a dire condition? Many, no doubt, would drift either cynically or
sincerely to the right, regretting their earlier views as infantile idealism. Others might keep the faith purely out of habit, anxiety, or
nostalgia, clinging to an imaginary identity and risking the neurosis that that may bring. A small clutch of left triumphalists,
incurably hopeful, would no doubt carry on detecting the stirrings of the revolution in the faintest flicker of militancy. In others,
the radical impulse would persist, but would be forced to migrate elsewhere. One can imagine that the ruling

assumption of this period would be that the system was, at least for the moment,
unbreachable; and a great many of the left's conclusions could be seen to flow
from this glum supposition. One might expect, for example, that there would be an upsurge of
interest in the margins and crevices of the system--in those ambiguous,
indeterminate places where its power seemed less secure. If the system could not
be breached, one might at least look to those forces which might momentarily
transgress, subvert, or give it the slip. There would be, one might predict, much celebration of the marginal-but this would be partly making a virtue out of necessity, since the left would itself have been rudely displaced from the
mainstream, and might thus come, conveniently enough, to suspect all talk of centrality

as suspect. At its crudest, this cult of marginality would come down to a

simpleminded assumption that minorities were positive and majorities
oppressive . Just how minorities like fascist groups, Ulster Unionists, or the international bourgeoisie fitted into this picture
would not be entirely clear. Nor is it obvious how such a position could cope with a previously marginal movement--the ANC, for
example--becoming politically dominant, given its formalist prejudice that dominance was undesirable as such. The
historical basis for this way of thinking would be the fact that political movements
that were at once mass, central, and creative were by and large no longer in
business. Indeed, the idea of a movement that was at once central and subversive would now appear something of a
contradiction in terms. It would therefore seem natural to demonize the mass, dominant, and consensual, and romanticize
whatever happened to deviate from them. It would be, above all, the attitude of those younger dissidents who had nothing much,
politically speaking, to remember, who had no actual memory or experience of mass radical politics, but a good deal of experience
of drearily oppressive majorities. If the system really did seem to have canceled all opposition to itself, then it would not

be hard to generalize from this to the vaguely anarchistic belief that system is
oppressive as such. Since there were almost no examples of attractive political systems around, the claim
would seem distinctly plausible. The only genuine criticism could be one launched
from outside the system altogether; and one would expect, therefore, a certain
fetishizing of "otherness" in such a period. There would be enormous interest in
anything that seemed alien, deviant, exotic, unincorporable, all the way from aardvarks to Alpha
Centauri, a passion for whatever gave us a tantalizing glimpse of something beyond the logic of the system altogether. But this
romantic ultra-leftism would coexist, curiously enough, with a brittle pessimism-for the fact is that if the system is all-powerful, then there can be by definition nothing beyond it, any more than there can be
anything beyond the infinite curvature of cosmic space. If there were something outside the system, then it would be entirely
unknowable and thus incapable of saving us; but if we could draw it into the orbit of the system, so that it could gain some effective
foothold there, its otherness would be instantly contaminated and its subversive power would thus dwindle to nothing. Whatever

negates the system in theory would thus be logically incapable of doing so in practice. Anything we can understand can by
definition not be radical, since it must be within the system itself; but anything which escapes the system could be heard by us as
no more than a mysterious murmur. Such thinking has abandoned the whole notion of a system

which is internally contradictory--which has that installed at its heart which can potentially undo it.
Instead, it thinks in the rigid oppositions of "inside" and "outside," where to be on
the inside is to be complicit and to be on the outside is to be impotent . The typical
style of thought of such a period, then, might be described as libertarian
pessimism--libertarian, because one would not have given up on the dream of
something quite other than what we have; pessimism, because one would be much
too bleakly conscious of the omnipotence of law and power to believe that such a
dream could ever be realized. If one still believed in subversion, but not in the existence of any flesh-and-blood
agents of it, then it might be possible to imagine that the system in some way subverted itself, deconstructed its own logic, which
would then allow you to combine a certain radicalism with a certain skepticism. If the system is everywhere, then it would seem,
like the Almighty himself, to be visible at no particular point; and it would therefore become possible to believe, paradoxically
enough, that whatever was out there was not in fact a system at all. It is only a short step from claiming that the system is too
complex to be represented to declaring that it does not exist. In the period we are imagining, then, some

would no doubt be found clamoring against what they saw as the tyranny of a real
social totality, whereas others would be busy deconstructing the whole idea of totality and claiming that it existed only in
our minds. It would not be hard to see this as, at least in part, a compensation in theory for the fact that the social totality was
proving difficult to crack in practice. If no very ambitious form of political action seems for the moment possible, if so-called
micropolitics seem the order of the day, it is always tempting to convert this necessity into a virtue--to console oneself with the
thought that one's political limitations have a kind of objective ground in reality, in the fact that social "totality" is in any case just
an illusion. ("Metaphysical" illusion makes your position sound rather more imposing.) It does not matter if there is no political
agent at hand to transform the whole, because there is in fact no whole to be transformed. It is as though, having mislaid the
breadknife, one declares the loaf to be already sliced. But totality might also seem something of an illusion because there would be
no very obvious political agent for whom society might present itself as a totality. There are those who need to grasp how it stands
with them in order to be free, and who find that they can do this only by grasping something of the overall structure with which
their own immediate situation intersects. Local and universal are not, here, simple opposites or theoretical options, as they might
be for those intellectuals who prefer to think big and those more modest academics who like to keep it concrete. But if some of
those traditional political agents are in trouble, then so will be the concept of social totality, since it is those agents' need of it that
gives it its force. Grasping a complex totality involves some rigorous analysis; so it is not surprising that such strenuously
systematic thought should be out of fashion, dismissed as phallic, scientistic, or what have you, in the sort of period we are
imagining. When there is nothing in particular in it for you to find out how you stand--if you are a professor in

Ithaca or Irvine, for example--you can afford to be ambiguous, elusive, deliciously

indeterminate. You are also quite likely, in such circumstances, to wax idealistthough in some suitably new-fangled rather than tediously old-fashioned sense. For one primary way in which we know the world
is, of course, through practice; and if any very ambitious practice is denied us, it will not be long before we catch ourselves
wondering whether there is anything out there at all. One would expect, then, that in such an era a belief in reality as something
that resists us ("History is what hurts," as Fredric Jameson has put it) will give way to a belief in the "constructed" nature of the
world. This, in turn, would no doubt go hand in hand with a full-blooded "culturalism" which underestimated what men and
women had in common as material human creatures, and suspected all talk of nature as an insidious mystification. It would

tend not to realize that such culturalism is just as reductive as, say, economism or
biologism. Cognitive and realist accounts of human consciousness would yield ground to various kinds of pragmatism and

relativism, party because there didn't any longer seem much politically at stake in knowing how it stood with you. Everything
would become an interpretation, including that statement itself. And what would also gradually implode, along with reasonably
certain knowledge, would be the idea of a human subject "centered" and unified enough to take significant action. For such
significant action would now seem in short supply; and the result, once more, would be to make a virtue out of necessity by singing
the praises of the diffuse, decentered, schizoid human subject--a subject who might well not be "together" enough to topple a bottle
off a wall, et alone bring down the sate, but who could nevertheless be presented as hair-raisingly avant garde in contrast to the
smugly centered subjects of an older, more classical phase of capitalism. To put it another way: the subject as producer (coherent,
disciplined, self-determining) would have yielded ground to the subject as consumer (mobile, ephemeral, constituted by insatiable
desire). If the "left" orthodoxies of such a period were pragmatist, relativist, pluralistic, deconstructive, then one might well see
such thought-forms as dangerously radical. For does not capitalism need sure foundations, stable identities, absolute authority,
metaphysical certainties, in order to survive And wouldn't the kind of thought we are imagining put the skids under all this The
answer, feebly enough, is both yes and no. It is true that capitalism, so far anyway, has felt the need to underpin its authority with
unimpeachable moral foundations. Look, for example, at the remarkable tenacity of religious belief in North America. On the other
hand, look at the British, who are a notably godless bunch. No British politician could cause anything other than acute
embarrassment by invoking the Supreme Being in public, and the British talk much less about metaphysical abstractions like
Britain than those in the United States do about something called the United States. It is not clear, in other words, exactly how
much metaphysical talk the advanced capitalist system really requires; and it is certainly true that its relentlessly secularizing,
rationalizing operations threaten to undercut its own metaphysical claims. It is clear, however, that without

pragmatism and plurality the system could not survive at all. Difference,

"hybridity," heterogeneity, restless mobility are native to the capitalist mode of

production, and thus by no means inherently radical phenomena. So if these ways
of thinking put the skids under the system at one level, they reproduce its logic at
another. If an oppressive system seems to regulate everything, then one will naturally look around for some enclave of which
this is less true--some place where a degree of freedom or randomness or pleasure still precariously survives. Perhaps you might
call this desire, or discourse, or the body, or the unconscious. One might predict in this period a quickening of interest in
psychoanalsis--for psychoanalysis is not only the thinking person's sensationalism, blending intellectual rigor with the most lurid
materials, but it exudes a general exciting air of radicalism without being particularly so politically. If the more abstract questions
of state, mode of production, and civil society seems for the moment too hard to resolve, then one might shift one's political
attention to something more intimate and immediate, more living and fleshly, like the body. Conference papers entitled "Putting
the Anus Back into Coriolanus" would attract eager crowds who had never heard of the bourgeoisie but who knew all about
buggery. This state of affairs would no doubt be particularly marked in those societies which in any case lacked strong socialist
traditions; indeed, one could imagine much of the style of thought in question, for all its suspiciousness of the universal, as no
more than a spurious universalizing of such specific political conditions. Such a concern with bodiliness and sexuality would
represent, one imagines, an enormous political deepening and enrichment, at the same time as it would signify a thoroughgoing
displacement. And no doubt just the same could be said if one were to witness an increasing obsession with language and culture-topics where the intellectual is in any case more likely to feel at home than in the realm of material production. One might
expect that some, true to the pessimism of the period, would stress how
discourses are policed, regulated, heavy with power, while others would proclaim
in more libertarian spirit how the thrills and spills of the signifier can give the slip
to the system. Either way, one would no doubt witness an immense linguistic inflation, as what appeared no longer

conceivable in political reality was still just about possible in the areas of discourse or signs or textuality. The freedom of text or
language would come to compensate for the unfreedom of the system as a whole. There would still be a kind of utopian vision, but
its name now would be increasingly poetry. And it would even be possible to imagine, in an "extremist" variant of this style of
thought, that the future was here and now--that utopia had already arrived in the shape of the pleasurable intensities, multiple
selfhoods, and exhilarating exchanges of the marketplace and the shopping mall. History would then most certainly have come to
an end--an end already implicit in the blocking of radical political action. For if no such collective action seemed generally possible,
then history would indeed appear as random and directionless, and to claim that there was no longer any "grand narrative' would
be among other things a way of saying that we no longer knew how to construct one effectively in these conditions. For this kind of
thought, history would have ended because freedom would finally have been achieved; for Marxism, the achievement of freedom
would be the beginning of history and the end of all we have known to date: those boring prehistorical grand narratives which are
really just the same old recycled story of scarcity, suffering, and struggle.

Anti-Oppression Politics
Anti-oppression politics, though en vogue, holds the goal of
integration into an oppressive system, and prevents revolutionary
politics that eradicates the system
Common Cause 6/6/14 (Anonymous, used to protect identity in the struggle, Lynchpin.ca, With Allies Like
These: Reflections on Privilege Reductionism, http://linchpin.ca/?q=content/allies-these-reflections-privilege-reductionism//JC)
Over the course of the last several decades, anti-oppression

politics have risen to a position of immense

influence on activist discourse in North America. Anti-oppression workshops and
reading groups, privilege and oppression checklists and guidelines, and countless books,
online blogs and articles make regular appearances in anarchist organizing and discussion. Enjoying a relatively
hegemonic position in Left conversation, anti-oppression politics have come to
occupy the position of a sacred objectsomething that expresses and reinforces particular values, but
does not easily lend itself to critical reflection. Indeed, it is common for those who
question the operating and implications of anti-oppression politics to be accused
of refusing to seriously address oppression in general. A political framework
should be constantly reflected upon and evaluated it is a tool that should serve
our struggles and not vice versa. Against this backdrop, this article aims to critically engage with the dominant
ideas and practices of anti-oppression politics. We define anti-oppression politics as a related group of analyses and
practices that seeks to address inequalities that materially, psychologically, and socially
exist in society through education and personal transformation. While there is value in some aspects of antioppression politics, they are not without severe limitations. Anti-oppression politics
obfuscates the structural operations of power and promotes a liberal project of
inclusion that is necessarily at odds with the struggle to build a collective force
capable of fundamentally transforming society. It is our contention that anti-oppression
furthers a politics of inclusion as a poor substitute for a politics of revolution . The
dominant practices of anti-oppression further an approach to struggle whose
logical conclusion is the absorption of those deemed oppressed into the dominant
order, but not to the eradication and transformation of the institutional
foundations of oppression.

-- Cooptation Turn
Anti-Oppressive politics are encouraged and rewarded by the state.
The instill a new pseudo-hierarchy that pacifies and allows for
cooptation
Common Cause 6/6/14 (Anonymous, used to protect identity in the struggle, Lynchpin.ca, With Allies Like
These: Reflections on Privilege Reductionism, http://linchpin.ca/?q=content/allies-these-reflections-privilege-reductionism//JC)
In the Global North, the 1960s and 1970s marked a high point in social movement struggle. Today, when revolution can seem impossible, it is difficult
to imagine a time when militants spoke of the revolution not cynically, but as something that was happening, or would happen in the near future.
Subdued using old-fashioned strategies of incarceration, murder, sexual assault, espionage and surveillance, blacklisting, and other forms of direct
physical, economical, and emotional violence, beginning in the 1980s, the

Left found itself entombed in a

sophisticated system of control and co-option. In describing this, our goal is to illustrate how antioppression politics are neither radical, nor revolutionary . In fact, the prominence of
anti-oppression in activist circles is both a symptom of, and contributing factor to,
the ongoing victory of the ruling elite over our movements. Dylan Rodriguez (2007), in The Revolution
Will Not Be Funded, elaborates this reality: Indeed, the US state learned from its encounters with the crest of radical and revolutionary liberationist
movements of the 1960s and early 1970s that endless, spectacular exercises of military and police repression against activists of colour on the domestic
front could potentially provoke broader local and global support for such strugglesit was in part because they were so dramatically subjected to
violent and racist US state repression that Black, Native American, Puerto Rican, and other domestic liberationists were seen by significant sectors of
the US and the international public as legitimate freedom fighters, whose survival of the racist State pivoted on the mobilization of a global political
solidarity. On the other hand, the

US state has found in its coalition with the Non-Profit Industrial Complex a far less
spectacular, generally demilitarized, and still highly effective apparatus of political
discipline and repression that (to this point) has not provoked a significant critical mass
of opposition or political outrage. Strategies previously employed by State-Capital interests to dispose of a fighting trade union movement
were modified and extended to control the heterogeneous New Left movements of the 1960s and 1970s. Rather than being
crushed by outright military force, elements of the resistance movements are subsumed
into the inner workings of State and Capital, and ultimately come to reinforce the
overarching structures of exploitation and oppression. In the 1950s in Canada, what is known as labour
peace was declared by a subsection of the labour movement, Capital and the State. The process of establishing labour peace involved some key
elements which could be seen as analogous to the pacification of other movements. The

process begins with legitimizing

a section of the antagonistic movement, and propping them up as leaders or representatives
of the whole. This representation requires funding and a bureaucracy to maintain itself. In the case of labour peace, funding was guaranteed
by the Rand Formula, a policy which requires employers whose workers are unionized to collect dues and hand them over to the union, which serves to
put the union in a dependent position to the legislative framework, and therefore the State. The

maintenance of power and

outside legitimacy by those placed on the top of the hierarchy is contingent on
their discipline of the rank and file. Finally, other systems of domination are mobilized
to keep everyone in checkfor example, white union workers enforcing a racial hierarchy among their co-workers.While the cooption of revolutionary movements was no new insight on the part of the ruling class, the scale of this project was novel. Understanding that every new
generation would bring with it a "new" awareness that revolutionary change is desirable, the

ruling class sought to create

infrastructure not just to contain existing movements, but to redirect the energies
of future ones. Destroy existing movements by way of violence, infiltration, etc., and replace all aspects of people's movements with

institutions that are in line with the interests of the ruling class. For our purposes, it is on this latter point that we focus.In the 1980s, substantial
inroads were made for new areas where peoples organizations previously enjoyed a monopoly: the creation of revolutionary theory, the internal
movement and popular education by which that theory is shared and elaborated upon, the provision of services to marginalized people and the creation

liberalism posturing as an emancipatory politics has

thoroughly washed the revolutionary potential away.
of progressive social spaces. In these four areas,

Black-White Binary
Black white binary impoverishes racial discourse and prevents
coalitions among POC
Darren Lenard Hutchinson, Critical Race Histories: In and Out Professor of Law, Washington College of Law, American
University. B.A., University of Pennsylvania; J.D., Yale Law School. American University Law Review Volume 53 | Issue 6 2004,

MM

A third area of critical race innovation involves multiracial politics. Internal critics have argued
that racial discourse in the United States fixates upon black/white racial issues,
thereby marginalizing Latino, Native American, and Asian American
experiences.95 Empirically, this observation is indisputable. Race theorists lack a
full understanding of the breadth of racial injustice. The inclusion of the
experiences of Latinos, Native Americans, and Asian Americans in racial discourse
can improve CRT in several ways. First, a multiracial discourse permits a full
accounting of the problem of racial inequality and allows for the construction of
adequate remedies for racial subordination. 96 Although all people of color suffer
racism, often in similar ways, racial hierarchies impact communities of color in
diverse ways. A narrow focus on black/white subjugation severely limits the reach
of antiracist remedies. The black/white paradigm also prevents persons of color
from engaging in coalition politics.97 By treating racism as a problem that affects
blacks primarily (or exclusively), racial discourse in the United States divides
persons of color who could align to create formidable political forces in the battle
for racial justice. Binary racial discourse also causes persons of color to compete
for the attention of whites, as marginalized racial groups treat racial justice as a
zero-sum game.98 Instead of recognizing the pervasiveness and complexity of racial injuries,
binary racial discourse leads to the tyranny of oppression ranking and to
competing demands for centrality in a marginalized space of racial victimization.

Binary shatters alliances and fuels backlash

Darren Lenard Hutchinson, Critical Race Histories: In and Out Professor of Law, Washington College of Law, American
University. B.A., University of Pennsylvania; J.D., Yale Law School. American University Law Review Volume 53 | Issue 6 2004,

MM
Ultimately, however, the exclusive deployment of a binary black/white paradigm
artificially narrows racial discourse and harms racial justice efforts. In order to
construct adequate antiracist theories and to develop effective remedies for racial injustice,
Critical Race Theorists must excavate the multidimensional harms that racial
injustice causes, including harms that are racial but not endured by blacks.
Furthermore, progressive racial politics can only survive with broad political

support. The most likely support for progressive racial change comes from
persons of color. Yet, the deep divisions that result from binary racial politics
hinders the formation of helpful antiracist alliances. Finally, a multiracial
discourse may help blacks demonstrate the pervasiveness of racial inequality.
Whites tend to view racism as a relic of prior generations, and they often respond to blacks
claims of ongoing racial injustice with suspicion.108 Moreover, in a white-supremacist
culture, binary racial discourse obscures the experiences of discrimination
experienced by Latinos and Asian Americans.109 As a result, whites argue that

blacks should emulate model minorities, usually Asian Americans, who either
do not suffer from racism or do not believe that racism injures them enough to
oppose it on a political level.110 Binary racial discourse therefore allows whites to
discredit blacks claims of racism by offering Asian Americans as proof that the
United States has eradicated racial injustice, or that blacks can easily overcome
what little racism still exists. Multiracial discourse, however, offers a powerful
rebuttal to this negative and deceitful discourse. By portraying the complexity of
racial inequality, Critical Race Theorists can counter a white-supremacist narrative that
disparages blacks assertions of racial injustice by deploying model minority constructs.111

The aff reduces the world into black or whitebut the borderline
European exists and doesnt have a place in the world of the aff
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 28-29, 2009//SRSL)

there were/are what he refers to as '"borderline Europeans"-"the Irish,

Slavs, Mediterraneans, and above all, of course, Jews"' (Mills, 1997, pp. 78-79), and, elsewhere (Mills, 2007, p. 249)
that the Irish may have been 'the first systematically racialized group in history'.
He also notes there also existed 'intra-European varieties of"racism"' (p. 79; see also Perea et al.).
However, he argues that, while there remain 'some recognition of such distinctions 'in popular
culture'-he gives examples of an '"Italian" waitress' in the TV series Cheers, calling
a WASP character 'Whitey' and a discussion in a 1992 movie about whether
Italians are really white (p. 79)-he relegates such distinctions primarily to history.
While he is prepared to 'fuzzify' racial categories (p. 79) with respect to 'shifting
criteria prescribed' by the evolving Racial Contract' (p. 81) and to acknowledge the
existence of 'off-white' people at certain historical periods (p. 80), he main- tains that
his categorization-'white/nonwhite, person/subperson' 'seems to me to map the
essential features of the racial polity accurately, to carve the social reality at its
ontological joints' (p. 78), whereby white = person; non-white = non-person. It is my view that this
Mills acknowledges that

does not address current reality. The exclusive fore- fronting of people of color militates against an understanding of non-color- coded-racism. Marxist 'race' theorist Robert
Miles (1987, p. 75) argues that racialization is not limited to skin color: The characteristics signified vary historically and, although they have usually been visible somatic

I would like to make a couple of

amendments to Miles' position. First, I would want to add 'and culturaF after,
'biological'. Second, the common dictionary definition of 'somatic' is 'pertaining to
the body', and, given the fact that people can be racialized on grounds of symbols
features, other non-visible (alleged and real) biological features have also been signified.

(e.g., the hijab), I would also want this to be recognized in any discussion of social collectivi- ties and the construction of racialization. Miles' Marxist analysis of racism is
discussed at length later in this chapter. Racism directed at white people is not new and has a long history. To take the case of Britain, for example, there has been a long history
of non-color- coded racism directed at the Irish (e.g., Mac an Ghaill, 2000)6, at the Gypsy Roma Traveler (GRT) communities (e.g., Puxon, 2005)-the fastest grow- ing minority
ethnic constituency in Europe (Doughty, 2008), and increas- ingly at the Muslim communities or those perceived to be Muslim.

Black Body
Fixation on bodily aesthetics as the basis for identity politics
replicates visualist exploitation
Champagne 95 (John Champagne Associate Professor of English, University of Pittsburgh, Ph.D. in Critical and
Cultural Studies, The Ethics of Marginality: A New Approach to Gay Studies, University of Minnesota Press (1995), pp. 115-116 //
JJ)
When recounting how the film text might have engaged more fully with the problematic of presenting a representation of Black
culture to a largely white audience, hooks suggests that Livingstons physical presence in the film might

have allowed viewers to recognize that they are watching a work shaped and formed from a
perspective and standpoint specific to Livingston (62). hooks suggests that because we hear Livingston
ask questions of her subjects but never see her, the film assumes an imperial overseeing
position that is in no way progressive or counterhegemonic. The implication here is that the
bodily presence of Livingston in the film would have disrupted its colonizing impulses, as if
the problems of representation of the Other could be overcome with recourse to a
spectatorial experience of Livingston the historical person. A certain faith in the visible is
operating here, a realist ontology of the photographic image that is at odds with hookss own state intellectual
project, which is the attempt to call into crisis the truth of Livingstons documentary representation. Although hookss analysis
wants to marshal here the suggestion form a feminist- and Brechtian-inflected film theory that the passive, voyeuristic

pleasure of the spectator must be disrupted if theoretical reflection is to occur, the analysis
concurrently relies on a faith in the ontological power of the image , a faith interrupted
by this same film theory. Here we see another instance of the limits of what I have discussed
earlier as an identity-politics-inflected deconstruction of the real. My critique of hookss project should not

obscure her important insistence that Livingstons project is necessarily implicated in the project of imperialism, nor her contention
that the current trend in producing colorful ethnicity for the white consumer appetite makes it

possible for blackness to be commodified in unprecedented ways, and for whites to appropriate
black culture without interrogating whiteness or showing concern for the displeasure of blacks
(63). One of the major differences between hookss perspective and my own is that although she faults Livingston for
approaching her subject matter as an outsider looking in (62), I would insist that no other vantage
point is available to her from which to view drag-ball culture. hookss faith in the category of originating experience makes

possible the suggestion that Livingston could somehow have gotten sufficiently inside the world of the drag balls to overcome
certain problems of racism and classism. I would instead critique the film by proposing that its highly complicated discursive
circumstances perhaps require a greater attentiveness to the (discursive) constraints operating in the genre of the testimonial than
the film seems willing to allow. Nonetheless, hookss queries regarding questions of the location of the filmmaker, as well as the films
intended audience, remain.

Critical Race Theorists

CRT obscures the root of the problem historacle materialism
addresses the social construction of race, while effectively criticizing
globalization
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapyer 6, pgs 96-97, 2009//SRSL)

Globalization always has been and is a central feature in the maintenance and parasitic growth
of capitalism. However, it became one of the orthodoxies of the 1990s and continues to hold
sway into the twenty-first century, as a new phenomenon. Its premises are that in the face of global competition,
capitalist organizations are increasingly constrained to compete on the world market. Its argument is that,
in this new epoch, these organizations can only do this in so far as they become multinational
corporations and operate on a world scale, outside the confines ofnation states (Harman, 1996). The
argu- ment continues: this diminishes the role of the nation-state, the implication being that
there is little, if anything, that can be done about it. Capitalists and their allies, particularly procapitalist politicians, insist that, since glob- alization is a fact of life, it is incumbent on workers,
given this globalized market, to be flexible in their approach to what they do and for how long
they do it; to accept lower wages; and to concur with the restructuring and diminution of welfare
states (Cole, 2008d). It is important to stress the ideological nature of this scenario, and to note that, while
globalization is taking new forms, essentially it is as old as capitalism itself. Marxists are not
only interested in processes of modern globalization, but are also interested in this ideological
element which furthers the interests ofcapitalists and their political supporters (for an analysis, see Hill, 2003;
Hill, 2009a, 2009b; Hill and Kumar, 2009; Hill and Rosskam, 2009; see also Cole, 1998a, 2005), of the way in which it is used to mystify the
populace as a whole and to stifle action by the Left in particular (e.g., Murphy, 1995; Gibson-Graham, 1996; Harman, 1996;
Meiksins Wood, 1998). ritical Race Theorists, Delgado and Stefancic (2001, p. lll) argue that globalization 'is very much in the forefront
ofcritical race theory'. They then proceed with a fundamentally Marxist analysis of the direction
globaliza- tion is taking in the twenty-first century: a globalizing economy removes
manufacturing jobs from the inner city; it creates jobs in the knowledge economy, for which
minorities have little training; the sweatshops and other exploitative conditions it creates afflict
poor people of color, many of them women in developing countries, which were formally
colonized; globaliza- tion concentrates capital in the hands of an elite class who refuse to share
it. The Marxist-inspired explanation continues: globalization creates alliances of United States and 'third world'
workers against American corporations; it facilitates mobilization oflabor unions; and protests
against the WTO ensue. The reason wages are low and the new jobs are attractive, they continue
(pp. lll-120) is because United States and European colonialism has robbed the former colonies of
their natural wealth, stifled the development of local leaders and conspired with right-wing
dictators to keep the people poor and unorganized. 'If the materialist wing (see chapter 1 pp. 21-22 of this volume
for a discussion) of critical race theory is right', they state, 'domestic minori- ties have suffered at the
hands ofvery similar forces' [I would add white work- ers have suffered too]. In classic Marxist fashion they conclude,
'[domestic minorities]' fates are linked with those of their overseas counterparts, since
capitalists can always use the threat that investments will relocate overseas to defeat unions,
workplace regulations, welfare, and other programs ofinterest to U.S. minorities ' [again I would want to add,
'and white workers'].

Pedagogy
Critical Race Theory Pedagogy fails It needs to recognize white
culture and realize that capitalism is the cause of division and
oppression
Cole 9 (Mike Cole, Mike Cole is a Professor in Education, and is also an Emeritus Research
Professor in Education and Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include
research and publications, PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate
teaching. He also has a PhD in Philosophy. June 9, 2009, Critical Race Theory comes to the
UK: A Marxist response, http://etn.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/9/2/246.)//ky
Prestons classroom pedagogies John Preston (2007) provides a way in which such critical
theory might be introduced into schools. Preston (2007: 198) concludes his book by advocating
neo-abolitionist (the word is prefixed with neo to differentiate the abolition of whiteness from
the earlier abolition of slavery) pedagogies (abolition of whiteness teaching) in the classroom.
Given that the undoubtedly good intentions of the abolition of whiteness arguments are
regularly misunderstood by academics (Preston, 2007), its introduction in the school
curriculum is a most worrying and counterproductive suggestion. That whiteness (not white
people) should be abolished is advocated for the following reasons: 1. Whiteness is a false form
of identity and . . . there is no such thing as white culture; 2. Whiteness, in terms of a structural
system of white supremacy, is oppressive . . . [and] whiteness is only false and oppressive and . .
. there is no possibility of redemption or reformation of whiteness; 3. Whiteness divides
humanity against itself and therefore is not in the genuine interests even of white people; 4.
Class, gender and sexuality are important in understanding oppression but race is central to
understanding why other forms of political activity are not possible, particularly in the US
(Preston, 2007: 10). I consider each of these propositions in turn. Whiteness is a false form of
identity and . . . there is no such thing as white culture While I agree that there is no such thing
as white culture per se, there are white cultures. It is particularly important, given the scenario
of continuing white working-class racism, that educators do not deny the existence of white
working-class cultures. Indeed, as I have argued elsewhere with respect to such cultures,
educational institutions should be centrally involved in helping to identify and develop
strategies to promote good inclusive practice for all pupils/students, including the white
working class. Sections of the white working class in England have voted for the fascist British
National Party (BNP) at recent elections precisely because they feel that they are treated with
less equality than others. If we were to teach white working-class young people that they have no
culture, that would be racist, would alienate white working-class children even more, and would
not be conducive to effective socialist practice. The notion would also rightly be massively
contested, including by most of the Left in the UK. Whiteness is a structural system of
oppression and there is no possibility of redemption or reformation of whiteness I would argue
that it is capitalism, not white supremacy, that is a structural system of oppression. With
capitalisms overthrow, there is every possibility that the colour of ones skin will be irrelevant
and racism (which, as I have argued, is not necessarily based on skin colour) abolished. While it
may well be the intention of Critical Race Theorists to make skin colour irrelevant, it is my view
that encouraging young people in schools to think along these lines is also not conducive to
effective socialist practice. I refer later to current developments in Venezuela (see also Cole,
2009), which point to a revolutionary process where whiteness is not redeemed, or reformed or
abolished but, in the context of major ameliorative projects, rendered irrelevant in an anti-racist
struggle for 21st-century socialism. Whiteness divides humanity against itself and therefore is
not in the genuine interests even of white people A belief that a division of whiteness divides
humanity is not surprising, given Prestons claims that whiteness is an objective power
structure. For Chakrabarty and Preston (2006: 1), likewise, white supremacy, along with

capitalism itself, has the status of an objective inhuman [system] of exploitation and
oppression. From a Marxist perspective, it is capitalism that is the objective system that divides
humanity against itself, and is against the interests of all workers. For Marxists, it is this
message that should be considered in the school curriculum (see later for a discussion; see also
Cole, 2009). Class, gender and sexuality are important in understanding oppression but race is
central to understanding why other forms of political activity are not possible, particularly in the
US While it is true that Marxism has a history of not taking on board issues of equality other
than social class, 21st-century Marxism most definitely does relate to other equality issues. I
have argued earlier against making race rather than class central to analysis. I am not totally
sure what Preston means by other forms of political activity are not possible, particularly in the
US.

Capitalism causes xeno-racism, which CRT doesnt account for

Cole 9 (Mike Cole, Mike Cole is a Professor in Education, and is also an Emeritus Research
Professor in Education and Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include
research and publications, PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate
teaching. He also has a PhD in Philosophy. June 9, 2009, Critical Race Theory comes to the
UK: A Marxist response, http://etn.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/9/2/246.)//ky
Xeno-racism With respect to racism that is not necessarily colour-coded, it is not only Muslims
and people perceived to be Muslims who have been racialized. Britain, for example, is also
witnessing, in the current period, a new form of racism. This racism has all the hallmarks of
traditional racism, but impacts on recently arrived groups of people. It is a non-colour-coded
racism that has been described by Sivanandan (2001: 2) as xeno-racism: . . . a racism that is not
just directed at those with darker skins, from the former colonial countries, but at the newer
categories of the displaced and dispossessed whites, who are beating at western Europes doors,
the Europe that displaced them in the first place. It is racism in substance but xeno in form a
racism that is meted out to impoverished strangers even if they are white. It is xeno-racism. In
the UK in the 21st century, the enlarged European Union provides an abundance of cheap
Eastern European labour, and there is substantial evidence of xeno-racism here (Cole, 2004b;
Cole and Maisuria, 2007, 2009). I have described the process by which refugees, asylum
seekers8 and certain migrants from the newly joined countries of the EU become falsely
categorized as belonging to distinct races as xeno-racialization (for an analysis, see Cole,
2004b). In addition to cheap Eastern European labour, capitalism also benefits from illegal
labour power, from outside the EU, which is even cheaper. As Alex Callinicos (2006) puts it, the
interests of capital are best served by controls that are weak enough to allow immigrants in, but
strong enough to keep illegal workers vulnerable and therefore easy to exploit. As David Renton
(2006: 12) argues, business welcomes migration, but on its own terms, with migrant workers
insecure, unpopular: a class of people who will remain as long as possible marginal and poor.
As he puts it (Renton, 2006: 123): Economically, they will not feel confident to demand the
same rights as the settled population, while the media encourages the non-migrant majority to
see migrant workers as a threat.9 Given the widespread existence of xeno-racism and
accompanying xenoracialization (Cole, 2004b), it is important that in the current era, as well as
through history, that racism directed at people with white skins remains firmly on the agenda.
The limits to the CRT argument with respect to Britain are that it restricts racism (white
supremacy in CRT terms) to a set of practices directly related to skin colour. Islamophobia and
xeno-racism are not necessarily colourcoded. In claiming that with the exception of Nazi
Germany . . . borderline Europeans . . . were not subpersons in the full technical sense and
would all have been ranked ontologically above genuine nonwhites (Mills, 1997: 80), Mills is
seriously underestimating the actual and potential virulence of noncolour- coded racism. In

focusing on issues of colour and being divorced from matters related to capitalist requirements
with respect to the labour market, CRT is ill-equipped to analyse the discourses of
Islamophobia, xeno-racism and processes of xeno- racialization.

CRT cant solve without cap focus

Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 151-152, 2009//SRSL)

genesis
of CRT was that tireless and irrepressible cam- paigner against racism, Martin
Luther King Jr. At the time of writing (Summer 2008), it is the fortieth
anniversary of King's assassination. King, a reformer, pacifist and Baptist minister rather than a revolutionary social- ist (Martin,
It is worth recalling that, at the beginning of this volume, I recounted that one ofthe people cited by Delgado and Stefancic (2001, p. 4) as being influential in the

2008a), is quite accurately known for his gradualism and his reformism. However, it is significant that in the year preceding his death King became notably radicalized. Charles
Steele, 2008 president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) (King was the first president) has emphasized that, towards the end ofhis life, King had moved
on from purely 'racial' issues, and that his final campaigns were focused on fighting poverty and on labor disputes (cited in Harris, 2008).1 Steele believes that King, who came to
Memphis in 1968 in support of striking workers (Harris, 2008), 'was killed [there] because he had started to focus on poor folks, regardless oftheir colour' (cited in ibid.). As

[i]fyou thought hav- ing a talk about race was difficult in America, then
having one about class is even harder' (cited in ibid.). Paul Harris (2008) concludes that '40 years ago King tried to start that debate as
well. A bullet cut short his ambitions' (Harris, 2008).2 The implications for the subject matter
of this book are clear. As long as CRT centralizes 'race' rather than class, and as
long as it voices no seri- ous challenge to United States and world capitalism, it will
be tolerated. As Roland Sheppard (2006, p. 7) notes, Martin Luther King had a different perspective at
the time of his death to the 1963 'I have a dream' speech: 'he had begun to view the
struggle for equality as an economic struggle and the capitalist economic system as
the problem'. As King, who by 1967 believed that the total elimination of poverty was now a
practical respon- sibility (Sheppard, 2006, p. 8), put it in a speech to the SCLC in August, 1967: We've got to begin to ask questions about the whole
Jerald Podair puts it, '

society. We are called upon to help the discouraged beggars in life's marketplace. But one day we must come to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. It
means that questions must be raised. 'Who owns this oil? ...Who owns the iron ore? ... Why is it that people have to pay water bills in a world that is two- thirds water?' (cited in
Sheppard, 2006, p. 8) However, perhaps Martin Luther King's most unequivocal declaration of a firm change of direction came earlier, in remarks to his staff at the SCLC on
November 14, 1966. King proclaimed that the civil rights reforms ofthe early 1960s 'were at best surface changes' that were 'limited mainly to the Negro middle class'. He went
on to add that demands must now be raised to abolish poverty (cited in Martin, 2008a): You can't talk about solving the economic problem of the Negro without talk- ing about
billions of dollars. You can't talk about ending the slums without first saying profit must be taken out of slums. You're really tampering and getting on dangerous ground because

... Now this means that we are treading in

difficult water, because it really means that we are saying that something is
wrong...with capitalism.... There must be a better distribution ofwealth and maybe
America must move toward a democratic socialism. (cited in The Democratic Socialists of Central Ohio, 2008)3
you are messing with folk then. You are messing with captains of industry .

Critical Race Theorys color coded philosophy fails to account for

Islamophobia, which dehumanizes prisoners to the point where they
are worse than the animal
Cole 9 (Mike Cole, Mike Cole is a Professor in Education, and is also an Emeritus Research
Professor in Education and Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include
research and publications, PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate
teaching. He also has a PhD in Philosophy. June 9, 2009, Critical Race Theory comes to the
UK: A Marxist response, http://etn.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/9/2/246.)//ky
Islamophobia Since the suicide bombings of 7 July 2005 (7/7) when a coordinated attack was
made on Londons public transport system during the morning rush hour, there has been an
upsurge in Islamophobia in the UK (Cole and Maisuria, 2007, 2009). People who appear to be
of Islamic faith are immediately identified as potential terrorists and are five times more likely
to be stopped and searched than a white person (Dodd, 2005). It is important to underline the
fact that Islamophobia is not necessarily triggered by skin colour, and is often sparked off by one
or more (perceived) symbols of the Muslim faith. Much of the world in the 21st century is
imbued with the vestiges of the old (British) and the new (US) imperialism. Thus there coexists
the longstanding denigration of Asian cultures and the more recent intensification of
Islamophobia, which is directly related to US foreign policy. As living testimony to the two

imperialisms, Benjamin Zephaniah states: . . . when I come through the airport nowadays, in
Britain and the US especially, they always question me on the Muslim part of my name. They are
always on the verge of taking me away because they think converts are the dangerous ones.
(Zephaniah, 2004: 19) Zephaniahs experience was by no means an isolated one, with thousands
of Asian people being given special attention at security checkpoints. The actors in the highly
acclaimed film The Road to Guantanamo were stopped at an airport after returning to England
from Germany where the movie had been awarded the Silver Bear Award. They were treated
with intimidation about making further political movies, refused access to legal aid, had
personal belongings, including a mobile phone, confiscated, and were verbally abused (BBC,
2006). Islamophobia, like other forms of racism, can be colour-coded: it can be biological
(normally associated with skin colour). But it can also be cultural DEBATE Downloaded from
etn.sagepub.com at UNIV OF MICHIGAN on July 13, 2014 (not necessarily associated with skin
colour), or it can be a mixture of both. Echoing the quote from old UK school textbooks, where
Asia was denigrated as a continent of dying nations rapidly falling back in civilisation
(MacKenzie, 1988: 184), and where reference was made to the barbaric peoples of Asia
(Chancellor, 1970: 122), the former head of the Anglican Church, the Archbishop of Canterbury,
defended a controversial speech in which he criticized Islam as a faith associated with violence
throughout the world (Reynolds, 2004). At the Gregorian University in Rome, he said that
Islam was resistant to modernity, and that Islamic societies had contributed little to world
culture for hundreds of years. A more biological Islamophobic racism is revealed by Jamal alHarith, a British captive freed from Guantanamo Bay, who was perceived as subhuman
inferior to a dog. He informed the British tabloid paper, the Daily Mirror, that his guards told
him: You have no rights here. al-Harith went on: After a while, we stopped asking for human
rights we wanted animal rights. In Camp X-Ray my cage was right next to a kennel housing an
Alsatian dog. He had a wooden house with air conditioning and green grass to exercise on. I said
to the guards, I want his rights and they replied, That dog is [a] member of the US army.
(Prince and Jones, 2004) Such treatment is sustained by racialization. Indeed, the a priori
racialization of Muslims as subhumans and terrorists serves to facilitate and legitimize torture,
rape, humiliation and degradation. US imperialism exacerbates such abuse. In the pursuit of
global hegemony, the killing and torture of the enemy has to be normalized. Moreover, soldiers
on the ground become brutalized by the whole experience and the enemy, in being racialized,
becomes dehumanized. US soldier Lynndie England, serving at the Abu Ghraib camp in Iraq,
was charged with seriously abusing detainees by forcing them to stack naked in a human
pyramid. The BBC (2004) reported that there were numerous incidents of sadistic and wanton
abuse. . . . Much of the abuse was sexual, with prisoners often kept naked and forced to perform
simulated and real sex acts. This is particularly humiliating for Muslims who place importance
on covering and not exposing flesh. Racialization, under conditions of imperialism, is fired by
what Dallmayr (2004: 11) has described as the intoxicating effects of global rule that anticipates
corresponding levels of total depravity and corruption among the rulers. Global rule, of course,
is first and foremost, about global profits, and serves to relate old and new imperialisms. In
being colour-coded, CRT is ill-equipped to analyse multifaceted Islamophobia, and its
connection to capital, national and international.

Debate
Inclusive debate strategies will fail and be coopted We must
abandon competitive debate, and overthrow, instead of seek
success in capitalist structures
Cane and Zorn 08 -- Don Cane

and Jacob Zorn are of the Spartacist League Central Committee speaks and write on
Race, Class and Socialist Revolution ( Communist Organizing in the Jim Crow South: What's Not in The Great
Debaters, Workers Vanguard No. 92521 November 2008//JC)
The Great Debaters represents a take on the old theme of racial upliftthe belief

that a talented black petty bourgeoisie can by hard work and dedication transcend
the evils of racism and achieve justice. In the words of Denzel Washington, this is not a film about racism in
Texas in 1935. Its what these young people did about it...to overcome whatever obstacles were in their way. It is this very
aspect of the film that has made it popular among both black and white critics . Roger

Ebert, film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times, called it the feel-great movie of the year and black journalist Herb Boyd described it
as a feel-good movie (and the underdogs win) and an uplifting film that most African Americans gladly embraced. Racial uplift
is the same theme that W.E.B. Du Bois raised in the late 19th century in arguing against Booker T. Washington, who promoted the
servile acceptance of segregation. Du Bois argued that it was the responsibility of the educated black petty bourgeoisie to uplift
black people under capitalism. In a 1903 article, he stated: The Negro race, like all races, is going to be saved by its exceptional men.
The problem of education, then, among Negroes must first of all deal with the Talented Tenth; it is the problem of developing the
Best of this race that they may guide the Mass away from the contamination and death of the Worst, in their own and other races.
Du Bois thesis was based on the acceptance of capitalism. In The Souls of Black Folk (1903), he defended the rule of inequality:
that of the million black youth, some were fitted to know and some to dig; that some had the talent and capacity of university men,
and some the talent and capacity of blacksmiths. The point of education, he wrote, was to teach the workers to work and the
thinkers to think. The Great Debaters articulates the liberal-integrationist view

promoted by mainstream civil rights groups that black equality can be achieved
under capitalism. In a scene that attracted the attention of all leftist reviewers, a Wiley debater in a
contest with a white college team declares, My opponent says today is not the day
for whites and coloreds to go to the same college.... No, the time for justice, the
time for freedom, and the time for equality is always, is always right now! By
showing their skills and intelligence, the talented tenth are supposed to break
down the barrier of racial injustice. But what is left unsaid speaks volumes to the
class divisions among the oppressed black population. The black students at Wiley
certainly faced a racist world where even distinguished PhDs like Farmer could be killed with relative impunity.

One of the more powerfuland accuratescenes comes when the team narrowly escaped being lynched while on a rural road in the
South. The college debating circuit was segregated, with many white universities refusing to debate blacks. Nonetheless, black
colleges such as Wiley, Morehouse and Howard University were founded by church institutions to primarily train clergy and
teachers, the core of the black petty bourgeoisie. Political protest was forbiddenas shown by the elder Farmers negative reaction to
Tolsons radicalism. For the overwhelming majority of black people, exploited and oppressed as sharecroppers and tenants, the halls
of Wiley College might as well have been Mars. From

the movie, one would get the idea that debate

can change the world . The official Web site of the movie declares, Believe in the power of words.
But racial oppression is fundamentally not a question of bad ideas in peoples
heads that they can be argued out of. It is based on the workings of American
capitalism. In reality, the material conditions for most black people have
continued to deteriorate. While Jim Crow is dead, the majority of black people, as a race-color caste segregated at the
bottom of society, face brutal daily racist subjugation and humiliation, by whatever index of social life one might choose
joblessness, imprisonment, lack of decent, integrated housing. As the economy crashes into recession, blacks are disproportionately
affected. At the same time, black workers are a strategic part of the proletariat in

urban transport, longshore, auto, steel, and they are the most unionized section of
the working class. They form an organic link to the downtrodden ghetto masses.
Being strategically located in the economy and facing special oppression, black
workers led by a multiracial revolutionary party will play a vanguard role in the
struggles of the entire U.S. working class. Class-conscious black workers, armed
with a revolutionary program, will play a central role in the building of the

workers party necessary to sweep away the capitalist system of exploitation and
racial oppression.

The Movie of the Great Debaters provides a metaphor for

contemporary black liberation strategies Fighting for integration
within racist,capitalist institutions, like debate, ends in cooptation
and continued violence and oppression Liberation groups should
not vote for Obama, they should overthrow the racist, capitalist
system of exploitation
Cane and Zorn 08 -- Don Cane

and Jacob Zorn are of the Spartacist League Central Committee speaks and write on
Race, Class and Socialist Revolution ( Communist Organizing in the Jim Crow South: What's Not in The Great
Debaters, Workers Vanguard No. 92521 November 2008//JC)

The Great Debaters, directed by Denzel Washington, produced by Oprah Winfrey and starring Washington and Forest
Whitaker, is supposed to be a feel-good movie about overcoming racism in the
segregated South. It is loosely based on an article published in 1997 in American Legacy magazine about the debate team

of Wiley Collegea small, religious black college in East Texasduring the Great Depression in the 1930s. Under the tutelage of
their coach, English professor Melvin B. Tolson, the debaters triumph in contest after contest against bigger black schools and jump
over the color bar to triumph over prestigious white schools as well, such as a touring Oxford University team from England. The

highlight of the movie is their victory over Harvard; the team defeats the all-white
Ivy League team by advocating peaceful civil disobedience against oppression. As
the credits roll, we are told that one of the debaters, James Farmer Jr., went on to form
the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), which was founded in 1942 and went on to become one of the
organizations active in the mass civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s. The Great Debaters drives home
the hardships faced by even relatively elite black students and intellectualsthe
talented tenthin the Jim Crow South. Farmers father, religion professor James Farmer Sr., the first

black person in Texas to earn a PhD, is threatened with death by two impoverished white farmers while driving through the
countryside with his family because Farmer accidentally hit their pig with his car. His son resolves to stand up after he sees his
educated father forced to grovel before illiterate whites. Tolson, on the other hand, is obviously some sort of radical, perhaps even a
Communist, and he actively opposes racial injustice. In one scene, the young Farmer follows Tolson as he sneaks out in the middle of
the night to organize an integrated sharecroppers union, and barely escapes arrest as the police raid the meeting. Later, the police
track down Tolson after torturing some of the sharecroppers, arrest him at Wiley and drag him to jail. For an audience not familiar
with the everyday violence, oppression and humiliation at the core of Jim Crow segregation, the movie provides a glimpse. Black
Rights and the Reformist Left Today The Great Debaters opened during the 2007 holiday season, but there
should be no doubt that it was

made for the 2008 presidential election campaign. The heroes of

evoke Barack Obama. The audience is
supposed to see Obama, who claims that the civil rights movement took us 90
percent of the way toward racial equality, as the modern-day Great Debater,
triumphing over historic racism through hard work. It is an echo of Booker T.
Washington, who over a century ago preached accommodation to the racist status quo by telling
impoverished blacks to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Trade-union
bureaucrats, black bourgeois politicians, reformist leftists and others seized on
economic and social discontent and peddled support to Obama and the lesser
evil capitalist Democratic Partythe other party of war and racism. The Communist Partys
the film, Tolson and his protg Farmer, are obviously designed to

Peoples Weekly World (30 December 2007) wrote, A film that rings as true and powerful as The Great Debaters may have an
effect on the 2008 election primaries. After Obama won the elections, the Peoples Weekly World headlined a November 6 online
statement, Dawn of a New Era. Workers World Partys paper (1 February) called the movie

magnificent because it puts everything in context. The message Workers World draws is that liberation is not to be won
through electoral bourgeois politics, but is to be waged and won through open class struggle. This is rich coming from an
organization that has repeatedly supported black Democrats, from Jesse Jackson in the 1980s to New York City councilman Charles
Barron in recent years. Workers World called for a vote to Cynthia McKinney, a former Democratic Congresswoman and the 2008
presidential candidate for the capitalist Green Party. After Obamas win, Workers World (13 November) enthused, Millions in
Streets Seal Obama Victory. Genuine Marxists do not support any capitalist party or

politicianDemocrat, Republican, Green or independent. The working class

must forge a class-struggle workers party that fights for workers revolution.
Capitalism is a system based on exploitation of labor, and, in the U.S., a unique and
critical mainstay continues to be the subjugation of the black population at the
bottom of society. The veteran American Trotskyist, Richard S. Fraser, wrote in his 1955 work, For the Materialist
Conception of the Negro Struggle: The dual nature of the Negro struggle arises from the fact that a whole people regardless of class
distinction are the victims of discrimination. This problem of a whole people can be solved only through the proletarian revolution,
under the leadership of the working class (reprinted in Marxist Bulletin No. 5 [Revised], What Strategy for Black Liberation?
Trotskyism vs. Black Nationalism). We of the Spartacist League base our program for black liberation

upon Frasers perspective of revolutionary integrationism, premised on the

understanding that black freedom requires smashing the capitalist system and
constructing an egalitarian socialist society. As we wrote in For a Workers America! (WV No. 908, 15
February): This program of revolutionary integrationism is a fight to assimilate black
people into an egalitarian socialist order, which is the only way to achieve real
equality. While we fight against all aspects of racial oppression, we point out that there is no solution to that
oppression short of a social revolution. This program is in sharp counterposition
to the program of liberal integrationism what American Trotskyist leader James P. Cannon once
derided and denounced as inch-at-a-time gradualismwhich is based upon the
deception that black freedom can be achieved within the confines of the racist
capitalist system. It is also in sharp contradiction to the petty-bourgeois utopian program of black nationalism and
separatism, which rejects and despairs of united multiracial class struggle to abolish this racist capitalist system. Instead, black
nationalism seeks to make a virtue of the racial segregation and ghettoization of black people that is seen as unchangeable. The
Great Depression in the Jim Crow South The Great Debaters is a well-made movie. But in its paeans to

dedication and debate, it downplays the real social struggle that was going on in the
U.S. in the 1930s, including by black people in the South. The Great Depression exposed the
brutal irrationality of capitalismin stark contrast to the industrial achievements of the USSRas it threw
millions of workers into starvation and misery internationally, including in other imperialist countries. Germany,

which was defeated in World War I, was especially rocked by crises, culminating in the rise to power of Hitler and the Nazis in 1933.
Only the betrayal by the Stalinist and Social Democratic misleaders allowed the Nazis to come to power unopposed and smash the
organized working class in order to save capitalism. A few years later, the Stalinists went on to play an aggressive
counterrevolutionary role in the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39, slaughtering revolutionary fighters in order to appease the
democratic imperialists and head off proletarian revolution in Spain. Nonetheless, millions of workers, peasants, students and
intellectuals joined Communist and social-democratic parties internationally, trying to find a way out of the apparent dead end of
capitalism and fascism.

--Cooptation Turn
Civil disobedience, like the 1ac, will be coopted by the capitalist
institution in which it seek inclusion to James Farmer, the
great debater, ended up working for Nixon
Cane and Zorn 08 -- Don Cane

and Jacob Zorn are of the Spartacist League Central Committee speaks and write on
Race, Class and Socialist Revolution ( Communist Organizing in the Jim Crow South: What's Not in The Great
Debaters, Workers Vanguard No. 92521 November 2008//JC)
There are several other dramatic scenes in The Great Debaters. One

example is a closing scene of

the debate with Harvard, in which Farmer Jr. argues that it is a right, even a duty
to resist unjust laws with violence or civil disobedience. You should pray I
choose the latter. This message of the fictionalized debate is clearly intended for
todays consumption, to read back the pacifism of Farmer and Martin Luther King
Jr. into the 1930s. Blacks fighting against Jim Crow and capitalist exploitation in the
South did not live in a peaceful world: they faced a campaign of terror, both legal
and extralegal. The right to armed self-defense was key to the fight for black rights.
Black veterans, including from both world wars, were often in the forefront of struggles against Jim Crow and of
the Southern civil rights movement in the 1950s. Furthermore, the movie distorts the facts of the debate. As
Timothy M. ODonnell, a professor at the University of Mary Washington in Virginia, pointed out in a review of
the movie, not only was the culminating debate at the University of Southern

California and not Harvard, the 1935 Wiley team debated the national
intercollegiate debate topic about arms sales to foreign countries and not
segregation or civil disobedience; they debated both sides of the proposition, not
just the side of truth and justice. Finally, by all accounts, Farmer wasif anythingthe
alternate in the match against USCand never did have the opportunity to give the
winning last rebuttal. Nor does the movie mention the fact that Farmer later
served as Assistant Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare under Richard
Nixon!

The movement of the Marxist share-croppers in the film, failed in real

life because they voted for FDR instead of continuing to reject the
system
Cane and Zorn 08 -- Don Cane

and Jacob Zorn are of the Spartacist League Central Committee speaks and write on
Race, Class and Socialist Revolution ( Communist Organizing in the Jim Crow South: What's Not in The Great
Debaters, Workers Vanguard No. 92521 November 2008//JC)

The Great Debaters is a well-made movie. But in its paeans to dedication and debate, it downplays
the real social struggle that was going on in the U.S. in the 1930s, including by black people in the
South. The Great Depression exposed the brutal irrationality of capitalismin stark
contrast to the industrial achievements of the USSRas it threw millions of workers into starvation and misery
internationally, including in other imperialist countries. Germany, which was defeated in World War I, was especially rocked by
crises, culminating in the rise to power of Hitler and the Nazis in 1933. Only the betrayal by the Stalinist and Social Democratic
misleaders allowed the Nazis to come to power unopposed and smash the organized working class in order to save capitalism. A few
years later, the Stalinists went on to play an aggressive counterrevolutionary role in the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39, slaughtering
revolutionary fighters in order to appease the democratic imperialists and head off proletarian revolution in Spain. Nonetheless,
millions of workers, peasants, students and intellectuals joined Communist and social-democratic parties internationally, trying to
find a way out of the apparent dead end of capitalism and fascism. The catastrophic impact of the Great

Depression on the U.S. working class was keenly felt by its most oppressed section, black workers.
The unemployment rate of black workers exceeded white joblessness by 30 to 60
percent. Even though millions of black people moved to the industrial North and Midwest during the Great Migration, which

began with World War I, and many others moved to growing Southern cities, half of American blacks still lived in the rural South at

the start of the Depression. Southern agriculture was in decline before the Depression hit. By 1933 most blacks could neither find
jobs of any kind nor contracts for their crop at any price, as noted by historian Harvard Sitkoff in A New Deal for Blacks. A

specter of starvation haunted black America. Southern agriculture in the 1930s was, even by

contemporary bourgeois standards, economically backward. It retained significant remnants of the slave system. The Civil War,
Americas second bourgeois revolution, had smashed the slave system, paving the way for the development of industrial capitalism
in the U.S. as a whole. But after the betrayal of Reconstruction by the Northern bourgeoisie, the Negro was left in the South in the
indefinite position of semi-slavery, semi-serfdom and semi-wage slavery as then-Trotskyist Max Shachtman put it in his 1933 piece
Communism and the Negro (reprinted by Verso in 2003 as Race and Revolution). Sharecropping and tenancy formed the labor
backbone of Southern agriculture. The sharecropper worked in lieu of wages for a share of the cash crop and furnishings (food
allowance, housing, etc.). The tenant farmer worked land on which he paid ground rent with a share of the crop in lieu of cash.
Sharecroppers and tenants found themselves more in debt every year, and could not leave the land until they had paid off their
debts. Even when cotton prices rose, they were cheated by white landowners and merchants. According to Sitkoff, Over two-thirds
of the black farmers cultivating cotton in the early thirties received no profits for the crop, either breaking even or going deeper in
debt. Sitting atop all this was the system of Jim Crow. Designed to prevent blacks from voting, becoming educated or fighting for
their rights, Jim Crow was the systematic legal segregation of black people in the South, enforced by legal and extralegal violence.
When blacks did challenge Jim Croweither by personally refusing to follow its rules or, more rarely, by organizingthey faced
racist terror, whether by the local sheriff or the Klan (who were often one and the same). At least 3,000 black people were lynched
between the end of Reconstruction in 1877 and the dismantling of Jim Crow in the 1960s. Shachtman summarized the position of
black farmers in 1933: In a word, to all intents and purposes hundreds of thousands of Negroes in the South today occupy, both in
economic as in the political sense, the position of serfs and peons, tied to the land, life and limb at the disposal of the landlord,
whose semi-feudal sway is maintained with the aid of the sheriff, the courts, the elaborate system of social and political
discrimination, and, when necessary, the law of Judge Lynch. The white sharecroppers and tenants are not very much better off.
Poor white farmers were also horribly oppressed economically. Southern agriculture remained dependent on the cash crop cotton
and cheap labor, and where cheap labor is in abundance technology will lag. In 1929, less than 10 percent of all Texas farms had
tractors. The rural South was still mired in primitive farming techniques, illiteracy and poverty. During the 1930s, the price of cotton
plummeted. In 1929, cotton sold for 18 cents per pound; in 1933, for less than 6 cents per pound. By the Depression, with the South
sinking further and further into misery, the ruling class as a whole was desperate to modernize this decrepit system, which could
only be done under capitalism through the immiseration of untold numbers of black and white rural toilers. The United States in the
1930s was an advanced industrialized capitalist country with a powerful working class. By the Depression, textile, iron, coal, steel
and chemical industries were developing in the South. In the North, powerful industrial unions formed the Congress of Industrial
Organizations (CIO) that broke away from the ossified American Federation of Labor (AFL) craft unions. The CIO organized all
workers in a particular industry, regardless of their ethnicity or racea significant improvement from the color bar of many AFL
unions. In the 1930s, large sections of the industrial working class in the U.S.black and

white, native-born and immigrantbecame more militant and radical, fighting to build the CIO, often under
the leadership of Communists and other leftists. However, thanks in large part to the Stalinists and
social democrats, the incipient radicalization of labor was diverted into Franklin Delano
Roosevelts Democratic Party. During the Second World War, the Communist Party subordinated the struggles of
workers and black people to U.S. imperialisms war effort, falsely portraying this interimperialist war as a struggle against fascism.
In contrast, the Trotskyists, while standing for the unconditional military defense of the Soviet degenerated workers state during
World War II, opposed all the imperialist combatants in that carnagea position for which Trotskyists were imprisoned in 1941
under the Smith Act.

Debate/University/Education
Long Tag - Educational institutions are NOT the starting point for the revolution
Unequal power relations, bourgeois cooptation, empirical destruction of
movements and inaccessible literature prove
Short Tag Debate cant breed revolution 4 reasons
Common Cause 6/6/14 (Anonymous, used to protect identity in the struggle, Lynchpin.ca, With Allies Like
These: Reflections on Privilege Reductionism, http://linchpin.ca/?q=content/allies-these-reflections-privilege-reductionism//JC)

While analysis and theory were historically produced by radicals in the context of
struggle, this task has largely been shifted into the realm of academia. Over the course
of the last several decades, entire bodies of literature and corresponding vocabularies
have been developed, turning radical theory and analysis into a highly specialized
undertaking. Coming out of the 1970s, many liberation movements sought to create
homes for themselves within the university through the creation of Progressive Studies
departments (eg. Gender Studies, Critical Race Studies, Disability Studies, Queer Studies,
Labour Studies, etc.).
At the time, some activists thought that obtaining space within universities was an
important goal because of its potential to organize collectively, and because of the large
amount of resources within the university. However, in hindsight, the channeling of
resistance into the universities facilitated the destruction of the grassroots
movements, and created a space in which people could build careers off of the
backs of past struggles. Despite ostensibly radical beginnings, Progressive Studies
function to hinder (rather than further) the interests of revolutionary movements.
The gravitation of would-be revolutionaries to the university for an education, where
radical theory is subject to bourgeois pressures more than an accountability to
humanity, harnesses our radical traditions and erases collective memory of
struggle. There exists a fundamental misunderstanding (to be generous regarding motivation)
of a radical education: that the classroom can serve as a foundation for transformative politics,
rather than an adjunct to learning and development focused on real-world struggle.
Research conducted by students on marginalized constituencies, which is the
closest thing to grassroots work that may be seen, is often based on such exploitative
assumptions and power relationships that value may only occasionally be derived
from it. The demobilizing effects of the alienation of theory from action cannot
here be overstated.

Experience
Using experience as a starting point for social theory ignores larger
structures of capitalist development and exploitation
Scatamburlo-DAnnibale 3 (Valerie Scatamburlo-DAnnibale Professor at the University of Windsor, The
Strategic Centrality of Class in the Politics of Race and Difference, Cultural Studies Critical Methodologies, vol. 3 no. 2
(2003), pp. 148-175 // JJ)
This framework must be further distinguished from those who invoke the terms classism and/or class elitism to (ostensibly)
foreground the idea that class matters (cf. hooks, 2000) because we agree with Gimenez (2001) that class is not simply another
ideology legitimating oppression (p. 24). Rather, class denotes exploitative relations between people mediated by their relations
to the means of production (p. 24). To marginalize such an understanding of class is to conflate individuals objective locations in
the intersection of struc- tures of inequality with individuals subjective understandings of how they are situated based on their
experiences. 7 Another caveat. We are not renouncing the concept of experience. On the contrary, we believe that it is imperative
to retain the category of lived experience as a reference point in light of misguided post-Marxist critiques that imply that all forms
of Marxian class analysis are dismissive of subjectivity. We are not, however, advocating the uncritical

fetishization of experience that tends to assume that personal experience

somehow guarantees the authenticity of knowledge and that often treats expe-
rience as self-explanatory, transparent, and solely individual. Rather, we advance a
framework that seeks to make connections between seemingly iso- lated situations
and/or particular experiences by exploring how they are consti- tuted in, and
circumscribed by, broader historical and social conditions. They are linked, in other words, by
their internal relations (Ollman, 1993). Expe- riential understandings, in and of themselves, are
initially suspect because dia- lectically they constitute a unity of opposites they
are at once unique, specific, and personal but also thoroughly partial, social, and
the products of historical forces about which individuals may know little or
nothing. A rich description of immediate experience can be an appropriate and
indispensable point of departure, but such an understanding can easily become an
isolated difference prison unless it transcends the immediate perceived point of
oppres- sion, confronts the social system in which it is rooted, and expands into a
com- plex and multifaceted analysis (of forms of social mediation) that is capable of mapping
out the general organization of social relations. That, however, requires a broad
class-based approach. Having a concept of class helps us to see the network of
social relations constituting an overall social organization which both implicates
and cuts through racialization/ethnicization and gender . . . . [A] radical political economy [class]
perspective emphasizing exploitation, dispossession and survival takes the issues of . . . diversity [and difference] beyond questions
of conscious identity such as culture and ideology, or of a paradigm of homogeneity and heterogeneity . . . or of ethical imperatives
with respect to the other. (Bannerji, 2000, pp. 7, 19) Various culturalist perspectives seem to
diminish the role of political econ- omy and class forces in shaping the edifice of
the socialincluding the shift- ing constellations and meanings of difference. Furthermore, none of the dif-
ferences valorized in culturalist narratives alone, and certainly not race by
itself, can explain the massive transformation of the structure of capitalism in
recent years. We agree with Meyerson (2000) that race is not an adequate explanatory category on its own and that the
use of race as a descriptive or analytical category has serious consequences for the way in which social life is presumed to be
constituted and organized. The category of racethe concep- tual framework that the

oppressed often employ to interpret their experiences of inequalityoften clouds

the concrete reality of class, and blurs the actual structure of power and
privilege; in this regard, race is all too often a barrier to understanding the
central role of class in shaping personal and collective out- comes within a
capitalist society (Marable, 1995, pp. 8, 226).

emphasizing lived experience obscures the conditions of possibility

for that experience. Their pedagogy robs class of explanatory power
that's key to sustainable challenges to the relations of production
Mas'ud Zavarzadeh retired professor of English at Syracuse University jac 23.1 (2003) journal of Advanced Composition
Theory

The pedagogy of appearance focuses on cultural representation and the role of representation
in constructing the represented. By centering teaching in the machinery of "representation," it
obliterates the objective. Reducing pedagogy to lessons in cultural semiotics, it makes "experience" of
the pleasures of "depth less" surfaces the measure of reality and thus obscures the social relations of
production that are the material conditions of that experience. However, "This 'lived'
experience is not a given, given by a pure 'reality,' but the spontaneous 'lived experience' of
ideology in its peculiar relationship to the real" (Althusser 223). The ideological value of the concept of
"experience" in de-conceptualizing pedagogy will perhaps become more clear in examining the way bourgeois radical
pedagogues, such as Giroux, deploy experience as an instance of spontaneity to eviscerate
class as an explanatory concept by which the social relations of property are critiqued. In his
Impure Actsa book devoted to marginalizing explanatory concepts and popularizing "hybrids" and that, in effect, justifies political
opportunism in pedagogy-Giroux repeats the claims of such other cultural

phenomenologists as Stuart Hall, Judith Butler, and Robin Kelley that "class" is "lived
through race" (28). Class, in other words, is an affect. He represents this affective view of class as epistemological
resistance against class which, he claims, is a universal category that takes the "difference" of race out of class. As I have already
argued, epistemology is used in mainstream pedagogy as a cover for a reactionary class politics

that does several things, as Giroux demonstrates. First, it segregates the "black" proletariat from
the "white" proletariat and isolates both :from other "racial" proletariats. In doing so,
Giroux's pedagogy carries out the political agenda of capital-to pit one segment of the
proletariat against the other and to turn the unity of the working class into contesting (race)
"differences." Second, it rewrites the system of wage labor itself into a hybrid. Giroux's experience-ism obscures the
systematicity of wage labor and argues that there is no capitalism operating with a single logic of exploitation.

Instead, there are many, aleatory, ad hoc, local arrangements between employees and employers depending on the color of the
worker not the laws of motion of capital. Third, it converts capitalism from an economic system based on the

"exploitation" of humans by humans (wage labor)through the ownership of the means of

production-into an institution of cultural "oppression" based on "power." Fourth, since class is
lived through race, it is not an objective fact (the relation of the worker to ownership ofthe means of production)
but a subjective experience. The experience of ("living") class through race, like all experiences, is
contingent, aleatory, and indeterminate. Class (lived through the experience of race) is thus reconstituted as
contingent-an accident not a necessity of wage labor. Fifth, since capitalism is not a system but a
series of ad hoc arrangements of exchange with various workers of diverse colors, it does not produce an objective
binary class system but only cultural differences. One cannot, therefore, obtain objective
knowledge of capitalism. There are, in short, no laws of motion of capital; there are only "experiences" of
work influenced by one's color. Consequently, to say-as I have said-that capitalism is a regime of exploitation is simply a
totalitarian closure. We cannot know what capitalism is because, according to Giroux's logic, it is fraught with
differences (of race) not the singularity of "surplus labor." In Giroux's pedagogy, there is no capitalism ("totality"),
only cultural effects of capitals without capitalism ("differences"). Giroux represents his gutting of class as a
radical and groundbreaking notion that will lead to liberation of the oppressed. However, he
never completes the logic of his argument because in the end it will deground his position and
turn it into epistemological nonsense and political pantomime. If class is a universal category
that obliterates the difference of race, there is (on the basis of such a claim) no reason not to say that
race is also a universal category because it obliterates the difference of sexuality (and other
differences), which is, by the same logic, itself a universal category since it obliterates
the difference of age (and other differences), which is itself a universal category because it obliterates the difference of
(dis )ability (and other differences), which is itself a universal category because it obliterates the difference of class (and other
differences). In short, the social, in Giroux's pedagogy is a circle of oppressions, none

of

whose components can explain any structural relations; each simply absorbs the other
("class is actually lived through race," paraphrasing Giroux) and thus points back to itself as a local knowledge of
the affective, difference, and contingency. Class explains race; it does not absorb it as an
experience (see Butler, "Merely"), nor does it reduce it to the contingencies of ethnicities (Hall, "New") or
urban performativities (Kelley, Yo '). To put it differently, since in this pluralism of oppressions each
element cancels out the explanatory capacity of all others, the existing social
relations are reaffirmed in a pragmatic balancing of differences. Nothing changes,
everything is resignified. The classroom of experience reduces all concepts (which it marks as
"grand narratives") to affects ("little stories") and, instead of explaining the social in order to
change it, only "interprets" it as a profusion of differences. Teaching becomes an affirmation of the singularas-is; its lessons "save the honor of the name" (see Lyotard, Postmodern 82). Giroux's program is a mimesis of the
logic of the ruling ideology: as in all pedagogies of affect, it redescribes the relation of the subject of
knowledge with the world but leaves the world itself intact by reifying the signs of
"difference" (see Rorty, Contingency 53, 73). The subject, as I will discuss later in my analysis of Cary Nelson's radical
pedagogy, feels differently about itself in a world that remains what it was Giroux is putting forth a class-cleansing
pedagogy: he erases class from teaching in the name of epistemology ("totalization"). But as I have already
argued, epistemology is not an issue for Giroux; it is an alibi for hollowing out from class its
economic explanatory power. Epistemology in bourgeois pedagogy is class politics represented
as "theory"-whose aim is to turn class into a cultural aleatory experience. In Giroux's phenomenological
experientialism, lived experience is an excuse for advancing the cause of capital in a
populist logic (respect for the ineluctable "experience" of the student) so that the student, the future worker,
is trained as one who understands the world only through the sense-able-his own "unique"
experience as black, white, or brown; man or woman; gay or straight-but never as a proletariat: a person who,
regardless of race, sexuality, gender, age, or (dis )ability has to sell his or her labor power to capital in order
to obtain subsistence wages in exchange. Experience, in Giroux's pedagogy, becomes a self-protecting
"inside" that resists world-historical knowledge as an intrusion from "outside"; it thus valorizes
ignorance as a mark of the authenticity and sovereignty of the subject-as independence and free
choice.

Your epistemology is wrong- Locating activism prevents action and

results in cooptation
Common Cause 6/6/14 (Anonymous, used to protect identity in the struggle, Lynchpin.ca, With Allies Like
These: Reflections on Privilege Reductionism, http://linchpin.ca/?q=content/allies-these-reflections-privilege-reductionism//JC)
In the creation of Progressive Studies, the passing of stories, information, theory, and practice was very smartly removed from
organizations where work was happening. The blossoming of the historical study of people's movements

by academia in the past thirty years has had some key effects. Those with the best access to
university have the best access to people's history. Simply having access to university, being competent working
within it, and having an interest in people's history, is enough to facilitate access to the history . Therefore,
there is no correlation between access to history, the framing and development of that history, and
being engaged in struggle oneself. Lacking intimate knowledge of the context of
organizing, students of people's history are rarely capable of understanding the material
they study. Therefore, we have noticed that historians who consider themselves radicals
because they have an interest in liberation stories are often stumped when it
comes to extracting the value from their work. While people's history was a
people's pursuit in the 1960s and 1970s, its movement into the university effectively
removed people's access and contributions to it. In this sense, history is back to being
written by the victors the liberal bourgeoisie, and those who are able to adapt
their studies to their criteria for inclusion. Despite this, it manages to maintain a
veneer of subversiveness, which is misleading and unhelpful.

Identity Politics
Identity politics forecloses potential for radical change by creating
insurmountable rifts based on difference. Only Marxism solves.
International Socialist Review 2008 (The ISR is dedicated to advancing socialist theory and
practice in the United States The Politics of Identity February 2008 ISR Issue 57
http://www.isreview.org/issues/57/feat-identity.shtml accessed 7.11.14 .nt)
LaClau and Mouffe describe society as made up of a whole range of autonomous, free-floating
antagonisms and oppressions, none more important than any othereach is a separate sphere
of struggle.14 But this concept falls apart once it is removed from the world of abstraction and
applied to the real world. Separate struggles do not neatly correspond to separate
forms of oppression. Forms of oppressions overlap, so that many people are both
Black and female, or both lesbian and Latino. If every struggle must be fought
separately, this can only lead to greater and greater fragmentation and eventually
to disintegration, even within groups organized around a single form of
oppression. A Black lesbian, for example, faces an obvious dilemma: If all men are enemies of
women, all whites are enemies of Blacks, and all straights are enemies of gays, then allies must
be precious few. In the real world, choices have to be made. If LaClau and Mouffe are correct,
and the main divisions in society exist between those who face a particular form of
oppression and those who dont, then the likelihood of ever actually ending
oppression is just about nil . At its heart, the politics of identity is extremely
pessimistic, implying not just a rejection of the potential to build a broad united
movement against all forms of exploitation and oppression, but also a very deep
pessimism about the possibility for building solidarity even among people who
face different forms of oppression. The only organizational strategy identity
politics offers is for different groups of oppressed people to each fight their own
separate battles against their own separate enemies. The second key problem with
LaClau and Mouffe flows from the concept of autonomy that is so central to their theory. Most
importantly from a theoretical standpoint, Laclau and Mouffe go to great lengths to refute the
Marxist analysis of the state, or the government. Marxist theory is based upon an
understanding that the government is not a neutral body, but serves to represent
the interests of the class in powerwhich in the case of capitalism is the capitalist
class . This should not be too hard to imagine in the era of George W. Bush, when the capitalist
class has brazenly flaunted its wealth and power. But Laclau and Mouffe insist that the state is
neutral and autonomous. Even the different branches of government are autonomous from each
other. Apparently, the Senate and the House of Representatives have no real relationship, and
the White House is similarly autonomous. If that is the case, then the stranglehold of
neoconservatives and the Christian Right over U.S. politics since 9/11 must have been a figment
of liberals imaginations. Thus, there is a serious flaw in this logic. Oppression is built into
the capitalist system itself, and the state is one of the key ways in which
oppression is enforcedthrough laws that discriminate and the police who serve

and protect some people while harassing and brutalizing other groups of people.
But the theory of autonomy leads to another theoretical problem as well: every
separate struggle warrants equal importance, no matter how many people are
involved on either side, and whether or not demands are being made against the
state or other institutions . Indeed, LaClau and Mouffe carry this logic a critical step
further, noting that struggle need not involve more than one person. It can simply denote a
matter of achieving increasingly affirmed individualism.15 The personal struggle in this
process substitutes for political struggle, leaving the system that maintains and
enforces oppression intact. Like LaClau and Mouffe, theorists who advocate the most
extreme forms of identity politics do not actually aim to build a movement, large or small. They
prefer small groups of the enlightened few, who remain content in their superiority to the
ignorant masses. Marxism offers a way forward for those interested in ending
oppression in the real world. As Marx remarked of his generation of smug
academics, The philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various
ways. The point, however, is to change it. 16

Class is a better starting point - Marxism is key to historically

contextualize and examine all forms of oppression.
Taylor 11 (Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, on the editorial board of the International Socialist Review
and a doctoral student in African American Studies at Northwestern University; Race, class and
Marxism, SocialistWorker.org, http://socialistworker.org/2011/01/04/race-class-and-marxism
.nt)
What do Marxists actually say? Marxists argue that capitalism is a system that is based on the
exploitation of the many by the few. Because it is a system based on gross inequality, it requires
various tools to divide the majority--racism and all oppressions under capitalism serve this
purpose. Moreover, oppression is used to justify and "explain" unequal relationships in society
that enrich the minority that live off the majority's labor. Thus, racism developed initially to
explain and justify the enslavement of Africans--because they were less than human and
undeserving of liberty and freedom. Everyone accepts the idea that the oppression of slaves was
rooted in the class relations of exploitation under that system. Fewer recognize that under
capitalism, wage slavery is the pivot around which all other inequalities and oppressions turn.
Capitalism used racism to justify plunder, conquest and slavery, but as Karl Marx pointed out, it
also used racism to divide and rule--to pit one section of the working class against another and
thereby blunt class consciousness. To claim, as Marxists do, that racism is a product of
capitalism is not to deny or diminish its importance or impact in American society. It is simply
to explain its origins and the reasons for its perpetuation. Many on the left today talk about class
as if it is one of many oppressions, often describing it as "classism." What people are really
referring to as "classism" is elitism or snobbery, and not the fundamental organization of society
under capitalism. Moreover, it is popular today to talk about various oppressions, including
class, as intersecting. While it is true that oppressions can reinforce and compound each other,
they are born out of the material relations shaped by capitalism and the economic exploitation
that is at the heart of capitalist society. In other words, it is the material and economic structure
of society that gave rise to a range of ideas and ideologies to justify, explain and help perpetuate
that order. In the United States, racism is the most important of those ideologies. Despite the
widespread beliefs to the contrary of his critics, Karl Marx himself was well aware of the
centrality of race under capitalism. While Marx did not write extensively on the question of
slavery and its racial impact in societies specifically, he did write about the way in which

European capitalism emerged because of its pilfering, rape and destruction, famously writing:
The discovery of gold and silver in America, the extirpation, enslavement and entombment in
mines of the aboriginal population, the beginning of the conquest and looting of the East Indies,
the turning of Africa into a warren for the commercial hunting of Black skins, signalized the rosy
dawn of the era of capitalist production. He also recognized the extent to which slavery was
central to the world economy. He wrote: Direct slavery is just as much the pivot of bourgeois
industry as machinery, credits, etc. Without slavery you have no cotton; without cotton you have
no modern industry. It is slavery that has given the colonies their value; it is the colonies that
have created world trade, and it is world trade that is the pre-condition of large-scale industry.
Thus slavery is an economic category of the greatest importance. Without slavery North
America, the most progressive of countries, would be transformed into a patriarchal country.
Wipe out North America from the map of the world, and you will have anarchy--the complete
decay of modern commerce and civilization. Cause slavery to disappear and you will have wiped
America off the map of nations. Thus slavery, because it is an economic category, has always
existed among the institutions of the peoples. Modern nations have been able only to disguise
slavery in their own countries, but they have imposed it without disguise upon the New World.
Thus, there is a fundamental understanding of the centrality of slave labor in the national and
international economy. But what about race? Despite the dearth of Marx's own writing on race
in particular, one might look at Marx's correspondence and deliberations on the American Civil
War to draw conclusions as to whether Marx was as dogmatically focused on purely economic
issues as his critics make him out be. One must raise the question: If Marx was reductionist, how
is his unabashed support and involvement in abolitionist struggles in England explained? If
Marx was truly an economic reductionist, he might have surmised that slavery and capitalism
were incompatible, and simply waited for slavery to whither away. W.E.B. Du Bois in his Marxist
tome Black Reconstruction, quotes at length a letter penned by Marx as the head of the
International Workingmen's Association, written to Abraham Lincoln in 1864 in the midst of the
Civil War:

Identity politics ignores the material realities of class-based

oppression. Only Marxism, through an analysis of the systemic
benefits of oppression, can equip us with the tools to holistically
examine oppression and generate the cohesive political will to create
real change.
International Socialist Review 2008 (The ISR is dedicated to advancing socialist theory and
practice in the United States The Politics of Identity February 2008 ISR Issue 57
http://www.isreview.org/issues/57/feat-identity.shtml accessed 7.11.14 .nt)
The entire element of social class is missing from the theory of identity politics.
The same analysis that assumes Barack Obama shares a fundamental interest
with all African Americans in ending racism also places all straight white men in
the enemy camp, whatever their social class. Yet, the class divide has rarely been more
obvious than in the United States today, where income and class inequality is higher than at any
time since 1929, immediately before the onset of the Great Depression.10 It is plain to see that
the rich obtain their enormous wealth at the expense of those who work for them to produce
their profits, a process known as exploitation in Marxist parlance. Class inequality is not a
side issue, but rather the main byproduct of exploitation, the driving force of the
capitalist system. Class inequality is currently worsening by the minute , as the
economy edges its way toward a deep recession. Yet the theory of identity politics barely

acknowledges the importance of class inequality, which is usually reduced to a

label known as classisma problem of snobbery, or personal attitude. This,
again, should be confronted when it occurs, but such confrontations do not change the system
that relies upon class exploitation. In contrast to the inconsistencies and contradictions of
identity politics, a class analysis bases itself on materialisma concrete and
objective measure of systemic benefits derived from racism, sexism, and
homophobia. In short, the ruling class has an objective interest in upholding the
capitalist system, which is based upon both oppression and exploitation, while the
working class has an objective interest in overthrowing it . For the special oppression
of women, Blacks, Latinos, other racially oppressed populations, and the LGBT community
actually serves to increase the level of exploitation and oppression of the working class as a
whole. The ruling class has always relied upon a divide and conquer strategy to
maintain its rule, aimed at keeping all the exploited and oppressed fighting against
each other instead of uniting and fighting against their real enemy. At the most basic
material level, no one group of workers ever benefits from particular forms of oppression. The
historic role of racism in the U.S. provides perhaps the clearest example. The prevailing view is
that if Black workers get a smaller piece of the pie, then white workers get a bigger piece of it. In
fact, the opposite is true. In the South, where racism and segregation have traditionally been the
strongest, white workers have historically earned lower wages than Black workers in the
North.11 The same dynamic holds true for men and women workers. When lower paid women
workers enter an occupation, such as clerical work, in large numbers the wages in that
occupation tend to fall. The dynamic is straightforward: Whenever capitalists can force a
higher paid group of workers to compete with a lower paid group, wages tend to
drop. The same dynamic also holds for the global capitalist system. When U.S.
capitalists force their workers into competition with workers in the poorest
countries, U.S. workers wages do not rise; they fall . And that is precisely why U.S.
workers wages have been falling in recent years. The only beneficiaries are capitalists, who earn
bigger profits, while ensuring the survival of the rule of the profit system. It is also important to
recognize that all working-class people suffer from some forms of oppression. Workers pay
much higher proportions of their incomes in taxes than rich people and have far less leisure
time; working-class schools are underfunded and overcrowded, poorer neighborhoods are more
run-down, and the streets have more potholes. Perhaps most significantly, prevailing ideology
regards workers as generally too stupid to run societyassuming this is better left to the
experts, dooming the vast majority of workers to a lifetime of alienated labor. So oppression
is something that even most white male workers suffer to some degree. If one
were to compare the self-confidence of the vast majority of white male workers to
that of the arrogant Hillary Clinton or Condoleezza Rice, it would be clear that
something more than personal politics is a determining factor in oppression. The
problem is systemic. The point here is not at all to trivialize racism, sexism, or
homophobiabut to understand that the entire working class faces oppression and has an
objective interest in ending it. To be sure, workers dont always realize this . Male workers
can behave in an utterly sexist manner ; white workersmale and femalecan embrace
racism; and straight workersBlack, white, and Latinocan be completely homophobic. But

such behaviors are subjective they vary from individual to individual and, unlike
objective interests that remain the same, subjective factors change according to changing
circumstances. Most important among these is the Marxist concept of false consciousness. The
definition of false consciousness is straightforward: whenever workers accept rulingclass ideologies, including racism, sexism, and homophobia, they are acting
against their own class interestsprecisely because these ideas keep workers
fighting against each other . False consciousness is not unique to white, male workers.

Identity as both the means and ends for politics prevents communal
discussion and further forecloses possibility for individual
development. Capital formulates all identity and must be our starting
point for liberation.
Rectenwald 13 (Michael, Editor at the North Star Magazine a magazine dedicated to
examining radical politics, from social democracy to anarchy Whats Wrong With Identity
Politics (and Intersectionality Theory)? A Response to Mark Fishers Exiting the Vampire
Castle (And Its Critics) http://www.thenorthstar.info/?p=11411 December 2, 2013 accessed
7/13/14 .nt)
Much better in this regard is a longer article by the feminist Marxist blogging at Unity and
Struggle: I Am a Woman and a Human: A Marxist-Feminist Critique of Intersectionality
Theory. Here, while some unfortunate lapses into a humanist essentialism are apparent, the
author otherwise argues rather convincingly that identity groups , such as straight white
man, gay black man, lesbian black woman, trans* person, etc., are not natural
categories into which people are born and sorted. Rather, they are relatively
recent formations possible only under capitalism, equivalent to occupations with
their own forms of alienation attendant upon the division of labor. As Marx wrote in
The German Ideology, as soon as the distribution of labour comes into being, each
man has a particular, exclusive sphere of activity, which is forced upon him and
from which he cannot escape. Similarly, identity, like an occupation, is a trap, because
it curtails human potential and bars workers from participation in the social
totality as fully developing individuals. Identities are reified social categories from which
we should emerge, not within which we should be compelled to remain. The problem with
identity politics, then, is that it is one-sided and undialectical . It treats identities
as static entities, and its methods only serve to further reify those categories. It
aims to liberate identity groups (or members thereof) qua identity groups (or individuals),
rather than aiming to liberate them from identity itself. Identity politics fails not
because it begins with various subaltern groups and aims at their liberation, but because
it ends with them and thus cannot deliver their liberation. It makes identities and
their equality with other privileged groups the basis of political activity, rather
than making the overcoming of the alienated identity, for themselves and all
identity groups, the goal. The abolition of the one-sidedness of identity as worker,
woman, man, or what have you represents real human emancipation. Always failing this,

identity politics settles for mere linguistic emancipation, which is offered (and policed so
assiduously, as Fisher notes) by the defenders of the sanctuary of identity. As I suggested above,
the most common response to Fishers article has been that his position is explicable strictly in
terms of his identity . No sooner does one make a critique of identity politics, than is
ones identity deemed the cause of said critique . It is as if identity explains the
argument itself, and causes it. Once identity is deemed the actual causal factor of
a statement, nothing that is said means what it says. Everything is explicable only
in terms of identity, and the content of the statement becomes identity itself. Once
set, identity is a trap from which no one escapes . Of course, such defenses are circular,
reverting to that which is being critiqued to explain those doing the critiquing.

But theory like this , or any other, as the author of I am a Woman suggests, does not
appear out of thin air. Rather, it is produced in relation to the social relations of
production and the overall social relations themselves: There was no revolution
in the US in 1968. The advances of Black Power, womens liberation, gay liberation, and
the movements themselves, have been absorbed into capital. Since the 1970s,
academia has had a stronghold on theory. A nonexistent class struggle leaves a
vacuum of theoretical production and academic intellectuals have had nothing to
draw on except for the identity politics of the past. But , identity politics has not
since been absorbed into capital, as suggested in the quote above . As forms of
alienated labor, capitalist relations have always determined them. They have been
the products of capitalism from the outset. By treating such categories as ends in
themselves, therefore, a politics based on identities necessarily leads down the
blind alley of reification. That is, such politics, even when successful, necessarily
ends at the limits of identity itself. The problem is , while theoretically , we might all
wake up tomorrow to changed identities, or to changed conditions for our identities,
we would still be exploited under capitalism. Running the circuits of capital from
production through consumption, identity can only lead us back to the office, the factory, or the
streets, allowing at best our coalescence around particular consumer cultures. Finally, as I
mentioned above, Fisher claimed that while promising a politics of collectivities , identity
politics is actually individualistic. One might wonder how he arrives at such a statement,
especially since he merely asserts it rather than arguing it. He could have argued that because
identity politics and intersectionality focus on difference and its articulations, the
divisions are potentially endless, but necessarily extend to differences not only
between groups, but also between individuals. Ones display of the
characteristics becomes a requirement for the politics of identity. Identity politics
requires identification, which requires signaling of individual membership by
virtue of particular characteristics. The understanding and appreciation of individual
difference is surely not a liability in itself, by any stretch. Nor does understanding and
appreciation necessarily entail an individualistic ideological and political agenda. But because
identity is the object rather than merely the starting point, the ends rather than only the means

of collectivity, identity politics continually devolves into the articulation of the requirements for
group membership, and thus, to the individual. This individualism extends to those whose
privilege differentiates them from the identity groups in question. That is, each encounter with
the group involves the articulation of the characteristics of the group, and the evaluation of all
comers on the basis of such characteristics. Whether or not this involves the imputation of guilt
to non-members is a question of particular circumstances, and likewise, cannot be generalized
without qualification. But identity politics does involve a linguistic policing around various
identity formations, not only to determine eligibility for membership, but as importantly, to
guard against the ill treatment of said group and its members as representatives thereof. Of
course, any political movement on the left worthy of support will defend those subject to various
forms of discrimination and abuse. But in the case of identity politics, the defense is of
the group and its individual members as such, as particular identities , for the
maintenance and continuation of said identities, and not for their liberation from
the liabilities that all identities necessarily entail. Thus, identity politics is
exclusionary and divisive, continually falling back on difference in order to
establish group identity and cohesion.

Information Sharing
Information sharing is a tool of the capitalist system and key to the
imperialist strategy
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapyer 6, pgs 102-103, 2009//SRSL)

Information warfare is a key imperialist strategy and modus operandi of capitalism; so is 'enfraudening the public sphere'. 'Enfraudening the public sphere' is
a term coined by David Geoffrey Smith (Smith, 2003, p. 488-489) to describe 'not just simple
or single acts of deception, cheating or misrepre- sentation' (which may be described as 'defrauding'),
but rather 'a more gen- eralized active conditioning of the public sphere through
systemized lying, deception and misrepresentation'. The major strength of transmodernism, I would argue,
lies in its argu- ment that European philosophers still are not facing the historical responsi- bilities of their legacies (Smith, 2004, p. 644). As I argued
elsewhere (Cole, 2008d), transmodernism

makes an important contribution to an understanding of the legacy of the European invasion of the Americas because it reveals
how the imperialism in which contemporary U.S. foreign policy is currently
engaged has a specific and long-standing genealogy. Smith (2003, p. 489) argues that the Bush

Administration's 'war on ter- ror' was used to veil long-standing, but now highly intensified, global impe- rial aims. Following McMurtry (1998, p. 192),
he suggests that, under these practices, knowledge becomes 'an absurd expression' (Smith, 2003, p. 489). Again, following McMurtry (2002, p. 55),
Smith (2003, pp. 493-494) argues that the corporate structure ofthe global economy (dominated by the United States, particularly through its
petroleum corporations) 'has no life co-ordinates in its regulating paradigm' and is structured to misrepresent its indifference to human life as "lifeserving"'. Thus

we have terror in the name of anti-terrorism; war in the name of peace

seeking. Accordingly, U.S. secre- tary ofstate, Colin Powell (2003) was able to declare with a straight face and in a matter-of-fact tone that the
'Millennium Challenge Account' ofthe Bush administration was to install 'freely elected democracies' all over the world, under 'one standard for the
world' which is 'the free market system...prac- ticed correctly' (cited in Smith, 2003, p. 494). This

provides the justifica- tion

for the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children since 1990 through
NA TO bombing and the destruction of the public infrastructure (water, healthcare, etc.). This
slaughter has, of course, taken on a new dimen- sion since the March 2003 invasion and occupation oflraq. Such justification is also given for the
destabilization of democratically elected governments throughout Latin America, Africa and Asia (Smith, 2003, p. 494). Smith (2003, p. 494)
describes this rhetorical

process as enantiomorphic- whereby a claim is made to act in a

certain way, when one actually acts in the opposite way. Enantiomorphism
reached its zenith, I would argue, in the absurd claim nurtured by Bush and Blair
that the invasion and occupa- tion of Iraq was necessary because Saddam Hussein
had weapons of mass destruction, which he was going to use on the West. There were also
reason- able claims made that he tortured his people and was anti-democratic. The Americans and their allies were
going there, we were told, to find the weap- ons of mass destruction, stop the
people being tortured, and bring democ- racy. The reality is, of course, that not only did Saddam have no weapons
of mass destruction (it is the Americans who have such weapons, and remain the only country that has dropped atomic bombs in warfare) but the
Americans and the British have continued the torture (see later in this chapter); and upheld the lack of democracy.2

Information sharing is a tool of the capitalist system and key to the

imperialist strategy
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the
Centre for Education for Social Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK
(Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response, chapyer 6, pgs 102-103,
2009//SRSL)
Information warfare is a key imperialist strategy and modus operandi of cap- italism; so is
'enfraudening the public sphere'. 'Enfraudening the public sphere' is a term coined by David
Geoffrey Smith (Smith, 2003, p. 488-489) to describe 'not just simple or single acts of deception, cheating
or misrepre- sentation' (which may be described as 'defrauding'), but rather 'a more gen- eralized active
conditioning of the public sphere through systemized lying, deception and misrepresentation'.
The major strength of transmodernism, I would argue, lies in its argu- ment that European philosophers still are not facing the historical responsi-

bilities of their legacies (Smith, 2004, p. 644). As I argued elsewhere (Cole, 2008d), transmodernism

makes an important
contribution to an under- standing of the legacy of the European invasion of the Americas
because it reveals how the imperialism in which contemporary U.S. foreign policy is currently
engaged has a specific and long-standing genealogy. Smith (2003, p. 489) argues that the Bush Administration's 'war on
ter- ror' was used to veil long-standing, but now highly intensified, global impe- rial aims. Following McMurtry (1998, p. 192), he suggests that, under
these practices, knowledge becomes 'an absurd expression' (Smith, 2003, p. 489). Again, following McMurtry (2002, p. 55), Smith (2003, pp. 493-494)
argues that the corporate structure ofthe global economy (dominated by the United States, particularly through its petroleum corporations) 'has no life
co-ordinates in its regulating paradigm' and is structured to misrepresent its indifference to human life as "life-serving"'. Thus

we have terror

in the name of anti-terrorism; war in the name of peace seeking. Accordingly, U.S. secre- tary ofstate, Colin Powell

(2003) was able to declare with a straight face and in a matter-of-fact tone that the 'Millennium Challenge Account' ofthe Bush administration was to
install 'freely elected democracies' all over the world, under 'one standard for the world' which is 'the free market system...prac- ticed correctly' (cited in
Smith, 2003, p. 494). This

provides the justifica- tion for the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi
children since 1990 through NA TO bombing and the destruction of the public infrastructure
(water, healthcare, etc.). This slaughter has, of course, taken on a new dimen- sion since the March 2003 invasion and occupation oflraq. Such
justification is also given for the destabilization of democratically elected governments throughout Latin America, Africa and Asia (Smith, 2003, p.
494). Smith (2003, p. 494) describes this rhetorical

process as enantiomorphic- whereby a claim is made to act

in a certain way, when one actually acts in the opposite way. Enantiomorphism reached its
zenith, I would argue, in the absurd claim nurtured by Bush and Blair that the invasion and
occupa- tion of Iraq was necessary because Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction,
which he was going to use on the West. There were also reason- able claims made that he tortured his people and was antidemocratic. The Americans and their allies were going there, we were told, to find the weap- ons of
mass destruction, stop the people being tortured, and bring democ- racy. The reality is, of course, that not only
did Saddam have no weapons of mass destruction (it is the Americans who have such weapons, and remain the only country that has dropped atomic
bombs in warfare) but the Americans and the British have continued the torture (see later in this chapter); and upheld the lack of democracy.2

Intersectionality/Hooks
Their focus on black womanhood and rejection of universal humanity
sanitizes neoliberalism
Eve Mitchell, http://www.thenorthstar.info/?p=11425 12-2-13 (Member Unity and Struggle " Unity and Struggle began in
2003 among a number of activists primarily involved in anti-Israeli apartheid work. Searching for a means to deepen our association
and build on our experiences we formed a small grouping of people, which provided the basis for further discussion and support
organizing in other areas important to us. Some of the areas of work we are or have been involved in include labor, anti-budget cuts
in the schools, anti-racist, anti-apartheid, queer liberation work, as well as around public transportation. "
Furthermore, this individualism is characteristic of the current social moment. As left communist theorist Loren Goldner has
theorized, capitalism has been in perpetual crisis for the last 40 years, which has been absorbed in

appearance through neoliberal strategies (among others). Over time, capital is forced to invest in machines over

workers in order to keep up with the competitive production process. As a result, workers are expelled from the production process.
We can see this most clearly in a place like Detroit, where automation combined with deindustrialization left hundreds of thousands
jobless. The effects of this contradiction of capitalism is that workers are forced into precarious working

situations, jumping from gig to gig in order to make enough money to reproduce themselves.
Goldner refers to this condition as the atomized individual worker. As Goldner has written elsewhere, this
increased individualism leads to a politics of difference, where women, queers, people of color,
etc., have nothing in common with one another. Intersectionality theorists correctly identified and critiqued this
problem with identity politics. For example, bell hooks, in a polemic against liberal feminist Betty Friedan,
writes, Friedan was a principal shaper of contemporary feminist thought. Significantly, the one-dimensional perspective on
womens reality presented in her book became a marked feature of the contemporary feminist movement. Like Friedan before them,

white women who dominate feminist discourse today rarely question whether or not their
perspective on womens reality is true to the lived experiences of women as a collective group . Nor
are they aware of the extent to which their perspectives reflect race and class biases (3). hooks is correct to say that
basing an entire politics on one particular experience, or a set of particular differences, under capitalism
is problematic. However, intersectionality theory replicates this problem by simply
adding particular moments, or determinant points ; hooks goes on to argue for race and
class inclusion in a feminist analysis. Similarly, theories of an interlocking matrix of
oppressions, simply create a list of naturalized identities, abstracted from their
material and historical context . This methodology is just as ahistorical and antisocial as
Betty Friedans. Again, patriarchy and white supremacy are not objects or institutions that exist
throughout history; they are particular expressions of our labor, our life-activity, that are
conditioned by (and in turn, condition) our mode of production. In Capital, Marx describes labor as the
metabolism between humans and the external world; patriarchy and white supremacy, as
products of our labor, are also the conditions in which we labor. We are constantly interacting with the
world, changing the world and changing ourselves through our metabolic labor. So patriarchy and white supremacy,
like all social relations of labor, change and transform. Patriarchy under capitalism takes a specific form that is
different from gendered relations under feudalism, or tribalism, etc. There will be overlap and similarities in how patriarchy is
expressed under different modes of production. After all, the objective conditions of feudalism laid the foundation for early
capitalism, which laid the foundation for industrial capitalism, etc. However, this similarity and overlap does not mean that
particular, patriarchal relations transcend the mode of production. For example, under both feudalism and capitalism there are
gendered relations within a nuclear family, though these relations took very different forms particular to the mode of production. As
Silvia Federici describes, within the feudal family there was little differentiation between men and women. She writes, since work
on the servile farm was organized on a subsistence basis, the sexual division of labor in it was less pronounced and less
discriminating than the capitalist farm. Women worked in the fields, in addition to raising children, cooking, washing, spinning,
and keeping an herb garden; their domestic activities were not devalued and did not involve different social relations from those of
men, as they would later, in a money-economy, when housework would cease to be viewed as real work (25). A historical

understanding of patriarchy needs to understand patriarchy from within a set of social relations
based on the form of labor. In other words, we cannot understand the form of appearance,
womanhood, apart from the essence, a universal human.

Nature
Capitalism penetrates nature for profit and the affirmative is no
different
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapyer 6, pgs 99-100, 2009//SRSL)

The unrelenting abuse of nature, viewed as a resource to plunder by global

neoliberal capitalism, has had disastrous consequences. Millions of poor people have been driven off their land, while whole
areas of agricultural land have been damaged, and rain forests destroyed by mining, logging and oil companies. Our health is seriously at risk by the
food we eat, genes are being engineered and modified, and 'global warming' is
threatening the survival of life on the planet. Elsewhere (Cole, 2008d, pp. 90-96; see also Feldman and Lotz, 2004) I have dealt with the

effects of environmental destruction under the following headings: Unhealthy Food; Genetic Modification; the Destruction ofResources; and Climate Change. I have argued that the food that we eat in 'developed'
countries is unhealthier than ever before, and that it is estimated that 70 percent of the 20 million global annual food adver- tising budget is used to promote (unhealthy) soft drinks, sweets and snacks (Feldman

I further noted that the last twenty-five years or so has seen a dramatic
extension and deepening of global capitalism's penetration of nature for profit. For
and Lotz, 2004, p. 129).

example, genetic modification, having first occurred in 1973, is an unprecedented incursion. Moreover, this knowledge is being privatized through patents on genes (Feldman and Lotz, 2004, p. ll8). Paul Gilroy

these developments as the 'corporate control of the substance oflife

itself', 'linking 'the colonization of territory and human beings with the
colonization of all life'. Jeremy Rifkin, 1999, cited in Feldman and Lotz, 2004, p. 137, has summed up the dangers of genetic
engineering as a whole, where: a] handful of corporations, research institutions
and governments could hold patents on virtually all 100,000 genes that make up
the blueprint of the human race, as well as the cells, organs, and tissues that
comprise the human body. They may also own similar patents on thousands of
micro-organisms, plants and animals, allowing them unprecedented power to
dictate the terms by which we and future generations will live our lives With
respect to the destruction of resource, I pointed out how intensive farming in the
last 60 years and the turn to industrialized agriculture under current globalization
have resulted in ecological catastrophe. Of particular concern is the destruction of
rainforests, home to more species of plants and animals than the rest of the world
put together. The drilling and produc- tion of oil is also a great threat to large areas
of rainforests. Burning oil and other fossil fuels pollutes the atmosphere, and contributes to global warming and climate change, one of the greatest threats to the survival of the all the
(2004, p. 84) has described

inhabitants, and indeed all living things on our planet. Glaciers in Greenland are slipping into the sea at a rate that doubled between 1996 and 2000, and the Antarctic ice cap, which holds 70 per- cent of the
world's water, is now losing water at the same rate as Greenland (Ward, 2006, p. 12).

global warming is indisputable.

The causal role ofneoliberal global capitalism in

An annual growth rate (GNP) of 3 percent (the accepted rate for the developed world) means that production is doubled every 24

'the capitalist system

... is incapable of downsizing except by means of destructive slump or war'. As
argued earlier, capitalism is out of control 'set on a trajectory, the "trajectory of
production" ... powered not simply by value but by the "constant expansion of
surplus value"' (Postone, 1996, p. 308, cited in Rikowski, 2001, p. ll). (Rikowski's emphasis) Petroleum is the main fuel used by consumers. The connection
between increased fossil fuel use and imperialist adventures in oil-rich countries
is an obvious one. One of the primary reasons for U.S. imperial expansion is, of
course, to control access to, and the marketing of oil (the other being U.S. capitalist hegemony). This, in turn ,
years, and there is a close correlation between GNP and the rate of increased fossil fuel use (Kinnear and Barlow, 2005). As Phil Ward (2005, p. 14) puts it,

creates further environmental degrada- tion and destruction, both in the United
States, and worldwide. I will now consider the role of the 'New Imperialism' in the
twenty-first century, and, in the last chapter of this volume, will argue the case for
a study ofimperialisms to be a central feature of the curriculum . Ellen Meiksins Wood (2003, p. 134) has
Actually existing globalization .. . means the opening
of subordinate econo- mies and their vulnerability to imperial capital, while the
imperial economy remains sheltered as much as possible from the adverse effects.
captured succinctly globalization's current imperialist manifestations:

Globalization has nothing to do with free trade. On the contrary, it is about the careful control of trading conditions in the interest of imperial capital (cited in McLaren and Farahmandpur, 2005, p. 30)
While globalization is used to further the interests of capitalists and their
supporters per se, it is often similarly used ideologically to justify the New
Imperial Project. On September 17, 2002, a document entitled National Security Strategy of the United States of America (NSSUSA) was released which laid bare U.S. global strategy in
the most startling terms (Smith, 2003, p. 491). As transmodernist, David Geoffrey Smith points out, the Report heralds a 'single
sustainable model for national success: freedom, democ- racy and free enterprise'.
Europe is to be kept subordinate to, and depen- dent on, U.S. power, NATO is to be
reshaped as a global interventionist force under U.S. leadership, and American
national security is claimed to be dependent on the absence ofany other great
power. The Report also refers to 'information warfare', whereby deliberate lies are spread as a weapon of war. Apparently, a secret army has been established to provoke terrorist attacks, which would
then justify 'counter attack' by U.S. forces on countries that could be announced as 'harboring terrorists' (The Research Unit for Political Economy (RUPE), 2003, pp. 67-78, cited in Smith, 2003, pp. 491-492).
While the NSSUSA states that American diplomats are to be retrained as 'viceroys' capable of governing client states ((RUPE), 2003 cited in Smith, 2003, p. 491), the New Imperialism, in reality, no longer seeks
direct terri- torial control ofthe rest ofthe world, as did British Imperialism for example, but instead relies on 'vassal regimes' (Bello, 2001, cited in Smith, 2003, p. 494) to do its bidding. This is because capital is

Writing from a liberal perspective

now accumulated via the control of markets, rather than by sovereignty over territories.
, Michael Lind (2004, p. 5) points
out that this does not stop many neo-Conservatives in the United States hanker- ing after British Imperialism (and in particular the young Winston Churchill) as their model. British neo-Conservative popular
historian and TV presenter Niall Ferguson, for whom the British Empire was relatively benevolent, has similar views. In a speech in 2004, he argued that the American Empire which 'has the potential to do great
good' needs to learn from the lessons of the British Empire. First it needs to export capital and to invest in its colonies; second, people from the United States need to settle permanently in its colonies; third, there
must be a commitment to imperialism; fourth there must be collaboration with local elites. Success can only come, he con- cludes ifthe Americans are prepared to stay (Ferguson, 2004). George Bush and Tony
Blair were, of course, pivotal in extending and consolidating U. imperialism. Ferguson (2005) argued that Bush is an 'idealist realist' who is 'clearly open to serious intellectual ideas'. Bush is a realist because he
belieYeJ that power is 'far more important than law in the relations between states. and an idealist because he wants to spread 'economic and political freedom around the world'. Bush, he goes on, has picked up
two main ideas from the academy, namely that free markets accelerate economic growth which make democracy more likely to succeed, and democracies are 'much less likely to make war than authoritarian

The lesson to be
learnt from that Empire is the need to stay longer. 'Elections are not everything'
and the danger posed to liberty in the United States, and on the imperial front, he
concludes, is less worrying than 'a decline in US power ... surely something about
which idealists and realists can agree'. Wall Street Journalist, Max Boot has gone so far as to state that 'Afghanistan and other troubled lands today cry
regimes'. Ferguson then offers the President a further idea. It helps to think of the U.S. Empire (Ferguson's words not mine) 'as a kind ofsequel to the British Empire'.

out for the sort of enlightened foreign administration provided by self-confident Englishmen in jodhpurs and pith helmets' (cited in Smith, 2003, p. 490) (see pp. 57-60 and p. llO of this volume for a discussion of
the imperialist views of Barack Obama; see also the Postscript to this volume).

The intrusion of EEzs is an example of postmodern imperialism

specifically the imperialism of neighbors approach
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapyer 6, pgs 103-104, 2009//SRSL)

In Cole, 2008d, pp. 98-100, I also discussed the 'postmodern fantasy' of Robert Cooper
(2002, p. 5).3 Briefly, Cooper argues that postmodern impe- rialism takes two forms.
The first is the voluntary imperialism of the global economy, where institutions
like the IMF and the World Bank provide help to states 'wishing to find their way
back into the global economy and into the virtuous circle of investment and
prosperity' (ibid.). If states wish to benefit, he goes on 'they must open themselves
up to the interference of international organizations and foreign states' (ibid.) (my
emphasis). Cooper (ibid.) refers to this as a new kind of imperialism, one which is
needed and is acceptable to what he refers to as 'a world of human rights and
cosmopol- itan values': an imperialism 'which, like all imperialism, aims to bring
order and organisation' [he does not mention exploitation and oppression] 'but which
rests today on the voluntary principle'. While '[w]ithin the postmod- ern world,
there are no security threats' ... 'that is to say, its members do not consider
invading each other' (p. 3), that world, according to Cooper has a right to invade others. The
'postmodern world' has a right to pre-emptive attack, deception and whatever else is necessary.
The second form ofpostmodern imperialism Cooper calls 'the imperial- ism
ofneighbours' (Cooper has in mind the European Union), where insta- bility 'in your
neighbourhood poses threats which no state can ignore'. It is not merely soldiers
that come from the international community; he argues, 'it is police, judges,
prison officers, central bankers and others' (my empha- sis). Between 1999 and 2001,
Cooper was Tony Blair's head of the Defence and Overseas Secretariat, in the British Cabinet
Office.

Slavery
Slavery is a uniquely bad lens for modern oppressionour ev is
comparativetheir fixation suppresses class inquiry and exports a
USA-centric historical narrative
Dave Hill, teaches at Middlesex University and is Visiting Professor of Critical Education Policy and Equality Studies at the
University of Limerick, Ireland. Culturalist and Materialist Explanations of Class and "Race", Cultural Logic 2009
http://clogic.eserver.org/2009/Hill.pdf
One of two major tenets of CRT that Cole (2008a, b, 2009; see also Cole and Maisuria (2007, 2009)) critically examine is CRTs

idea that the concept of white supremacy better expresses oppression in contemporary societies based on
race than does the concept of racism. Cole and Maisuria (and Cole) argue that Critical Race Theory
homogenises all white people together in positions of class power and privilege, which, of course,
is factually incorrect, both with respect to social class inequality in general, and, as will be shown
in later in this paper, with reference to xenoracialization. Cole and Maisuria (2007) continue, it is
certainly not white people as a whole who are in this hegemonic position, nor white people as a whole
who benefit from current education policy, or any other legislation. Indeed the white working class, as part of the
working class in general, consistently fares badly in the education system. Cole (2008a) notes that, in
focusing on issues of color and being divorced from matters related to capitalist requirements
with respect to the labour market, CRT is ill-equipped to analyse the discourse of xenoracism and
processes of xenoracialization. McGary (1999:91) points out that Black people have been used in ways that
white people have not. Youngs (2001) comment (with which I and Cole and Maisuria would concur) is that
McGarys observation may be true, but it does not mean that whites have not also been used.
Young continues, yes, whites may be used differently, but they are still used because that is the logic of
exploitative regimes people are used, that is to say, their labor is commodified and exchanged for profit. Young
continues, in his critique of McGary, that such a view disconnects black alienation from other social
relations; hence, it ultimately reifies race, and, in doing so, suppresses materialist inquiries
into the class logic of race. That is to say, the meaning of race is not to be found within its own
internal dynamics but rather in dialectical relation to and as an ideological justification of the
exploitative wage-labor economy. Critical Race Theory, and other similar theories of race salience, such as (Molefi
Kete Asante, and of Paul Gilroy (2001), critiqued in Young, 2006) are understandable, as Leonardo (2004) notes, in the USA, as a
salient subjective lens and understanding/analysis of felt (and indeed, of course, actual and widespread) oppression. As Leonardo
(2004), Young (2006), Cole and Maisuria (2007), and Cole (2008b) note, Critical Race Theory, just as earlier

theories such as that of Fanon and Negritude, do draw into the limelight, do expose and represent black
experience, humilation, oppression, racism. But they collude, just as much as race equivalence theorists such as
Michael W. Apple, in super-elevating subjective consciousness of one aspect of identity and
thereby occluding the (raced and gendered) classessential nature of capitalism and the
labour-capital relation. As such it seeks social democratic reformism, the winning of equal rights and
opportunities within a capitalist (albeit reformed) economy and society. As Young (2006) puts it, unlike
many commentators who engage race matters, I do not isolate these social sites and view race as a local
problem, which would lead to reformist measures along the lines of either legal reform or a cultural-ideological
battle to win the hearts and minds of people and thus keep the existing socioeconomic
arrangements intact . . . the eradication of race oppression also requires a totalizing
political project: the transformation of existing capitalism a system which produces
difference (the racial/gender division of labor) and accompanying ideological narratives that justify the
resulting social inequality. Hence, my project articulates a transformative theory of race a theory that reclaims
revolutionary class politics in the interests of contributing toward a post-racist society. Critical Race Theory seems
analytically flawed, to be based on the category error of assigning race as the primary form of
oppression in capitalist society, and to be substantially situationally specific to the USA,
with its horrific experience and legacy of slavery. It also seems to me to be a form of left radical
United States imperialist hegemonizing, that is, of USA-based academics projecting

on to other countries those experiences and analyses and policy perspectives that
derive most specifically from the USA experience of slavery and its contemporary
effects. I am very much aware of the existence and horrors of racism in, for example, Britain and Europe in general.18
Notwithstanding those horrors, the Critical Race Theory analysis would appear to have less significance and applicability in, for
example, Western and Eastern Europe, or, for example, India, Pakistan, and Nepal, than in the USA.

U.S.-centrism
U.S. cultural politics take an ivory tower approach to difference and
representation while ignoring the material violence of the capitalist
system they further
Scatamburlo-DAnnibale 3 (Valerie Scatamburlo-DAnnibale Professor at the University of Windsor, The
Strategic Centrality of Class in the Politics of Race and Difference, Cultural Studies Critical Methodologies, vol. 3 no. 2
(2003), pp. 148-175 // JJ)

It is remarkable, in our opinion, that so much of contemporary social theory has

largely abandoned the problems of labor and class analysis at a time when
capitalism is becoming more universal, more ruthless, and more deadly. The metaphor
of a contemporary tower of Babel seems appropriate hereacademics striking radical poses in seminar
rooms while remaining oblivious to the possi- bility that their seemingly radical
discursive maneuvers do nothing to further the struggles against oppression and
exploitation which continue to be real, material and not merely discursive
problems of the contemporary world (Dirlik, 1997, p.176). Harvey (1998) has indicted the new academic

entrepre- neurs, the masters of theory-in-and-for-itself whose discourse radicalism has deftly sidestepped the enduring
conundrums of class struggle and who have, against a sobering background of cheapened discourse and opportunis- tic politics,
been stripped of their self-advertised radicalism (pp.29-31). For years, they contested socialism, ridiculed Marxists, and
promoted their own alternative theories of liberatory politics, but now they have largely been reduced to the role of supplicants
in the most degraded form of pluralist poli- Tics imaginable (pp.30-31). As they pursue the politics of

difference, the class war rages unabated, and they seem either unwilling or
unable to focus on the unprecedented economic carnage occurring around the
globe (pp. 30-31). Harveys searing criticism suggests that post-Marxists have been busy fiddling while Rome burns, and his

comments echo those made by Marx (1978) in his critique of the Young Hegelians who were, in spite of their allegedly worldshattering statements, the staunchest conservatives (p. 149). Marx lamented that the Young Hegelians were simply fighting
phrases and that they failed to acknowledge that in offering only counterphrases, they were in no way combating the real
existing world but merely combating the phrases of the world. Taking a cue from Marx and substituting phrases with dis-
courses or resignifications, we would contend that the practitioners of ludic difference politics who

operate within exaggerated culturalist frameworks that privilege the realm of

representation as the primary arena of political struggle question some discourses
of power while legitimating others. 16 In their anath- ema towards totalization and
in their penchant for thematizing culture with a particularizing impulse that
domiciles class in the hinterland of a divertissement, they reinscribe racial
formations within the prevailing logic of capitalist social relations. Moreover, because
they generally lack a class perspec- tive, their gestures of radicalism are belied by
their own class positions. We agree with Reed (2000) who contended that cultural politics are class
politics insofar as they are manifestations within the political economy of
academic life and the left-liberal public sphere of the petit bourgeois, brokerage
politics of interest-group pluralism (p. xxii). Regardless of the radical-sounding patina that such
theorizing attempts to lay over this all-too-familiar worldview and practice (p. xxii), the paralysis and inconsequentiality of post-
al, culturalist discourses in the face of globalized capitalism are patently clear. As Ahmad (1997b) has contended, One may speak of
any number of disorientations and even oppressions, but one cultivates all kinds of politeness and indirection about the structure of
capitalist class relations in which those oppressions are embedded. To speak of any of that directly and simply is to be vulgar. In
this climate of Aesopian languages it is absolutely essential to reiterate that most things are a matter of class. That kind of

statement is . . . surprising only in a culture like that of the North American

university. . . . But it is precisely in that kind of culture that people need to hear such obvious truths. (p. 104 Ahmads

provocative observations imply that substantive analyses of global- ized class exploitation have, for the most part, been
marginalized by the kind of radicalism that has been instituted among the academic Left in North Amer- ica. He has further
suggested that although various post-Marxists have invited us to join their euphoric

celebrations honoring the decentering of capitalism and the abandonment of class

politics in favor of a post-al tomorrow filled with the proliferation of more and
more forms of difference, such formulations will never be able to challenge let
alone overturn capitalist universality (Ahmad, 1998, p. 22). Indeed, such gestures often

result in a pragmatic fetishization of particularity and difference that precludes

systemic critique, a serious analysis of capitalism, and coherent action. As such, Ahmad

invited us to ask anew, the proverbial question, What then, must be done? To this question, we offer no simple theoretical or
political prescriptions. Yet we would argue that if social change is the aim, as it has traditionally been for the Left, progressive
educa- tors and intellectuals must cease in displacing class analysis with the politics of difference, they must resuscitate a sustained
and unrelenting interrogation of capitalism in its globalized forms, and they must overcome the corrosive skepti- cism of those
narratives that have rendered visions of social transformation hopelessly impractical or obsolete.

Fixation on the black-white binary and U.S. race relations recreates

colonialism and undermines resistance through American
exceptionalism
ODriscoll 13 (Dnal ODriscoll, Creating an Anarchist Theory of Privilege, Dysophia: Anarchist Debates on Privilege,
vol. 4 (November 2013), pp. 54-56 // JJ)

Sticking with skin-colour as a useful example for the moment, what we have is a
very simplistic view of race that is used in many circles to overlook other issues.
For instance, by focusing on skin colour, other forms of racism and ethnic struggle are
glossed over e.g. inter-'white' racism in Northern Ireland; or against travellers and Eastern Europeans immigrants. The
reliance on particular forms of anti-racism theory has meant 'White' has become
synonymous with the privileged / hegemonic group which has the effect of creating
the belief among some activists that because some groups are white-skinned
means they cannot know racism, so denying their experience. In a similar
process, this binary can treat all 'non-whites' as a homogenous group whose
experience is universal that is of being oppressed. Inter-group tensions and racism are
likewise ignored. It allows people to ignore how social class and national culture
affects experience of racism for different peoples. Just because someone has an
attribute that confers privilege in some contexts, there are other factors which
mean they don't get those benefits in others. Their experience is not so much devalued as considered

non-existent. This is something commonly seen in the way 'white male' is used as a set phrase, yet also is played on in a classist
way, for example in discussions of 'chavs'. Experiences of patriarchy and economic powerlessness are relevant across all situations
of concern in privilege politics, and are just as destructive to people who fall into the broadly drawn 'oppressor' groups as they are
to those in the oppressed groups. I believe

this is in danger of becoming a form of cultural /

academic imperialism centred on the US experience , and emphasises why we

need to develop our own anarchist theory and practice of privilege theory. In particular,
the notion of 'whiteness' is very much based on US racial laws and is not
applicable to the situation in other parts of the world. It is rarely asked if the wholehearted
application to Europe is actually appropriate. The irony is that, in the UK at least, it is an imposition of identity by sections of the
anti-racist Left on oppressed populations who do not see themselves in those terms. Tariq Modood, in particular, points out how
inappropriate the terminology of 'white' and 'black' as political terms are for the experiences of Muslims and South Asians in
Europe (albeit, he is a liberal intellectual who relies on laws and states for solutions) 8 . (C) Status This simplistic

approach of binaries also means that individuals can focus on that aspect of their
life where they experience membership of an oppressed group and conveniently
ignore all those other aspects in which they experience privilege. Through our own political
critiques, anarchists readily recognise the notion of how different oppressions overlap ('intersectionality', in the jargon) and affect
people. However, often this intersectionality is only paid lip-service and anarchist are

often equally as much at fault as those with reformist / liberal politics when it
comes to privilege. Instead, we find individuals, anarchists included, who seek to protect
the advantages they have in life by emphasising the particular oppressed group
they belong to, even where they do not suffer disadvantage. The differences between disrespect

and oppression are blurred as it is ignored that oppression is specifically about disadvantages. The result is those with the loudest
voice claiming status in an inverse hierarchy of oppression, while quieter ones often get ignored. Thus, for example, we see working
class carers being abused by middle class disabled employers. Or the needs of a person with a hidden disability being ignored
because their ethnicity is white or they are cis-male. Action ceases to be about revolutionary change, but asserting that they are

members of an oppressed group regardless of context. One effect of this is a tendency towards separatism. It

is worth
citing at this point that obsession with identity is a problem in itself. As an example, at the

2012 Kln- Dsseldorf No Borders camp, migrants complained that a section of the European activists were so focused on dealing
with 'critical whiteness theory' that it came to dominate the camp at the expense of the needs of the migrants, whom the camp
was there to help. (D) Victimhood and Pacification A side-effect of the influence of the middle-class

liberal approach is encouragement of victimhood and pacification of those

suffering oppression. By constantly emphasising that those oppressed are victims,
they are disempowered from action. Yet at the same time, the oppressed are
expected to the source of radical social change. This vicious circle maintains the status quo. And where
oppressed groups have sought to break out of it, famously the Black Panthers or the militancy of the suffragist movement 9 , that

revolutionary history is denied or discretely written out of history. Expression and

definition is very much controlled by a middle-class narrative, and outbursts of
anger are neutered or discouraged as being counterproductive to the reformist
approaches that serve their needs. This 'pacification of the oppressed' aspect of the implementation of privilege
theory is pointed out in the article, Privilege Politics is Reformism, published by the Black Orchid Collective. 10
They argue it is being applied in a way that does not challenge the liberal-capitalist
structure of society. The aspirations of oppressed groups ceases to be to be about
radical social change and a fair, just society, but about getting access to the class
ladder. A focus on the individual makes it easier to ignore the wider impersonal
social structures which are just as important sources of oppression. So,
apparently liberatory politics end up reinforcing the very discriminations they
want to challenge through poor application of the politics, something that goes
right back to anti-colonisation struggles. 11 Failure to recognise the role of class politics in shaping the
theory is undermining it and is what Audrey Lorde warned of when she famously wrote The master's tools will never dismantle the
master's house. Sadly, I see privilege theory becoming a way of maintaining status in some

activist circles, where advocates of identity politics create in-groups based around
a particular identity, rather than perceiving a wider notion of solidarity (aka love &
caring) or recognising contexts. In parallel to what has happened with consensus decision making in many places, a
particular form of the theory is being taken up dogmatically and is being applied uncritically, undermining what it is seeking to
achieve. We see implicit hierarchies of oppression and a culture of seeing individuals as victims of oppression, thus denying them
histories of rebellion (many anarchist circles excepted) and even the ability to see themselves as agents of change. People become
entrenched in their positions and see those they are most naturally allied with as a threat, rather than seeking to incorporate them
in the solution. This is often closer to home than we like to admit how many working class groups are focused around men,
implicitly excluding women, arguing that class is more important than gender in revolutionary change? And vice versa...

Violence
Violence prevents coalescence of the movement to overthrow cap
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social
Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 7, pg 120, 2009//MG)
It is, in fact, capitalism that has created and continues to promote death and violence and terror on a global scale.

Inequalities in wealth and quality of life cause death and disease in capitalist
countries themselves, and the capitalist west's underdevelopment of most of the
rest of the world and the aforementioned massive disparity in wealth and health
has dire consequences (Hill and Kumar, 2009; Hill and Rosskam, 2009). In addition, imperialist conquest
historically and contemporaneously unleashes death, terror and destruction on a
colossal scale. Stalinism, and other atrocities, committed in the name of, but not in
the spirit of socialism, also shares this guilt, but as argued above, there is no inherent
reason why the historical perversities of Stalinism need to be repeated. As for the
violence entailed in future social revolution is concerned, this is, of course, an
unknown. However, as argued in Cole, 2008d, pp. 78-79, socialism is a majoritarian process not an
imposed event which is not dependent on violence. It is, of course, inconceivable that a
world social revolution would involve no violence, not least because of the
resistance of the dominant capitalist class . However, there are no reasons for violence
to be a strategic weapon. Anyone who has ever attended a mass socialist gathering,
e.g., Marxism 2008 in Britain (http://www.marxismfestival.org.uk/), can attest to the fact that violence is
not, in any way, an organizing tool of the socialist movement. Mass violence is the
province of world capitalism. Moreover, Marxists oppose terrorism unreservedly.
Terrorism is reactionary, in that it diverts attention away from the class struggle. It
militates against what Leon Trotsky has described as self-organization and self-education. Trotsky favored a different resolution to
the revenge desired by many who subscribe to terrorism. As he put it: The more 'effective' the terrorist acts,

the greater their impact, the more they reduce the interest of the masses in selforganisation and self-education ... To learn to see all the crimes against humanity,
all the indignities to which the human body and spirit are subjected, as the twisted
outgrowths and expressions of the existing social system, in order to direct all our
energies into a collective struggle against this system-that is the direction in which
the burning desire for revenge can find its highest moral satisfaction. (Trotsky, 1909)

Visibility
Fixation on the "ontological" nature of blackness in Afro-pessimism
produces a commodified politics of visibility. This shifts the field of
revolutionary struggle from the material (the street, the congress) to the
representational (identity, ideology). This sanitizes neoliberal market
froces by recasting struggle as the purest expression of freedomindividualized, divorced from collective yearning
Valerie Scatamburlo-DAnnibale PhD, Prof University of Windsor AND Peter McLaren PhD, Prof University
of California, Los Angeles The Strategic Centrality of Class in the Politics of Race and Difference Cultural Studies Critical
Methodologies, Volume 3 Number 2, 2003 148-175

Because post-al theories of difference often circumvent the material dimensions of difference and tend
to segregate questions of difference from analyses of class formation and capitalist social relations,
we contend that it is necessary to (re)conceptualize difference by drawing onMarxs materialist and historical
formulations. Difference needs to be understood as the product of social contradictions and in relation to political
and economic organization. Because systems of difference almost always involve relations of
domination and oppression, we must concern ourselves with the economies of relations of difference that
exist in specific contexts. Drawing on the Marxist concept of mediation enables us to unsettle the
categorical (and sometimes overly rigid) approaches to both class and difference for it was Marx himself who
warned against creating false dichotomies at the heart of our politicsthat it was absurd to choose between
consciousness and the world, subjectivity and social organization, personal or collective will, and historical or structural
determination. In a similar vein, it is equally absurd to see difference as a historical form of consciousness unconnected to class
formation, development of capital and class politics (Bannerji, 1995, p. 30). Bannerji has pointed to the need to historicize
difference in relation to the history and social organization of capital and class (inclusive of imperialist and colonialist legacies) and
to acknowledge the changing configurations of difference and otherness. Apprehending the meaning and function of

difference in this manner necessarily highlights the importance of exploring (a) the institutional and structural aspects of

difference; (b) the meanings and connotations that are attached to categories of difference; (c) how differences are produced out of,
and lived within, specific his- torical, social, and political formations; and (d) the production of difference in relation to the
complexities, contradictions, and exploitative relations of capitalism. Moreover, it presents a challenge to

identitarian understandings of difference based almost exclusively on questions of cultural and/or racial
hegemony. In such approaches, the answer to oppression often amounts to creating greater
cultural space for the formerly excluded to have their voices heard (represented). Much of
what is called the politics of difference is little more than a demand for an end to monocultural quarantine
and for inclusion into the metropolitan salons of bourgeois representation a
posture that reinscribes a neoliberal pluralist stance rooted in the ideology of free
market capitalism. In short, the political sphere is modeled on the marketplace, and freedom
amounts to the liberty of all vendors to display their different cultural goods. A paradigmatic

expression of this position is encapsulated in the following passage that champions a form of difference politics whose presumed aim
is to make social groups appear.Minority and immigrant ethnic groups have laid claim to the street as a legitimate forum for the
promotion and exhibition of traditional dress, food, and culture. . . . [This] is a politics of visibility and invisibility.
Because it

must deal with a tradition of representation that insists on subsuming varied social
practices to a standard norm, its struggle is as much on the page, screen . . . as it is at the
barricade and in the parliament, traditional forums of political intervention before the postmodern. (Fuery &
Mansfield, 2000, p. 150) This position fosters a fetishized understanding of difference in terms of
primordial and seemingly autonomous cultural identities and treats such differences as inherent,
as ontologically secure cultural traits of the individuals of particular cultural
communities. Rather than exploring the construction of difference within specific contexts mediated
by the conjunctural embeddedness of power differentials, we are instead presented with an overflowing
cornucopia of cultural particularities that serve as markers of ethnicity, race, group boundaries, and so forth.
In this instance, the discourse of difference operates ideologicallycultural recognition
derived from the rhetoric of tolerance averts our gaze from relations of production and
presents a strategy for attending to difference as solely an ethnic, racial, or cultural issue. What

advocates of such an approach fail to acknowledge is that the forces of diversity and difference are allowed to
flourish provided that they remain within the prevailing forms of capitalist social
arrangements. The neopluralism of difference politics cannot adequately pose a substantive
challenge to the productive system of capitalism that is able to accommodate a vast pluralism of ideas and
cultural practices. In fact, the post-al themes of identity, difference, diversity, and the like mesh quite nicely with
contemporary corporate interests precisely because they revere lifestyle the quest for,
and the cultivation of, the selfand often encourage the fetishization of identities in the marketplace as
they compete for visibility (Boggs, 2000; Field, 1997). Moreover, the uncritical, celebratory tone of
various forms of difference politics can also lead to some disturbing conclusions. For example, if we take to their
logical conclusion the statements that postmodern political activism fiercely contests the reduction of the other to the same, that
post-al narratives believe that difference needs to be recognized and respected at all levels (Fuery &Mansfield, 2000, p. 148), and
that the recognition of different subject positions is paramount (Mouffe, 1988, pp. 35-36), their political folly becomes clear.
Eagleton (1996) sardonically commented on the implications: Almost all postmodern theorists would seem to imagine

that difference, variability and heterogeneity are absolute goods, and it is a position I have long held myself. It has

always struck me as unduly impoverishing of British social life that we can muster a mere two or three fascist parties. . . . The
opinion that plurality is a good in itself is emptily formalistic and alarmingly unhistorical. (pp. 126127) The liberal pluralism manifest in discourses of difference
contestation, or contradiction. The inherent limitations

politics often means a plurality without conflict,

of this position are also evident if we turn our attention to

issues of class. Expanding on Eagletons observations and adopting the logic that seems to inform the unqualified celebration of
difference, one would be compelled to champion class differences as well. Presumably,

the differences between the

475 billionaires whose combined wealth now equals the combined yearly incomes of more than 50%
of the worlds population are to be celebrateda posturing that would undoubtedly lend itself to a triumphant
endorsement of capitalism and inequitable and exploitative conditions. San Juan (1995) noted that the cardinal flaw in
current instantiations of culturalism lies in its decapitation of discourses of intelligibility from
the politics of antagonistic relations. He framed the question quite pointedly: In a society stratified by uneven
property relations, by asymmetrical allocation of resources and of power, can there be equality of cultures and genuine toleration of
differences? (pp. 232233).

White Ally
The language of Ally proves a lack of solidarity, disproving
revolutionary potential of anti-oppression politics
Common Cause 6/6/14 (Anonymous, used to protect identity in the struggle, Lynchpin.ca, With Allies Like
These: Reflections on Privilege Reductionism, http://linchpin.ca/?q=content/allies-these-reflections-privilege-reductionism//JC)

The identity of ally (as someone who primarily identifies as engaging in struggle in support of
others) is another cornerstone of anti-oppression politics. According to a popular antioppression guide, an ally is a person who supports marginalized, silenced, or less
privileged groups. The fundamental pursuit of someone with privilege is the
quest to become a "good ally." It is considered fundamental to take leadership (usually
unquestionable) from representatives of oppressed groups and act as an ally to their struggles.
Innumerable lists, guides, and workshops have been produced to outline the steps and necessary
requirements for being an ally. The individual focus of the idea of ally in contrast to the
collective response of solidarity which used to occupy a similar place is
symptomatic of the general denigration of collective action by anti-oppression
politics.

White Supremacy
Use of white supremacy as a rallying point for anti-racism
entrenches racialized capitalismfails to explain non-color-coded
racismreject any perms
M. Cole, research professor in education and equality at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, 11-23-07
http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?storyCode=311222&sectioncode=26

The problem with standard critical race theory is the narrowness of its remit, says Mike Cole. One of the main
tenets of critical race theory is that "white supremacy" is the norm in societies rather than merely the province of
the racist right (the other major tenet is primacy of "race" over class). There are a number of significant problems
with this use of the term "white supremacy". The first is that it homogenises all white
people together in positions of power and privilege. Writing about the US, critical race theorist Charles
Mills acknowledges that not "all whites are better off than all non-whites, but ... as a statistical generalisation, the objective life
chances of whites are significantly better". While this is, of course, true, we should not lose sight of the life chances

of millions of working-class white people. To take poverty as one example, in the US, while it is the case that the

number of black people living below the poverty line is some three times that of whites, this still leaves more than 16 million "white
but not Hispanic" people living in poverty there. In the UK, there are similar indicators of a society underpinned by rampant colourcoded racism, with black people twice as poor as whites, and those of Pakistani and Bangladeshi origin more than three times as
poor as whites. Once again, however, this still leaves some 12 million poor white people in the UK. That such statistics are indicative
of racism, however, is beyond doubt, and to interpret them it is useful to employ the concept of "racialisation". Given that there is
widespread agreement among geneticists and social scientists that "race" is a meaningless concept, racialisation describes the
process by which people are falsely categorised into distinct "races". Statistics such as these are indicative of

racialised capitalism rather than white supremacy. A second problem with "white
supremacy" is that it is inherently unable to explain non-colour-coded racism. In the UK,
for example, this form of racism has been and is directed at the Irish and at gypsy/traveller communities.
There is also a well-documented history of anti-Semitism, too. It is also important to underline the fact that
Islamophobia is not necessarily triggered by skin colour. It is often sparked by one or more
(perceived) symbols of the Muslim faith. Finally, a new form of non- colour-coded racism has manifested itself recently in
the UK. This has all the hallmarks of traditional racism, but it is directed towards newly arrived groups of people. It has been
described by A. Sivanandan, director of the Institute of Race Relations, as "xeno-racism". It appears that there are some similarities
in the xeno-racialisation of Eastern European migrant workers and the racialisation of Asian and black workers in the immediate
postwar period, a point I address in my latest book. "White supremacy" is counterproductive as a

political unifier and rallying point against racism. John Preston concluded an article in The
Times Higher advocating critical race theory ("All shades of a wide white world", October 19) by citing the US journal
Race Traitor , which seeks the "abolition of the racial category 'white'". Elsewhere, Preston has argued "the
abolition of whiteness is ... not just an optional extra in terms of defeating capitalism (nor something which will be necessarily
abolished post-capitalism) but fundamental to the Marxist educational project as praxis". Indeed, for Preston, "the

abolition of capitalism and whiteness seem to be fundamentally connected in the current historical
circumstances of Western capitalist development". From my Marxist perspective, coupling the
"abolition of whiteness" to the "abolition of capitalism" is a worrying development
that, if it gained ground in Marxist theory, would most certainly further
undermine the Marxist project. I am not questioning the sincerity of the protagonists of "the abolition of
whiteness", nor suggesting in any way that they are anti-white people but merely questioning its extreme vulnerability to
misunderstanding. Anti-racists have made some progress in the UK at least in making anti- racism a mainstream rallying point, and
this is reflected, in part, in legislation. Even if it were a good idea, the chances of making "the abolition of

whiteness" a successful political unifier and rallying point against racism are virtually nonexistent. The usage of "white supremacy" should be restricted to its everyday meaning. To describe and analyse contemporary
racism we need a wide- ranging and fluid conception of racism. Only then can we fully understand its multiple manifestations and
work towards its eradication.

White supremacy is the manifestation of the relationship between

capitalism and racism
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pg 25, 2009//SRSL)

While, for Marxists, it is certainly the case that there has been a continuity of
racism for hundreds of years, the concept of 'white supremacy' does not in itself
explain this continuity, since it does not need to connect to modes of production
and developments in capitalism. It is true that Mills (1997) provides a wide-ranging
discussion of the history of economic exploitation, and that Preston (2007) argues that CRT
needs to be considered alongside Marxism. However, unlike Marxism, there is no a priori
need in CRT for- mulations to connect with capitalist modes of production. In
Marxist par- lance, the mode of production refers to the combination of forces
(human labor power and the means of production) and the relations of production
(primarily the relationship between the social classes). This combination means that the
way people relate to the physical world and the way people relate to each other are
bound together in historically specific, structural and necessary ways. As Marx
(1859) put it: The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic
struc- ture of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political
super- structure and to which correspond definite forms ofsocial consciousness.
The mode of production of material life conditions the general process of social,
political and intellectual life. Critical Race Theorists do not analyze these crucial
relationships. Thus Gillborn (e.g., 2005, 2006a) is able to make the case for CRT and
'white supremacy' without providing a discussion of the relationship of racism to
capitalism. The Marxist concept of racialization, however, does articulate with
modes of production. Examples of the ways in which it does this are discussed later in this
chapter.

Impact

Root Cause

Slavery
The claim that race produced slavery is an empirical onethus you
should judge the evidence for it based on historical fact, not abstract
theory. Most aff evidence is solely conclusionaryconsensus goes neg
Drescher 97 [Seymour, Department of History, University of Pittsburgh; Slavery & Abolition, 18: 3, 212 227]
Perhaps the best point of departure is the collective volume that emerged from the fortieth anniversary conference on Capitalism
and Slavery, held at Bellagio, Italy, and was published in 1987. The editors, Barbara L. Solow and Stanley L. Engeriran, divided the
non-biographical contributions into three parts, corresponding to three major hypotheses on the relationship between economic
development and slavery in the British empire. We may appropriately test the first hypothesis most briefly. Williams only briefly
broached the subject and his assessment has not been of major historiographical interest in the subsequent literature. Williams took
the position that economic factors rather than racism occupied pride of place in the switch to

African labour in the plantation Americas, that slavery 'was not born of racism' but rather
slavery led to racism. Although some recent interpretations make racial preferences and inhibitions central to the choice of
African labour, Williams's order of priorities, if not his either-or approach, is supported by a survey of
hundreds of articles. They show virtual unanimity on the primacy of economics in
accounting for the turn toward slave labour. Non-economic factors, such as race or religion, entered
into the development of New World slavery only as a limiting parameter. Such factors affected the historical

sequence by which entire human groups (Christians, Jews, Muslim North Africans, Native Americans) were excluded from liability
to enslavement in the Atlantic system. Since Williams published his book, the main change in the historiographical context of origins
is an increase in the number and variety of actors brought into the process. That broader context complicates the role of any
exclusively 'African' racial component of the slave trade. From the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries,

slavery, even the English colonial varieties, was hardly synonymous with Africans.
Nor were Africans synonymous with slaves. In the African sector of the Atlantic
system Europeans were forced to regard Africans (and Afro-Europeans) as autonomous
and even locally dominant participants in the slave trade. They were often dominant
militarily and were certainly dominant in terms of their massive presence and
limited vulnerability to local diseases. Even in the Americas, Africans did not arrive only as captives and
deracinated slaves.

Prefer Drescher - Capitalism predates the middle passage and it

fostered the ideologies that led to slavery
Schmidt-Nowara, professor of history Fordham University, 2
(Christopher, Big Questions and Answers: Three Histories of Slavery, the Slave Trade and the
Atlantic World, Social History, Vol. 27, No. 2, p. 210-217, MM)
Bold, but not always convincing. This

reader found the volume's most controversial thesis, that the use of
African slavery was an uneconomic decision guided by European racial and gender ideologies, particularly weak in its
demonstration. Eltis wants to show that the social and institutional factors that would have permitted widespread European enslavement were

in place in the early modern period (57-84). In doing so, he marshals impressive evidence about the various forms of coercive labour existing in early
modern western Europe, such as indenture and convict labour. Given the prevalence of overt coercion in Europe, he asks, why did European elites not
take the next step and enslave and transport Europeans in vast numbers? In doing so, he also examines and finds wanting explanations for African
slavery based on epidemiological and economic assumptions. Europeans adapted as well as Africans to New World climates, while the shipping costs
from Europe would have been cheaper than those from Africa. For Eltis, the explanation for this uneconomic behaviour lies in the realm of cultural
values that bound all Europeans regardless of their class position: What seems incontestable is that in regard to slavery the sense of the appropriate was
shared across social divisions and cannot easily be explained by ideological differences or power relationships among classes. Outrage at the treatment
of Africans was rarely expressed at any level of society before the late eighteenth century. . . . For elite and non-elite alike enslavement remained a fate
for which only non-Europeans were qualified. (83-4) Eltis's conclusion regarding a shared European racial identity and sense of racial supremacy is
evocative and cannot be dismissed easily, if at all. But what

this account lacks is sustained consideration of

alternative types of sources and historical approaches that might reinforce or modify it. Eltis makes an
inelegant leap from his counter-factual of mass European enslavement to his explanation of why
it did not take place; his claim of homogeneity of racial values reads more like an assertion than
a proof. For instance, there is little effort to flesh out the values he attributes to Europeans of the period,
largely because his study is short on the types of sources that historians employ to plumb the

beliefs of human cultures, such as pamphlets, broadsheets, autobiographies and memoirs, philosophical tracts or records of political and
religious rituals. It would be foolish to demand of Eltis that he use these sources himself after such meticulous research into economic history. But it is
quite reasonable to expect a more sophisticated engagement with historians who have reached alternative conclusions about early modern European
culture through different sources and methods. Readers of E. P. Thompson, Natalie Zemon Davis or Carlo Ginzburg will be surprised to learn that early
modern European society was so cohesive and homogenous in its values. They will also be dismayed by the indifference Eltis displays towards
questions of resistance and agency and his glib dismissal of class conflict and consciousness as useful analytical categories (84). Historians working in
the broader field of Atlantic history have also tended to see Europe as a contentious society, most notably Seymour Drescher, who sees

class
conflict in the industrialization process as a major factor in the rise of British anti-slavery. Peter

Linebaugh and Marcus Rediker have expanded the temporal and spatial dimensions of that conflict in their recent account of popular anti-slavery
sentiment and cross-racial alliances against slavery in the early modern Atlantic.5 This is not to say categorically that these scholars are correct and
Eltis wrong. Rather, to make his argument more robust and persuasive, Eltis needs to engage, not sidestep, the important scholarly literature that belies
his conclusions. Any explanation of the absence of European enslavement and the apparent indifference towards African slavery must take into account
the balance of political and social forces that produced some semblance of autonomy and liberty among the European working classes as well as
cultural assumptions about race and gender. Eltis s instinct about the cultural origins of African slavery in the Americas is plausible but, given the
narrow perspective from which he addresses the issue, his conclusion is not. Robin Blackburn's The Making of New World Slavery is more varied in its
approach and interpretation. While insisting, unlike Eltis, upon the driving force of 'civil society' in the construction of the plantation complex (6-12),
Blackburn none the less handles questions of ideology and politics with great care and insight. This multipronged explanatory method was also evident
in his earlier volume, The Overthrow of Colonial Slavery, 1776-1848, which today reads as perhaps the most cogent narrative of the forces at work in the
Atlantic world's 'age of revolution'. One of the qualities that makes The Overthrow so attractive is the intermixture of a trenchant analysis of the
political economy of war, empire, decolonization, abolitionism and slave rebellion with the invocation of a 'usable past' with which Blackburn
introduces the volume: Despite the mixed results of anti-slavery in this period the sacrifices of slave rebels, of radical abolitionists and of revolutionary
democrats were not in vain. They show how it was possible to challenge, and sometimes defeat, the oppression which grew as the horrible obverse of
the growth of human social capacities and powers in the Atlantic world of the early modern period. More generally they are of interest in illuminating
the ways in which, however incompletely or imperfectly, emancipatory interests can prevail against ancient law and custom and the spirit of ruthless
accumulation.6 The task of the present volume is to explain the construction of the powerful political and economic complex that was undone in the
nineteenth century. Like Eltis, Blackburn emphasizes European actions and decision-making in the process. The book's first section is tided 'The
Selection of New World Slavery' and ranges from medieval Europe to the eighteenth-century Caribbean. It follows the tracks of the Iberian conquerors
and their northern European imitators and inheritors, thus cutting effectively across the different European empires (the same is true of the works of
Eltis and Thornton), unlike many Atlantic histories which exclude Iberia and Latin America.7 The

selection of African slavery in

the Americas was a tortuous process which involved experiments with indentured European
labour and Indian slavery. Numerous factors made these alternatives unsatisfactory for the various
European colonizers. Spain found a viable labour source in Indian waged labour and forms of coercion associated with
the mita, encomienda and repartimiento in its imperial core, the mining centres of Peru and Mexico. Given the emphasis on bullion,
rather than sugar, Spain found less use for African slave labour than did the other European colonizers (though
African slavery was important in virtually every branch of the Spanish colonial economy). Not until the Cuban plantation
economy took off in the later eighteenth century did the Spanish empire see the intensive use of slave
labour for sugar cultivation that was the magnet for the Atlantic slave trade.8 The Portuguese, Dutch, English and French American
colonies, in contrast, came to be based on the sugar plantation from north-eastern Brazil to the Caribbean. From the later sixteenth through the later
seventeenth centuries these

powers tested European and Indian labour before turning full-force to the
African slave trade. Blackburn coincides with Eltis in that he acknowledges important ideological motives in the selection of African

slavery, finding precedents for European practices in Roman law and Europeans' early association of Africans with slavery and servitude (31-93). Also,
like Eltis, he notes the virtual absence of European criticism of African slavery, figures like the Spanish clerics Bartolome de las Casas and Alonso de
Sandoval being few and far between. However, he places

more explanatory power in existing economic and

political forces. Not only was slavery entrenched in West Africa (as Thornton carefully discusses), but the
development of class relations in late medieval and early modern western Europe precluded the
mass enslavement and especially the hereditary enslavement - of Europeans, an explanation that Blackburn
synchronizes with the arguments of Edmund Morgan, Richard Dunn and K. G. Davies.9 Blackburn sees ideas regarding race, or what Eltis calls
'cultural values', in Weberian terms as '"switchmen", selecting different paths of historical development' (357). Racism

was a cause of the

it was
not the primary one. For Blackburn, the explanations of the rise of slavery by historians like Morgan, Davies
and Dunn, who emphasize economic, political and institutional factors, are more convincing than Eltiss
depiction of racism as the motive force behind American slavery, a thesis Blackburn rebuts at length and counters with his own
implantation of African slavery in the Americas and, therefore, more than an epiphenomenon of the master-slave relationship. But

counter-factual construction of an Atlantic system built on free, instead of bonded, labour (350-63).10 Blackburn's discussion of the selection of African
slavery is wide-ranging and comprehensive. It is surely the single best place to read about the early phase of African slavery in the Americas. Many of
his conclusions in this section will be familiar to scholars of slavery and colonialism, something Blackburn himself acknowledges through references to
the works of Morgan and Dunn and his own reworking of the FreyreTannenbaum thesis regarding the differences between Iberian and northern
European, especially English, slave societies. The former Blackburn calls 'baroque','an alternative modernity to that associated with the Puritan ethic'
(20-1). This modernity was more inclusive (though hierarchical and exploitative) than the British and French plantation colonies, where slaves were not
treated as members of a stratified yet organic community beholden to Crown and Church, but as mere factors of production in a ruthlessly capitalistic
vision of modernity.11 The latter, however, won out, as Blackburn argues in the second half of the book, 'Slavery and Accumulation'. Barbados, Jamaica
and St Domingue were the pinnacle of the early modern Atlantic plantation complex, importing hundreds of thousands of slaves and exporting vast
quantities of sugar in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. England, in particular, emerged triumphant, in part because of the victorious slaves of
St Domingue/Haiti who overthrew their bondage at the end of the eighteenth century, but also because England settled on a more successful colonial
policy that encouraged investment and innovation both in the metropolis and the colonies. In Blackburn's characterization, English colonialism was
'orchestrated by an inverted mercantilism - that is to say, not by financiers and merchants serving raison d'etat but by the state serving capitalist
purposes. . . . The colonial and Adantic regime of extended primitive accumulation allowed metropolitan accumulation to break out of its agrarian and
national limits and discover an industrial and global destiny' (515). In the chapter entided 'New World slavery, primitive accumulation and British
industrialization', Blackburn takes the exact opposite position from Eltis, arguing that colonial slavery was the foundation of England's industrial

revolution, a labyrinthine account that takes him through the works of Adam Smith, Karl Marx, Eric Hobsbawm, Charles Kindelberger, Paul Bairoch
and Stanley Engerman, among others (510-80). The length and care of that chapter indicates one of the major purposes of The Making of New World
Slavery. This work is not just about the rise of African slavery in the Americas; it is also about the rise of the 'West'. How and why did Europe emerge as
the world's dominant power? For Blackburn, Europe's ascendancy led directly through the early modern Atlantic world. Indeed, while his two volumes
have come to occupy centre stage in the historiography of the rise and fall of Atlantic slavery, his work must also be seen in relationship to the recent
revisions in British sociology of the ideas of Marx and Weber concerning the origins and nature of capitalist modernity and the nation-state. Michael
Mann, Perry Anderson, Ernest Gellner, John Hall and Anthony Giddens - as much as C. L. R. James and Fernando Ortiz - are his peers.12 The most
comparable figure is Paul Gilroy. Like Gilroy's The Black Atlantic, The Making of New World Slavery seeks to demonstrate that the Atlantic slave
complex was the wheelhouse and slaughterhouse - of modernity. Whereas Gilroy focuses on the Black experience of modernity forged in the Atlantic
world and Black reflections on that experience, Blackburn approaches the slave complex as the pivot of European industrialization and state formation.
Though his work builds up to an evaluation of European modernity, it would be a gross simplification to call the work of Blackburn, or Eltis,
Eurocentric. However, it is correct to say that the two works do focus on European actions, interests and decisions and conclude with incisive
arguments about the impact of slavery on European economic, political and social development. Just such a focus John Thornton seeks to displace by
emphasizing the actions, interests and decisions of Africans in the making of the Atlantic world. How Africans influenced the origins and management
of the Atlantic slave trade and how Africans affected the culture of the New World colonies are his major concerns. A reader like myself who works on
Europe and the Americas will find this work indispensable both as a conceptual tool and as an introduction to various historiographies pertaining to
Africa and to Africans in the Americas. The book's most provocative and counter-intuitive section,' Africans in Africa', discusses the origins and
development of the slave trade and is most comparable to the other works discussed here. Thornton

makes a strong case that the

decisive players in the process were not Europeans but Africans. He constructs his argument through various
considerations. Slavery was a fundamental institution in most West African societies , though it differed greatly
from the plantation slavery of the Americas. Slaves in West Africa, usually captured in the endemic wars among
the myriad polities of the region, fulfilled a wide variety of roles, from menial labour to administrative and military
leadership. Slavery was not necessarily associated with a society's most debased tasks, as it was in the American plantation zone. It was not
based on colour, nor was it hereditary, the most pernicious of changes in slavery as it crossed the Atlantic (72-97). Moreover,
Thornton takes great pains to show that the European presence on the west coast of Africa, with the possible exception of the
Portuguese in Angola, was weak and completely dependent on the interests and goodwill of African
states and merchants. These latter were the true masters of the slave trade. In making this argument, Thornton is consciously inverting the

terms of dependency theory explanations of the origins and impact of the slave trade. Pointing specifically to the work of Walter Rodney (43), Thornton
disputes the view that the origins of the slave trade lay in European military and commercial superiority, that the immediate consequences of the
European presence were an escalation of African warfare, and that the longer term consequences were a drain on African human capital and the
bending of the African economy to European interests (a description captured in the title of Rodney's influential work How Europe Underdeveloped
Africa).,3 Thornton, in contrast, argues that Africans

held the upper hand. Different African states possessed

sophisticated naval technologies well adapted to the coastal environment that made effective
penetration impossible for the Europeans. European efforts to subdue African kingdoms through force of arms met with

repeated failure. Confronted with a military and naval foe of equal or greater strength, Europeans had no choice but to establish small trading forts on
islands off the coast of Africa. Such a weak presence, Thornton holds, had very little effect on the nature of African politics. The same was true of
Europe's economic impact on the region. In the lengthy chapter 'The process of enslavement and the slave trade', Thornton argues that it was not the
temptation of European commodities such as guns that stoked the slave trade and African warfare. Rather, war

among African states

responded more frequently to internal political pressures, while African slave traders had
various markets open to them, so that selling to Europeans was only one option among others.
Economic decisions regarding the pace and volume of the slave trade were made by Africans.

Europeans, therefore, and not Africans, were in a dependent position: 'African participation in the slave trade was voluntary and under the control of
African decision makers. This was not just at the surface level of daily exchange but even at deeper levels. Europeans possessed no means, either
economic or military, to compel African leaders to sell slaves' (125). Thornton bases his arguments on an extensive scholarly literature and on close
readings of primary sources. Those sources were produced almost exclusively by Europeans in European languages. This situation thus opens an
intriguing question that Thornton does not directly address: what does it mean that an argument about African primacy in military and economic
encounters with Europeans relies heavily on the European perspective? Thornton's method of interpreting documents relevant to the slave trade and to
African cultures in the Americas is familiar: frequently he checks them against contemporary anthropological studies of African cultures and societies
and reads those back into the historical sources. Such a method is generally convincing, but it also implies a historical hierarchy. In the written record,
Europeans are the active agents, Africans their objects of description and contemplation. The prevalence of the European perspective in the writing of
the history of the slave trade thus led this reader to puzzle over Thornton's virtual effacement of colonialism from his explanation of Atlantic slavery's
rise (and of the legacies of colonialism in the writing of history). His argument about African autonomy and agency is forceful and persuasive, and he
demonstrates spectacularly that the history of Atlantic slavery is not only the history of the rise of the West. But by inverting the terms of the
dependency theory approach of Rodney and others, Thornton eclipses Europe's role in the making of both the Atlantic slave trade and the American
plantation, without which the slave trade would never have existed. Should he have presented a more balanced account? Maybe not; balance is not
necessarily the only virtue of the Atlantic historian. To argue with rigour, imagination and over a broad canvas are the marks of the great histories of
Atlantic slavery. Thornton, Blackburn and Eltis are squarely in that tradition and, like C. L. R. James, Fernando Ortiz, David Brion Davis, Seymour
Drescher and others before them, they have produced works that incite the reader to ask big questions and reach for big answers about a history whose
legacies continue to shape the Atlantic world.

Capitalism reconstitutes slavery

Philip McMichael 1/2/11 Springer Slavery in Capitalism: The Rise and Demise of the U. S. Ante-Bellum Cotton Culture
Pgs 321 324 http://www.jstor.org/stable/657556 (Cornell University) MG
My argument in this essay is that U.S. ante-bellum slavery did not

stand in such an "external"

relationship to capitalism. The slave South had a distinctive politics, but a politics increasingly

implicated in a broader social current as industrialism encompassed the slave plantation.2

However, the relation was not simply one of political effects. It was also a question of the changing
social organization of cotton production. Slave plantations assumed a new intensity in scale and
management, referred to by DuBois as a shift "from a family institution to an indus- trial system."3 And
slave labor itself assumed a new meaning as plant- ers acquired slaves less for social status, and
more as commodity- producing labor. In this movement slave labor became a phenomenal form
of value-producing labor. As value-producing labor, ante-bellum slavery was "internal" to world
capitalism. This is not to say that colonial slavery was not related to European capitalism, rather it is to emphasize that
capitalism itself was qualitatively different in the nineteenth century. Industrial capitalism transformed the
content of world-market relations.4 Instead of being regulated within the mercantilist
framework, commerce, now globally Theory and Society 20: 321-349, 1991. ? 1991 Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Printed in the Netherlands. 322 organized, was driven by value relations. Under these new relations, combining
metropolitan wage labor and peripheral slave labor, the content of the latter changed while its form remained. The central
issue here, to be developed below, is that phenomenally slavery and wage labor coexisted as
distinct social forms of labor, and yet theoretically value relations were their common
determinant. Briefly, the reproduc- tion of metropolitan wage labor depended on the
reorganization of global finance to expand and unify commodity circuits. The cotton cul- ture
was a creature of this movement. Through this mechanism slave labor was subordinated to the
competitive requirements of the regime of industrial capital. One expression of this shift was the adoption in
plantation management of a new bureaucratic regimen in the ante- bellum period, characterized by Thompson as "military
agriculture."5 My argument depends fundamentally upon demonstrating that indus- trial capital

and its new global circuits reconstituted slavery in the ante- bellum period. The most obvious change was
the rise of the gang- system of slave labor in the South, associated not only with the cotton crop in particular (rather than tobacco),
but also with the concentration of planter capital in the ante-bellum period. Gang labor proved to be the most

efficient organization of agricultural labor in the United States at the time, depending
fundamentally upon the open Southwestern frontier.6 Planter capital concentration was rooted
in the development of a mobile cotton culture, driven by an elaborate system of commer- cial
advancing, where cotton production, rather than a stable planta- tion culture, became the
overriding goal. Land and slaves became less a source of social status, and more the ingredients
of a specialized branch of commodity production stimulated by a global financial "putting-out"
system. The framing conception of this essay is the idea that ante-bellum slav- ery and its political system can be reinterpreted as

increasingly subject to the forces of a wage-labor regime with global dimensions. This approach is an attempt to resolve the
problems inherent in, for example, Genovese's essentialist conception of slavery on the one hand, and Wallerstein's undifferentiated
conception of world capital- ism, on the other. Genovese identifies the slave-labor relation as his analytical unit,7 as the basis of a
distinct slave mode of production in the Old South.8 But this reduces an already problematic concept of "mode of production" to
extant production relations devoid of the world-historical dimension of circulation relations. As a result, the world-

market context of the ante-bellum South remains external to the 323 specification of cotton
slavery.9 And consequently the cotton-culture dynamics reconstituting slavery are discounted.
Genovese's abstract methodological individualism is matched by Wallerstein's abstract generality. The concept of the
"world-system" tends to reduce differ- ences among systems of commodity producing labor in a
mutually determining world economy to variations of capitalism. Arguing as he does that "the essence
of capitalism" lies simply in the "combination" of diverse relations of production, Wallerstein forfeits
the ability to give analytical priority to any one relationship, in particular, wage-labor.10 My argument here is that one can
understand the specificity of nine- teenth-century world capitalism and slavery only by
elaborating the global determinants and implications of wage labor. The key to each was the
ongoing development of global capital circuits (money and commodities, including labor), and a
state system within which to anchor them." In the nineteenth century, a unified world market reduc- ing the
legitimacy and need for formal mercantilist relationships emerged as the substantive foundation of British hegemony . Liberal
political-economy anchored new commercial circuits, integral to the "self propulsion attained by
industrial capital,"'2 and marking the establishment of a wage-labor regime and its world
economy. This regime extended and reformulated value relations throughout the world, in
particular expanding the industrial inputs (e.g., cotton) and wage foods'3 of the new metropolitan
industrial culture. The master- slave relation, once organized particularistically, was reorganized gen- erally as a value relation

through its contribution to cheapening the costs of industrial capital. In this essay I

examine the trajectory of the

"cotton culture" as a conse- quence of the incorporation of Southern plantation slavery into the
global wage-labor regime. Incorporation transformed Southern slavery, displacing its patriarchal
form with an industrial form. Such transfor- mation generated contradictory social and political
currents leading to the eventual political demise of the Southern slave regime. The demise of
ante-bellum slavery was not a logical outcome of the confrontation of capitalist modernity with
slavery, however. Rather it derived from the intensification of slavery as it was fully incorporated within the regime of industrial
capital. Intensification encouraged Southern expansionism, in a proto-nationalist form, and this generated regime- threatening
conflict from both within and without the region. 324 Wage-labor as a world-historical relation This essay seeks to contribute to a
growing body of literature con- cerned with locating the formation of moder regional identities and local labor systems within larger,
world-historical processes.14 The goal is two-fold: (1) to emphasize the mutual conditioning of world- economic and local processes
and actors; and (2) to offer alternative explanations of social change to those conventional linear

accounts common to both liberal and Marxist historiography.

Racism is a result of capitalism

Selfa 2
(Lance, writer for the International Socialist Review, International Socialist Review, Issue 26,
November-December 2002, http://www.isreview.org/issues/26/roots_of_racism.shtml, acc.
7/4/14, arh)
Racism is a particular form of oppression. It stems from discrimination against a group of
people based on the idea that some inherited characteristic, such as skin color, makes them
inferior to their oppressors. Yet the concepts of race and racism are modern inventions. They
arose and became part of the dominant ideology of society in the context of the African slave
trade at the dawn of capitalism in the 1500s and 1600s. Although it is a commonplace for
academics and opponents of socialism to claim that Karl Marx ignored racism, Marx in fact
described the processes that created modern racism. His explanation of the rise of capitalism
placed the African slave trade, the European extermination of indigenous people in the
Americas, and colonialism at its heart. In Capital, Marx writes: The discovery of gold and silver
in America, the extirpation, enslavement, and entombment in mines of the indigenous
population of the continent, the beginnings of the conquest and plunder of India, and the
conversion of Africa into a preserve for the commercial hunting of black skins are
all things that characterize the dawn of the era of capitalist production.2 Marx
connected his explanation of the role of the slave trade in the rise of capitalism to the social
relations that produced racism against Africans. In Wage Labor and Capital, written twelve
years before the American Civil War, he explains: What is a Negro slave? A man of the black
race. The one explanation is as good as the other. A Negro is a Negro. He only becomes a slave in
certain relations. A cotton spinning jenny is a machine for spinning cotton. It only becomes
capital in certain relations. Torn away from these conditions, it is as little capital as gold by itself
is money, or as sugar is the price of sugar.3 In this passage, Marx shows no prejudice to Blacks
(a man of the black race, a Negro is a Negro), but he mocks societys equation of Black and
slave (one explanation is as good as another). He shows how the economic and social
relations of emerging capitalism thrust Blacks into slavery (he only becomes a slave in certain
relations), which produce the dominant ideology that equates being African with being a slave.
These fragments of Marxs writing give us a good start in understanding the Marxist explanation
of the origins of racism. As the Trinidadian historian of slavery Eric Williams put it: Slavery
was not born of racism: rather, racism was the consequence of slavery .4 And, one
should add, the consequence of modern slavery at the dawn of capitalism. While slavery existed
as an economic system for thousands of years before the conquest of America, racism as we
understand it today did not exist.

The need to conquer through manifest destiny is the reason why

racism exists
Foster 4
(Gerald, American Slavery: the Complete Story, Cardozo Public Law, Policy, and Ethics
Journal, May, 2004, http://academic.udayton.edu/race/02rights/slavery06a.htm, acc. 7/4/14,
arh)
How did slavery and race become so patently intertwined as distinctly American phenomena?
Slavery in America was different from any other corner of the world primarily because in
America it was viewed early on as the primary foundation upon which an emerging republic
could solidify its economic primacy in the global commerce of the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries. Two hundred and twenty-eight years of free labor will assure business success
anywhere in the cosmos. However, the social and political dilemma for a new republic was how
to justify public professions of equality, individual rights and democracy while at the same time
holding fast to African captives who had been systematically and mentally dehumanized and
designated as personal property. Therein lay the challenge for the founding fathers and the
signers of the Declaration of Independence (1776) as well as the United States Constitution
(1787). This marked the beginning of contentious race relations in America that persist to this
day. False sciences and religious zealotry were the primary fervent justifications for how black
slaves were treated and for the terror and brutality that flourished well into the twentieth
century, decades after slavery was legally ended. Social and political illusionists who purveyed
racial inferiority, genetic deficiencies, primal instinct and infantile proclivities successfully
convinced a nation that it was in fact acceptable to treat blacks as property because it was
scientifically and religiously sanctioned and preordained. In reality, it was a perverted extension
of manifest destiny.

A combination of capitalism and colorism led to modern/postmodern slavery

Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy, Civil Rights and Race and Public
Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong
The color

of plantation laborers changed from white to black during the last quarter of the 17th
century and the first half of the 18th century. African slaves began to pour into southern colonies in large numbers, throughout the late 17th and the
18th centuries. Between 1700 and 1750, roughly 45,000 African slaves were imported to Virginia alone. The African population in this colony increased
from about 9,000 to more than 100,000 (Morgan 1975, p. 301). In the Carolinas, the African slave population equaled the European population by
1708 and exceeded this population by 1724. By 1765, the African population was about 90,000 compared to a European population of about 40,000
(Franklin 1969, p. 79). In the first half of the 18th century, the slave population increased dramatically in almost every colony, including northern ones.
For example, the African slave population in New York increased from 2,170 in 1698 to 6,171 in 1723, and to 19,883 by 1771, when blacks accounted for
more than 10% of the colony's total population (Franklin, p. 90). As

the number of imported African slaves increased,

the number of imported indentured servants declined (Morgan 1975). A clear shift occurred from a reliance on
indentured servants to a dependency on black slave labor. Several factors contributed to this shift. First, mortality rates declined,
and life expectancy increased. This change made investment in slave labor more attractive. Second, expanded
agricultural production increased the demand for labor at the very time the supply of indentured
servants was declining. No doubt the declining costs of transportation across the Atlantic, the growing
unpopularity of indentured servitude status, and the increase in the demand for unskilled labor in
England's expanding industries all contributed to the decline in the supply of indentured servants. Moreover, capital accumulated in the colonies
during the 17th century provided resources to purchase large numbers of slaves. Third, r ebellion

and discontent among freed

indentured servants and the tendency of African slaves to escape with indentured servants made
social control in the racially mixed plantation system problematic. Moreover, as more indentured servants
completed their terms of service, more were freed. These freed people expected land and a decent life in an area in which land ownership was
concentrated in the hands of a few. This concentration of land ownership, prevalent in the southern colonies, limited opportunities for freed servants to
own land. Frustrated and angry, these freed servants rebelled. The Bacon revolt in Virginia in 1676 was one of the largest such rebellions in colonial
history (Morgan 1975, p. 308). Black

slavery had advantages in the area of social control. Black slaves were
easier to identify, distinguishable especially by skin color. They were unarmed and easily confined to
a small area, the plantation. They were rendered hopeless and had no expectations of freedom and
land ownership (Morgan 1975, p. 309). Finally, black slavery was more productive than indentured

servitude. The system of slavery allowed for much greater and more direct control over laborers. There was no limit to the
amount of work the master could extract from the slave, except the time necessary for the slave to eat and sleep
(Morgan 1975, p. 309). Slavery was also more productive for demographic reasons. Under slavery, black women and
their children worked in the fields. Servant women rarely worked the fields and their children were free (Morgan, p. 310). For these reasons, the

complexion and treatment of the lowest level of plantation labor changed in the late 17th
century. The black skin became the stigma of slavery and wretchedness. The treatment of the
slave degenerated to the lowest level of brutality. The image of the African became associated with
savagery, paganism, immorality, ignorance, and primitiveness. In short, racism materialized.
Slavery, Public Policies, and Racism The change in the color of plantation labor did not magically cause
racism to appear. Rather, local public policies reflected and promoted this racism. Morgan (1975, p. 331)

maintained that Virginia's legislative body "deliberately did what it could to foster the contempt of whites for blacks and Indians." He noted, "In 1680 it
prescribed thirty lashes on the bare back 'if any negroe or other slave shall presume to lift up his hand in opposition against any christian'" (p. 331). This
law subordinated the black slave to the white Christian indentured servant. It allowed the servant to harass or assault the slave with little fear of
reprisal. A 1705 law mandated the dismemberment of unruly slaves but, at the same time, prohibited masters from whipping white Christian servants
naked, without a court order (Morgan 1975, p. 331). Laws

protected the property of servants but denied slaves any

right to property. These laws made clear distinctions between the status of black slaves and
white servants. They made the black slave subordinate to the white servant. They denied all human rights to slaves; placed them in the lowest

possible social position imaginable; defined them as beasts of burden, pieces of property, owned totally and absolutely by the master, and forced to do
the most dreadful work in society. At the same time, these laws elevated indentured servants, gave them some powers over black slaves, protected their
property rights, recognized some of their human rights, and afforded them some social privileges. Contempt

for subordinated

groups now focused on black slaves. A deeper, more profound subordination produced a deeper and more profound level of

contempt. Although the images of black slaves were similar to some of those of poor whites, the fear, contempt, and hatred for blacks was much deeper
than anything exhibited toward poor whites. This deeper contempt is reflected in laws enacted by the colonial legislatures mandating the castration of
slaves guilty of assaulting their masters or of habitually escaping. Of these laws, Jordan (1968, p. 155) said, It was sometimes prescribed for such
offenses as striking a white person or running away; until 1722 South Carolina legally required masters of slaves running away for the fourth time to
have them castrated and in 1697 the Assembly ordered castration of three Negros who had attempted to abscond to the Spanish in St. Page 54
Augustine. Until the 1760s, North Carolina paid jailers to perform official castrations, reimbursing masters if their slave died (Jordan, p. 155).
Statemandated castration of black slaves found guilty of habitually running away or of striking a white person was one of the most powerful political
expressions of the racism of this era. This policy symbolized the absolute power of white masters over black slaves and the total emasculation of slaves.
It symbolized the slave's relegation to the level of the bull or workhorse, other animals that faced castration for the purpose of control. It reflected a
deep contempt and a controlled hatred for black slaves. It was one of the most sadistic and inhuman laws in world history. Racism, Slavery, and
Economic Determinism Slavery

did not cause racism. Rather, slavery provided the material basis for
racism. Several conscious human decisions helped form and shape racism: the decision to shift
from the use of European indentured servants to African slaves; the decision to increase the
level of control and brutality toward African slaves; the decision to deny all rights to African
slaves but grant some rights to the lowest class of Europeans; the decision to subordinate all
Africans to all Europeansall of these decisions contributed to a clear dichotomy, at the lowest
level of society, between black slaves and white free persons. The black slave became the most
undesirable thing to be. Even the lowest class worker was better off than the black slaves. In fact, as
Roediger (1991) demonstrated, European laborers developed their identity as free white workers in contrast to black slaves. Even the Irish, who were
once treated no differently than African slaves, identified with white labor. Black

slavery made white liberty possible (Morgan

whites, all of whom stood above
the slaves economically and socially, joined together in a hymn of liberty that gave thanks for the
enslaved blacks, who made white harmony and republicanism, thus liberty possible." The social
acceptance of Africans as belonging to the slave class allowed for greater solidarity among other
European classes. That is, black slavery facilitated white unity. No matter how low their social rank, no matter how
poverty Page 55 stricken they might be, Europeans could always identify with other whites and stand above blacks. To be white is to be
free. To be black is to be a slave.
1975; Cooper 1983; Bell 1987). Cooper (1983, p. 38) made this point cogently when he said, " The

Slavery is a product of class- race is the accidental evil associated with

the cause of slavery
Maller 8 [Katharine Maller, A senior at Hunters College who wrote this piece working with a
PHD in African American Studies, 2008, Capitalism, Slavery, and the Birth of Racism,
http://macaulay.cuny.edu/eportfolios/kmaller/writing/academic/capitalism-slavery-and-thebirth-of-racism/, MM]

In his book Mythologies, Roland Barthes asserts that myths persist through inoculationadmitting the accidental evil of a classbound institution, the better to conceal its principal evil (20). In other words, myth is carefully crafted to manipulate a societys
view of history. A myth that has become fully naturalized, (Barthes, 11) or integrated, in American

society centers on its history of slavery. The prevailing myth insists that the
institution was rooted in racism that Europeans, from the onset of imperialism,
enslaved Africans because of their skin color. However, historical documents and
studies, including the slave narrative of Olaudah Equiano, the poetry of Phyllis
Wheatley, and Linebaugh and Redikers text The Many Headed Hydra, show that
early American and European slavery was justified not by race, but by class.
Racism is the accidental evil, the ruse that conceals the motive of the myth; the
preservation of capitalism, the principle evil.

What is perhaps most important in examining the early

history of British and American slavery is that the institution was not limited to any one group of people. Religious

radicals, indigenous Americans, Africans, commoners, sailors, and women

(Linebaugh and Rediker, 66) were all equally abhorred by the ruling class that developed in Britain in the
16th century. These were people of the lowest classes, who had neither wealth nor
property, and were therefore of no value to the developing capitalist society . They
were all thus enslaved or slaughtered, either forced to serve the system of
commerce that oppressed them or be killed by it. Forced labor was used in
conjunction with imprisonment and capital punishment to control the peasantry,
and thereby make the ruling classes richer and more powerful. (Linebaugh and Rediker, 49)
During the seventeenth century, some two hundred thousand [British, Irish, and Scottish were shipped] to American shores
(Linebaugh and Rediker, 58) to become servants or slaves in the new world. The results of this system become

clear in The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, in which

Equiano, among other hardships experienced as a slave, describes the Middle
Passage between African and America. The absolutely pestilential (Equiano, 424) conditions in which the

African slaves were kept were certainly inhumane, but the cruelty of the white sailors exacerbated the misery. The slaves were not
well fed, and when they sought their own means of sustenance, they suffered some very severe floggings. (Equiano, 425) Given

the myth that slavery was always racialized, one would assume that this cruelty
was the product of the white sailors hatred of these black slaves. However,
Equiano also describes an incident in which the white sailors flogged [one of their
own] unmercifully. (Equiano, 425) This removes race as the motivation for cruelty. The
slaves were viewed as commodities instead of people.
The equally inhumane treatment of a white sailor would then confirm that the
sailors, too, were commodities in the capitalist system that they served. They, along with
the slaves they shipped, were the laboring subjects of the Atlantic economy, (Linebaugh and Rediker, 111) the slaves that
were essential to the rise of capitalism . (Linebaugh and Rediker, 28) This is not to ignore the fact that
Africans were enslaved, but rather to call into question the grounds on which they were
enslaved. The focus of European imperialists in Africa and the Americas was not
on the race of the inhabitants, but their uncivilized nature. Beginning with Columbus and
inhumane treatment of slaves confirms that

spanning through centuries of literature written by explorers and colonists, natives in the new territories were savages, but

skin color was not deemed the cause of their savagery . They were instead
chastised for their lack of civilization, specifically their lack of Christian religion,
and it became widely affirmed that all good Protestants in England had an obligation to help convert the savages in America to
Christianityall had a duty to extend English dominion. (Linebaugh and Rediker, 15) Thus, colonization and

subsequent enslavement were deemed not only a Christian duty, but also the only mode of
salvation for African and American natives. This rhetoric was so deeply engrained that even those enslaved were made

to believe it; Phyllis Wheatley, an African American poet and slave in the 18th century, says Twas mercy brought me from my
Pagan land (Wheatley, 505) in her poem On Being Brought from Africa to America. While the superiority of American society is
conveyed in this poem, it is not a racial superiority. Rather, the supremecy lies in the knowledge That theres a god, that theres a
Saviour too. Wheatley also asserts that Negroes, black as Cain/May be refind and join th angelic train, (Wheatley, 506) which
clearly indicates that she was writing in a time before blacks were considered inferior because of their race; through Christianity,
those born in Pagan lands could become equal to Europeans. If slavery was not always racialized, how and when did it become so?
The seeds were planted towards the end of the 17th century. The capitalists who profited from the slavery

and indentured servitude of the poorer classes quickly realized that those who
served them vastly outnumbered them. By collecting Irish, Scottish, and English peasants as servants and

enslaving African natives like Olaudah Equiano and Phyllis Wheatley, the

slave and servant class became

immense, which facilitated new forms of self-organization among them, which
was alarming to the ruling class of the day. (Linebaugh and Rediker, 40, emphasis mine) The goal of the
Parliamentarians and royalists, former antagonists in the English Revolution and civil wars (Linebaugh and Rediker, 132) was
thence to divide this mass, in order to prevent them from conspiring to overthrow their oppressors.

The most efficient

way to divide this class was along racial lines . Citing fear that [white] lives will be as cheap as those
negroes, (Linebaugh and Rediker, 134) white servants were granted rights to protect them, while
black slaves were defined by law as a form of property. (Linebaugh and Rediker, 138) This divide
would ensure that, like the sailors that abused Equiano, whites would continue to exercise power over
their black charges, rather than uniting with them in resistance to the system that
oppressed them both. According to Barthes, myth deprives the object of which it speaks of
all history. (21) Indeed, the perpetuation of the myth that slavery was always a
racialized institution deprives all others who were enslaved of their history . But to
is the motivation behind the assertion that slavery
was always motivated by racial hatred? For the past century and a half, it has been accepted in
American society that slavery is an immoral institution, one that has no place in a
country that cites freedom as its most important principle. In order for slavery to
what end? All myths are also motivated what

be abolished, the ideologies that supported it had to be condemned. But

capitalism could not be abolished, as America is as much rooted in capitalism as it
is in ideas of freedom. Thus, although American slavery was essential to the rise of
capitalism, (Linebaugh and Rediker, 28) it was not acknowledged as such. Myth gives
natural and eternal justification, (Barthes, 17), and the natural and eternal
justification given to slavery was race. Racism took capitalisms place as the
ideology to be disposed of along with slavery. This permits America to say, with
confidence, that slavery is an institution entirely in the past, despite the fact that
the roots of the system are still the roots of our existing society. T he accidental
evil is acknowledged as the whole evil, and reality is understood more cheaply.
(Barthes, 20-22) Capitalism, the principal evil, therefore thrives.

Slavery was not based on racial antagonism, but economic

exploitation
Alexander 2010 (Michelle, associate professor of law, Ohio State University, Kirwan
Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity, former direct of ACLUS Racial Justice Project,
J.D., Stanford Law School) The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of
Colorblindness, The New Press 2010, pages 23-25, MM)
The concept of race is a relatively recent development. Only

in the past few centuries, owing largely to

European imperialism, have the worlds people been classified along racial lines. Here, in
America, the idea of race emerged as a means of reconciling chattel slaveryas well
as the extermination of American Indianswith ideals of freedom preached by whites in the
new colonies. In the early colonial period, when settlements remained relatively small, indentured
servitude was the dominant means of securing cheap labor. Under this system, whites and
blacks struggled to survive against a common enemy, what historian Lerone Bennett Jr. describes as
the big planter apparatus and a social system that legalized terror against black and white bondsmen.
Initially, blacks brought to this country were not all enslaved; many were treated as indentured
servants. As plantation farming expanded, particular tobacco and cotton farming, demand increased
greatly for both labor and land. The demand for land was met by invading and

conquering larger and larger swaths of territory. American Indians became a growing impediment to white European
progress, and during this period, the images of American Indians promoted in books, newspapers, and magazines became
increasingly negative. As sociologists Keith Kilty and Eric Swank have observed, eliminating savages is less of a moral problem
than eliminating human beings, and therefore American Indians came to be understood as a lesser raceuncivilized savagesthus
providing a justification for the extermination of a native peoples. The growing demand for labor on plantations

was met through slavery. American Indians were considered unsuitable as slaves, largely
because native tribes were clearly in a position to fight back. The fear of raids by Indian
tribes led plantation owners to grasp for an alternative source of free labor. European
immigrants were also deemed poor candidates for slavery, not because of their race, but rather because they
were in short supply and enslavement would, quite naturally, interfere with voluntary
immigration to the new colonies. Plantation owners thus viewed African, who were relatively powerless, as the ideal slaves.
The systematic enslavement of Africans, and the rearing of their children under bondage, emerged
with all deliberate speed quickened by events such as Bacons Rebellion. Nathaniel Bacon was a white property
owner in Jamestown, Virginia, who managed to unite slaves, indentured servants, and poor whites in a revolutionary effort to
overthrow the planter elite. Although slaves clearly occupied the lowest position in the social hierarchy and suffered the most under
the plantation system, the condition of indentured whites was barely better, and the majority of free whites lived in extreme poverty.
As explained by historian Edmund Morgan, in colonies like Virginia, the planter elite, with huge land grants, occupied a vastly
superior position to workers of all colors. Southern colonies did not hesitate to invent ways to extend the terms of servitude, and the
planter class accumulated uncultivated lands to restrict the options of free workers. The simmering resentment against the planter
class created conditions that were ripe for revolt. Varying accounts of Bacons rebellion abound, but the basic facts are these: Bacon
developed plans in 1675 to seize Native American lands in order to acquire more property for himself and others and nullify the
threat of Indian raids. When the planter elite in Virginia refused to provide militia support for his scheme, Bacon retaliated, leading
an attack on the elite, their homes, and their property. He openly condemned the rich for their oppression of the poor and inspired
an alliance of white and black bond laborers, as well as slaves, who demanded an end to their servitude. The attempted revolution
was ended by force and false promises of amnesty. A number of people who participated in the revolt were hanged. The events in
Jamestown were alarming to the planter elite, who were deeply fearful of the multiracial alliance of bond workers and slaves. Word
of Bacons Rebellion spread far and wide, and several more uprisings of a similar type followed. In an effort to protect

their superior status and economic position, the planters shifted their strategy for
maintaining dominance. They abandon their heavy reliance on indentured servants in favor of the importation of
more black slaves. Instead of importing English-speaking slaves from the West Indies, who were more likely to be familiar with
European language and culture, many more slaves were shipped directly from Africa. These slaves

would be far easier to control and far less likely to form alliances with poor whites.
Fearful that such measures might not be sufficient to protect their interests, the planter
class took an additional precautionary step, a step that would later become known as a racial
bribe. Deliberately and strategically, the planter class extended special privileges
to poor whites in an effort to drive a wedge between them and black slaves. White
settlers were allowed greater access to Native American lands, white servants were allowed to police slaves through slave patrols and
militias, and barriers were created so that free labor would not be placed in competition with slave labor. These measures

effectively eliminated the risk of future alliances between black slaves and poor
whites. Poor whites suddenly had a direct, personal stake in the existence of a
race-based system of slavery. Their own plight had not improved by much, but at least
they were not slaves. Once the planter elite split the labor force, poor whites responded
to the logic of their situation and sought ways to expand their racially privileged position.

Capitalism is the cause of slavery- the alternative is a class-based

critique of the system which is the only way to deconstruct racism
McLaren 4, Distinguished Fellow Critical Studies @ Chapman U and UCLA urban schooling
prof, and Scatamburlo-DAnnibale, associate professor of Communication U Windsor, 4
(Peter and Valerie, Class Dismissed? Historical materialism and the politics of difference,
Educational Philosophy and Theory Vol. 36, Issue 2, p. 183-199, MM)
For well over two decades we have witnessed the jubilant liberal and conservative pronouncements of the demise of socialism.
Concomitantly, history's presumed failure to defang existing capitalist relations has been

read by many self-identified radicals as an advertisement for capitalism's inevitability. As a result,

the chorus refrain There Is No Alternative, sung by liberals and conservatives, has been

buttressed by the symphony of post-Marxist voices recommending that we give

socialism a decent burial and move on. Within this context, to speak of the promise of Marx and socialism may

appear anachronistic, even nave, especially since the post-al intellectual vanguard has presumably demonstrated the folly of doing
so. Yet we stubbornly believe that the chants of T.I.N.A. must be combated for they offer as a fait accompli, something which
progressive Leftists

should refuse to accept namely the triumph of capitalism and its

political bedfellow neo-liberalism, which have worked together to naturalize suffering,
undermine collective struggle, and obliterate hope. We concur with Amin (1998), who claims that
such chants must be defied and revealed as absurd and criminal, and who puts the challenge we face
in no uncertain terms: humanity may let itself be led by capitalism's logic to a fate of
collective suicide or it may pave the way for an alternative humanist project of
global socialism. The grosteque conditions that inspired Marx to pen his original critique of
capitalism are present and flourishing. The inequalities of wealth and the gross imbalances of power that
exist today are leading to abuses that exceed those encountered in Marx's day (Greider, 1998,
p. 39). Global capitalism has paved the way for the obscene concentration of wealth in fewer and fewer hands
and created a world increasingly divided between those who enjoy opulent affluence and those who
languish in dehumanizing conditions and economic misery. In every corner of the globe, we are witnessing
social disintegration as revealed by a rise in abject poverty and inequality. At the current historical
juncture, the combined assets of the 225 richest people is roughly equal to the annual income of the poorest 47 percent of the world's
population, while the combined assets of the three richest people exceed the combined GDP of the 48 poorest nations (CCPA, 2002,
p. 3). Approximately 2.8 billion peoplealmost half of the world's populationstruggle in desperation to

live on less than two dollars a day (McQuaig, 2001, p. 27). As many as 250 million children are
wage slaves and there are over a billion workers who are either un- or under-employed.
These are the concrete realities of our timerealities that require a vigorous class analysis , an
unrelenting critique of capitalism and an oppositional politics capable of
confronting what Ahmad (1998, p. 2) refers to as capitalist universality. They are realities that require

something more than that which is offered by the prophets of difference and post-Marxists who would have us relegate socialism to
the scrapheap of history and mummify Marxism along with Lenin's corpse. Never before has a Marxian

analysis of capitalism and class rule been so desperately needed. That is not to say that everything
Marx said or anticipated has come true, for that is clearly not the case. Many critiques of Marx focus on his
strategy for moving toward socialism, and with ample justification; nonetheless
Marx did provide us with fundamental insights into class society that have held
true to this day. Marx's enduring relevance lies in his indictment of capitalism which continues to wreak havoc in the lives of

most. While capitalism's cheerleaders have attempted to hide its sordid underbelly, Marx's description of capitalism as the sorcerer's
dark power is even more apt in light of contemporary historical and economic conditions. Rather than jettisoning

Marx, decentering the role of capitalism, and discrediting class analysis, radical
educators must continue to engage Marx's oeuvre and extrapolate from it that which
is useful pedagogically, theoretically, and , most importantly, politically in light of the challenges
that confront us. The urgency which animates Amin's call for a collective socialist vision
necessitates, as we have argued, moving beyond the particularism and liberal pluralism that
informs the politics of difference. It also requires challenging the questionable

assumptions that have come to constitute the core of contemporary radical theory,
pedagogy

and politics. In

terms of effecting change, what is needed is a cogent

understanding of the systemic nature of exploitation and oppression based on the

precepts of a radical political economy approach (outlined above) and one that incorporates Marx's notion of
unity in difference in which people share widely common material interests. Such an understanding extends
far beyond the realm of theory, for the manner in which we choose to interpret and explore the social world, the
concepts and frameworks we use to express our sociopolitical understandings,
are more than just abstract categories. They imply intentions, organizational
practices, and political agendas. Identifying class analysis as the basis for our

understandings and class struggle as the basis for political transformation implies

something quite

different than constructing a sense of political agency around issues of race, ethnicity,
gender, etc. Contrary to Shakespeare's assertion that a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, it should be clear that
this is not the case in political matters. Rather, in politics the essence of the flower lies in the name by
which it is called (Bannerji, 2000, p. 41). The task for progressives today is to seize the
moment and plant the seeds for a political agenda that is grounded in historical
possibilities and informed by a vision committed to overcoming exploitative conditions. These seeds, we would argue,
must be derived from the tree of radical political economy. For the vast majority of people today
people of all racial classifications or identities, all genders and sexual
orientationsthe common frame of reference arcing across difference, the concerns and aspirations
that are most widely shared are those that are rooted in the common experience of everyday life
shaped and constrained by political economy (Reed, 2000, p. xxvii). While post-Marxist
advocates of the politics of difference suggest that such a stance is outdated, we would
argue that the categories which they have employed to analyze the social are now losing
their usefulness, particularly in light of actual contemporary social movements. All over the globe, there
are large anti-capitalist movements afoot. In February 2002, chants of Another World Is Possible became the
theme of protests in Porto Allegre. It seems that those people struggling in the streets havent read
about T.I.N.A., the end of grand narratives of emancipation, or the decentering of
capitalism. It seems as though the struggle for basic survival and some semblance of human dignity in the mean streets of the
dystopian metropoles doesnt permit much time or opportunity to read the heady proclamations emanating from seminar rooms. As
E. P. Thompson (1978, p. 11) once remarked, sometimes experience walks in without knocking at the door, and announces deaths,
crises of subsistence, trench warfare, unemployment, inflation, genocide. This, of course, does not mean that

socialism will inevitably come about, yet a sense of its nascent promise animates
current social movements. Indeed, noted historian Howard Zinn (2000, p. 20) recently pointed out that after
years of single-issue organizing (i.e. the politics of difference), the WTO and other anticorporate capitalist protests signaled a turning point in the history of movements
of recent decades, for it was the issue of class that more than anything bound everyone together.
History, to paraphrase Thompson (1978, p. 25) doesnt seem to be following Theory's script. Our vision is informed by Marx's
historical materialism and his revolutionary socialist humanism, which must not be conflated with liberal humanism. For left
politics and pedagogy, a socialist humanist vision remains crucial, whose fundamental features

include the creative potential of people to challenge collectively the circumstances

that they inherit. This variant of humanism seeks to give expression to the pain, sorrow and degradation of the oppressed,
those who labor under the ominous and ghastly cloak of globalized capital. It calls for the transformation of those conditions that
have prevented the bulk of humankind from fulfilling its potential. It vests its hope for change in the

development of critical consciousness and social agents who make history, although not
always in conditions of their choosing. The political goal of socialist humanism is, however, not a resting in difference but rather
the emancipation of difference at the level of human mutuality and reciprocity. This would be a step forward for the discovery or
creation of our real differences which can only in the end be explored in reciprocal ways (Eagleton, 1996, p. 120). Above all else,

the enduring relevance of a radical socialist pedagogy and politics is the centrality
it accords to the interrogation of capitalism. We can no longer afford to remain indifferent to the horror
and savagery committed by capitalist's barbaric machinations. We need to recognize that capitalist
democracy is unrescuably contradictory in its own self-constitution. Capitalism and
democracy cannot be translated into one another without profound efforts at manufacturing empty idealism. Committed
Leftists must unrelentingly cultivate a democratic socialist vision that refuses to forget the

wretched of the earth, the children of the damned and the victims of the culture of silencea task which requires more than
abstruse convolutions and striking ironic poses in the agnostic arena of signifying practices. Leftists must illuminate the little
shops of horror that lurk beneath globalizations shiny faade; they must challenge

the true evils that are

manifest in the tentacles of global capitalism's reach. And, more than this, Leftists must search
for the cracks in the edifice of globalized capitalism and shine light on those
fissures that give birth to alternatives. Socialism today, undoubtedly, runs against the
grain of received wisdom, but its vision of a vastly improved and freer
arrangement of social relations beckons on the horizon. Its unwritten text is

nascent in the present even as it exists among the fragments of history and the shards of distant memories. Its potential
remains untapped and its promise needs to be redeemed.

Capitalism led the material realities of slavery

Donegan 13, MA Geography U British Columbia, 13
(Connor McElwee, Incarceration and State Terror: Racial Capitalism in the American South,
1865-1945, Masters Thesis, August, MM)
Chapter One explores this history in broad strokes in order to approximate the social relations that constituted plantation slavery.
This chapter cannot begin to synthesize the enormous amount of scholarship on plantation slavery, but it does seek to
address recurring theoretical shortcomings found in Marxist scholarship. Too often such studies

have erred by
holding out an ideal-type definition of capitalism and comparing it to the
plantation in order to declare it to be capitalist or not. I strive to avoid any such declaration for its
own sake and, instead, attempt to construct an historical analysis that may enrich our
understanding of the social relations of power that constituted plantation slavery
while establishing the necessary historical context for my subsequent analysis of
postbellum racial capitalism. American plantation slavery was an amalgamation of mutually constituting forms of
domination-- slavery, capitalist production, patriarchy, and white supremacy in particular. If the Atlantic slave trade
enabled the slave-relation to flourish to its fullest and most gruesome expression this was in large part
because the trade rendered enslaved Africans fully alienable commodities within
a rapidly expanding international market. While being held captive by traders and merchants, the
condition of enslavement meant above all human commodification. No other social ties, demands, or obligations--such as those of
kinship or community--were powerful enough to compete with the potential exchange-value embodied in the slave. The

experience of enslavement was thus one of complete social death or, to distinguish Atlantic
slavery from less extreme variants, "social annihilation."4 On the plantation, slavery and the terroristic violence that
served as its guarantor proved ideal for creating a highly regimented, disciplined army of
labourers. At the same time, enslavement and the commodification of labour enabled
planters to intervene in and even " capitalize " the most intimate elements of life , in particular sex
and social reproduction. Invested capital fused with patriarchal power (not to be confused with
"paternalism") in order to express the planter's full domination over slave life, to ensure
the reproduction of the labour force, and expand his capital. While slavery proved incredibly
useful and fruitful for capital in these ways, it also locked the plantation system into labour-intensive production methods (with the
notable exception of the capital-intensive, industrial sugar estates), a point that I return to in the second chapter. It was
through this extended process of commodification and enslavement that the
complete devaluation of black life emerged as the legally and symbolically codified
precondition for "the profit of the Master, his security, and the public safety."5 With an eye for the
continuity amongst historical change, we can say in summary that plantation slaves were incarcerated
proletarians in a state of social death.

Exploitation
Capitalism and systemic racism are closely intertwined, capitalism
contributes to racism
Joe 11/6/11 Racism Review Does Capitalism = Systemic Racism? http://www.racismreview.com/blog/2011/11/06/does-capitalismsystemic-racism/ (contributor to Racism Review)
Over at the Village Voice website the provocative African American critical theorist and savvy analyst of U.S. society, Greg Tate, offers Top 10 Reasons
Why So Few Black Folk Appear Down To Occupy Wall Street, a humorous and sarcastic take on this issue. (See other comments on Tates piece here
and here.) Most

of the Occupy movements do appear to have been disproportionately white. One barbed
offers is that African Americans want to see the OWS movement stay alive. If it got to
be known as a Black Thing, then white officials like Mike Bloomberg and Ray Kelly would feel compelled to
set more upon the movement than decrepit desk sergeants with pepper spray. Another point is that African
reason Tate

Americans already have a radical heart, which has been shown many times. They are certainly not afraid to participate: Protest history shows our folk
couldnt be turned around by deputized terrorists armed with dynamite, firebombs, C4, tanks, AKs, machine guns, fixed bayonets, billy clubs, K-9
corps, truncheons, or water hoses. Stop-and-frisk

has prepped most brothers to anticipate a cell block visit

just for being Slewfoot While Black. That is, African Americans have never shown they were scared
of fighting societal oppression. Two of his reasons get seriously at the core issue of the relationships of contemporary capitalism and
systemic racism. One more reason is that African Americans have long ago realized something that the OWS
folks seem to be late in coming to understandthat is, that American elites never signed the
social contract and will sell the people out for a fat cats dimehey, no news flash over here. Black folk got
wise to the game back in 1865 when we realized neither 40 acres nor a mule would be
forthcoming. Then Tates number one reason gets even deeper into this issue. Capitalism, as usually framed in OWS
discussion, is often of less immediate concern to black Americans than systemic racism:
Experience shows that racism can trump even greed in Amerikkkaespecially in the workplace.
White dudes with prison records get hired over more qualified bloods with not even jaywalking
citations. You dont have to be as high up the food chain as banker-scum to benefit from white
supremacy or profit sideways from the mass povertization of the Negro. Tates points about the need to
consider the relationships of actual capitalism and racism brought to my mind just how Western capitalism got its first huge
surges of capital and wealth, in the process Karl Marx called primitive accumulation. Recall this
famous passage from Das Kapital: The discovery of gold and silver in America, the extirpation, enslavement
and entombment in mines of the aboriginal population, the beginning of the conquest and
looting of the East Indies, the turning of Africa into a warren for the commercial hunting of
black-skins, signalised the rosy dawn of the era of capitalist production. These idyllic
proceedings are the chief moments of primitive accumulation. . . . [They all] depend in part on brute force, e.g., the
colonial system. But, they all employ the power of the State, the concentrated and organised force of society, to hasten, hot-house fashion, the process
of transformation of the feudal mode of production into the capitalist mode . . . . [C]apital

comes dripping from head to foot,

from every pore, with blood and dirt. Western capitalistic wealth and production thus began with
the violent looting of resources and forcible enslavement of numerous populations. All these
chief moments of early capitalistic wealth accumulation involve non-Europeansindigenous
peoples, Africans, Asians, and Latin Americansthose racialized as not white in the dominant
racial framing of white Americans ever since. Capitalism is so intertwined with systemic racism
in its distant historical origins and contemporary history that it has been a mistake for analysts
and activists to try to separate them. To the present day. Capital today still often comes dripping from head to foot, from every
pore, with blood and dirt.

Capitalism root cause commodification and abuse

Maller No date (post 2011)
(Katherine, William Macauly University,
http://macaulay.cuny.edu/eportfolios/kmaller/writing/academic/capitalism-slavery-and-thebirth-of-racism/, Post 2011, acc. 7/4/14, arh)
The results of this system become clear in The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah
Equiano, in which Equiano, among other hardships experienced as a slave, describes the Middle

Passage between African and America. The absolutely pestilential (Equiano, 424) conditions
in which the African slaves were kept were certainly inhumane, but the cruelty of the white
sailors exacerbated the misery. The slaves were not well fed, and when they sought their own
means of sustenance, they suffered some very severe floggings. (Equiano, 425) Given the
myth that slavery was always racialized , one would assume that this cruelty was the
product of the white sailors hatred of these black slaves. However, Equiano also describes an
incident in which the white sailors flogged [one of their own] unmercifully. (Equiano, 425)
This removes race as the motivation for cruelty. The inhumane treatment of slaves confirms that
slaves were viewed as commodities instead of people. The equally inhumane treatment of
a white sailor would then confirm that the sailors, too, were commodities in the
capitalist system that they served . They, along with the slaves they shipped, were the
laboring subjects of the Atlantic economy, (Linebaugh and Rediker, 111) the slaves that were
essential to the rise of capitalism. (Linebaugh and Rediker, 28)

Cap sustains the modern day systemic oppression of racism

Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy, Civil Rights and Race and Public
Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong
Economic factors play a primary role in producing and sustaining racism. These factors include the

accumulation process, private property, and modes of production. the Accumulation Process Page 17
Racism appeared after fundamental changes occurred in the economies of Western Europe. It
emerged with a postfeudal economy, undergirded by a drive to accumulate wealth. This drive
developed in stages, characterized by different ways of producing wealth or different modes of production. The most
primitive stage involved brute force, conquest, and plunder. This is the era when the Portuguese
plundered the coastal cities of Africa for their riches and the Spaniards destroyed civilizations in
the Americas for their gold. This period of plunder was primitive because those seeking wealth
destroyed the source of wealth upon acquiring it. They destroyed the cities, the civilizations, and
the people that produced the wealth. Subsequent stages involved seizing land and forcing people to
continuously extract wealth from the land. This required more than brute force. It required
special ways of controlling the use of land and of organizing and sustaining labor. It required the
development of special economic arrangements. Thus the perpetuation of the accumulation process and the
maintenance of racial oppression required a particular economic structure. Force, Accumulation, and

Economic Structure Friedrich Engels ([1877] 1975) made this point in his critique of Herr Duhring in AntiDuhring. Duhring had
argued that oppression was a function of direct force, as slaves were coerced into servitude. He used the example of Robinson Crusoe
enslaving Friday. In this example, Crusoe, with sword in hand, enslaves Friday. Engels asked where did Crusoe get the sword? He
argued that the presence of the sword presupposes a particular level of production and technology. Why doesn't Friday run away
when Crusoe looks the other way? Engels maintained that Friday's state of servitude must be based on an arrangement in which
Crusoe controls productive land, instruments of labor, and surplus resources. Engels's point is that oppression is sustained by more
than force; it is perpetuated within the context of an oppressive economic structure. Engels claimed that there are a number of
economic prerequisites for the maintenance of slavery and other forms of oppression. He argued that the subjugation of a man or
group is perpetuated only within an economic context with specific characteristics. Engels (1975, p. 192) said,In order to be

able to make use of a slave, one must possess two kinds of things: first, the instruments and
material for his slave's labor; and second, the means of bare subsistence for him. Therefore,
before slavery becomes possible, certain levels of production must already have been reached and a certain inequality of
distribution must already have appeared. . . . The subjugation of a man to make him do servile work, in all its
forms, presupposes that the subjugator has at his disposal the instruments of labor with the help
of which alone he is able to employ the person placed in bondage, and in the case of slavery, in
addition, the means of subsistence which enables him to keep his slave alive. In all cases, therefore, it presupposes the
possession of a certain amount of property, in excess of the average. Private Property Engels ([1877] 1975) added
that private property is also required to sustain exploitative relations. He argued that in primitive societies
based on common ownership of the land, ''slavery either did not exist at all or played only a very
subordinate role" (p. 193). According to Engels, slavery arose in the Greek and Roman societies when
land ownership became concentrated in the hands of a small class of rich proprietors. In some areas

of the ancient world, the slave population outnumbered freemen by a ratio of 10 to 1, Engels claimed. This

oppressive
system was not maintained by simple force, although force was involved. It was sustained within
the context of an economic structure in which land ownership was concentrated in the hands of
a few and in which society accepted the legitimacy of this arrangement. Not only are oppression
and accumulation sustained within an economic structure, this structure provides the skeletal
frame for the form of that oppression. In other words, as this structure changes, so does the form of
oppression. This structure consists of the dominant mode of production, the level of technology,
and the sum total of relations of production (Marx [1859] 1959b, p. 42). The dominant mode of
production plays the most important role in shaping the form of oppression. Mode of Production and
Exploitation Gough (1985, p. 18) defined mode of production as "the way production is organized and the means
by which the production and extraction of the surplus labor or surplus product takes place." We
add that modes of production are distinguishable by the way production is organized, the manner in which
wealth is created and labor exploited, and the dominant way in which goods are produced. Marx
([1859] 1959b) suggested that since ancient times, the organization of production has involved a division between two groups: a
dominant class that owns the means of production and a subordinate class that does not. Exploitation occurs when the

dominant group appropriates surplus value from the subordinate class. This appropriation occurs,
according to Gough (1985, p. 18), when the subordinate class produces a social product, part and only part
of which is returned to or retained by that class in the form of consumption goods (food, shelter,
clothing, fuel, etc.). . . . The remainder is appropriated by the dominant class whose members or agents
may use it for a variety of purposes: enlarging the stock of means of production, building lavish temples,
churches, or mansions, engaging in luxury consumption, furnishing large armies, or whatever. Thus different modes
of production are distinguishable by different ways the dominant class exploits the subordinate classes and
accumulates wealth. Different modes of production are also identifiable by differences in the predominant type of productive
activity. These modes of production shape forms of oppression. This proposition can easily be demonstrated by
examining the eras of slavery and Jim Crow. The eras of industrial capitalism and late capitalism are
more complicated and require more elaboration. In the era of slavery, the predominant
productive activity was agricultural production. A dominant class not only owned the means of productionland
it owned and controlled the bodies of the slave laborers who worked on the land. This mode of production created the arrangement
of direct domination that characterizes this form of oppression. In the period of Jim Crow segregation,

agricultural production continued as the major economic activity, with industrial production
emerging to overtake farming. Land ownership remained concentrated in a dominant class, but
this class exploited labor in a different manner. The dominant class used tenant farmers and sharecroppers, who
labored under threat of starvation, to produce for their own maintenance (necessary labor) and for rent (surplus labor). Because
rent and debt absorbed maintenance production, this process of exploitation perpetuated and
exacerbated the poverty and misery of the subordinate class. It also contributed to a hierarchy of
poverty and status, with black sharecroppers on the bottom and white landowners at the top. The
lowest class, blacks, were segregated from the other classes in a system of caste and class stratification. Thus this type of
exploitation provided the framework for the Jim Crow form of racial oppression. These examples
demonstrate two points: 1. Racial oppression is grounded in exploitative and oppressive economic
structures, in which a dominant class privately owns the means of production and in which wealth
is concentrated in this class. 2. The form of racial oppression varies with modes of production.

Modern racism was enabled by both capitalism and racism

Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy, Civil Rights and Race and Public
Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong
The Historical Origins of Racism Racism is a modern historical phenomenon, grounded in alienating,

exploitative, and oppressive economic arrangements. It arose in a particular stage in history, after
the dissolution of feudalism, after the Protestant Reformation, and with the rise of a new economic order
undergirded by an intense drive to accumulate wealth. This drive was both a creative and a liberating force. At the same time, it
was destructive, dehumanizing, and exploitative. On the one hand, it contributed to the growth of
Western culture and civilization. On the other, it fueled the genocide against Native Americans and
propelled the Atlantic slave trade. Modern racism emerged out of slavery and colonialism. These

economic institutions created clear demarcation lines between the oppressed and the oppressor,
which overlapped with color lines. The oppressed were not only separated from the oppressors, the oppressed
were primarily people of color. The notion that people of color were of a different species and were
inferior to the oppressors functions to legitimize the

Gender
Cap is the root cause of gender and race
Zhang 12 Environment/Energy Reporter Content Marketing intern at PRE Brands, Intern reporter at Circle of Blue, Reporter

at Medill News Service Washington Bureau, Master of Science i... Education Northwestern University, Xi'an International Studies
University (LinYi, MeDill, LGBT activists link homophobia to capitalism, MAY 31, 2012,
http://news.medill.northwestern.edu/chicago/news.aspx?id=206330 //SRSL)
Danelle Wylder is a college student in Chicago. She is an activist for queers. She was also among thousands of protesters during
last weeks NATO summit. When she wore her rainbow-colored wings and appeared in the crowds that

converged near Millennium Park, she defined it as a battle against capitalism. Look around
you, the majority of the world is suffering, Wylder said. LGBT community is as oppressed as other
communities. She said, like racism, homophobia was created by capitalism, adding that the
wealthy use the economic system to divide people and prevent them from forming alliances. And
she attributed LGBT issues such as homophobia to capitalism. Like racism,
homophobia was created by capitalism, Wylder said, because they [the rich] use
these tools [capitalism] to separate people from each other, from coming together
to actually fight against who is really oppressing them . Wylder said some and a small portion of
people who oppose gay marriages say they are concerned that it will affect heterosexual lifestyles. were trying to get support by
saying that queer people wanting to get married will affect their marriages, just like how they used racism to justify slavery. Using
the analogy of racism and slavery, she added that Because of the separation, transgender people are being killed, and the majority of
hate crime deaths is involve transgender women, she added. Even though With the LGBT community gaineding support from a
small portion of the one 1 percent a term that describes the rich -- on the gay marriage, social acceptance still remains an issue as
evidenced by. Homophobia-caused statistics showing that hate crimes rosedid not diminish but rise last year. The National
Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs report showed reported that anti-LGBTQH hate violence increased 13 percent from 2009 to
2010. Anti-LGBTQ murders increased 23 percent from 22 murders in 2009 to 27 murders in 2010. Among the violence, transgender
women were disproportionately targeted, according to the report. We are not just LGBTQ people, Wylder said. We are also
workers, women and immigrants. We have all the same root cause, which is capitalism. Supporting Wylders position, Ryne
Poelker, 21, who studies at a University of Illinois at Chicago student, agrees with Wylder. He said that the sexual oppression is the
outcome of the norms that are set by a class society. Referring to the recent NATO summit in Chicago, Darrell Moore, associate
sociology professor at DePaul University expressed argued that homophobia is associated with capitalism. What I would argue is
that sexuality is absolutely crucial to the functioning of a nation because [in this case] NATO is about opposing a certain way of being
a citizen in a certain form of the nation states, Moore said. If we look at the larger picture, homophobia is connected to class.
Moore said that LGBT activists are using homophobia as a rallying cry against capitalists to Moore said another reason that LGBT
activists blame homophobia for capitalism is that they are trying to forge alliances with people who are concerned with other social
issues. and gain support from them. However, he added said that there are different ways of being forms of capitalism. Moore
added toTo those NATO protesters it was capitalism, but it was also militarism, which is also a side of homophobia. Capitalism
is just one side among many, Moore said. And it gets really complicated because its an irony.

Moore said some LGBT people are feel satisfied in workplace and at home, adding that in that case capitalism is working for some. .
In that case, capitalism is working out great for the version of being queers. I would argue against the idea that it is the side
because sometimes it is in the space of capitalism that one can find a way to be gay, he said. The solution is by no means simple,
Moore said, but he said he believes that progress can be made as the more people become informed and who are informed and
involved. in the discussion like the conversation with the government during NATO summit, the more just the outcome will be.
We are just fighting for a new world, for something that works for everyone, not just for the

few, Wylder said.

Ideology
Capitalism is the root cause of the ISMs and can overcome ideologies
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social
Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 7, pgs 114-115, 2009//MG)
Outside of these political and economic crises, everything under capitalism has a certain, at times

hidden, at times transparent, class-based, racialized and gendered logic of

inevitability and insurmountability, prompted in part by the success of the state
apparatuses in interpellating subjects-this is how things are or even should be, and
there's nothing we can or even should do (see chapter 2 of this volume). 2 The ruling class's success at
keeping Marxism off the agenda, most notably in the United States, and significantly in the United Kingdom since Thatcherism and
its aftermath (see Cole, 2008g) is not logical (indeed, given that Marxism is in the interests of the working class, it is, in fact,
illogical). However, as Stuart Hall (1978) once remarked, ideologies don't work by logic-they have logics

of their own. Thus: we act and respond to ideology as if we were the originators of the
ideas and values within it. In other words, when The Sun or The Daily Mail 3 speaks of what 'the public' 'wants',
'needs', 'is fed up with', 'has had enough of' this strikes a chord with all the other organs of ruling-class ideology-the rest of the
media, the various apparatuses of the state. Because we are largely trapped with one view of the world
... -it

all makes sense to us. (Cole, 1986b, p. 131) It is the role of Marxism and Marxists to
transcend these ruling class interpellations, to provide an alternative vision, an
insistence that another world is possible. I will now address some of the common objections to Marxism,
themselves by and large the result of successful interpellation, and attempt to respond to them.

Racism
Race is a product of capital, produced to justify disparate labor
practicesthey have it backwards
Tom Keefer, a member of Facing Reality, an anti-imperialist, anti-racist collective in Montreal , 2003
http://newsocialist.org/old_mag/magazine/39/article03.html
The brutality and viciousness of

capitalism is well known to the oppressed and exploited of this world. Billions

of people throughout the world spend their lives incessantly toiling to enrich the already wealthy, while throughout
history any serious attempts to build alternatives to capitalism have been met with bombings, invasions, and blockades by imperialist nation states.
Although the modern day ideologues of the mass media and of institutions such as the World Bank and IMF never cease to inveigh against scattered
acts of violence perpetrated against their system, they always neglect to mention that the

capitalist system they lord over was called into

existence and has only been able to maintain itself by the sustained application of systematic violence .
It should come as no surprise that this capitalist system, which we can only hope is now reaching the era of its final demise, was just as rapacious and
vicious in its youth as it is now. The

"rosy dawn" of capitalist production was inaugurated by the process of

slavery and genocide in the western hemisphere, and this "primitive accumulation of capital" resulted in the
largest systematic murder of human beings ever seen. However, the rulers of society have found that naked
force is often most economically used in conjunction with ideologies of domination and control
which provide a legitimizing explanation for the oppressive nature of society. Racism is
such a construct and it came into being as a social relation which condoned and secured
the initial genocidal processes of capitalist accumulation--the founding stones of contemporary bourgeois society.
While it is widely accepted that the embryonic capitalist class came to power in the great bourgeois revolutions of the 17th and 18th centuries, what
is comparatively less well known is the crucial role that chattel slavery and the plunder of the "New World" played
in calling this class into being and providing the "primitive accumulation of capital" necessary to
launch and sustain industrialization in Europe. The accidental "discovery" of the Western Hemisphere by the mass murderer

Christopher Columbus in 1492 changed everything for the rival economic and political interests of the European states. The looting and pillaging of the
"New World" destabilized the European social order, as Spain raised huge armies and built armadas with the unending streams of gold and silver
coming from the "New World", the spending of which devalued the currency reserves of its rivals. The only way Portugal, England, Holland, and France
could stay ahead in the regional power games of Europe was to embark on their own colonial ventures. In addition to the extraction of precious
minerals and the looting and pillaging of indigenous societies, European

merchant-adventurers realized that

substantial profits could also be made through the production of cash crops on the fertile lands surrounding
the Caribbean sea. The only problem was that as the indigenous population either fled from enslavement
or perished from the diseases and deprivations of the Europeans, there was no one left to raise the sugar, tobacco,
cotton, indigo, and other tropical cash crops that were so profitable. A system of waged labour would not work for the simple
reason that with plentiful land and easy means of subsistence surrounding them, colonists would naturally prefer small scale
homesteading instead of labouring for their masters. As the planter Emanuel Downing of Massachusetts put it in 1645: "I

do not see how we can thrive until we get a stock of slaves sufficient to do all our business, for our children's children will hardly see this great continent
filled with people so that our servants will still desire freedom to plant for themselves, and not stay but for very great wages." Capitalistic

social relations have always been based on compulsion, and they require as a precondition that
workers possess nothing but their capacity to labour. The would-be developers of the wealth of the "New World"
thus turned to forced labour in complete contradiction to all the theories of bourgeois economists because unfree labour was the only kind of labour
applicable to the concrete situation in the Americas. Although

slavery is now, and has almost always been equated with unfree
Black labour, it was not always, or even predominantly so. Capitalists looked first to their
own societies in order to find the population to labour in servitude on the large-scale plantations necessary for
tropical cash crop production. Eric Williams, in his groundbreaking work Capitalism and Slavery, noted that in the early stages
of colonialism "white slavery was the historic base upon which Negro [sic] slavery was
constructed." Between 1607 and 1783 over a quarter million "white" indentured servants arrived
in the British colonies alone where they were set to work in the agricultural and industrial processes of the time. The shipping companies,
ports, and trading routes established for the transport of the poor, "criminal", and lumpen
elements of European society were to form the backbone of the future slave trade of Africans.
Slavery became an exclusively Black institution due to the dynamics of class struggle as repeated
multi-ethnic rebellions of African slaves and indentured European servants led the
slaveholders to seek strategies to divide and conquer. The fact that an African slave could be
purchased for life with the same amount of money that it would cost to buy an indentured

servant for 10 years, and that the African's skin color would function as an instrument of
social control by making it easier to track down runaway slaves in a land where all whites
were free wage labourers and all Black people slaves, provided further incentives for this system of
racial classification. In the colonies where there was an insufficient free white population to provide a counterbalance to potential slave
insurgencies, such as on the Caribbean islands, an elaborate hierarchy of racial privilege was built up, with the
lighter skinned "mulattos" admitted to the ranks of free men where they often owned slaves
themselves. The concept of a "white race" never really existed before the economic
systems of early capitalism made it a necessary social construct to aid in the
repression of enslaved Africans. Xenophobia and hostility towards those who were
different than one's own immediate family, clan, or tribe were certainly evident, and
discrimination based on religious status was also widespread but the development of modern
"scientific" racism with its view that there are physically distinct "races" within humanity, with
distinct attributes and characteristics is peculiar to the conquest of the Americas, the
rise of slavery, and the imperialist domination of the entire world. Racism provided a
convenient way to explain the subordinate position of Africans and other victims of Euro-colonialism, while at the
same time providing an apparatus upon which to structure the granting of special privileges to sectors of the working class admitted as members of the
"white race". As David McNally has noted, one

of the key component of modern racism was its utility in

resolving the contradiction as to how the modern European societies in which the bourgeoisie
had come to power through promising "freedom" and "equality" were so reliant on slave labour
and murderous, yet highly profitable colonial adventures. The development of a concept like
racism allowed whole sections of the world's population to be "excommunicated" from
humankind, and then be murdered or worked to death with a clear conscience for the profit of
the capitalist class.

Ev from every context shows slavery predates the concept of racial

division - blackness emerged as a unique historical product of
economic relations
McLaren and Torres 99 (Peter Mclaren, professor of education at U of California, and Rudolfo Torres, Professor of

Planning, Policy, and Design, Chicano/Latino Studies, and Political Science, Racism and Multicultural Education: Rethinking Race
and Whiteness in Late Capitalism, Chapter 2 of Critical Multiculturalism: Rethinking Multicultural and Antiracist Education,
edited by Stephen May, p.49-50, Questia)
According to Alex Callinicos (1993),

racial differences are invented. Racism occurs when the characteristics

form of oppression is peculiar to
capitalist societies; it arises in the circumstances surrounding industrial capitalism and the
attempt to acquire a large labour force. Callinicos points out three main conditions for the existence of
racism as outlined by Marx: economic competition between workers; the appeal of racist ideology to
white workers; and efforts of the capitalist class to establish and maintain racial divisions among
workers. Capital's constantly changing demands for different kinds of labour can only be met through immigration. Callinicos
remarks that 'racism offers for workers of the oppressing race the imaginary compensation for the
exploitation they suffer of belonging to the ruling nation' (1993, p. 39). Callinicos notes the way in which
Marx grasped how 'racial' divisions between 'native' and 'immigrant' workers could weaken the
working-class. United States' politicians like Pat Buchanan, Jesse Helms and Pete Wilson, to name but a few,
take advantage of this division which the capitalist class understands and
manipulates only too well-using racism effectively to divide the working-class. At this
point you might be asking yourselves: Doesn't racism pre-date capitalism? Here we agree with Callinicos that
the heterophobia associated with precapitalist societies was not the same as modern racism.
Pre-capitalist slave and feudal societies of classical Greece and Rome did not rely
on racism to justify the use of slaves. The Greeks and Romans did not have theories of white
superiority. If they did, that must have been unsettling news to Septimus Severus, Roman Emperor from Ad 193 to 211, who
was, many historians claim, a black man. Racism emerged during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
from a key development of capitalism-colonial plantations in the New World where slave labour
which justify discrimination are held to be inherent in the oppressed group. This

stolen from Africa was used to produce tobacco, sugar, and cotton for the global consumer market (Callinicos, 1993).

Callinicos cites Eric Williams who remarks: 'Slavery was not born of racism: rather, racism was the consequence of slavery' (cited in
Callinicos, 1993, p. 24). In effect, racism emerged as the ideology of the plantocracy. It began with the class of
sugar-planters and slave merchants that dominated England's Caribbean colonies. Racism developed out of the 'systemic slavery' of
the New World. The 'natural inferiority' of Africans was a way that Whites justified enslaving them. According to Callinicos: Racism
offers white workers the comfort of believing themselves part of the dominant group; it also provides, in times of crisis, a readymade scapegoat, in the shape of the oppressed group. Racism thus gives white workers a particular identity,

and one which unites them with white capitalists. We have here, then, a case of the kind of
'imagined community' discussed by Benedict Anderson in his influential analysis of nationalism. (1993, p. 38) In short, to
abolish racism in any substantive sense, we need to abolish global capitalism.

Capitalism is the reason other forms of exclusion exist the

alternative is a prerequisite to effectuating change
Kovel 2 (Joel, Professor of Social Studies at Bard College, The Enemy of Nature, p. 122-24, ,
2002, arh)

Unlike gender, class

is grounded not in physical difference or biological plan, but in the

formalization of the productive core of human being. Since the free exercise of transformative
power expresses human nature, class is a violation of human nature, and with it, of nature itself,
even if it is not grounded in the physical body. But class relationships never appear in pure, unadulterated form, however, as
the splits they impose would tear society apart. They occur, rather, embedded in a further institutional turn,
which emerges and takes the form of the state. It is the class/state nexus that comprises the decisive leap between
archaic society and what we call civilization. With this, history as such begins, and the cyclical, differentiated time of original society
is transformed according to the hierarchical ground plan of class. Now society has a controlling agency to tell its story to itself a
story, however, given over to conflict because of the institutionalization of class. States impose writing, through their cadres of
technicians; they impose universalizing religions such as Christianity through their cadres of priests; and they impose laws through
their judges and courts; they impose violence and conquest with their armies, and also the legitimation of violence and conquest.
Everything thereafter is marked with contradiction, stemming from the states original dilemma, that it stands over the whole of
society but is for societys ruling classes. States carry forth all those notions we call progress. They also,

however, implement the domination of nature, in all the forms taken by nature women certainly but
also the other peoples conquered by those states which achieve imperial status. As enslaved and dominated peoples
become incorporated into the domain, they acquire the status of Other barbarians, savages,
human animals, and eventually (with the growth of science), ethnicities and races all of which
categories cluster with the female at the nature end of the bifurcation within humanity This discussion may help clarify
a vexing issue on the left as to the priority of different categories of what might be called
dominative splitting chiefly, those of gender, class, race, ethnic and national exclusion, and,
with the ecological crisis, species. Here we must ask, priority in relation to what? If we intend
prior in time, then gender holds the laurel and, considering how history always adds to the past rather than

replacing it, would appear as at least a trace in all further dominations. If we intend prior in existential significance, then that would
apply to whichever of the categories was put forward by immediate historical forces as these are lived by masses of people: thus to a
Jew living in Germany in the 1930s, anti-Semitism would have been searingly prior, just as anti-Arab racism would be to a
Palestinian living under Israeli domination today, or a ruthless, aggravated sexism would be to women living in, say, Afghanistan. As
to which is politically prior, in the sense of being that which whose transformation is practically more urgent, that depends upon the
preceding, but also upon the deployment of all the forces active in a concrete situation; we shall address this in the last section of this
work, when we deal with the politics of overcoming the crisis. If, however we ask the question of efficacy, that is,

which split sets the others into motion, then priority would have to be given to class, for the
plain reason that class relations entail the state as an instrument of enforcement and control,
and it is the state that shapes and organizes the splits that appear in human ecosystems. Thus
class is both logically and historically distinct from other forms of exclusion (hence we should not talk of
classism to go along with sexism and racism, and species-ism). This is, first of all, because class is an essentially man-made
category, without root in even a mystified biology. We cannot imagine a human world without gender distinctions although we can
imagine a world without domination by gender. But

a world without class is eminently imaginable

indeed, such was the human world for the great majority of our species time on
earth, during all of which considerable fuss was made over gender. Historically,

the difference arises because class signifies one side of a larger figure that
includes a state apparatus whose conquests and regulations create races and
shape gender relations. Thus there will be no true resolution of racism so long as
class society stands, inasmuch as a racially oppressed society implies the activities
of a class-defending state.0 Nor can gender inequality be enacted away so long as
class society, with its state, demands the super-exploitation of womans labour.
Class society continually generates gender, racial, ethnic oppressions and the like, which take on a life of their own, as well as
profoundly affecting the concrete relations of class itself. It follows that class politics must be fought out in terms

of
all the active forms of social splitting. It is the management of these divisions that keeps state
society functional. Thus though each person in a class society is reduced from what s/he can become, the varied reductions
can be combined into the great stratified regimes of history this one becoming a fierce warrior, that one a routine-loving clerk,
another a submissive seamstress, and so on, until we reach todays personifications of capital and captains of industry. Yet no

matter how functional a class society, the profundity of its ecological violence ensures a basic
antagonism which drives history onward. History is the history of class society because no matter how modified, so

powerful a schism is bound to work itself through to the surface, provoke resistance (class struggle), and lead to the succession of
powers. The relation of class can be mystified without end only consider the extent to which religion exists for just this purpose, or
watch a show glorifying the police on television yet so long as we have any respect for human nature, we must recognize that so
fundamental an antagonism as would steal the vital force of one person for the enrichment of another cannot be conjured away.

Capitalism perpetuates racism through its unequal division of labor

and resources empirical examples
Brodkin 05 (Karen, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at UCLA, Xenophobia, the State, and Capitalism, American
Ethnologist Vol. 32, No. 4, Nov. 2005, pg. 519-520,

arh)
In the United States, and in the global economy, more broadly, racism's resonance rests on
institutionalized and persistent racial and ethnic segregation in the labor force, in
neighborhoods, and in public space (Brodkin 2000). This segregation of some into the worst
jobs, schools, and neighborhoods is the foundation for institutionalized racialization projects,
whereby new groups of immigrants become racial Others. White Americans have limited
interaction with new immigrants and experience them as a shadowy population of aliens. The
Bush administration has rivaled European governments in Islamophobic state policies and
discourse, yet Muslims are not the primary focus of popular xenophobia in the United States.
Certainly, a virulent niche market exists for Islamophobia in the United States among an
unsavory coalition of the political and religious Right, including a Jewish Right. Still, many
more Americans stereotype Mexican and Central American immigrants for taking U.S. jobs and
taking advantage of U.S. public services, in much the same way that Western Europeans blame
Turks and other Muslims. I suspect that popular resonance of state-promoted Islamophobia in
Western Europe rests on earlier decades of immigration of workers from the Middle East.
Much of the working class for Europe's post-World War II rebuilding and reindustrialization
came from Turkey and former North African colonies. These "guest workers," like
undocumented immigrants in the United States, were vulnerable to exploitation because of
state-imposed restrictions on work allowed and conditions of residence, more generally. To
better understand why Islamophobia strikes a popular chord in Europe today, one might ask
about the ethnic composition of the late 20th-century European working class, about the
patterns of occupational and residential segregation, about state policies toward immigrant
workers, and about whether unions and progressive political forces represented their interests
in the fifties, sixties, and seventies. Was there a discourse of domestic antiracism on the
European left? Anti-guest worker sentiments may well have been antecedents and foundations
of today's discourses about "unassimilable" Muslims destroying European civilization. The
particular hostility toward Turkey and Islam extends outward to "the Balkans" and is part of a
longer pattern in prosperous northern and western Europe that views its southern and eastern

neighbors, who come as job seekers more than as investors, as unassimilable Others. In other
words, to Bunzl's argument about the role of the state-superstate, I would add that
anthropologists seeking to understand the bases of widespread embrace or not of racist policies
also look to the ways capitalism joins governments in organizing the daily life of work and social
space.

Capitalism is the root cause of the degradation of people of color

based on the structural tendency built into the marketplace
Kurukshetra 14 (Kurukshetra,Environmental Racism as a Systemic Tendency of Capitalism March 20 2014,

http://kurukshetra1.wordpress.com/2014/03/20/environmental-racism-as-a-systemic-tendency-of-capitalism/ /SRSL)

The disproportionate impacts of pollution and other forms of environmental degradation on

people of color is not the result of scheming racists in power, so much as a structural tendency
built into the dynamics of the marketplace. Environmental justicethe movement that seeks to
fight against ecological problems that fall along lines of class and raceis a relatively new
movement in the realm of environmentalism. This appears to be mostly due to the persistent hegemony of
conservation-based movements, which mostly consist of old White liberals who see the idea of environmentalism as a
strict delineation between humans and nature. Environmental justice movements, on the other hand, seek to fight against ecological externalities that
directly and disproportionately affect working class and people of color communitiesand increasingly advocate for the complete overthrow of modern systems of power. The Structural
Drive to Exploit Whats fundamentally important to understand is that more often than not,
environmental racism is an objective function of capitalism. The term objective here does not
refer to some kind of absolute Truth, but rather to the fact that there is no subjective, individual
actor behind environmental racism and the impoverishing effects of capitalismon the other
hand, it is a consequence of the historical development of market structures, and the dynamics
that emerge from the structure of capitalism and the unequal distribution of wealth and the
means of production. The structural disadvantage that poor communities have with regards to
dealing with environmental externalities lies in capitals structural drive to maximize profits. The

companies that have the most profits in any given sector can use their economic advantage to place themselves in an even better position relative to other companies, by investing in new technologies, expanding
production and increasing market share, etc. They are then able to accumulate even more profits, which allows them to further solidify their place in the market, and so on. On the other hand, companies that do
not increase their rate of capital accumulation risk going bankrupt, seeing their stock prices fall (if they are publicly traded), or getting acquired by larger companies, more profitable companies. In the ecological
context, this pressure to maximize profits means that companies that can successfully externalize the damage they do to the environment (i.e. dumping waste products into a nearby river) are at an advantage in
the marketplace relative to firms that may seek to take the moral high ground and properly deal with waste streams. The extra profits polluting firms accumulate means that they can potentially out-maneuver
clean firms, and if the profit differential is large enough then clean firms might even be systematically bankrupted or bought out by dirty firms. This means that on the macroscopic scale, capitalism creates a
downward pressure on the ability of organizations to engage in ecologically sustainable practices. Parallels with the Sub-Prime Mortgage Crisis Another excellent example to illustrate the structural creation of
exploitation by capitalism is the situation that lead up to the global financial crisis of 2008. In this clip (4:55-7:34) from a talk by the communist philosopher Slavoj Zizek sponsored by the Dutch public
broadcasting company, a young woman explains how her small, family-owned bank was affected by the sub-prime mortgage crisis. During the run-up to 2008, while the bigger banks were giving out loans to lowincome people (and then selling off those loans to unwitting investors and institutions), her bank refused to deal with such unethical practices. However, the bank banks which were engaged in sub-prime lending
were making far larger profits than the family-owned bankprompting the majority share-holders to question the leadership of the young woman and her family, and eventually selling the bank off to people who
would engage in sub-prime lending. As the woman succinctly puts it at the end: Its incredibly difficult to operate ethically in the pressure thats been created over the past 10 years or so to make massive amounts
of money. Youre trying to do itand then you just get sold. Of course, it shouldnt be controversial to carry this observation further, and say that the drive to make massive amounts of money is not a recent
tendency, but has in fact been at the very core of capitalist logic for the past 500 years. But the young family banker does identify a key point: that while there may be individual actors who are guided by moral
instincts, the dynamics of the system means that these instincts are more or less irrelevant. There is an objective, structural drive for different firms and different industries to externalize as many costs as
possibleand put in the environmental context, there is a structural drive to pollute and not have to pay the costs of environmental degradation that results from a companys activities. Marginalized Populations:
Capitals Path of Least Resistance The question, then, is that if the company doesnt bear the costs of environmental degradation, who does? Just like there is a systemic tendency for firms to externalize costs, so
too is there a systemic tendency for poor, marginalized populations to be forced to bear these costs. From a firms point of view, externalizing costs isnt necessarily a frictionless processthey can easily get pushback from local populations, government regulators, and other entities that arent bound by the rules and dynamics of the marketplace. The profit-maximizing process must account for this potential friction, and
find ways or avenues by which this friction is reduced or eliminated entirely. Poor populations, by definition, lack economic resources; and this economic marginalization almost always translates into political
marginalization, since it requires a not insignificant amount of time, energy, and resources to engage with and have power with modern political institutions. Thus, from the firms point of view, such regions offer
the path of least resistance in terms of finding ways to externalize environmental externalities. A working-class community of color will (typically) be able to resist far, far less than a wealthy White community,

. This tendency can also be

seen in recent empirical studies. A recent Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) report found
that in California, Blacks and Latin@s are disproportionately affected by pollution. And given
the analysis above, this shouldnt be surprisingas of 2010, Blacks and Latin@s have a median
income around 50% less than Whites, and are more than twice as likely to be under the poverty
line than Whites. Again, it should be emphasized that the racial disparities behind environmental externalities arent so much the result of some Rich White Man sitting in a skyscraper,
and thus the former will find themselves dealing with polluted water supplies and toxins in their neighborhood air far more often than the latter

cackling as he decides to invest in a coal plant in the middle of a predominantly Black community; rather, it is the result of historic economic marginalization, and the lack of resources that communities of color
have to organize and resist environmental exploitation. The need to focus on the class disparities, as well as racial disparities, is confirmed by looking at another good case study: that of China. This article from
The Guardian points out that protests by middle class urbanites in China are far more likely to have an effect on industrial projects than protests by poor rural folks: The middle class protest against PX in Dalian
this week was, in many ways, a re-run of a similarly successful demonstration against the same compound in Xiamen four years ago. In both cities, average annual incomes are now well above the $6,000 level at
which citizens in developed countries started demanding more political rights and cleaner environments. PX may not be a deadly poison, but it is now a proven irritant for these influential white collar workers.
Meanwhile in the countryside, chemical plants dealing with far deadlier toxins such as cyanide, mercury, cadmium, sodium dichromate and yellow phosporus will continue to stir up local unease, spark
violence and generate the occasional headline, but their cases are unlikely to gain anything like the same political traction. Even in communist countries like China, economic disparitieswhich themselves are
the result of uneven development by capitalist institutionsare an excellent indicator of which populations are likely to bear the brunt of ecological degradation. The Need for Revolutionary Redistribution of
Wealth and Power In response to all this, it may be tempting for liberal and progressive-minded folks to advocate for reforms, and call for stronger regulations and more environmentally-minded politicians. But
such a call would ignore the entirety of this analysis. If the reason why certain communities are disproportionately impacted by degradation is because they lack economic resources, then the only real solution is
to redistribute wealth, and the ownership of wealth-generating assets. This is because, as the analysis above implies, wealth is power, and disparities in wealth equates to disparities in powerand the ability of
powerful (wealthy) people to exploit weak (poor) people. This is most directly argued in the classical Marxist analysis of how capitalists exploit powerless workers, but it also has a clear application to the realm of
environmental justice. The implication, then, is that it is not enough to focus on trying to pass reforms and legislation; if the root cause of exploitation is economic disparity, then the only real solution is to attack
this problem head on. Rather than trying to emphasize all organizational efforts on making policy and campaigning for politicians, labor should be put into the building of strong, community-based organizations
and institutions that empower them independently of political organizations, political parties, and for-profit institutions. Groups like the Black Panthers recognized this, and (despite their eventual collapse) put
the bulk of their organizing efforts into the creation of free health clinics, transportation services, community schools, breakfast programs, and so onand all for the rationale of strengthening communities and
building power for the revolutionary overthrow of class society.

This isnt to say that reformist and legislative methods cannot be

usefuljust that they are insufficient for stable, long-term efforts to battle environmental racism and
other systems of exploitation. As Lucy Parsons, the revolutionary anarcho-communist and
feminist said: Never be deceived that the rich will allow you to vote away their wealth.
State and economic power are means by which the dominant class enforces racism

Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy, Civil Rights and Race and Public

Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong
Economic Base and Political and Cultural Superstructures We have drawn from a broad literature in an attempt to build a model for
explaining the formation and perpetuation of racism in the United States. We construct our model in the historical

materialist framework. That is, we reject the idealist notion that racism and racial differences are
merely attitudes or images that are voluntarily created by the mind. We eschew the materialist
view that racism is caused by inexorable economic forces. Our historical materialist framework is based on the
assumption that racism emerged during a particular stage in history, under particular material
conditions, and in dynamic ways. We focus on the economic base of racial Page 33 oppression, which
contributes directly to political and cultural aspects of racism. We see the relationship between base
and superstructure as dynamic and interactive. Moreover, we see politics as an indeterminate factor.
In developing this eclectic model, we combine several different but complementary perspectives. Each perspective
focuses on different aspects of the relationship between base and superstructure. These perspectives include the MarxistGramscian,
the radical psychoanalytical, and the neoWeberian models. MarxistGramscian Approach Economic base is a broad
Marxist term that refers to the primary mode of production, instruments of production, social

relations of production,
the way in which people are treated in the process of producing goods and services, the manner in
which wealth is generated and distributed, and other economic processes and arrangements. In a racially oppressive society the
important elements of this base include the following: 1. Wealth, concentrated in the hands of a few 2. Private

ownership of the primary means of production 3. An exploitative accumulation process 4.

Alienating and dehumanizing modes of production 5. Hierarchical relations in production In this
model, racial oppression is understood as arising out of an exploitative accumulation process in
which wealth is concentrated in the hands of a few. Racial oppression is grounded in this economic base,
which in turn sustains racial oppression. This economic base, with its concentrated wealth,
produces a dominant class that maintains its hegemony and protects these oppressive
arrangements in several ways. It captures or pressures the state to use state power to protect these arrangements. It
creates a racial ideology to convince members of all classes that these arrangements are legitimate and natural
and that more equitable arrangements will be disastrous. Persuading members of other classes to accept
inequitable and oppressive arrangements is a more powerful way of sustaining oppression than
the use of state power. This persuasion occurs more readily with the construction of racist culture. Page 34 Although
culture is constructed in many ways and on both individual and social levels, the dominant class
plays a major role in the initial construction of racist culture. Members of this class generate
racist discourse in their everyday conversations about the oppressed. This process was most evident in the
antebellum South, as planters talked about their slaves and the legitimacy of slavery. This culture arises as members of this
dominant class become active socially and politically. Members of the dominant class are disproportionately

represented among political leaders. They are in key positions to disseminate their ideas. Their
worldview becomes well known throughout society as they or their sympathizers articulate it in state legislatures,

in the U.S. Congress, in courtrooms, in administrative offices, on political campaign trailstrain stops, convention halls, and so on
and in the newspapers, magazines, theaters, and other media sources. Members of this class often own local

newspapers or are able to influence the editorial boards, especially when newspapers depend on advertising revenues from this
class. Members of the dominant class have the resources and the connections to make their views
known to a wide audience. They make substantial contributions to major universities. They often
influence universities that train people for other institutions, such as schools, churches, courts, businesses, and industries. Once
racist culture is established and permeates the major institutions of society, it functions to perpetuate
racial oppression. It influences people of all classes, including white workers, to accept racially
oppressive arrangements as natural, rational, and legitimate. Gramsci's (1980) model of the relationship

between economic base and politics and culture is dynamic in the sense that it accounts for political conflict. This model considers
the possibility of social movements. In these movements, efficacious oppressed groups are able to capture parts of the state for use in
ameliorating oppressive conditions and challenging racist culture by underscoring its irrational and oppressive features and by

articulating an alternative worldview. The

possibility of social movements makes the outcome of political

struggles uncertain and indeterminate. It makes the construction and reconstruction of culture
dynamic.

Racialization exists in the political economy of capitalismwe control

the root cause
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 43-44, 2009//SRSL)

With respect to the United States, Manning Marable (2004) has used the concept of
racialization to connect to modes of production there. He has described the
current era in the United States as 'The New Racial Domain' (NRD). This New Racial Domain, he
argues, is 'different from other earlier forms ofracial domination, such as slavery, Jim
Crow segregation, and ghet- toization, or strict residential segregation, in several
critical respects' (ibid.). These early forms of racialization, he goes on, were based primarily,
if not exclusively, in the political economy of U.S. capitalism. 'Meaningful social reforms such as the Civil
Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were debated almost entirely within the context of America's expand- ing, domestic economy, and a background

The political economy of the 'New Racial Domain', on the

other hand, is driven and largely determined by the forces of transnational
capitalism, and the public policies of state neoliberalism, which rests on an unholy
trinity, or deadly triad, of structural barriers to a decent life (ibid.). 'These oppressive
structures', he argues, 'are mass unemployment, mass incarceration; and mass
disfranchisement', with each factor directly feed- ing and accelerating the others,
'creating an ever-widening circle of social disadvantage, poverty, and civil death,
touching the lives of tens of millions of U.S. people' (ibid.). For Marable, adopting a Marxist perspective, '[t]he process
begins at the point of production. For decades, U.S. corporations have been outsourcing millions of
better-paying jobs outside the country. The class warfare against unions has led to
a steep decline in the percentage of U.S. workers' (ibid.). As Marable concludes: Within whole U.S. urban
ofKeynesian, welfare state public policies' (ibid.).

neighborhoods losing virtually their entire eco- nomic manufacturing and industrial employment, and with neoliberal social policies in place cutting job training programs,
welfare, and public housing, millions of Americans now exist in conditions that exceed the devastation of the Great Depression of the 1930s. In 2004, in New York's Central
Harlem community, 50 percent of all black male adults were currently unemployed. When one considers that this figure does not count those black males who are in the

the new jobs being generated for the most

part lack the health benefits, pensions, and wages that manufacturing and
industrial employment once offered (ibid.). Connecting to capitalist modes of production, for Marxists, is not as Mills (forthcoming,
2009) claims 'a manifestation ofdogma', but a serious attempt to understand racism's interconnections with capitalism historically and contemporaneously. In
making connections with modes of production, the Marxist concept of
racialization, I must conclude, provides a more convinc- ing account ofracism in
capitalist societies than do CRT emphases on 'white supremacy' on the one hand,
and 'race' rather than class on the other.
military, or inside prisons, its truly amazing and depressing (ibid.).Moreover,

AT: Cap cant address Racism

Racism is an issue of classthe K is able to best answer the questions
of racism
Red Critique 2 "Race is Class" The Red Critique, November/December 2002,
http://www.redcritique.org/NovDec02/raceisclass.htm, acc. 7/13/14, arh)
This is because, despite the desperate singularity of the media's focus on Trent Lott, the issue is
not whether or not certain politicians are racists; racism is not a matter of people's ideas. Even
Republican Governor George Ryan has recognized this fact when, in an attempt to repair the
public face of the party in the wake of the scandal caused by Lott's remarks, he commuted all
death penalty cases in Illinois on the basis of their racist determination stating that, "While we
are not in a civil war now, we are facing what is shaping up to be one of the great civil rights
struggles of our time". Trent Lott and the rest of Bush's racist cabal are symptoms of a deeper
truth that is at the core of both parties' (one overt, one silent) defense of a growing U.S.
segregationism. The issue, in short, is that despite whatever people think or say about racism in
the United States the ruling party is racist in practice. It is the political economy of racism that is
the issue not cultural differences. The politics of racist segregation are, in other words, the direct
product of U.S. capitalism. Recent statistics demonstrate the actual fact that while segregation
might have been made "illegal" before the courts (a point which the Bush administration is
trying to change), in practice segregationist policies are one of the main tools of capitalist bosses
to divide the working class along racial lines while driving down wages, by eliminating necessary
public services such as health care and education that affect all workers, for example. While the
capitalist bosses enjoy the full benefits of their workers' labor and live a life without fear of not
being able to afford basic necessities, 22% of African-American workers and 34% of Latino
workers do not have access to health care and 27% of both African-American and Latino workers
live below the poverty line. At the same time, the U.S. capitalist class is trying to extend the
policing tactics it has used against the African-American members of the working classfor
instance, while African-Americans constitute roughly 13% of the population in the United States,
they represent almost half (48%) of all prison inmates and half of all death-row convictions in
what has become a form of "legal lynching"by criminalizing all people of color as part of their
"war on terror". INS lock-ups, draconian immigration laws that are going to require all working
people to carry ID cards, and Ashcroft's on-going policy of detainment without trial are all
aimed at dividing the working class and ensuring that a segment of the population forever
remains available as a "cheaper" source of labor (and a "scapegoat" when crisis emerges). While
Lott's comments have made all of this (momentarily) "visible" in the mainstream press, the
unfolding cultural commentary has trivialized the issue by focusing on the personalities and
speculating about whether the American people are ready to accept a racist message from their
leaders. In other words, the corporate media does what it always does and turns what
should be an occasion for investigating the social effects created by the powers
that be, which should be the role of the press in a democracy, into a cultural
debate about people's "values" that silently normalizes the rule of the powerful
whose material interests in fact dictate what counts as public opinion because in
actuality they own and control the culture industry and government. The political
economy of race, in short, is systematically suppressed by the ruling ideology. The common
sense of "race" trivializes it as a cultural "stigma" that blocks the free play of market forces and
produces unfair "discrimination" in the job market that, if left to itself, gives all an "equal
opportunity". By turning racism from an economic to a cultural matter, the common-sense view
of race diffuses the issue into a private matter of individualsthat is, there is racial

discrimination because there are racist people; a circular logic that fails to explain what it claims
to. This privatized view of race as discriminatory ideas, however, reflects the rule of a society
that enshrines private property as the motor of economic life and normalizes the exploitation of
the majority who are therefore forced to produce profit for the few just in order to survive. In
other words, the common-sense of race in capitalism silently accepts and normalizes the
unequal class relations that systematically contradict the ideal of "equal opportunity" and
produce racism today: in an economy based on private control of the social means of
production, competition is the rule and racism is a tool for increasing profits because it justifies
unequal wages and undermines the unity of workers in the face of their exploiters. This classconsciousness of race is suppressed under the false consciousness that if left to itself the market
frees the people from discriminatory ideas and gives everyone a chance to benefit equally: i.e.,
that the market is "colorblind". The common-sense that race is a matter of ideas that contradict
the principles of the free market is a not so subtle ruse to deflect attention from the socioeconomic causes of racism in capitalism onto its cultural effects and serves the interests of the
few who alone actually benefit from racism in the world of wage-labor and capital. The cultural
debate over the racism of the Republicans, the speculation of whether such and such politician is
or is not racist, makes racism a matter of the ideas and beliefs of individuals so as to instill faith
in the underlying class relations that systematically breed racism today.

We access the root cause economic disparity has the greatest

explanatory power
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 25-28, 2009//SRSL)

While for Critical Race Theorists 'white supremacy' primarily describes the
structural dimension of 'white power', 'white privilege' mainly refers to the dayto-day practices that arise directly or indirectly from 'white supremacy'. However, both
interact with each other (Delgado, personal correspondence, 2008), and both have structural and day-todaypractical implications. Thus immigration restrictions would be part of the
structural dimension of the 'white supremacist' state (ibid.), but with obvious day-today practical manifestations. From a Marxist perspective, it is, ofcourse, the poor and dispossessed rather than the rich and powerful, whose entry into other (richer) countries
is restricted (although this exclusion is dependent on capitalists' relative need for
cheap labor). Delgado (ibid.) gives an example of the practical nature of 'white privi- lege' when
'store clerks put change directly in the upraised palms of white customers but lay
the coins down on the counter for blacks or Latinos/ Latinas'. For Critical Race
Theorists, such practices are also enshrined struc- turally in 'white supremacist'
societies. For Marxists, the class element is crucial. Rich people of color are less
likely to get their change thrust on the counter. Moreover, well-off people of color will
tend to shop in more 'up- market' stores, and will be more disposed to the use of
plastic as a form of payment. Critical Race Theorists believe that all white people
are beneficiaries of 'white supremacy' and 'white privilege'. Gillborn (2008, p. 34) states that while they are not all
active in identical ways, and do not all draw similar advantages, '[a]ll White-identified people are implicated in ... [relations of shared power and dominance]- ... they do all benefit, whether they like it or not'.
Sabina E. Vaught and Angelina E. Castagno (2008, p. 99) would appear to hold similar views and refer to 'the ways in which power over others ... benefits Whites individually and collectively' (p. 99), and specifically emphasize white privilege's 'structural nature' (p. 100). They argue (2008, p. 96) that 'Whiteness as property is a concept that reflects the conflation ofWhiteness with the exclusive rights to freedom, to the
enjoy- ment ofcertain privileges, and l:o the ability to draw advantage from these rights'. Following Cheryl Harris (1993, p. 1721) they state that 'to be identified as white' was 'to have the property of being white.

Whiteness was the characteristic, the attribute, the property of free human
beings'. 'In this way', Vaught and Castagno (2008, p. 96) continue, 'individual
White persons came to exercise, benefit from, and mutually create and recreate a
larger structural system of collective, institutional White priv- ilege' (ibid.). Again, following Harris (1993,
p. 1762), they refer to 'the continued right to determine meaning' (Vaught and Castagno, 2008, p. 101), and make reference to Peggy Mcintosh's (1988) notion of sys- temic 'arbitrarily-awarded' privilege (Vaught

They conclude that the societal systems 'that sustain the reign of White
race privilege are peopled and the concurrent, interactive acts of individu- als and
systems inexorably reinforce and entrench pervasive racial power across
and Castagno, 2008, p. 99).

institutions, sites and events' (p. 96). 'White racial power', they claim, 'permeates every
institution' (p. 101). When Gillborn makes reference to Mcintosh's 'famously listed 50 privi- leges' (Gillborn, 2008, p. 35), and describes them as
'privileges that accrue from being identified as White', he has seriously
misunderstood Mcintosh's list. In merely describing the privileges as accruing
from being identified as white, he decontextualizes and dehistoricizes her analysis.

In actual fact, Mcintosh contextualizes white privilege with respect to her social class posi- tion as a white academic with respect to her 'Afro-American co-workers, friends, and acquaintances' with whom she
comes into 'daily or frequent con tact in this particular time, place, and line ofwork' (p. 293).4 Homogenizing the social relations of all white people ignores, of course, this crucial social class dimension of privilege
and power. Mills (1997, p. 37) acknowledges that not 'all whites are better off than all nonwhites, but [argues that] ... as a statistical generalization, the objec- tive life chances of whites are significantly better'.

To take poverty as one example, in the

United States, while it is the case that the number of black people living below the
pov- erty line is some three times that of whites, this still leaves over 16 million
'white but not Hispanic' people living in poverty in the United States (U.S. Census Bureau, 2007). This is
While this is, of course, true, we should not lose sight of the life chances of millions of working class white people.

indicative ofa society predicated on racialized capitalism, rather than indicative of a white supremacist society. While the United States is witnessing the effects ofthe New Racial Domain (Marable, 2004-see
below) with massively disproportionate effects on black people and other people of color, white people are also affected. In the United Kingdom, there are similar indicators of a society underpinned by rampant
racism, with black people currently twice as poor as whites, and those of Pakistani and Bangladeshi origin over three times as poor as whites (Platt, 2007).5 Once again, however, this still leaves some 12 million
poor white people in the United Kingdom, who are, like their American counterparts, on the receiving end of global neoliberal capitalism. The devastating effects ofsocial class exploitation and oppression are
masked by CRT blanket asser tions of 'white supremacy' and 'white privilege'. There are further problems with the homogenization of all whites. First it masks essential power relations in capitalist societies. For
Marxists, the ruling class are by definition those with power since it is they who own the means of production, and the working class, in having to sell their labor power in order to survive, are (also by definition)
the class largely without power. The manifestations of this major power imbalance in the capital/ labor relation massively affects relative degrees of privilege in capitalist, the aforementioned rates of poverty being
just one. Lack of power for the working class is particularly evident in countries like the United States and the United Kingdom where that class has been successfully interpellated (Althusser's concept of
interpellation, outlined in chapter 1 of this volume). Moreover, some of the very privileges that poor white people possess are in a very real sense compensatory privileges. For example, Delgado (2008, personal
correspondence) has introduced the concept of 'paltry privileges' to describe those 'privileges' that whites enjoy that compensate for the fact that they are living ii). impoverished conditions with low paid jobs,
unpaid bills and poor life chances. Alpesh Maisuria and I (Cole and Maisuria, 2008) made a similar point when referring to the suc- cess ofsoccer in keeping white workers in line: Ruling class success in
maintaining hegemony in the light of the disparity of wealth and the imperial quest was displayed in England during the 2006 World Cup by the number of St. George flags signifying a solid patriotism in rundown (white) working class estates, on white vans, on dated cars exhibit- ing a 'proud to be British' display. In addition, as economically active migrant workers from Eastern Europe enter the UK (a great benefit
for capital, and for the middle strata who want their homes cleaned or renovated cheaply), the (white) working class, who spontaneously resist neo-liberalism by resisting working for low wages that will increase
their immiseration, need to be assured that they 'still count'. Hence the ruse ofcapital is to open the markets, and the role ofsections ofthe tabloid media is to racialize migrant workers to keep the (white) working
class happy with their lot with the mindset that 'at least we are not Polish or Asian or black, and we've got our flag and, despite everything, our brave boys in Iraq did us proud. In Althusser's words, their response
is: 'That's obvious! That's right! That's true!' (Althusser, 1971, p. 173). In this case the homogenization ofall whites obfuscates the ideological element of the capital/labor relation. While it is undoubtedly true that
racism and xeno-racism (see below) have penetrated large sections of the white working class, resulting in racist practices that contribute to the hegemony of whites, and while it is clearly the case that members
ofthe (predominantly though not exclusively) white ruling class are the beneficiaries of this, it is certainly not white people as a whole who hold such power (Cole and Maisuria, 2008). For example, sections of the
white working class in England have voted for the fascist British National Party (BNP) at recent elections precisely because they feel that they are treated with less equality than others (Cruddas et al., 2005).

There are thus a number of problems with homogenizing all white peo- ple.
Attempts to do this ignore capitalist social relations, which are infused with the
crucial dimensions ofsocial class, power and ideology.

Racism is complex and changingthe only way to understand it is

through relating it to the development of capitalism
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 38-39, 2009//SRSL)

It should be clear from the above analysis that I favor a wide-ranging defi- nition of racism and
racialization in order to account for changes in racism which accompany changes in the
capitalist mode of production. Shortly, I would like to offer my preferred definition of
racism. I should point out at this stage that this definition is different to that favored by a
number ofother Marxists who prefer the analysis of Robert Miles. Miles and his associates
are totally against inflation of the concept of racism. Miles (1989) argues against
inflating the concept of racism to include actions and processes as well as
discourses. Indeed, he argues that 'racism' should be used to refer exclusively to an
ideological phenomenon, and not to exclusionary practices. He gives three reasons for
this. First, exclusionary practice can result from both intentional and unintentional
actions (Miles, 1989, p. 78). I would argue, however, that the fact that racist discourse is
unintentional does not detract from its capacity to embody racism. For its
recipients, effect is more important than intention (see my definition of racism later in
this chapter). Second, such practices do not presuppose the nature of the
determination, for example, the disadvantaged position of black people is not
necessarily the result of racism (ibid.). However, the fact that the 'disadvantaged
position of black people is not necessarily the result of racism' is addressed by
Miles' own theoretical approach, a class-based analysis which also recognizes
other bases of unequal treatment. Therefore, I would argue, this recognition does not
need the singling out that Miles affords it. Miles' third reason for mak- ing racism
exclusively ideological is that there is a dialectical relationship between exclusion
and inclusion: to exclude is simultaneously to include and vice versa, for example
the overrepresentation ofAfrican-Caribbean children in 'special schools' for the

'educationally subnormal' (ESN) in the 1960s involves both exclusion from 'normal schools'
and inclusion in ESN schools (ibid.). I do not see the purpose of this attempt to
privilege inclusion. The simultaneous inclusion of black people entailed by
exclusion is, by and large, a negative inclusion, as in the case of Miles' own
example of ESN schools. There are, ofcourse, situations where exclusion on
account ofthe application of positive labels leads to positive consequences for
those thus labeled. The way monarchies and aristocracies are perceived is an obvious
example. They are excluded from everyday life but included in very elite settings with multi- ple
positive benefits. I fail to see how Miles' observation about the dialectical
relationship between exclusion and inclusion informs an analysis of While I
understand Miles' desire to retain a Marxist analysis, and not to reify racism (since
describing actions and processes as 'racist' may forestall an analysis of various practices in
different historical periods of capitalist devel- opment), it is my view, as I attempted to
demonstrate in this book, that it is precisely the Marxist concept of racialization
(and xeno-racialization) that enables, and indeed requires, a persistent and constant
analysis of the multi- ple manifestations ofracism in different phases ofthe
capitalist mode ofpro- duction in different historical periods. Indeed, I try to show in
this chapter racism. hat, contrary to Miles, not only should racism be inflated to
incorporate actions, processes and practices, but that it should, in fact, be inflated
con- siderably to include a wide range of actions, processes and practices. Miles'
position on not inflating the concept of racism retains a fervent following in the Department of
Sociology at the University of Glasgow where Miles first expounded his views on racism and
racialization. I attended a work- shop there in 2006, entitled What can Marxism teach Critical
Race Theory about Racism (Centre for Research on Racism, Ethnicity and Nationalism
(CRREN) Department of Sociology, University of Glasgow). Some Marxist sociologists who
attended were quite insistent on defending Miles' position, and stressed the need to use Marxist
terminology rather than the concept of racism (though no such terminology was generally
forthcoming).17 One contributor went as far as to express the view that 'there is not a lot
ofracism out there'. Another, also following Miles, stated that racism should be nar- rowed
down, and confined to the level of ideas, and that actions should not be described as racist. The
same delegate found the concept of racialization problematic, adding that people 'magically
becoming racialized' is mean- ingless. Another delegate argued that, whereas once people were
sure what racism was; now both in the United Kingdom and globally, it is difficult to understand
what racism is. Miles and the Marxist defenders of his position are right to be wary of any
tendency to call everything 'racist' and thereby to foreclose discussion. However, in my view,
there are grounds for believ- ing that if an action or process is perceived to be
racist then it probably is. Indeed this is enshrined in the excellent UK Race Relations
(Amendment) Act (2000). What I think should distinguish a Marxist analysis of racism is the
attempt to relate various instances of racism and (xeno-) racialization to different stages in
capitalist development (some examples are given later in this chapter), but also to relate them to
political and other ideological fac- tors. This is not to say that all individual or institutional
instances ofracism and racialization are reducible to the economy (Miles acknowledges this as a
functionalist position), but that racism and racialization in capitalist coun- tries needs to be
understood in terms of stages in capitalist development. I take the position that there are
striking similarities in actions and processes of racism and (xeno-) racialization directed against
different people in dif- fering economic, political and ideological circumstances. This is notto
claim that racism is primary and that all else flows from it, which is the position of
Critical Race Theorists and was the fear of one delegate at the workshop, but to
stress the need for retaining the concept of racism, widening it and relating it to
developments in capitalism.

Racialization is in relation to capitalism and the appropriation of

labor power
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 41-42, 2009//SRSL)

racialization as an ideological21 process that accompanies the

appropriation oflabor power (the capacity to labor), where people are categorized
falsely into the scientifically defunct notion of dis- tinct 'races'. As Miles puts it, the
processes are not explained by the fact of capitalist development (a functionalist
position). Racialization, like racism, is socially constructed. In Miles' (1989, p. 75) words,
racialization refers to 'those instances where social relations between people have
been structured. by the signification of human biological characteristics [elsewhere in the same book, Miles (1989, p. 79) has added cultural characteristics] in
such a way as to define and construct differentiated social collectivities' (my emphasis). Consistent
with my own definition of racism I would want to add, in addition to 'the
biological' and 'the cultural', the other dimen- sions outlined above. '[T]he process of racialization',
Miles (1987) has defined

Miles states, 'cannot be adequately understood without a conception of, and explanation for the complex interplay of different modes of production and, in particular, of the
social relations necessarily established in the course of material produc- tion' (Miles, 1987, p. 7). It is this articulation with modes of production which makes the concepts
ofracialization and xeno-racialization inherently Marxist. 22

AT: Race Rt/C Slavery

The capitalist mindset enabled slavery
Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy, Civil Rights and Race and Public
Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong

The dissolution of feudalism and the rise of mercantilism and capitalism did two things related
to the rise of racism. First, these conditions generated a heightened sense of human alienation
from community, labor, production, and self. That is, the new, postfeudal people became
alienated from community, as they became dislocated from the land and as people became more
transient. They became alienated from their own labor, as labor became a commodity to be sold
on the market. Labor alienation became more complete with industrial production as workers
lost control over the production process. That is, unlike artisans of the feudal period, industrial
workers neither designed nor produced the entire product. They functioned as cogs in the larger
machinery of production. They no longer realized their human potential in the process of
production. They became alienated from their own potential, and thus, from themselves. This
alienation made possible deeper levels of dehumanization, a detachment from self and from
others that made it easier to eliminate other selves in wars of extermination. The move from
feudalism to mercantilism and capitalism also released new passions and new drives: the
passion for profit and the drive to dominate the world market. The desire for profit is an
insatiable form of greed. Kovel (1984) maintained that greed, which has been around as long as
man, is the desire to have the most or to take from others. However, he added, "The desire for
profit . . . is an extended form of greed, a rationalized abstract pursuit which aims at the
progressive accumulation of the medium of exchange" (p. 114). Under feudalism, greed was
constrained by a sense of mutual obligation, by notions of community, by the social virtues of
charity and cooperation. With the fall of feudalism, Kovel (p. 114) observed, "Giving was no
longer proof of virtue; taking became its replacement." What emerged with the new order was
an unrestrained desire for wealth. In greed, the desire was for the object to be obtained and
enjoyed. In the drive for profit, the passion was not for the object but for the process itselfthe
process of accumulating more and more wealth.

AT: Class discussion is colorblind

Marxist analysis of class includes race and explains the emergence of
racial oppression as a response to slavery
Selfa 2 (Lance, on the editorial board of the International Socialist Review, the author of The Democrats: A Critical History, a
socialist analysis of the Democratic Party, and editor of The Struggle for Palestine, a collection of essays by leading solidarity
activists, Slavery and the Origins of Racism, International Socialist Review, Issue 26,
http://www.isreview.org/issues/26/roots_of_racism.shtml)

IT IS commonly assumed that racism is as old as human society itself. As long as human beings have been

around, the argument goes, they have always hated or feared people of a different nation or skin color. In other words, racism is just
part of human nature. Representative John L. Dawson, a member of Congress after the Civil War, insisted that racial prejudice was
implanted by Providence for wise purposes. Senator James Doolittle of Wisconsin, a contemporary of Dawsons, claimed that an
instinct of our nature impelled us to sort people into racial categories and to recognize the natural supremacy of whites when
compared to people with darker skins.1 More than a century later, Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray produced The Bell Curve,
an 800-page statistics-laden tome that purported to prove innate racial differences in intelligence. Todays racists might don the
mantel of science to justify their prejudices, but they are no less crude or mistaken then their 19th century forebears. If racism is

part of human nature, then socialists have a real challenge on their hands. If racism is hard-wired into

human biology, then we should despair of workers ever overcoming the divisions between them to fight for a socialist society free of
racial inequality. Fortunately, racism isnt part of human nature. The best evidence for this assertion is the fact that racism

has not always existed. Racism is a particular form of oppression. It stems from discrimination
against a group of people based on the idea that some inherited characteristic, such as skin
color, makes them inferior to their oppressors. Yet the concepts of race and racism are modern
inventions. They arose and became part of the dominant ideology of society in the context of the African slave
trade at the dawn of capitalism in the 1500s and 1600s. Although it is a commonplace for academics and opponents of
socialism to claim that Karl Marx ignored racism, Marx in fact described the processes that created modern
racism. His explanation of the rise of capitalism placed the African slave trade, the European
extermination of indigenous people in the Americas, and colonialism at its heart. In Capital, Marx

writes: The discovery of gold and silver in America, the extirpation, enslavement, and entombment in mines of the indigenous
population of the continent, the beginnings of the conquest and plunder of India, and the conversion of Africa into a preserve for the
commercial hunting of black skins are all things that characterize the dawn of the era of capitalist production.2 Marx connected his
explanation of the role of the slave trade in the rise of capitalism to the social relations that produced racism against Africans. In
Wage Labor and Capital, written twelve years before the American Civil War, he explains: What is a Negro slave? A man of the black
race. The one explanation is as good as the other. A Negro is a Negro. He only becomes a slave in certain relations.

A cotton spinning jenny is a machine for spinning cotton. It only becomes capital in certain
relations. Torn away from these conditions, it is as little capital as gold by itself is money, or as
sugar is the price of sugar.3 In this passage, Marx shows no prejudice to Blacks (a man of the black race, a Negro is a

Negro), but he mocks societys equation of Black and slave (one explanation is as good as another). He shows how the
economic and social relations of emerging capitalism thrust Blacks into slavery (he only becomes a slave
in certain relations),

which produce the dominant ideology that equates being African with being a
slave. These fragments of Marxs writing give us a good start in understanding the Marxist explanation of the origins of racism. As
the Trinidadian historian of slavery Eric Williams put it: Slavery was not born of racism: rather,
racism was the consequence of slavery.4 And, one should add, the consequence of modern slavery at the dawn of
capitalism. While slavery existed as an economic system for thousands of years before the conquest
of America, racism as we understand it today did not exist.

Scenarios

Exploitation
The economic drive in exploration is a pre-requisite to racial
subjugation, which leads to massacres, terrorism, and torture
Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy, Civil Rights and Race and Public
Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong
By the end of the 15th century, the Western character was more alienated and more driven

to accumulate
wealth. Both this alienation and this drive have been behind the tendency of Western culture to reduce
the entire world, including human beings, into lifeless things to be used to create wealth, to be
exchanged for wealth, or to be disposed of if they stood in the way of acquiring wealth. This drive
and this alienation were behind the African slave trade, the rise of the plantation system, and the
extermination of Native Americans. Columbus expressed this drive for wealth and contempt for
man in his description of the Native Americans he encountered. He said, They [Native Americans] are the best
people in the world and above all the gentlestwithout knowledge of what is evilnor do they murder or steal. They are very simple
and honest . . . none of them refusing anything he may possess when he is asked for it. They exhibit great love toward all

others in preference to themselves. They would make fine servants. With 50 men we could
subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want. (quoted in Phillips and Phillips 1992, p. 166) In
pursuit of wealth, Columbus and his men enslaved, tortured, mutilated, and massacred Native
Americans. In 1495, he and his forces captured 1,500 Native Americans, packing 500 of them on
his ships to send to Spain for sale. Two hundred died en route (Zinn 1990, p. 4). On Haiti, Columbus and his
men forced natives to collect gold. Those who refused had their hands cut off, and they bled to
death. In 2 years, as a result of murder, massacre, mutilation, or suicide, half the native population of
Haiti was dead (Zinn, p. 4). Commenting on the depopulation of Haiti, Cuba, San Juan, and Jamaica, Father Bartholome De
las Casas, an eyewitness to the carnage, said, And Spaniards have behaved in no other way during
the past forty years, down to the present time, for they are still acting like ravening beasts,
killing, terrorizing, afflicting, torturing and destroying the native peoples, doing all this with the
strangest and most varied new methods of cruelty, never seen or heard of before, and to such a degree
that this Island of Hispaniola, once so populous (Having a population that I estimated to be more than three million), has now a
population of barely two hundred persons. The island of Cuba is nearly as long as the distance between

Valladolid and Rome; it is now almost completely depopulated. San Juan and Jamaica are two of
the largest, most productive, and attractive islands; both are now deserted and devastated. (quoted
in Bradley 1991, p. xvii) Spanish explorers and conquerors, in their passion for seizing wealth,
decimated Native American populations and destroyed whole civilizations. Most notable among
the Spanish conquistadores were Cortez, who massacred the Aztec in Mexico, destroying their
civilization for their gold, and Pizarro, who slaughtered natives in Peru for the same purposegold. After
seizing land in the Americas, Spanish conquerors and colonists needed labor to extract wealth from the
land. When they failed to attract sufficient numbers of European laborersand after they
decimated the Native American population with disease, overwork, and violencethey turned to
the African slave trade, which had already begun on a small scale several years before Columbus sailed to the Americas.

Slavery
The drive to accumulate wealth resulted in the genocides and
enslavement of Africans
Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy,
Civil Rights and Race and Public Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism.
Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong
The passion to accumulate wealth and a deep sense of human alienation were behind the
genocide of Native Americans and the enslavement of Africans. These passions emerged out of changes that
occurred in Western Europe's economic structure, social organizations, culture, and patterns of human interaction. As
feudalism gave way to mercantilism and capitalism, the social chains of feudalismwith their
social and community obligationswere broken, thus creating a greater sense of alienation and releasing new social
classes with an unrestrained passion to accumulate wealth. These changes in Western Europe did not cause
racism. Rather, they provided the fertile ground out of which racism grew. These were the seeds
of racism: slavery and colonialism, drawn along a color line, with an uncommonly high level of
brutality and exploitation. The passion for wealth drove particular European nations to
subjugate and enslave people of other worlds. Racism emerged with the brutal and
dehumanizing treatment of people of color. This racism was not present at the beginning of the
age of exploration. It emerged with the African slave trade, with colonialism, and with the
oppression and dehumanization of people who appeared different from their oppressors. Two
cases best illustrate this relationship between oppressive and dehumanizing treatment of a
people and the production of dehumanizing images of and attitudes toward them: Spain and
England. We examine the first case in this chapter and the second in the next. The case of Spain illustrates the
relationship between the African slave trade and racism. Spain had a long history of interaction
with Africa dating back to the time of Hannibal and the second Punic War, 218 to 201 B.C. (Du Bois

1969b, p. 141). Like most occupying armies, Carthaginian soldiers commonly intermarried with European women, especially in
Spain and Italy. Hannibal married a Spanish woman (Du Bois 1969b, p. 142). Africans invaded Spain again in the 11th century A.D.
The Almoravids, black Africans from west Africa who were also known as Moors, conquered Morocco. From Morocco, they invaded
and conquered Spain, dominating this country until 1492. The point is that Africans were in Europe before the

African slave trade. They were with Columbus when he journeyed across the Atlantic. Apparently, an
African was the captain of one of his ships (Bennett 1970, p. 35). African Spanish explorers, most notably
Estanvanico, led a number of expeditions in the Americas. African Spanish were with Cortez in Mexico and Pizarro in Peru. Before
the establishment of slavery in the Americas, darkskinned Africans freely intermingled and

intermarried with light skinned Europeans. There was little evidence of the type of race and
color prejudice that plagues the modern and postmodern eras. Even during the early period of the African

slave trade, the Portuguese pillaging of the coastal cities of Africa, and the Spanish ravaging of the civilizations of the Americas, there
was little evidence of the type of racism found in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. This racism emerged as more Africans were
imported to the Americas to work the mines and plantations of the Caribbean and South and Central America. Color prejudice

emerged with a new world order. This order involved a new division of the world between dominant
European nations and people of color in other parts of the globe. Among the dominant class in Europe, it
entailed a passionate drive to accumulate wealth. This drive propelled dominant European nations on a path of
savage destruction and brutal subjugation of other people. This accumulation drive was the force behind the
Atlantic slave trade, the destruction of the Aztec and Mayan civilizations, the reduction of the Native
American population, and the establishment of the plantation system. In other words, it was not racism that produced
the enslavement of people of color. It was the accumulation drive that led to the enslavement
that produced the racismthe notion that people of color constitute a subspecies of humanity or
a species below humankind.

Value To Life
We have four internal links into our value to life impact only our
criticism can restore humanity
Cole 09 (Mike, professor in Education, Emeritus Research Professor in Education and
Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include research and publications,
PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate teaching, 3/31, Critical Race
Theory and Education: A Marxist Response (Marxism and Education)
On page 41 of chapter 3, Gillborn (2008) states that CRT argues 'strongly against any comforting
belief in the essential goodness of the human spirit'. In chapter 3 of this volume, I expressed
agreement with Gillborn, in his con- clusion that The Lawrence Inquiry was not agreed to by a
benign state that wanted to put right an injustice, but was rather in the wake of protests and
demonstrations. However, given that the context on Gillborn's page 41 is a discussion about
whether racism is permanent, and given that for Gillborn (2008, p. 41) this is 'a moot point',
more seems to be being said here. Gillborn seems to be making a more general, more ahistorical
point about humankind. Marx would not agree, since he related our humanity to the
capitalist mode of production, which he believed stifles the worker's 'species
essence'. In order to understand what Marx meant, it is necessary to briefly consider Marx's
theory of alienation. Marx attributes four types of alien- ation, a fundamental
condition oflabor under capitalism, which prevented humankind from realizing its
species-being and establishing an objectively better socialist society. These are
described by Gordon Marshall (1998) as follows: alienation of the worker from his or her
'species essence' as a human being rather than an animal; alienation between
workers, since capitalism reduces labour to a commodity to be traded on the
market, rather than a social rela- tionship; alienation of the worker from the
product, since this is appropriated by the capitalist class, and so escapes the
worker's control; and, finally, alien- ation from the act of production itself, such
that work comes to be a meaning- less activity, offering little or no intrinsic
satisfactions. Marshall (ibid.) goes on to argue that the last of these 'generates ... feelings of
powerlessness, isolation, and discontent at work-especially when this takes place
within the context oflarge, impersonal, bureaucratic social orga- nizations'. In
Marx's own words, this is how the alienation of labor affects the worker: It] mortifies
his flesh and ruins his mind. Hence, the worker feels himself better socialist society. These
are described by Gordon Marshall (1998) as follows: alienation of the worker from his or
her 'species essence' as a human being rather than an animal; alienation between
workers, since capitalism reduces labour to a commodity to be traded on the
market, rather than a social rela- tionship; alienation of the worker from the
product, since this is appropriated by the capitalist class, and so escapes the
worker's control; and, finally, alien- ation from the act ofproduction itself, such
that work comes to be a meaning- less activity, offering little or no intrinsic
satisfactions. only when he is not working; when he is working, he does not feel
himself. He "..' is at home when he is not working, and not at home when he is
working. His labour is, therefore, not voluntary but forced, it is forced labour. It is,
there- fore, not the satisfaction of a need but a mere means to satisfy needs outside
itself. Its alien character is clearly demonstrated by the fact that as soon as no
physical or other compulsion exists, it is shunned like the plague. Thus, workers
under capitalism cannot come to full self-realization. To be alienated is to be
separated from one's essential humanity. We can only fulfill our species essence
through freely chosen labor, in a collective and coop- erative society. Only in such a

society can our 'essential goodness', to use Gillborn's terminology, come to

fruition.

Alternative

Alt solves

Education
Using a Marxist approach to education by introducing imperialism
and colonization allows us to solve for the tenets of Critical Race
Theory
Cole 9 (Mike Cole, Mike Cole is a Professor in Education, and is also an Emeritus Research
Professor in Education and Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include
research and publications, PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate
teaching. He also has a PhD in Philosophy. June 9, 2009, Critical Race Theory comes to the
UK: A Marxist response, http://etn.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/9/2/246.)//ky
ANTI-IMPERIALIST/ANTI-RACIST EDUCATION IN THE US AND THE UK12 In
contemporary societies, we are in many ways being globally miseducated. The Bush and Blair
administrations propaganda war about weapons of mass destruction, aimed at masking new
imperialist designs and capitals global quest for imperial hegemony and oil, was a key example.
Conditioning the discourse is only half the story. Education has become a key component in the
profit-making process itself. Tied to the needs of global, corporate capital, education worldwide
has been reduced to the creation of a flexible workforce, the openly acknowledged, indeed
lauded (by both capitalists and politicians) requirement of todays global markets. Corporate
global capital is in schools, in the sense of both determining the curriculum and exercising
burgeoning control of schools as businesses. An alternative vision of education is provided by
Peter McLaren. Education should, McLaren argues, following Paulo Freire, put social and
political analysis of everyday life at the centre of the curriculum (McLaren, 2003: xxix). Racism
should be a key component in such an analysis. Following through the thrust of this article, I
would argue that, in order for racism to be understood, and, in order for strategies to be
developed to undermine it, there is a need first to reintroduce the topic of imperialism in
schools; second to initiate in schools a thorough analysis of the manifestations of xeno-racism
and xeno-racialization. I deal with each in turn. The reintroduction of the teaching of
imperialism in schools Anti-imperialism is one of Chvezs main platforms. As he remarked in
2003: In Venezuela, we are developing a model of struggle against neoliberalism and
imperialism. For this reason, we find we have millions of friends in this world, although we also
have many enemies. (cited in Contreras Baspineiro, 2003)13 DEBATE Downloaded from
etn.sagepub.com at UNIV OF MICHIGAN on July 13, 2014 I have dealt with the teaching of
imperialism in schools at length elsewhere (e.g. Cole, 2004c, 2008a). Here I make a few general
points. Reintroducing the teaching of imperialism in schools, I believe, would be far more
effective than CRT in increasing awareness of racism, and crucially linking racism to capitalist
modes of production. Students will need skills to evaluate the New Imperialism and the
permanent war being waged by the US with the acquiescence of Britain. Boulang (2004) has
argued that it is essential, with the Bush and Blair war on terror, and Islamophobia worldwide
reaching new heights, for teachers to show solidarity with Muslims, for this will strengthen the
unity of all workers, whatever their religion (Boulang, (2004: 24), and this will have a powerful
impact on the struggle against racism in all spheres of society, and education in particular. In
turn, this will strengthen the confidence of workers and students to fight on other issues.
According to the neoconservative, Niall Ferguson (2003): Empire is as cutting edge as you
could wish . . . [It] has got everything: economic history, social history, cultural history, political
history, military history and international history not to mention contemporary politics (just
turn on the latest news from Kabul). Yet it knits all these things together with . . . a
metanarrative. For Marxists, an understanding of the metanarrative of imperialism, past and
present, does much more than this. Indeed, it encompasses but goes beyond the centrality of
racial liberation in CRT theory. It takes us to the crux of the trajectory of capitalism from its
inception right up to the 21st century; and this is why Marxists should endorse the teaching of

imperialism old and new. Of course, the role of education in general, and teaching about
imperialism in schools in particular, has its limitations and young people are deeply affected by
other influences and socialized by the media, parents/carers and by peer culture (hence the need
for media awareness). Unlike Marxism, CRT does not explain why Islamophobia, the war on
terror and other forms of racism are necessary to keep the populace on task for permanent war
and the accumulation of global profits. Teaching against xeno-racism and xeno-racialization
Marxism most clearly connects old and new imperialisms with capitalism. It also provides an
explanation for xeno-racism and xeno-racialization. While CRT certainly reminds us that racism
is central in sustaining the current world order, and that we must listen to the voices of people
oppressed on grounds of racism, it does not and cannot make the necessary connections to
understand and challenge this racism. Indeed, as I have argued, its advocacy of white
supremacy as an explanatory factor is counterproductive, particularly, as I have argued, in the
school and university context, in the struggle against racism. 262 ETHNICITIES 9(2)
Downloaded from etn.sagepub.com at UNIV OF MICHIGAN on July 13, 2014 263 Xeno-racism
and xeno-racialization in the UK and the rest of Europe need to be understood in the context of
the origins of the EU, and globalization generally. With respect to the EUs current enlargement,
connections need to be made between the respective roles of (ex-)imperial citizens in the
immediate post-Second World War period, and migrant workers from Eastern Europe today
(both sources of cheap labour). An analysis of the way in which the media portrays asylum
seekers and refugees, on the one hand, and migrant workers, on the other, would also foster an
awareness of the processes of xeno-racism and xeno-racialization. Alternatives to neoliberal
global capitalism Chvez devoted a call-in television programme on 15 May 2005 to education.
In direct contrast to the US and the UK view that we should teach the entrepreneurial culture in
schools, for Chvez there is a new educational model: competition and individualism in schools
must give way to unity and solidarity: We are all a team, going along eliminating little by little
the values or the anti-values that capitalism has planted in us from childhood (Chvez, cited in
Whitney, 2005). No space in the education systems of the US or the UK is provided for a
discussion of alternatives to neoliberal global capitalism, such as world democratic socialism.
Marxists should agitate for the (totally democratic) suggestion that such discussions should take
place in schools, colleges and universities.

Discourse is a product of reality- capitalism shapes how we view

conflicts
Cole 09 (Mike, professor in Education, Emeritus Research Professor in Education and
Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include research and publications,
PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate teaching, 3/31, Critical Race
Theory and Education: A Marxist Response (Marxism and Education)
For Marxists, any discourse is a product of the society in which it is formu- lated. In
other words, 'our thoughts are the reflection of political, social and economic
conflicts and racist discourses are no exception' (Camara, 2002, p. 88). While such
reflections can, of course, be refracted and disarticulated, dominant discourses (e.g.,
those of the Government, of Big Business, of large sections of the media, of the
hierarchy of some trade unions) tend to directly reflect the interests of the ruling
class, rather than 'the general pub- lic'. The way in which racialization connects
with popular consciousness, however, is via 'common sense'. 'Common sense' is
generally used to denote a down-to-earth 'good sense' and is thought to represent the distilled
truths of centuries of practical experience, so that to say that an idea or practice is 'only common
sense' is to claim precedence over the arguments ofLeft intel- lectuals and, in effect, to foreclose
discussion (Lawrence, 1982, p. 48). As Diana Coben (2002, p. 285) has noted, Gramsci's
distinction between good sense and common sense 'has been revealed as
multifaceted and complex' For Common Sense is not a single unique conception,

identical in time and space. It is the 'folk- lore' of philosophy, and, like folklore, it takes
countless different forms. Its most fundamental characteristic is that it
is...fragmentary, incoherent and inconsequential. (Gramsci, 1978, p. 419)

**Historacle Materialism**

-- Solves Race
Historical materialism can best account for the production of racialized labor in
globalized capitalism. Their focus on cultural/racial difference obscures class
influence on social relations and prevents causal understanding of neoliberal
exploitation
Valerie Scatamburlo-DAnnibale PhD, Prof University of Windsor AND Peter McLaren PhD, Prof University
of California, Los Angeles The Strategic Centrality of Class in the Politics of Race and Difference Cultural Studies Critical
Methodologies, Volume 3 Number 2, 2003 148-175

A historical materialist approach adopts the imperative that categories of difference are
social/political constructs that are often encoded in dominant ideological formations and that they often
play a role in moral and legal state-mediated forms of ruling. It also acknowledges the material force of
ideologies particularly racist ideologiesthat assign separate cultural and/or biological
essences to different segments of the population that, in turn, serve to reinforce and rationalize
existing relations of power. But more than this, a historical materialist understanding foregrounds
the manner in which difference is central to the exploitative production/reproduction dialectic
of capital, its labor organization and processes, and the way labor is valued and renumerated. The real
problem is the internal or dialectical relation that exists between capital and labor within the
capitalist production process itselfa social rela- tion in which capitalism is intransigently
rooted. This social relationessential or fundamental to the production of abstract labordeals with how already
existing value is preserved and surplus vale is created. If, for example, the process of actual exploitation
and the accumulation of surplus value are to be seen as a state of constant manipulation and as a realization
process of concrete labor in actual labor timewithin a given cost-production system and a labor marketwe cannot
underestimate the ways in which differenceracial as well as gender differenceis encapsulated in the
production/reproduction dialectic of capital. It is this relationship that is mainly responsible for the
inequitable and unjust distribution of resources. Hence, we applaud E. San Juans goal of racial/ethnic
semiotics that is committed to the elimination of the hegemonic discourse of race in which
peoples of color are produced and reproduced daily for exploitation and oppression under
the banner of individualized freedom and pluralist, liberal democracy (1992, p. 96). A deepened
understanding of this phenomenon is essential for understanding the emergence of an acutely
polarized labor market and the fact that disproportionately high percentages of people of color
are trapped in the lower rungs of domestic and global labor markets (McLaren & Farahmandpur, 1999).
Difference in the era of global capitalism is crucial to the workings, movements, and profit levels of multinational
corporations, but those types of complex relations cannot be mapped out without attending to
capitalist class formations (Ahmad, 1998). To sever issues of difference from class conveniently
draws attention away from the crucially important ways in which people of color (and
more specifically women of color) provide capital with its superexploited labor poolsa
phenomenon that is on the rise all over the world. Most social relations constitutive of racialized differences are
considerably shaped by the relations of production, and there is undoubtedly a racialized and gendered division of
labor whose severity and function vary depending on where one is situated in the capitalist global economy (Meyerson, 2000;
Stabile, 1997). That racism and sexism are necessary social relations for the organization of

capitalism and new forms of emerging neocolonialism seems to escape the collective
imaginations of those who theorize difference in a truncated and exclusively culturalist
manner. Bannerji (2000, pp. 8-9) forcefully argued that culturalist discourses of difference have had the
effect of deflecting critical attention from an increasingly racialized political
economy.

-- Solvency
Failures of liberal civil society demand MATERIALIST explanations not
pessimistic abandonement.
Ellen Meiksins Wood, PhD Poli Sci UCLA , Member Royal Society of Canada, What is the Postmodern Agenda? in In defense
of history 1997
In its defeatist submission to apparently uncontrollable forces combined with a surrender to, and sometimes even a celebration
of, consumerism, the postmodernist current seems to represent an intellectual manifestation of Millss robots. But where Mills
appears to have held the elitist view that workers were more likely to be robots, leaving it for students and intellectuals to rise
above the robotic condition, now it is those very intellectuals who have become, so to speak, the cheerful robots theoretical
consciousness. It would be easy after having said all this just to dismiss the current fashions. But for all their contradictions, their
lack of historical sensitivity, their apparently unconscious repetition of old themes, and their defeatism, they are also responding to
something real, to real conditions in the contemporary world in the current conditions of capitalism, with which people on the
socialist left must come to terms. None of us would want to deny the importance of some postmodernist themes. For instance, the

history of the twentieth century could hardly inspire confidence in traditional notions of
progress, and those of us who profess to believe in some kind of progressive politics have to come to terms with all that has
happened to undermine Enlightenment optimism. And who would want to deny the importance of
identities other than class, of struggles against sexual and racial oppression, or the complexities of human
experience in such a mobile and changeable world, with such fragile and shifting solidarities? At the same time, who
can be oblivious to the resurgence of identities like nationalism as powerful, and often
destructive, historical forces? Dont we have to come to terms with the restructuring of capitalism, now both more
global and more segmented than ever before? For that matter, who is unaware of the structural changes that
have transformed the nature of the working class itself? And what serious socialist has ever been
unconscious of the racial or sexual divisions within the working class? Who would want to subscribe to

the kind of ideological and cultural imperialism that suppresses the multiplicity of human values and cultures or disdains the
particular knowledges of non-privileged groups, with their own wealth of experience and skills? And how can we possibly deny the
importance of language and cultural politics in a world so dominated by symbols, images, and mass communication, not to
mention the information superhighway? Who would deny these things in a world of global capitalism so dependent on the
manipulation of symbols and images in a culture of advertisement, where the media mediate our own most personal
experiences, sometimes to the point where what we see on television seems more real than our own lives, and where the terms of
political debate are setand narrowly constrictedby the dictates of capital in the most direct way, as knowledge and
communication are increasingly in the hands of corporate giants? We dont have to accept postmodernist

assumptions in order to see all these things. On the contrary, these developments cry out for a
materialist explanation. For that matter, there have been few cultural phenomena in human history whose material
foundations are more glaringly obvious than those of postmodernism itself. There is, in fact, no better confirmation of
historical materialism than the connection between postmodernist culture and a consumerist
and mobile global capitalism. Nor does a materialist approach mean that we have to devalue or
denigrate the cultural dimensions of human experience. A materialist understanding is, instead,
an essential step in liberating culture from the stranglehold of commodification.
Postmodernists reject Enlightenment universalism on the grounds that it denies the diversity of
human experience, cultures, values, and identities; but this rejection of universalism on behalf of an
emancipatory pluralism is contradictory and self-defeating. A healthy respect for difference and
diver- sity, and for the plurality of struggles against various oppressions, does not oblige us to jettison all
the universalistic values to which Marxism at its best has always been attached, or to abandon
the idea of a universal human emancipation . On the contrary, even the mildest forms of
pluralism have been unsustainable without appeals to certain universalistic values like the classic
liberal principle of toleration. The radical pluralism espoused by postmodernistsbased as it is on denying any
fundamental commonality, or even the possibility of mutual access and understanding, among plural identitieshas fatally
undercut its own foundations. As Aijaz Ahmad puts it later in this volume: if in the constitution of your
identity, I have no rights of cognition, participation, criticism, then on what basis may you ask
for my solidarity with you except on the basis of some piety, some voluntaristic good will that 1
can withdraw at any moment? In the end, it is hard to imagine how any of the diverse struggles that supposedly
constitute the left postmodernist agenda can be sustained without some appeal to those dreaded modernist and Enlightenment
values of democracy, equality, social justice, and so on.(10-12)

-- AT: Perm
Their permutation robs class of its revolutionary potential- it reduces class from a
material factor to one of a list of socially constructed identities.
Valerie Scatamburlo-DAnnibale PhD, Prof University of Windsor AND Peter McLaren PhD, Prof University
of California, Los Angeles The Strategic Centrality of Class in the Politics of Race and Difference Cultural Studies Critical

Methodologies, Volume 3 Number 2, 2003 148-175

We need to include an important caveat that differentiates our approach from those who invoke the hackneyed race/class/gender
triplet that can sound, to the uninitiated, both radical and vaguely Marxian. It is not. Although race, class, and gender

invariably intersect, they are not coprimary. On the surface, the triplet may be convincingsome
people are oppressed because of their race, some as a result of their gender, and others because
of their classbut this is grossly misleading and approximates what philosophers call a
category mistake. For it is not that some individuals manifest certain characteristics known
as class which then results in their oppression; on the contrary, to be a member of a social class
just is to be oppressed, and in this regard, class is a wholly social category (Eagleton, 1998, p. 289).
Furthermore, even when class is invoked as part of the aforementioned triptych, it is usually
gutted of its practical, social dimension or treated solely as a cultural phenomenon or
category as just another form of difference. In these instances, class is transformed from an economic
and, indeed, social category to an exclusively cultural or discursive one or one in which class merely
signifies a subject position. Class is therefore cut off from the political economy of capitalism , and
class power is severed from exploitation and a power structure in which those who control
collectively produced resources only do so because of the value generated by those who do not
(Hennessy&Ingraham, 1997, p. 2). This has had the effect of replacing a historical materialist class
analysis with a cultural analysis of class . As a result, many post-Marxists have also stripped the
concept of class of precisely that element which, for Marx, made it radical namely, its status as a
universal form of exploitation whose abolition required (and was also central to)
the abolition of all manifestations of oppression (Marx, 1978, p. 60). With regard to this issue, Kovel
(2002) was particularly insightful for he explicitly tackled the priority given to different categories (i.e., gender, class, race, ethnic,
and national exclusion) of what he called dominative splitting. Kovel argued that we need to ask the question: Priority with respect
to what? He noted that if we mean priority with respect to time, then the category of gender would have priority because there are
traces of gender oppression in all other forms of oppression. If we were to prioritize in terms of existential significance, Kovel
suggested that we would have to depend on the immediate historical forces that bear down on distinct groups of peoplehe offered
examples of Jews in 1930s Germany who suffered from brutal forms of anti-Semitism and Palestinians today who experience antiArab racism under Israeli domination. The question of what has political priority, however, would depend on

which transformation of relations of oppression is practically more urgent, and although this would
certainly depend on the preceding categories, it would also depend on the fashion in which all the forces acting in a concrete
situation are deployed. As

to the question of which split sets into motion all the others, the priority
would have to be given to class because class relations entail the state as an
instrument of enforcement and control, and it is the state that shapes and organizes the
splits that appear in human ecosystems. Thus class is both logically and historically
distinct from other forms of exclusion (hence we should not talk of classism to go along with sexism and
racism and speciesism). This is, first of all, because class is an essentially man-made category, without
root in even a mystified biology.We cannot imagine a human world without gender distinctionsalthough we can
imagine a world without domination by gender. But a world without class is eminently imaginableindeed, such
was the human world for the great majority of our species time on earth, during all of which considerable
fuss was made over gender. Historically, the differences arise because class signifies one side of a larger figure
that includes a state apparatus whose conquests and regulations create races and
shape gender relations. Thus there will be no resolution of racism so long as class society
stands, inasmuch as a racially oppressed society implies the activities of a class-defending state. Nor can gender
inequality be enacted away so long as class society, with its state, demands the super-exploitation of womens

labor. (pp. 123-124) Kovels remarks raise questions about the primacy given to class analysis and class strugglea debate that
continues unabated in most leftist circles. Contrary to what many have claimed, not all Marxian forms of class analysis

relegate categories of difference to the conceptual mausoleum. In fact, recent Marxist theory
has sought to reanimate them by interrogating how they are refracted through
material relations of power and privilege and linked to relations of production. Marx himself made
clear how constructions of race and ethnicity are implicated in the circulation process of
variable of capital. To the extent that gender, race, and ethnicity are all understood as social
constructions rather than as essentialist categories, the effect of exploring their insertion into
the circulation of variable capital (including positioning within the internal heterogeneity of collective labor and hence,
within the division of labor and the class system) must be interpreted as a powerful force reconstructing
them in distinctly capitalist ways (Harvey, 2000, p. 106). Unlike contemporary narratives that tend
to focus on one or another form of oppression, the irrefragable power of historical
materialism resides in its ability to reveal (a) how forms of oppression based on categories of
difference do not possess relative autonomy from class relations but rather constitute the ways
in which oppression is lived/experienced within a class-based system and (b) how all forms of
social oppression function within an overarching capitalist system.

Movements
The only choice is the new social movementits try or die
*is there any way to rephrase try or die as efficiently? try or die feels as if its inherently
operating under a utilitarian/consequentialist framing

Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy, Civil Rights and Race and Public
Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong
In every era, from slavery to advanced capitalism, racism arose out of oppressive and exploitative

economic arrangements in which wealth was concentrated in a dominant class. This class played
a leading role in generating discourse and ideology to legitimize these oppressive arrangements
and to convince other classes to support the established order. This class also used the state to protect these arrangements. This
discourse, ideology, and state action sustained oppressive arrangements and contributed to the formation
of racist culture. Changes in modes of production generated changes in forms of oppression and types
of racism. Also, shifts in political power precipitated changes in the role of the state and in the
formation of racist culture. The old racism died with the disintegration of the sharecropping system and the relative
success of the civil rights movement. Nevertheless, a new form of racism emerged out of new exploitative and oppressive
arrangementsmetaracism. The old exploitative mechanism of industrial capitalism and the Fordist period

gave way to new postFordist, exploitative processes. The corporate sector found new ways to
extract more surplus value from labor, new ways to reduce the costs of labor, and new ways to diminish the
power of labor unions. In their drive to accumulate wealth, corporations engaged in more flexible
capital investment strategies. They closed down many production facilities where labor costs were
high and unions strong. They relocated in areas of cheap labor and nonexistent unions. They subcontracted
with peripheral firms and eliminated core sector jobs. They used mergers and bankruptcy to undermine unions and
reduce labor costs. They attacked unions directly at the negotiating table. These economic changes contributed to
the rise of the new racism in several ways. First, economic changes influenced shifts in political power. These changes
contributed to greater concentrations of wealth in the upper stratum and the decline of organized labor. These changes meant a
weakening of civil rights forces and a strengthening of conservative forces. The corporate sector is now more politically active than
ever before. It contributes more resources to conservative think tanks committed to generating studies and

ideas supporting the established order. Some of the works from these research institutes contributed to the formation
and dissemination of racist ideology. The corporate sector also supports political leaders who have used
racist imagery and discourse in ways that encouraged the rise of racism. Second, these economic changes,
combined with institutional practices, produced new racially oppressive arrangements characterized by black poverty substantially
concentrated in inner cities. This concentrated black poverty is not simply a function of impersonal market forces nor the
unintended effects of a global economy. This poverty is associated with the uneven economic development

of advanced capitalism. It is the result of the impact of the shift from the Fordist to the postFordist period. It is related
to deliberate decisions of corporate leadersdecisions calculated to depress wages and weaken
labor power. These decisions affected black workers most severely. Also, Squires (1990, p. 202) contended that the
corporate sector deliberately avoided locating new industrial development in areas with large
black populations: Industrial development specialists in several state governments have reported that managers of
corporations seeking locations for new sites often request that areas with substantial minority populations be eliminated from
consideration. The stated concerns are that blacks are more susceptible to union organizing drives
and that if

there are fewer minorities there will be fewer equal opportunity obligations with which
to contend. PostFordist changes, uneven development, and an aversion to locating industrial
development in central cities have contributed to the marginalization of black workers. These factors,
in conjunction with housing segregation and labor market discrimination, produced black
poverty, substantially concentrated in inner cities. This visible aspect of racial oppression contributed directly to

the formation of the new racism, especially when political leaders justified this poverty in ways that further denigrated African Page
242 Americans. Third, conservative forces contributed to racist discourse in the process of justifying

the growth of concentrated black poverty. This discourse alienated poor blacks from the larger community and
desensitized its members to the plight of the poor. This discourse involved images of black welfare queens,
dangerous black males addicted to drugs and driven by uncontrollable rage, incompetent blacks given undeserved
jobs through affirmative action, lazy black males who prefer to hang out on street corners, and other denigrating

figures. This discourse contributed to the formation of the new racist culture, as it was popularized in the media. It influenced
most sectors of societyclasses, groups, and institutionswhich in turn operate to maintain
existing racially oppressive arrangements. The culture encourages the maintenance of racial segregation in
metropolitan areas and of racial discrimination in urban labor markets. Fourth, postFordist changes generated a
pervasive sense of anxiety and insecurity, especially among middleclass workers. This anxiety and
insecurity made people more susceptible to new forms of racism. It contributed to scapegoatingpure hostility
against blacks. It has fueled the assault on affirmative action. In the final analysis, exploitative and oppressive

This racism will

continue into the 21st century unless there is another major social
movement or unless shifts in political power occur that
counterbalance the dominant position of the corporate sectorthe
sector today most resistant to fairer ways of distributing societal
resources.
economic arrangements contributed to the formation of racial politics and racist culture.

Pre-Requisite
Marxism is key to understanding the racial implications of production
and development systems
Cole 9 (Mike Cole, Mike Cole is a Professor in Education, and is also an Emeritus Research
Professor in Education and Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include
research and publications, PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate
teaching. He also has a PhD in Philosophy. June 9, 2009, Critical Race Theory comes to the
UK: A Marxist response, http://etn.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/9/2/246.)//ky
Directing attention away from modes of production While, for Marxists, it is certainly the case
that there has been a continuity of racism for hundreds of years, the concept of white
supremacy does not in itself explain this continuity, since it does not need to connect to modes
of production and developments in capitalism. It is true that Mills (1997) provides a wideranging discussion of the history of economic exploitation, and that Preston (2007) argues that
CRT needs to be considered alongside Marxism. However, unlike Marxism, there is no a priori
need to connect with capitalist modes of production. Thus Gillborn (e.g. 2005, 2006a) is able to
make the case for CRT and white supremacy without providing a discussion of the relationship
of racism to capitalism. For me, the Marxist concept of racialization5 is most useful in
articulating racism to modes of production, and I have developed these links at length elsewhere
(e.g. Cole, 2004a, 2004b). Manning Marable (2004) has used the concept of racialization to
connect to modes of production in the US. He has described the current era in the US as The
New Racial Domain (NRD). This New Racial Domain, he argues, is different from other earlier
forms of racial domination, such as slavery, Jim Crow segregation, and ghettoization, or strict
residential segregation, in several critical respects. These early forms of racialization, he goes
on, were based primarily, if not exclusively, in the political economy of US capitalism.
Meaningful social reforms such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965
were debated almost entirely within the context of Americas expanding, domestic economy, and
a background of Keynesian, welfare state public policies. The political economy of the New
Racial Domain, on the other hand, is driven and largely determined by the forces of
transnational capitalism, and the public policies of state neoliberalism, which rests on an unholy
trinity, or deadly triad, of structural barriers to a decent life. These oppressive structures are
mass unemployment, mass incarceration and mass disfranchisement, with each factor directly
feeding and accelerating the others, creating an ever-widening circle of social disadvantage,
poverty, and civil death, touching the lives of tens of millions of US people. For Marable,
adopting a Marxist perspective, The process begins at the point of production. For decades, US
corporations have been outsourcing millions of better-paying jobs outside the country.The class
warfare against unions has led to a steep decline in the percentage of US workers. As Marable
concludes: Within whole US urban neighborhoods losing virtually their entire economic
manufacturing and industrial employment, and with neoliberal social policies in place cutting
job training programs, welfare, and public housing, millions of Americans now exist in
conditions that exceed the devastation of the Great Depression of the 1930s. In 2004, in New
Yorks Central Harlem community, 50 percent of all black male adults were currently
unemployed. When one considers that this figure does not count those black males who are in
the military, or inside prisons, its truly amazing and depressing. Moreover, the new jobs being
generated for the most part lack the health benefits, pensions, and wages that manufacturing
and industrial employment once offered.

Marxist analysis is key to understanding the systems of production,

and is needed to contextualize the relations of race in society
Cole 9 (Mike Cole, Mike Cole is a Professor in Education, and is also an Emeritus Research
Professor in Education and Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include
research and publications, PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate
teaching. He also has a PhD in Philosophy. June 9, 2009, Critical Race Theory comes to the
UK: A Marxist response, http://etn.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/9/2/246.)//ky
TENET II: RACE NOT CLASS AS THE PRIMARY CONTRADICTION Mills (2003: 156) rejects
both what he refers to as the original white radical orthodoxy (Marxist) for arguing that social
class is the primary contradiction in capitalist society, and the present white radical orthodoxy
(post- Marxist/postmodernist) for its rejection of any primary contradiction. Instead, for Mills
(2003), there is a primary contradiction, and . . . its race. Mills (2003: 157) states that Race
[is] the central identity around which people close ranks and there is no transracial class bloc.
Given the way in which neoliberal global capitalism unites capitalists throughout the world on
lines that are not necessarily colour-coded, this statement seems quite extraordinary. Race,
Mills argues, is the stable reference point for identifying the them and us which override all
other thems and uss (identities are multiple, but some are more central than others). Race,
he concludes is what ties the system together, and blocks progressive change. For Marxists, it is
self-evident that it is capitalism that does this. Mills (2003: 1578) goes on to suggest that
European models of radicalism, predicated on a system where race is much less
domestically/internally important (race as the external relation to the colonial world), operate
with a basically raceless (at least nominally) conceptual apparatus. Race, he states, then has to
be added on (Mills, 2003: 158). There is in fact a longstanding and wide range of US- and UKbased Marxist analyses of race and racialization (e.g. Marable, 2004; Miles, 1987, 1989, 1993;
Zarembka, 2002). Mills (2003: 158) invites readers to: Imagine youre a white male Marxist in
the happy prefeminist, pre-postmodernist world of a quarter-century ago. You read Marcuse,
Miliband, Poulantzas, Althusser. You believe in a theory of group domination involving
something like the following: The United States is a class society in which class, defined by
relationship to the means of production, is the fundamental division, the bourgeoisie being the
ruling class, the workers being exploited and alienated, with the state and the juridical system
not being neutral but part of a superstructure to maintain the existing order, while the dominant
ideology naturalizes, and renders invisible and unobjectionable, class domination. This all
seems a pretty accurate description of the US in the 21st century, but for Mills (2003: 158) it is a
set of highly controversial propositions. He justifies this assertion by stating that all of the
above would be disputed by mainstream political philosophy (liberalism), political science
(pluralism), economics (neo-classical marginal utility theory), and sociology (Parsonian
structural-functionalism and its heirs) (Mills, 2003: 158). My response to this would be, well, of
course it would be disputed by mainstream philos - ophers, pluralist political scientists,
neoclassical economists and functionalist sociologists, all of which, unlike Marxists, are
apologists for capitalism. Social class, I would argue, albeit massively racialized (and gendered)
is the system upon which the maintenance of capitalism depends. It is possible, though
extremely difficult because of the multiple benefits accruing to capital of racializing workers, and
the unpaid and underpaid labour of women as a whole, to imagine a capitalist world of racial
(and gender) equality. It is not logically possible for capitalism to exhibit social class equality.
Without the extraction of surplus value from the labour of workers, capitalism cannot exist. I am
not arguing that CRT cannot provide insights into racism in capitalist societies; for example, its
emphasis that people of colour need to be heard to provide meaningful analyses of racism is
useful and particularly illuminating for those whose life experiences are restricted to
monocultural settings in multicultural societies (Delgado, 1995). (Xeno-) racism and the process
of (xeno-)racialization can best be understood, however, by a combination of listening to and
learning about the life histories and experiences of those at the receiving end of racism, and by

objective Marxist analysis. There is a richness to be gained from this theoretical technique,
which facilitates a synthesis of lived experience through the lens of Marxist theory and traces the
how of life experience back to the why of capitalist class practices. This is always rooted in
shifts in the relations of production aimed at more and more profit for the few, and which
results in more and more immiseration for the many. There is thus considerable purchase in
Zeus Leonardos (2004) attempt to integrate Marxist objectivism and race theorys focus on
subjectivity, a move that works to ensure that the CRT concept of voice does not drift into
postmodern multivocality (multiple voices) where everyones opinion has equal worth and
therefore voice becomes thoroughly depoliticized (Maisuria, 2006). In summary, I must reject
the insistence of CRT to valorize race over class. Marxism has the crucial benefit of
contextualizing practices in capitalist relations of production. It gives priority to the abolition of
class society because without its demise, racism (as well as other forms of discrimination) is
likely to continue it in its various guises.

Social class and capitalism must be central to the analysis to avoid

partial and ambiguous explanations
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 44-45, 2009//SRSL)
I have described the process by which refugees, asylum-seekers23 and migrants to the United Kingdom from the newly joined
countries of the European Union become falsely categorized as belonging to distinct 'races' as xeno- racialization (for an analysis, see
Cole, 2004b, 2008c, 2008d, Chapter 9).24 With respect to the EU's current enlargement, connections can be made between the
respective roles of (ex-)imperial citizens in the immediate post World War II period, and migrant workers from Eastern Europe
today (both sources ofcheap labor). In addition, there are, as I have indicated, similarities in perceptions and treatment, something
that is promoted by sections of the racist capitalist media. The existence of xeno-racialization, although he did not use that term,
along with other forms of racism, was recognized by the Chair of the Commission for Equality and Human Rights in 2005, Trevor
Phillips, when he noted: The nature of racism is changing subtly, but critically. We cannot respond by recycling the slogans of the
'70s and '80s when race was regarded as a black and white affair. Today, we know that the reality of multi-

ethnic, multi-faith Britain is more complex. Now, when we talk 'racial equality' and 'disadvan- tage', we are
not necessarily referring to the needs ofyoung black men. Rather we are speaking ofthe stigmatised [E]astern European asylum
seeker; the Iraqi woman trapped in her own home by stone-throwing jobs; the Gypsies and Travellers who will live for 12 years less
than the rest of us; and the Muslims unjustly victimised for atrocities committed by a tiny minority offollowers of their faith ... A

recent . .. survey . .. shows that blatant discrimination or gross harassment is not

found as frequently as in the past. But increasingly we are seeing the emergence of
some other forms of racial bias which demand differ ent tools (redhotcurry.com, 2005) While
CRT analysis serves as a constant reminder that racism is central in sustaining the current world order, the CRT concept
of'race-ing' (Crenshaw et al., 1995, p. xxvi), unlike the Marxist concepts of racialization and xeno- racialization, does not
need to make the interconnections with modes ofpro- duction since 'race' is itself
material. In other words, oppression on grounds of 'race' can be explained merely as the modus operandi of 'white supremacy', a power structure in its own right. To reiterate, I would argue that, in articulating with modes of produc- tion, these Marxist
concepts of racialization and xeno-racialization have more purchase in explaining and understanding contemporary racism than
'white supremacy'. Indeed, I would maintain that if social class and capital- ism are not

central to the analysis, explanations are ambiguous and partial. Capitalism and
social class are addressed in chapter 6 ofthis volume. In this chapter I began by
critiquing two ofCRT's central tenets, the con- cepts of'white supremacy' and the
beliefin 'race' as primary. I then outlined the definition ofracism preferred by Marxist
theorist, Robert Miles and his colleagues (a narrow one) before developing my
own definition, which I argued, contra Miles, should be wide-ranging, finding this
more useful than 'white supremacy' in understanding the multiple manifestations
of racism in the contemporary neoliberal capitalist world. I then went on to make
the case that the Marxist concepts of racialization and xeno-racialization have
most purchase in explaining the processes by which certain groups become
racialized at different phases in the capitalist mode of production. I will revisit the
concept of racialization with respect to U.S. imperialism in chapter 6 of this
volume. Having identified what I perceive to be CRT's two major weaknesses, in

the next chapter I turn to what I perceive to be some of its strengths, strengths that
nevertheless can be enhanced by Marxist analysis.

Critical race theorists dont use specificity and without engaging the
discussion of cap is incomplete
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
intro, pgs 2-3, 2009//SRSL)
I first read Marx, starting with Capital Volume 1, nearly thirty years ago. At the same time, I became familiar with the work ofthe
Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies at the University of Birmingham. Headed at the time by Stuart Hall, the CCCS was
publishing neo-Marxist analyses ofpopular cul- ture at a breathtaking pace. Along with a number of Occasional Stenciled Papers, the
Centre and its associates produced some major books (e.g., Hall and Jefferson, 1976; Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies
[CCCS], 1977, 1978; Hall et al., 1978; Clarke et al., 1979; Hall et al., 1980; CCCS, 1981). One of the Centre's books, The Empire Strikes
Back (CCCS, 1982) dealt specifically with racism. This book, along with other Marxist analyses of racism both

emanating from the CCCS and elsewhere, made me think that perhaps Marxism
had most purchase in understanding the multifaceted nature ofracism, both
historically and contemporaneously. A few years after becoming acquainted with such analyses, I published

my first Marxist critiques ofracism (Cole, 1986a, 1986b) and have been using Marxist theory to try to understand racism ever since.
I am not sure when I first became aware of Critical Race Theory (CRT). However, I do remember the first critical Marxist analysis of
CRT (Darder and Torres, 2004, Chapter 5) that I came across. After reading it, I began to see CRT as the latest in a

long line of academic challenges to Marx and Marxism.4 This is how Antonia Darder and Rodolfo
Torres (2004, p. 117) conclude the chapter: any account of contemporary racism(s) and related
exclusionary practices divorced from an explicit engagement with racialization
and its articulation with the reproduction of capitalist relations of production is
incomplete. The continued neglect by critical race theorists to treat with theoretical
specificity the political economy of racialized class inequalities is a major
limitation in an otherwise significant and important body of literature. Since I had read
and respected previous work by Darder and by Torres, I decided that I needed to read CRT in order to ascertain whether I agreed
with the conclusion reached by Darder and Torres. Having read CRT, my purpose became clear: to

interrogate CRT from a Marxist perspective, but also to respect some of CRT's
strengths. Accordingly, Darder and Torres' critique will resonate throughout its
pages. While, as will become clear in chapter 1, CRT had its origins in law, the
specific focus in this volume is CRT and Education.

Poverty
Alt solves Socialism creates equality
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social
Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 7, pg 119, 2009//MG)

World socialism will only lower the standard of life for the Ruling Classes. There
will not, for sure, be the massive disparities of wealth apparent in our present
capitalist world. There will, of course, be no billionaires and no need for a
(parasitic) monarchy. If the wealth of the world is shared, then there will be a good
standard of life for all, since all reasonable needs will be met, including enough
food (as noted above by Molyneux (2008, p. 13) enough already exists). To paraphrase Marx, 1875, the principle will
be from each according to his or her ability, to each according to his or her needs.

Racism
Movements against capitalism have resulted in the elimination of
racism, Venezuela proves
Cole 9 (Mike Cole, Mike Cole is a Professor in Education, and is also an Emeritus Research
Professor in Education and Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include
research and publications, PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate
teaching. He also has a PhD in Philosophy. June 9, 2009, Critical Race Theory comes to the
UK: A Marxist response, http://etn.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/9/2/246.)//ky
MARXISM AND WAYS FORWARD Marxists would agree with Mills (1997: 127) that the aim is .
. . ultimately to eliminate race (not as innocent human variety but as ontological superiority and
inferiority, as differential entitlement and privilege) altogether. However, Marxists, as I have
indicated, would most definitely not go down the path advocated by John Preston. Elsewhere, I
have argued, at length, that I see the 21st-century socialism advocated by President Hugo
Chvez in Venezuela as an excellent example of a way forward. In the context of Mills concerns
about white Marxists, it is worth noting that Chvez was the first Venezuelan president ever to
claim and honour his indigenous and African ancestry. Anti-racist/anti-imperialist 21st-century
socialism Like the rest of Latin America, Venezuelas history is scarred by colonialism and
imperialisms racist legacies. Only now, with the gains being made by the socialist government
and the growing mass revolutionary movement, is Venezuela beginning to grapple in earnest
with how to confront this racist legacy. The rights of Venezuelas indigenous people were first
entrenched in the 1999 Bolivarian constitution (Chvez came to power in 1998), which was
ratified by 71 percent of voters. For the first time, indigenous land rights DEBATE Downloaded
from etn.sagepub.com at UNIV OF MICHIGAN on July 13, 2014 were identified as being
collective, inalienable and non-transferable, recognizing the: . . . rights of the indigenous peoples
over the land they traditionally and ancestrally occupied. They must demarcate that land and
guarantee the right to its collective ownership. (cited in Harris, 2007) As Harris points out:
Article 9 stipulates that while Spanish is Venezuelas primary language, indigenous languages
are also for official use for indigenous peoples and must be respected throughout the Republics
territory for being part of the nations and humanitys patrimonial culture. The 1999
constitution also affirms that exploitation by the state of natural resources will be subject to
prior consultation with the native communities, that indigenous peoples have the right to an
education system of an intercultural and bilingual nature, that indigenous people have the right
to control ancestral knowledge over native genetic resources and biodiversity, and that three
indigenous representatives are ensured seats in the countrys National Assembly (these were
elected by delegates of the National Council of Venezuelan Indians in July 1999). Since 1999, the
confidence of the indigenous rights movement has exploded. The multitude of social problems
that persist as a hangover of previous, capitalist policies has led to a culture of Chvista activists
who support the revolution and lobby the Chvez government to demand attention to their
particular issues (Harris, 2007). At the forefront of the anti-racist movement is the AfroVenezuelan Network, headed by Jesus Chucho Garcia, which is lobbying for recognition of
Afro-Venezuelans in the next round of amendments to the Bolivarian constitution. The Network
successfully campaigned for the creation of a presidential commission against racism in 2005,
the inclusion of Afro- Venezuelan history in the school curriculum, the establishment of a
number of cocoa-processing plants and farming cooperatives run by black Venezuelans and for
Afro-Venezuelan Day on 10 May each year (Harris, 2007). As Harris (2007) explains, the
ambitious land and agrarian reforms embedded in the 1999 constitution have been especially
beneficial to indigenous and Afro-Venezuelan communities. The constitution declares that idle,
uncultivated private land over a certain size can be transformed into productive units of land for
common social benefit. By prioritising socially productive land use over monopolistic private

land ownership and re distributing idle land to the landless, Chvez has promoted
independence, food sovereignty and local agricultural development (Harris, 2007). Such
developments are not confined to Venezuela. Chvez has also been building alliances with other
marginalized communities in the Americas, including providing food, water and medical care to
45,000 Hurricane Katrina victims in areas surrounding New Orleans, and supplying discounted
heating and diesel oil to schools, nursing homes and hospitals in poor communities in the US
(Harris, 2007). Harris (2007) concludes: . . . in Venezuela the space for frank discussion about
how to move forward in the context of a mass movement has been opened up by the ongoing
revolutionary process, and genuine gains have been made by indigenous and Afro-Venezuelan
movements to eliminate the systemic nature of racism from Venezuelan life.

Socialism creates equality between races

Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social
Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 7, pgs 130-, 2009//MG
In the light of CRT concerns about 'white Marxism' (see, for example the critique of Mills' and Gillborn's views on this in chapter 5 of
this volume), it is worth pointing out that Chavez was the first Venezuelan President ever to claim

and honor his indigenous and African ancestry.18 It is also important to emphasize
the antiracist developments currently occurring in Venezuela. Chavez articulated
this when he stated: We've raised the flag of socialism, the flag of anti-imperialism,
the flag of the black, the white and the Indian ... I love Africa. I've said to the Venezuelans that
until we recognise ourselves in Africa, we will not find our way ... We have started a hard battle to bring
equality to the African descendents, the whites and the indigenous people. In our
constitution it shows that we're a multicultural, multiracial nation. (Chavez, 2008, cited in
Campbell, 2008, p. 58) Like the rest of Latin America, Venezuela's history is scarred by colonialism's and imperialism's racist
legacies. Only now, with the gains being made by the Chavez Government and the growing mass

revolutionary movement, is Venezuela beginning to grapple in earnest with how to

confront this racist legacy. The rights of Venezuela's indigenous people were first
entrenched in the 1999 Bolivarian constitution (as noted earlier in this chapter, Chavez came to power in
1998), which was ratified by 71% of voters. For the first time, indigenous land rights were
identified as being collective, inalienable, and nontransferable, recognizing the
rights of the indigenous peoples over the land they traditionally and ancestrally
occupied. They must demarcate that land and guarantee the right to its collective
ownership. (cited in Harris, 2007)
Material base of discourse inverts the historical relationship between the Other
and imperialists
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the
Centre for Education for Social Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK
(Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response, chapyer 6, pgs 104-107,
2009//SRSL)
While Smith's arguments on enfraudening and enantiomorphism are con- vincing,
and in centering on the role of ideology, in essence Marxist, I have problems with
the vague transmodern notions of 'narcissism>4 in explain- ing the source of
Western violence directed against the Other. As Paul Warmington (2006, personal correspondence) has
pointed out, the trans- modern notion of 'narcissism' is problematic for Marxists.
First, it represents essentialist notions of 'kinship'; a natural tendency to align
oneselfwith one's 'own kind'. Second, because its psychosocial gloss does not take
account of Marxist understandings of the material base of discourse, it inverts the
his- torical relationship between imperialism and Otherness. Far from deriving
from a narcissistic alignmentwith one's own kind and antipathy to the Other, I would
argue, following Warmington (ibid.), that the western violence that enforced capitalist imperialism

entailed a conscious and strategic (and traumatic) alienation from other

nations (as well as from the west's own emergent liberal-democratic values). This histor- ically specific alienation was
achieved through contrived 'racial', cultural and spatial distinctions that served to
mask the key contradictions of imperialist production. 'Race' and racialization
were key factors here. As I agued in chapter 5 ofthis volume, the rhetoric ofthe purveyors ofdom- inant
discourses aims to shape 'common sense discourse' into formats which serve their
interests. Underlining the fragmentary and incoherent role of'com- mon sense' in
connecting racialization to popular consciousness, Peter Fryer (1988), outlines the following argument.
Modern racist ideology emerged with and from the Atlantic slave trade (which
predated the 'mature' colonial- ism of the Indian sub-continent by 150 years) and
was anomalous in that: at the point when western European production was
shifting towards free labor and was shifted by technological advances, it made
itselfincreasingly reliant on a backward form of production, that is, chattel slavery
(from the sixteenth century onward)

at the point at which the emergent Enlightenment began to posit notions ofindividual freedom, the west embarked on conquest and enslavement, in order to secure servile
labor systems (first in America, later in colonial Asia and Africa). As Warmington (2006, personal correspondence) argues, racialization can be seen, therefore, as a project to
rhetorically 'resolve' these contradictions, not merely to justify them in the sense Ofpapering over their cracks but to construct a racialized 'justice' upon which to build brutal,
servile produc- tion systems. In short, if liberty and the Enlightenment were morally and ideologically correct then they must necessarily be extended to all human- ity (and this

this extension was clearly impossible (both at home

and abroad-but espe- cially abroad in those continents that were, as Du Bois
pointed out, being subjected to conquests that made them bear the largest burden
of global pauperization, conquests involving unprecedented levels ofviolence and
dis- placement). Thus an ideology was required that placed the slave labor force
outside the bounds of humanity and therefore outside the 'human rights' being
tentatively proclaimed in Europe (clearly this ideology also infused racial folklore). Fryer (1988, p. 63) quotes Genovese and Genovese:
was the view of some dissident voices in the west). However,

'[The rising capitalist] class required a violent racism not merely as an ideological rationale but as a psychological imperative.' In Cole, 2006a I addressed the origins of the New
Imperialism, how 'the eclipse of the non-European' following the European invasion of 1492, con- solidated by subsequent invasions and conquests, unleashed racialized capi
talism, often gendered, on a grand scale. The expansion ofcapital entailed not only the beginnings of the transatlantic slave trade, but also the attempted enslavement, the
massacre, and the seizing ofthe land ofindigenous peoples, both local and adjacent. Its legacy today includes a very high and dispropor- tionate suicide rate for Native Americans
in general, and continuing attacks on the reproductive rights of Native American women; the 'prison industrial complex'-a legacy of slavery-where 'people of color' are
disproportion- ately represented; human rights abuse at U.S. borders; and continuing seg- regation in U.S. cities. Racialized notions of 'like' and 'Other' ('black' and 'white',
'civilized', and 'savage') are ends (or mediators), the starting point being shifts in production (slavery and colonialism's forms of sixteenth- to early-twentieth-century
globalization). 'Otherness' was a strategic, violent creation. Once groups have become racialized via 'common sense', for example, as 'savages' in the case of indigenous peoples,
or sub-human and genetically inferior, as in the case of African slaves, genocide becomes less problematic (Cole, 2006a; see also McLaren, 1997). In a similar fashion, once
Muslims are racialized as the Other (and the 'war on terror' knows no bounds) tor- ture, humiliation and other human rights abuses, to which Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib
bear witness, becomes routine practice. Such practice is not confined to these locations. Former detainee, Moazzam Begg (Begg and Brittain, 2006) for one, recalls abuse in U.S.
and British military prisons in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq and Egypt, as well as in Guantanamo Bay (see also Campbell and Goldenberg, 2004). Such treatment is sustained by
racialization. Indeed, the historic a priori racialization ofNative Americans and African Americans as sub-human, and Muslims as sub-human and terrorists serves to legitimate
and facilitate their massacre, enslavement, torture, rape, humiliation and degradation. In the current era, global imperialist abuse involves psychological as well as physi- cal
abuse, with detainees denied halal meat, for example. In addition, sexual torture has been revealed as having occurred on a massive scale, and as hav- ing apparently been
developed by intelligence services over many years. In particular the humiliation ofthe body stands in stark contrast to the Muslim importance ofcovering, and not exposing
flesh. Such abuse has also involved sexual humiliation. In 2003, U.S. soldier, Lynndie England serving at the Abu Ghraib camp in Iraq was charged with abusing detainees and
prison- ers by forcing them to lay in a naked pyramid with an aim to humiliate. Photographs taken by U.S. military also showed Lynndie England holding a leash attached to the
neck ofa naked man on the floor (Sands, 2008, p. 23), while another showed a prisoner with wires attached to his fingers, stand- ing on a box with his head covered (ibid.) BBC
News (2004) reported that there 'were numerous incidents of sadistic and wanton abuse.... Much of the abuse was sexual, with prisoners often kept naked and forced to perform
simulated and real sex acts'. Torture techniques, approved by Donald Rumsfeld, and endorsed by George Bush were in three categories: Category 1 comprised yelling and
deception; Category II included 'humiliation and sensory deprivation, including stress positions, such as standing for a maximum of four hours; isolation; deprivation of light
and sound; hooding; removal of religious and all other comfort items; removal of clothing; forced grooming, such as shaving of facial hair; and the use of individual phobias,
such as fear of dogs, to induce stress' (Sands, 2008, p. 21). Category III techniques were to be used for a very small percentage of detainees, 'the most uncoopera- tive (said to be
fewer than 3%) and exceptionally resistant individuals-and required approval by the commanding general at Guantanamo' (ibid.). There were four techniques in the last
category: 'the use of "mild, non-injurious physical contact", such as grabbing, poking and light pushing; the use of scenarios designed to convince the detainee that death or
severely painful consequences were imminent for him or his family; exposure to cold weather or water; and, finally, the use ofa wet towel and dripping water to induce the
misperception of suffocation' (ibid.). According to Sands (ibid.) the pattern at Guantanamo was always the same, and consisted of: 20-hour interrogation sessions, followed by
four hours of sleep. Sleep dep- rivation appears as a central theme, along with stress positions and constant humiliation, including sexual humiliation. These techniques were
supple- mented by the use ofwater, regular bouts ofdehydration, the use ofIV tubes, loud noise (the music of Christina Aguilera was blasted out in the first days of the new
regime), nudity, female contact, pin-ups. An interrogator even tied a leash to [one detainee], led him around the room and forced him to perform a series of dog tricks. He was
forced to wear a woman's bra and a thong was placed on his head. What seemed to unite torture at Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib was 'humiliation, stress, hooding, nudity,
female interrogators, shackles, dogs' (Sands, 2008, p. 23). Such sexualized abuse is part and parcel of the racial- ization ofthe Other in the pursuit ofhegemony and oil (see the
appendix to this chapter). Global rule and the New Imperialism are, of course, first and foremost, about global profits. This connection to capital, national and international is
outside the remits ofboth transmodernism and CRT, thereby rendering their use as a tool for analysis significantly lacking. Racialization, under conditions of imperialism is
fired by what Dallmayr (2004, p. 11), has described above as 'the intoxicating effects of global rule' that anticipates 'corresponding levels of total depravity and corruption among
the rulers'. The racialization of the Other provides a more convincing explanation of the justification of conquest and enslavement by the West and of 'The New Imperialism'
than the transmodern exaltation of basic narcissism as a causal factor. The concept of 'narcissism' is unconvincing because it starts from the opposition of 'like' and 'Other', and

Critical Race
Theorists like Ladson-Billings and Tate (1995, p. 55) note the plunder of native
Americans land through military conquest of the Mexicans to the construction of
Africans as property, they are unable within their own frames of reference,
without resorting to Marxist analysis, to relate all this to capitalism. As Darder and Torres (2004, p.
99) put it, the efforts of Critical Race Theorists: to explore the ways in which
socioeconomic interests are expressed in the law or education are generally vague
and undertheorized. Because of this lack of a theoretically informed account
because it conflates ahistorical notions of 'Otherness' with historically specific forms of racialization. While, as noted in chapter 1,

ofracism and capitalist social relations, critical race theory has done little to
further our understanding of the political econ- omy of racism and racialization. For
Marxists, the historical and contemporaneous racialization of the Other via 'common sense' must be connected historically and contemporaneously to changes and
developments in the mode ofproduction. Indeed, as I have tried to demonstrate in this book, for Marxists, an analysis of racism begins with the capitalist mode of production,
with social class and with class struggle (Darder and Torres, 2004, p. 99). In the current era, capital is preeminently under U.S. control. We live in a world, much of which is
increasingly at the beck and call ofthe White House, and ofthe diktats ofthe New Imperialism, where globalization is portrayed as inevitable, and imperialistic designs are
masked as 'the war against terror' and the promotion ofdemocracy.

Capitalism makes racism prevalentwith a capitalism overthrow skin

color would become irrelevant
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 8, pgs 137, 2009//SRSL)

I would argue that it is capitalism not white supremacy that is a structural sys- tem
ofoppression. With capitalism's overthrow, there is every possibility that the color
of one's skin will be irrelevant and racism (which, as I have argued, is not necessarily based on skin color)
abolished. While it may be the inten- tion of Critical Race Theorists to make skin
color irrelevant, it is my view that encouraging young people in schools to think on
these lines is also not con- ducive to effective socialist practice. In chapter 5 of this
volume, I referred to current developments in Venezuela (see also Cole, 2008g, 2008h) which
point to a revolutionary process where whiteness is neither redeemed, nor
reformed nor abolished but, in the context ofmajor ameliorative projects, seen as
a con- stituent form of identity in an antiracist struggle for twenty-first century
socialism. For Chavez, as I noted in that chapter, 'the flag of the black, the white and the Indian' has been raised (cited in Campbell, 2008, p.
58).

Technology
Our alternative would solve technology
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social
Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 7, pg 119, 2009//MG)

It Is Impossible to Plan Centrally in Such a Hugely Diverse and Complex World. In

a socialist world, local, national and international needs will need to be
coordinated fairly and efficiently. Given modern technology, this is easier now
than ever before, and will become more and more so, as technology continues to
develop. Under capitalism, technology is harnessed to the creation of greater and
greater surplus value and profit. In a socialist world, technology would be under
the control of the people for the benefit of the people as a whole; for universal
human need rather than global corporate profit. Cuba is a good example.

AT: Doesnt explain slavery

Even if capitalism doesnt explain slavery, Marxism is still the best
starting point for redress and forward-looking politics
Johnson, Associate Professor of History and American Studies NYU, 4
(Walter, The Pedestal and the Veil: Rethinking the Capitalism/Slavery Question, Journal of
the Early Republic Vol. 24, No. 2, p. 299-308, MM)
In trying to reframe the capitalism/slavery discussion as a set of questions about
eighteenth and nineteenth-century Atlantic political economy, it might be worth just for a second
(because that is all it will take) to see what Marx did say about the history of slavery in Capital. Right
before the business about the veil and the pedestal he wrote this: "Whilst the cotton industry introduced child-slavery in
England, it gave in the United States a stimulus to the transformation of the earlier, more or less
patriarchal slavery, into a system of commercial exploitation."14 What is striking about this
sentence is the first word: "whilst." It frames the relation of what we have been calling "capitalism" and what
we have been calling "slavery" in terms of dynamic simultaneity rather than simple supercession, though it does so with careful attention to the historically different relations of
production-slavery and wage labor-which characterized the two poles of this single
Atlantic economy. In so doing, it frames the pedestal metaphor that directly follows it as a structural (or spatial)
metaphor rather than a temporal one. Rather than focusing on the specifics of capitalist development
in Europe, this sentence treats the Atlantic economy as its ground of analysis, a spatial unit

over which economic practice had differential but nevertheless related forms and effects. And the name that Marx gives this transAtlantic political economy at this moment very close to the end of Capital is not "capitalism" but "slavery"-"child-slavery," "veiled
slavery," "slavery pure and simple." It would strain credibility to argue that the hundreds upon hundreds of pages of Capital in which
Marx ignored the question of slavery should be re-read in the light of the several moments at the end where he seemed to suggest
that "slavery" was the essential form of exploitation in the nineteenth-century economy and that the forms it took in Manchester or
in Mississippi were simply variant manifestations of a shared essence. Safer to understand the invocation of "slavery" as a rhetorical
effect, designed to pierce the illusion that wage-workers were in any sense "free." "Slavery" was, after all, an often-invoked metaphor
in the nineteenth-century. The term served as a sort of universal comparison for disparate injustices, and in the process it lost some
of its meaning and most of its liistorical specificity. But the very metaphorical promiscuity of the term "slavery" as Marx used it, calls
us to pay close attention to both the pattern of its deployment and the maneuvers by which its seemingly universal applicability was
contested and controlled. To pay attention, that is, to historical process by which the boundaries between slavery and "freedom"
were drawn, and to the character of the "veil" that separated them. The "veil" to which Marx refers is most

simply imagined as "contract freedom": the idea that wage-labor contracts (by which
"free" workers sold control over the capacities of their bodies by the hour) reflected freely given "consent" to
the bargain (and thus elided the deeper histories of expropriation and coercion that, according to Marx, actually structured
the bargain).15 It refers, that is, to the historical process by which the commodification of
laborers and the commodification of labor power came to be understood as two entirely
separate and, indeed, opposite things-slavery and freedom, black and white, household and
market, here and there-rather than as two concretely intertwined and ideologically
symbiotic elements of a larger unified though internally diversified structure of

exploitation. This formulation of functional unity veiled by ideological separation

entails several interesting avenues of inquiry taken up by these essays. They commend us, first, to
try to think about the economies of Europe, America, Africa-so long divided by historiographies
framed around national boundaries and hard-and-fast distinctions between modes of production-in all of their
concrete interconnection.16 This emphasis on the concrete and practical seems to me
to have the virtue of allowing for the use of some of the most powerful categories
produced by western political economy-the idea of commodification, the labor theory of value, the notion of
variability (across space and race) of the socially necessary cost of the reproduction of the laboring class,
and the calculation of surplus value-without having first to engage a long doctrinal
dispute about the capitalism question. Once the teleology of the "slavery-to-

capitalism" question has been set aside, that is, we still have an enormous amount to
learn from

we try to diagram the historical

interconnections and daily practices of the global economy of the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries. These essays likewise suggest a second set of topics as we try to think of the enormous work involved in categorizing
what

Marx

had to tell us about the work of capitalists as

and containing all of those interconnections in notions of process and history structured by the oppositions of slavery and freedom,
black and white, and coercion and consent. As they argued about where to draw the line between
proper and improper forms of political

economy-about whether wage work was wage slavery,

whether slaveholding was slave trading, and whether marriage was prostitution-capitalists and
anti-capitalists, employers and employees, masters and slaves, husbands and wives argued over the
character of freedom, right, and personhood, over where they began and where they ended, where these things could be
said to be salable and where they must be held to be sacred. These violent arguments were eventually settled
on a frontier where we live today: "slavery" was defined by the condition of blacks in the
South before 1865 and "freedom" was defined as the ability to choose to work for a wage
or a share of the crop (though not to choose not to work for a wage or a share of the crop or, indeed, to choose not to be "free"), and
"the household" was defined as "in but not of the market."17 "So massive was the effort" wrote Marx, "to

establish 'the eternal laws of Nature' of the capitalist mode of production."18 And so
began the history of "freedom," which is apparently hurtling toward such a fearful
conclusion all over the world

today.

AT: Perm
The abolition of whiteness fails to be a political unifier and would
undermine the Marxist Project
Cole 9 (Mike Cole, Mike Cole is a Professor in Education, and is also an Emeritus Research
Professor in Education and Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include
research and publications, PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate
teaching. He also has a PhD in Philosophy. June 9, 2009, Critical Race Theory comes to the
UK: A Marxist response, http://etn.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/9/2/246.)//ky
White supremacy as a unifier and political rallying point Here is the platform of Race Traitor
(2005), a journal that takes the dangers of white supremacy to their limits and that calls for the
abolition of whiteness: What We Believe The white race is a historically constructed social
formation. It consists of all those who partake of the privileges of the white skin in this society.
Its most wretched members share a status higher, in certain respects, than that of the most
exalted persons excluded from it, in return for which they give their support to a system that
degrades them. The key to solving the social problems of our age is to abolish the white race,
which means no more and no less than abolishing the privileges of the white skin. Until that task
is accomplished, even partial reform will prove elusive, because white influence permeates every
issue, domestic and foreign, in US society. The existence of the white race depends on the
willingness of those assigned to it to place their racial interests above class, gender, or any other
interests they hold. The defection of enough of its members to make it unreliable as a predictor
of behavior will lead to its collapse. RACE TRAITOR aims to serve as an intellectual center for
those seeking to abolish the white race. It will encourage dissent from the conformity that
maintains it and popularize examples of defection from its ranks, analyze the forces that hold it
together and those that promise to tear it apart. Part of its task will be to promote debate among
abolitionists. When possible, it will support practical measures, guided by the principle, Treason
to whiteness is loyalty to humanity. I have argued elsewhere (Cole, 2008c) that the style in
which Race Traitors ideological position is written is worryingly reminiscent of Nazi
propaganda, and seriously open to misinterpretation; that it could be interpreted as meaning
the abolition of white people. In fact, it is made clear in the book of the same name (Ignatiev and
Garvey, 1996) that this is not the case.10 However, when one taps in Race Traitor on a Google
search, it is the above statement written by the proprietors of Race Traitor, which comes up first.
I am not questioning the sincerity of the protagonists of the abolition of whiteness, nor
suggesting in any way that they are anti-white people merely questioning its extreme
vulnerability to misunderstanding. Anti-racists have made some progress, in the UK at least,
after years of establishment opposition, in making anti-racism a mainstream rallying point,
and this is reflected, in part, in legislation (e.g. the 2000 Race Relations Amendment Act).11
Even if it were a good idea, the chances of making the abolition of whiteness a successful
political unifier and rallying point against racism are virtually non-existent. And yet, for John
Preston (2007: 13), The abolition of whiteness is . . . not just an optional extra in terms of
defeating capitalism (nor something which will be necessarily abolished 254 ETHNICITIES 9(2)
Downloaded from etn.sagepub.com at UNIV OF MICHIGAN on July 13, 2014 255 postcapitalism) but fundamental to the Marxist educational project as praxis. Indeed, for Preston
(2007: 196) The abolition of capitalism and whiteness seem to be fundamentally connected in
the current historical circumstances of Western capitalist development. From a Marxist
perspective, coupling the abolition of whiteness to the abolition of capitalism is a worrying
development that, if it gained ground in Marxist theory in any substantial way, would most
certainly undermine the Marxist project, even more than it has been undermined already (for an
analysis of the success of the Ruling Class in forging consensus to capitalism in the UK, see Cole,
2008c). Implications of bringing the abolition of whiteness into schools are discussed later.

Thier 1AC isn't the kind of race theory their permutation evidence describes- our
alternative can endorse a MATERIALIST perspective on race but their original
arguments were IDEALIST race theory
Mike Cole Centre for Education for Social Justice , Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln , UK British Journal of
Sociology of Education, 33:2, 167-183 March 2012,

My aim in this paper is not an overall Marxist response to CRT (but see Cole 2009a), but to address theoretical tensions between the
two paradigms, and to evaluate from a Marxist perspective the concepts of abstract racial domination, and the abolition of
whiteness. Critical race theorists such as Charles Mills (for example, Mills 2009) and David Gillborn (for example, Gillborn
2008, 2009, 2010a, 2010b) are unappreciative of and hostile to Marxism. Others like Richard Delgado, one of the founders
of CRT, and of its most prominent advocates (for example, Delgado 2003), and Gloria Ladson-Billings (for example, Ladson-Billings
2006) have retained a certain sympathy with Marxism and social class analysis.6 Indeed, as Richard Delgado (2001) points
out, CRT

has an idealist wing and a materialist wing . The former, he argues, is concerned
with discourse analysis, and maintains that racism and discrimination are matters of thinking, attitude, categorization, and
discourse (Delgado 2001). In focusing on words, symbols, stereotypes and categories (Delgado 2003, 123), combating racism
means that we have to rid ourselves of the texts, narratives, ideas and meaning that give rise to it and convey negative messages
about specific groups (2003, 123). Like post-structuralism the analytic tools are discourse analysis (Delgado 2003, 123).

Materialist CRT, on the other hand, focuses on material factors and views racism as a means by
which society allocates privilege, status and wealth (Delgado 2001, 2). Materialist CRT scholars are
interested in factors such as profits and the labor market (Delgado 2003, 124). Such scholars are also
interested in international relations and competition and in the interests of elite groups, and
the changing demands of the labor market and how this benefits or disadvantages racial groups historically (Delgrado 2003, 124).
The legal system is key in sanctioning or punishing racism, depending on its larger agenda. Materialist CRT, then, has an

affinity with both Max Weber and Weberian analysis of capitalism, and with Marxism. Delgado argues that
CRT is almost entirely dominated by the idealist wing of CRT and that this means
that there are huge deficiencies in our understanding of institutional racism and
ways in which the law is being used to serve dominant groups (2003, 124125). John Preston
(for example, Preston 2007, 2010) has consistently argued the case for utilizing Marxism and CRT. Thus it is surprising that he
states that he agrees with Gillborn (2009) that Marxist critiques of CRT are a sideshow (Preston 2010, 116). This underplays the
importance that Marxists attach to getting the theory right in order to get the practice right, to move forward from abstraction to
concrete solutions for emancipation.

Answers To

--at: Ross/ K Is privilege

The alternative doesn't ignore or suppress aspects of personal
identity, it productively organizes them into a unified movement
against capitalism. The claim that "working class" politics is
associated with whiteness is reductive and erases the historical legacy
of POC anti capitalism
Valerie Scatamburlo-DAnnibale PhD, Prof University of Windsor AND Peter McLaren PhD, Prof University
of California, Los Angeles The Strategic Centrality of Class in the Politics of Race and Difference Cultural Studies Critical
Methodologies, Volume 3 Number 2, 2003 148-175
As Bannerji (2000) has noted, a
fundamentalismis

politics based on differencesbe it in the form of cultural/racial nationalism or religious

far more tolerable to those in power than would be class based social

movements among minority populations (pp. 7-8).12 Remarkably, much contemporary social theory, particularly those
theories ostensibly concerned with race and difference, has failed to acknowledge that struggles based on class are
fundamentally different from others for such struggles are aimed at the very foundations of
capitalist societyincluding its racist, exploitative underpinnings. Class struggle, rooted as it is
in the objective structures of capital itself, is ontologically distinct (Harvey, 1998, p. 7) from those
forms of oppression that motivate the various agendas of difference and cultural
politics.Multiple forms of oppression do exist, but these are best understood within the
overarching system of class domination and the variable discriminating mechanisms central to capitalism as a
system. This position is emphasized by Foster (2002) when he insisted that it is a serious mistake to view the
working class, except as an artificial abstraction, as cut off from issues of race, gender, culture
and community. In the United States the vast majority of the working class consists of women and people of color. The
power to upend and reshape society in decisive ways will come not primarily through single-issue
movements for reform, but rather through forms of organization and popular alliance that will
establish feminists, opponents of racism, advocates of gay rights, defenders of the environment,
etc. as the more advanced sectors of a unified, class-based, revolutionary political
and economic movement. (p. 45) We have argued that it is virtually impossible to
conceptualize class without attending to the forms and contents of difference, but this does
not imply that class struggle is now supplanted by the politics of difference. Indeed, we are now in the
midst of returning to the most fundamental form of class struggle in light of current global conditions (Jameson, 1998, p. 136).
Todays climate suggests that class struggle is not yet a thing of the past and that those who seek to

undermine its centrality are not only morally callous and seriously out of touch with reality but also
largely blind to the needs of the large mass of people who are barely surviving capitals newlyhoned mechanisms of globalized greed (Harvey, 1998, pp. 7-9).13 In our view, a more comprehensive and
politically useful understanding of the contemporary historical juncture necessitates
foregrounding class analysis and the primacy of the working class as the
fundamental agent of change. 14 This does not undermine the concerns of those
marginalized by race, ethnicity, and so forth. Post-Marxists too often assume that privileging capitalist
social relations necessarily undermines the importance of attending to difference and/or
trivializes struggles against racism and so forth in favor of an abstractly defined class-based politics
typically identified as White. Such formulations rest on a bizarre but generally unspoken logic
that assumes that racial and ethnic minorities are only conjuncturally related to the working
class. This stance is patently absurd because membership in the working class undoubtedly
included men and women of different races, ethnicities, and so forth (Mitter, 1997). A good deal of postMarxist critique is subtly racist (not to mention essentialist) insofar as it implies that people of color
could not possibly be concerned with issues beyond those related to their racial, ethnic, cultural
difference. This posits people of color as single-minded, onedimensional caricatures and
presumes that their working lives are less crucial to their self-understanding (and survival) than is

the case with their White male counterparts. It ignores not only the lengthy history of
Black working-class struggle (Fletcher, 1999) but also the fact that class is an ineradicable
dimension of everybodys lives (Gimenez, 2001, p. 24) and that social oppression is much more than
tangentially linked to class background and the social relations of production. On this topic, Meyerson
(2000) is worth quoting at length: Marxism properly interpreted emphasizes the primacy of class in a
number of senses. One of course is the primacy of the working class as a revolutionary agenta primacy which
does not render women and people of color secondary. This view assumes that working class
means whitethis division between a white working class and all the others, whose identity (along
with a corresponding social theory to explain that identity) is thereby viewed as either primarily one of gender
and race or hybrid. . . . The primacy of class means . . . that building a multiracial, multi-gendered
international working-class organization or organizations should be the goal of any
revolutionarymovement so that the primacy of class puts the fight against racism and sexism at
the center. The intelligibility of this position is rooted in the explanatory primacy of
class analysis for understanding the structural determinants of race, gender, and
class oppression.Oppression is multiple and intersecting but its causes are not. (p. 1)
The cohesiveness of this position suggests that forms of exploitation and oppression are related
internally to the extent that they are located in the same totalityone that is currently defined
by capitalist class rule. Capitalism is an overarching totality that is, unfortunately, becoming
increasingly invisible in post-Marxist discursive narratives that valorize difference as a
primary explanatory construct.15

--at: white slaves cheaper (eltis)

1. Their ev is based on an article by Eltiszero proof of that thesis
Schmidt-Nowara 02 [Christopher, Professor of History and Associate Chair at the Lincoln Center campus at Fordham
University, Big Questions and Answers: Three Histories of Slavery, the Slave Trade and the Atlantic World typos because of
OCRing, Social History, Vol. 27, No. 2 (May, 2002), pp. 210-217]
Bold, but not always convincing. This

reader found the volume's most controversial thesis, that the use of
African slavery was an uneconomic decision guided by European racial and gender ideologies, particularly weak in its
demonstration. Eltis wants to show that the social and institutional factors that would have permitted widespread European enslavement were

in place in the early modern period (57-84). In doing so, he marshals impressive evidence about the various forms of coercive labour existing in early
modern western Europe, such as indenture and convict labour. Given the prevalence of overt coercion in Europe, he asks, why did European elites not
take the next step and enslave and transport Europeans in vast numbers? In doing so, he also examines and finds wanting explanations for African
slavery based on epidemiological and economic assumptions. Europeans adapted as well as Africans to New World climates, while the shipping costs
from Europe would have been cheaper than those from Africa. For Eltis, the explanation for this uneconomic behaviour lies in the realm of cultural
values that bound all Europeans regardless of their class position: What seems incontestable is that in regard to slavery the sense of the appropriate was
shared across social divisions and cannot easily be explained by ideological differences or power relationships among classes. Outrage at the treatment
of Africans was rarely expressed at any level of society before the late eighteenth century. . . . For elite and non-elite alike enslavement remained a fate
for which only non-Europeans were qualified. (83-4) Eltis's conclusion regarding a shared European racial identity and sense of racial supremacy is
evocative and cannot be dismissed easily, if at all. But what

this account lacks is sustained consideration of

alternative types of sources and historical approaches that might reinforce or modify it. Eltis makes an
inelegant leap from his counter-factual of mass European enslavement to his explanation of why
it did not take place; his claim of homogeneity of racial values reads more like an assertion than
a proof. For instance, there is little effort to flesh out the values he attributes to Europeans of the period,
largely because his study is short on the types of sources that historians employ to plumb the
beliefs of human cultures, such as pamphlets, broadsheets, autobiographies and memoirs, philosophical tracts or records of political and
religious rituals. It would be foolish to demand of Eltis that he use these sources himself after such meticulous research into economic history. But it is
quite reasonable to expect a more sophisticated engagement with historians who have reached alternative conclusions about early modern European
culture through different sources and methods. Readers of E. P. Thompson, Natalie Zemon Davis or Carlo Ginzburg will be surprised to learn that early
modern European society was so cohesive and homogenous in its values. They will also be dismayed by the indifference Eltis displays towards
questions of resistance and agency and his glib dismissal of class conflict and consciousness as useful analytical categories (84). Historians working in
the broader field of Atlantic history have also tended to see Europe as a contentious society, most notably Seymour Drescher, who sees

class
conflict in the industrialization process as a major factor in the rise of British anti-slavery. Peter

Linebaugh and Marcus Rediker have expanded the temporal and spatial dimensions of that conflict in their recent account of popular anti-slavery
sentiment and cross-racial alliances against slavery in the early modern Atlantic.5 This is not to say categorically that these scholars are correct and
Eltis wrong. Rather, to make his argument more robust and persuasive, Eltis needs to engage, not sidestep, the important scholarly literature that belies
his conclusions. Any explanation of the absence of European enslavement and the apparent indifference towards African slavery must take into account
the balance of political and social forces that produced some semblance of autonomy and liberty among the European working classes as well as
cultural assumptions about race and gender. Eltis s instinct about the cultural origins of African slavery in the Americas is plausible but, given the
narrow perspective from which he addresses the issue, his conclusion is not. Robin Blackburn's The Making of New World Slavery is more varied in its
approach and interpretation. While insisting, unlike Eltis, upon the driving force of 'civil society' in the construction of the plantation complex (6-12),
Blackburn none the less handles questions of ideology and politics with great care and insight. This multipronged explanatory method was also evident
in his earlier volume, The Overthrow of Colonial Slavery, 1776-1848, which today reads as perhaps the most cogent narrative of the forces at work in the
Atlantic world's 'age of revolution'. One of the qualities that makes The Overthrow so attractive is the intermixture of a trenchant analysis of the
political economy of war, empire, decolonization, abolitionism and slave rebellion with the invocation of a 'usable past' with which Blackburn
introduces the volume: Despite the mixed results of anti-slavery in this period the sacrifices of slave rebels, of radical abolitionists and of revolutionary
democrats were not in vain. They show how it was possible to challenge, and sometimes defeat, the oppression which grew as the horrible obverse of
the growth of human social capacities and powers in the Atlantic world of the early modern period. More generally they are of interest in illuminating
the ways in which, however incompletely or imperfectly, emancipatory interests can prevail against ancient law and custom and the spirit of ruthless
accumulation.6 The task of the present volume is to explain the construction of the powerful political and economic complex that was undone in the
nineteenth century. Like Eltis, Blackburn emphasizes European actions and decision-making in the process. The book's first section is tided 'The
Selection of New World Slavery' and ranges from medieval Europe to the eighteenth-century Caribbean. It follows the tracks of the Iberian conquerors
and their northern European imitators and inheritors, thus cutting effectively across the different European empires (the same is true of the works of
Eltis and Thornton), unlike many Atlantic histories which exclude Iberia and Latin America.7 The

selection of African slavery in

the Americas was a tortuous process which involved experiments with indentured European
labour and Indian slavery. Numerous factors made these alternatives unsatisfactory for the various
European colonizers. Spain found a viable labour source in Indian waged labour and forms of coercion associated with
the mita, encomienda and repartimiento in its imperial core, the mining centres of Peru and Mexico. Given the emphasis on bullion,
rather than sugar, Spain found less use for African slave labour than did the other European colonizers (though
African slavery was important in virtually every branch of the Spanish colonial economy). Not until the Cuban plantation
economy took off in the later eighteenth century did the Spanish empire see the intensive use of slave
labour for sugar cultivation that was the magnet for the Atlantic slave trade.8 The Portuguese, Dutch, English and French American
colonies, in contrast, came to be based on the sugar plantation from north-eastern Brazil to the Caribbean. From the later sixteenth through the later
seventeenth centuries these

powers tested European and Indian labour before turning full-force to the

African slave trade. Blackburn coincides with Eltis in that he acknowledges important ideological motives in the selection of African
slavery, finding precedents for European practices in Roman law and Europeans' early association of Africans with slavery and servitude (31-93). Also,
like Eltis, he notes the virtual absence of European criticism of African slavery, figures like the Spanish clerics Bartolome de las Casas and Alonso de
Sandoval being few and far between. However, he places

more explanatory power in existing economic and

political forces. Not only was slavery entrenched in West Africa (as Thornton carefully discusses), but the
development of class relations in late medieval and early modern western Europe precluded the
mass enslavement and especially the hereditary enslavement - of Europeans, an explanation that Blackburn
synchronizes with the arguments of Edmund Morgan, Richard Dunn and K. G. Davies.9 Blackburn sees ideas regarding race, or what Eltis calls
'cultural values', in Weberian terms as '"switchmen", selecting different paths of historical development' (357). Racism

was a cause of the

it was

implantation of African slavery in the Americas and, therefore, more than an epiphenomenon of the master-slave relationship. But

not the primary one. For Blackburn, the explanations of the rise of slavery by historians like Morgan, Davies and
Dunn, who emphasize economic, political and institutional factors, are more convincing than Eltis s
depiction of racism as the motive force behind American slavery, a thesis Blackburn rebuts at length and counters with his own

counter-factual construction of an Atlantic system built on free, instead of bonded, labour (350-63).10 Blackburn's discussion of the selection of African
slavery is wide-ranging and comprehensive. It is surely the single best place to read about the early phase of African slavery in the Americas. Many of
his conclusions in this section will be familiar to scholars of slavery and colonialism, something Blackburn himself acknowledges through references to
the works of Morgan and Dunn and his own reworking of the FreyreTannenbaum thesis regarding the differences between Iberian and northern
European, especially English, slave societies. The former Blackburn calls 'baroque','an alternative modernity to that associated with the Puritan ethic'
(20-1). This modernity was more inclusive (though hierarchical and exploitative) than the British and French plantation colonies, where slaves were not
treated as members of a stratified yet organic community beholden to Crown and Church, but as mere factors of production in a ruthlessly capitalistic
vision of modernity.11 The latter, however, won out, as Blackburn argues in the second half of the book, 'Slavery and Accumulation'. Barbados, Jamaica
and St Domingue were the pinnacle of the early modern Atlantic plantation complex, importing hundreds of thousands of slaves and exporting vast
quantities of sugar in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. England, in particular, emerged triumphant, in part because of the victorious slaves of
St Domingue/Haiti who overthrew their bondage at the end of the eighteenth century, but also because England settled on a more successful colonial
policy that encouraged investment and innovation both in the metropolis and the colonies. In Blackburn's characterization, English colonialism was
'orchestrated by an inverted mercantilism - that is to say, not by financiers and merchants serving raison d'etat but by the state serving capitalist
purposes. . . . The colonial and Adantic regime of extended primitive accumulation allowed metropolitan accumulation to break out of its agrarian and
national limits and discover an industrial and global destiny' (515). In the chapter entided 'New World slavery, primitive accumulation and British
industrialization', Blackburn takes the exact opposite position from Eltis, arguing that colonial slavery was the foundation of England's industrial
revolution, a labyrinthine account that takes him through the works of Adam Smith, Karl Marx, Eric Hobsbawm, Charles Kindelberger, Paul Bairoch
and Stanley Engerman, among others (510-80). The length and care of that chapter indicates one of the major purposes of The Making of New World
Slavery. This work is not just about the rise of African slavery in the Americas; it is also about the rise of the 'West'. How and why did Europe emerge as
the world's dominant power? For Blackburn, Europe's ascendancy led directly through the early modern Atlantic world. Indeed, while his two volumes
have come to occupy centre stage in the historiography of the rise and fall of Atlantic slavery, his work must also be seen in relationship to the recent
revisions in British sociology of the ideas of Marx and Weber concerning the origins and nature of capitalist modernity and the nation-state. Michael
Mann, Perry Anderson, Ernest Gellner, John Hall and Anthony Giddens - as much as C. L. R. James and Fernando Ortiz - are his peers.12 The most
comparable figure is Paul Gilroy. Like Gilroy's The Black Atlantic, The Making of New World Slavery seeks to demonstrate that the Atlantic slave
complex was the wheelhouse and slaughterhouse - of modernity. Whereas Gilroy focuses on the Black experience of modernity forged in the Atlantic
world and Black reflections on that experience, Blackburn approaches the slave complex as the pivot of European industrialization and state formation.
Though his work builds up to an evaluation of European modernity, it would be a gross simplification to call the work of Blackburn, or Eltis,
Eurocentric. However, it is correct to say that the two works do focus on European actions, interests and decisions and conclude with incisive
arguments about the impact of slavery on European economic, political and social development. Just such a focus John Thornton seeks to displace by
emphasizing the actions, interests and decisions of Africans in the making of the Atlantic world. How Africans influenced the origins and management
of the Atlantic slave trade and how Africans affected the culture of the New World colonies are his major concerns. A reader like myself who works on
Europe and the Americas will find this work indispensable both as a conceptual tool and as an introduction to various historiographies pertaining to
Africa and to Africans in the Americas. The book's most provocative and counter-intuitive section,' Africans in Africa', discusses the origins and
development of the slave trade and is most comparable to the other works discussed here. Thornton

makes a strong case that the

decisive players in the process were not Europeans but Africans. He constructs his argument through various
considerations. Slavery was a fundamental institution in most West African societies , though it differed greatly
from the plantation slavery of the Americas. Slaves in West Africa, usually captured in the endemic wars among
the myriad polities of the region, fulfilled a wide variety of roles, from menial labour to administrative and military
leadership. Slavery was not necessarily associated with a society's most debased tasks, as it was in the American plantation zone. It was not
based on colour, nor was it hereditary, the most pernicious of changes in slavery as it crossed the Atlantic (72-97). Moreover,
Thornton takes great pains to show that the European presence on the west coast of Africa, with the possible exception of the
Portuguese in Angola, was weak and completely dependent on the interests and goodwill of African
states and merchants. These latter were the true masters of the slave trade. In making this argument, Thornton is consciously inverting the

terms of dependency theory explanations of the origins and impact of the slave trade. Pointing specifically to the work of Walter Rodney (43), Thornton
disputes the view that the origins of the slave trade lay in European military and commercial superiority, that the immediate consequences of the
European presence were an escalation of African warfare, and that the longer term consequences were a drain on African human capital and the
bending of the African economy to European interests (a description captured in the title of Rodney's influential work How Europe Underdeveloped
Africa).,3 Thornton, in contrast, argues that Africans

held the upper hand. Different African states possessed

sophisticated naval technologies well adapted to the coastal environment that made effective
penetration impossible for the Europeans. European efforts to subdue African kingdoms through force of arms met with

repeated failure. Confronted with a military and naval foe of equal or greater strength, Europeans had no choice but to establish small trading forts on
islands off the coast of Africa. Such a weak presence, Thornton holds, had very little effect on the nature of African politics. The same was true of
Europe's economic impact on the region. In the lengthy chapter 'The process of enslavement and the slave trade', Thornton argues that it was not the
temptation of European commodities such as guns that stoked the slave trade and African warfare. Rather, war

among African states

responded more frequently to internal political pressures, while African slave traders had
various markets open to them, so that selling to Europeans was only one option among others.
Economic decisions regarding the pace and volume of the slave trade were made by Africans.

Europeans, therefore, and not Africans, were in a dependent position: 'African participation in the slave trade was voluntary and under the control of
African decision makers. This was not just at the surface level of daily exchange but even at deeper levels. Europeans possessed no means, either
economic or military, to compel African leaders to sell slaves' (125). Thornton bases his arguments on an extensive scholarly literature and on close
readings of primary sources. Those sources were produced almost exclusively by Europeans in European languages. This situation thus opens an
intriguing question that Thornton does not directly address: what does it mean that an argument about African primacy in military and economic
encounters with Europeans relies heavily on the European perspective? Thornton's method of interpreting documents relevant to the slave trade and to
African cultures in the Americas is familiar: frequently he checks them against contemporary anthropological studies of African cultures and societies
and reads those back into the historical sources. Such a method is generally convincing, but it also implies a historical hierarchy. In the written record,
Europeans are the active agents, Africans their objects of description and contemplation. The prevalence of the European perspective in the writing of
the history of the slave trade thus led this reader to puzzle over Thornton's virtual effacement of colonialism from his explanation of Atlantic slavery's
rise (and of the legacies of colonialism in the writing of history). His argument about African autonomy and agency is forceful and persuasive, and he
demonstrates spectacularly that the history of Atlantic slavery is not only the history of the rise of the West. But by inverting the terms of the
dependency theory approach of Rodney and others, Thornton eclipses Europe's role in the making of both the Atlantic slave trade and the American
plantation, without which the slave trade would never have existed. Should he have presented a more balanced account? Maybe not; balance is not
necessarily the only virtue of the Atlantic historian. To argue with rigour, imagination and over a broad canvas are the marks of the great histories of
Atlantic slavery. Thornton, Blackburn and Eltis are squarely in that tradition and, like C. L. R. James, Fernando Ortiz, David Brion Davis, Seymour
Drescher and others before them, they have produced works that incite the reader to ask big questions and reach for big answers about a history whose
legacies continue to shape the Atlantic world.

*2. This is offensetrying to explain away the historical record of

capitalism through appeals to race is a main component of the
neoliberal strategy of sanitation
Adolph Reed, Jr., University of Pennsylvania http://nonsite.org/editorial/django-unchained-or-the-help-how-cultural-politicsis-worse-than-no-politics-at-all-and-why 2-25-13

The tendency to craft political critique by demanding that we fix our gaze in the rearview mirror
appeals to an intellectual laziness. Marking superficial similarities with familiar images of
oppression is less mentally taxing than attempting to parse the multifarious, often
contradictory dynamics and relations that shape racial inequality in particular and politics in
general in the current moment. Assertions that phenomena like the Jena, Louisiana, incident, the
killings of James Craig Anderson and Trayvon Martin, and racial disparities in incarceration
demonstrate persistence of old-school, white supremacist racism and charges that the
sensibilities of Thomas Dixon and Margaret Mitchell continue to shape most Americans understandings of slavery do
important, obfuscatory ideological work. They lay claim to a moral urgency that, as
Mahmood Mamdani argues concerning the rhetorical use of charges of genocide, enables disparaging efforts to
differentiate discrete inequalities and appropriate to generate historically specific causal
accounts of them as irresponsible dodges that abet injustice by temporizing in its face.38 But more is
at work here as well. Insistence on the transhistorical primacy of racism as a source of
inequality is a class politics. Its the politics of a stratum of the professional-managerial
class whose material location and interests, and thus whose ideological commitments, are bound up with
parsing, interpreting and administering inequality defined in terms of disparities among
ascriptively defined populations reified as groups or even cultures. In fact, much of the intellectual
life of this stratum is devoted to shoehorning into the rubric of racism all manner of
inequalities that may appear statistically as racial disparities.39 And that project shares
capitalisms ideological tendency to obscure races foundations, as well as the
foundations of all such ascriptive hierarchies, in historically specific political
economy. This felicitous convergence may help explain why proponents of cultural politics are so inclined to treat the
products and production processes of the mass entertainment industry as a terrain for political struggle and debate. They dont see
the industrys imperatives as fundamentally incompatible with the notions of a just society they seek to advance. In fact, they share
its fetishization of heroes and penchant for inspirational stories of individual Overcoming. This sort of politics of

representation is no more than an image-management discourse within neoliberalism.

That strains of an ersatz left imagine it to be something more marks the extent of our
defeat. And then, of course, theres that Upton Sinclair point.

3. Slavery was an economic strategy to grow crop margins, which was

the comparative advantage of the Americasour understanding is a
prerequisite to successful resistance
Tom Keefer, a member of Facing Reality, an anti-imperialist, anti-racist collective in Montreal , 2003
http://newsocialist.org/old_mag/magazine/39/article03.html
These large numbers of slaves and the success of the slave trade as jump starter for capitalist industrialization came from what has
been called the "triangular trade"--an intensely profitable economic relationship which built up

European industry while systematically deforming and underdeveloping the other economic
regions involved. The Europeans would produce manufactured goods that would then be traded
to ruling elites in the various African kingdoms. They in turn would use the firearms and trading
goods of the Europeans to enrich themselves by capturing members of rival tribes, or the less
fortunate of their own society, to sell them as slaves to the European merchants who would fill their now empty ships with
slaves destined to work in the colonial plantations. On the plantations, the slaves would toil to produce
expensive cash crops that could not be grown in Europe. These raw materials were then refined
and sold at fantastic profit in Europe. In 1697, the tiny island of Barbados with its 166 square miles, was
worth more to British capitalism than New England, New York, and Pennsylvania combined,
while by 1798, the income accruing to the British from the West Indian plantations alone was four million pounds a year, as opposed
to one million pounds from the whole rest of the world. Capitalist economists of the day recognized the super

profitability of slavery by noting the ease of making 100% profit on the trade, and by noting that
one African slave was as profitable as seven workers in the mainland. Even more

importantly, the profits of the slave trade were plowed back into further economic growth. Capital from the slave trade financed
James Watt and the invention and production of the steam engine, while the shipping, insurance, banking, mining, and textile
industries were all thoroughly integrated into the slave trade. What an analysis of the origins of modern capitalism shows is just how
far the capitalist class will go to make a profit. The development of a pernicious racist ideology, spread to justify the uprooting and
enslavement of millions of people to transport them across the world to fill a land whose indigenous population was massacred or
worked to death, represents the beginnings of the system that George W. Bush defends as "our way of life". For

revolutionaries today who seek to understand and transform capitalism and the racism encoded
into its very being, it is essential to understand how and why these systems of
domination and exploitation came into being before we can hope to successfully
overthrow them.

4. That's why early African enslavement was couched in terms of their

racial superiority, not inferiority
Sullivan 2013 former editor of The New Republic, influential blogger and editor of Dish
(3/13, Andrew, Dish, How Racism Was Made, Ctd,
http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2013/03/13/how-racism-was-made-ctd-2/)
One of the most surprising revelations of Hugh Thomass great book, The Slave Trade, is the
persistence and continuity of slavery in the Mediterranean world from classical times through
the nineteenth century. For most of that time racism was not an ideology used to justify slavery,
which was seldom thought to require justification. A religious prohibition emerged among Christians and
Muslims not to enslave members of their own faith, but for most of history the accidents of conquest, not a philosophy of racial
inferiority, determined who served whom. In fact, as Thomas describes it, the movement of the slave trade down

the
African coast was accompanied by admiration for the physical and mental hardiness of the
slaves who thereby became available because they were better able to survive the rigors of the
transatlantic trade and American plantation slavery than North Africans. In the writings of sixteenth and
seventeenth century slavers, it is the superiority of these southerly people, not their inferiority, that
rendered them appropriate objects for purchase.

5. Slave trade not originally motivated by race- Europeans were taking

advantage of a market distortion
Sullivan 2013 former editor of The New Republic, influential blogger and editor of Dish
(3/13, Andrew, Dish, How Racism Was Made, Ctd,
http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2013/03/13/how-racism-was-made-ctd-2/)
As you speak to this topic, you continue to state things that are completely at odds with the historic record. I dont dispute this, but
equally, the slave trade itself, along with colonialism everywhere, presumed a racial inferiority before the

Southern states codified it so precisely along Nuremberg lines. That is simply false. The slave trade was
owned and operated by Africans! Europeans tapped into it as an easy supply of necessary
labor for the brutal conditions of plantation staple crops (specifically sugar), but Europeans were
entirely incapable of penetrating beyond the coastline due to the disease environment. European
involvement altered a long standing slave trade along the Slave Coast, with fascinating political
and economic dynamics. However, racism had nothing to do with the enslavement of Africans.

--at: slave not worker

1. You misunderstand Marxa) payment is not a prerequisite to be a
worker b) Marx refers to the innate need to be satisfied through work,
meaning we are all born workers and c) worker refers to the working
class this is an attempt at semantic dismissal and is nonsensical
2. This becomes offense for usYour description of the working class
separates the collective based on class distinctions and whether and
how much people are renumerated prevents collectivism
3. Fixed elements of the labor theory of value are important for
revolution- attempts to reshape definitionally, like their distinction
between slave and worker, obscure capitalist warfare
Tumino 1 [Stephen, Prof English at Pitt, What is Orthodox Marxism and Why it Matters Now More than Ever, Red Critique,
p. online]

Orthodox Marxism has become a test-case of the "radical" today. Yet, what passes for orthodoxy on the leftwhether
like Smith and Zizek they claim to support it, or, like Butler and Rorty they want to "achieve our country" by excluding it from "U.S.
Intellectual life" ("On Left Conservatism"), is a parody of orthodoxy which hybridizes its central concepts and

renders them into flexodox simulations. Yet, even in its very textuality, however, the orthodox is a resistance to the

flexodox. Contrary to the common-sensical view of "orthodox" as "traditional" or "conformist" "opinions," is its other meaning:
ortho-doxy not as flexodox "hybridity," but as "original" "ideas." "Original," not in the sense of epistemic "event," "authorial"
originality and so forth, but, as in chemistry, in its opposition to "para," "meta," "post" and other ludic hybridities: thus "ortho" as
resistance to the annotations that mystify the original ideas of Marxism and hybridize it for the "special interests" of various groups.

The "original" ideas of Marxism are inseparable from their effect as "demystification" of
ideologyfor example the deployment of "class" that allows a demystification of daily life from
the haze of consumption. Class is thus an "original idea" of Marxism in the sense that it
cuts through the hype of cultural agency under capitalism and reveals how culture
and consumption are tied to labor, the everyday determined by the workday: how the amount of time workers
spend engaging in surplus-labor determines the amount of time they get for reproducing and cultivating their needs. Without
changing this division of labor social change is impossible. Orthodoxy is a rejection of the
ideological annotations: hence, on the one hand, the resistance to orthodoxy as "rigid" and "dogmatic" "determinism," and, on the
other, its hybridization by the flexodox as the result of which it has become almost impossible today to

read the original ideas of Marxism, such as "exploitation"; "surplus-value"; "class"; "class
antagonism"; "class struggle"; "revolution"; "science" (i.e., objective knowledge); "ideology" (as "false consciousness"). Yet, it is
these ideas alone that clarify the elemental truths through which theory ceases to be a gray
activism of tropes, desire and affect, and becomes, instead, a red, revolutionary guide to praxis for a
new society freed from exploitation and injustice. Marx's original scientific discovery was his labor theory of value.
Marx's labor theory of value is an elemental truth of Orthodox Marxism that is rejected by the flexodox left as the central dogmatism
of a "totalitarian" Marxism. It is only Marx's labor theory of value, however, that exposes the mystification of the wages system that
disguises exploitation as a "fair exchange" between capital and labor and reveals the truth about this relation as one of exploitation.

Only Orthodox Marxism explains how what the workers sell to the capitalist is not labor, a
commodity like any other whose price is determined by fluctuations in supply and demand, but
their labor-powertheir ability to labor in a system which has systematically "freed" them from the means of production so
they are forced to work or starvewhose value is determined by the amount of time socially necessary to
reproduce it daily. The value of labor-power is equivalent to the value of wages workers consume daily in the form of

commodities that keep them alive to be exploited tomorrow. Given the technical composition of production today this amount of
time is a slight fraction of the workday the majority of which workers spend producing surplus-value over and above their needs. The
surplus-value is what is pocketed by the capitalists in the form of profit when the commodities are sold. Class is the antagonistic
division thus established between the exploited and their exploiters. Without Marx's labor theory of value one

could only contest the after effects of this outright theft of social labor-power rather than its
cause lying in the private ownership of production. The flexodox rejection of the labor theory of value as the

"dogmatic" core of a totalitarian Marxism therefore is a not so subtle rejection of the principled defense of the (scientific) knowledge
workers need for their emancipation from exploitation because only the labor theory of value exposes the opportunism of
knowledges (ideology) that occult this exploitation. Without the labor theory of value socialism would

only be a moral dogma that appeals to the sentiments of "fairness" and "equality"
for a "just" distribution of the social wealth that does the work of capital by
naturalizing the exploitation of labor under capitalism giving it an acceptable
"human face."

4. Specifically, the distinction between slave and worker was created

to gain the allegiance of poor whites - the idea was they would say "at
least we aren't slaves" and accept capitalist brutality
Selfa 3 (on the editorial board of the International Socialist Review, Lance, the author of The Democrats: A Critical History, a
socialist analysis of the Democratic Party, and editor of The Struggle for Palestine, a collection of essays by leading solidarity
activists, Slavery and the Origins of Racism, International Socialist Review, Issue 26,
http://www.isreview.org/issues/26/roots_of_racism.shtml)

Within a few decades, the ideology of white supremacy was fully developed. Some of the greatest minds

of the daysuch as Scottish philosopher David Hume and Thomas Jefferson, the man who wrote the Declaration of
Independencewrote treatises alleging Black inferiority. The ideology of white supremacy based on the natural inferiority of Blacks,
even allegations that Blacks were subhuman, strengthened throughout the 18th century. This was the way that the leading
intellectual figures of the time reconciled the ideals of the 1776 American Revolution with slavery. The American Revolution of 1776
and later the French Revolution of 1789 popularized the ideas of liberty and the rights of all human beings. The Declaration of
Independence asserts that all menare created equal and possess certain unalienable rightsrights that cant be taken awayof
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. As the first major bourgeois revolution, the American Revolution sought to establish the
rights of the new capitalist class against the old feudal monarchy. It started with the resentment of the American merchant class that
wanted to break free from British restrictions on its trading partners. But its challenge to British tyranny also gave expression to a
whole range of ideas that expanded the concept of liberty from being just about trade to include ideas of human rights, democracy,
and civil liberties. It legitimized an assault on slavery as an offense to liberty, so that some of the leading American revolutionaries,
such as Thomas Paine and Benjamin Franklin, endorsed abolition. Slaves and free Blacks also pointed to the ideals of the revolution
to call for getting rid of slavery. But because the revolution aimed to establish the rule of capital in America,

and because a lot of capitalists and planters made a lot of money from slavery, the revolution
compromised with slavery. The Declaration initially contained a condemnation of King George for allowing the slave trade,
but Jefferson dropped it following protests from representatives from Georgia and the Carolinas. How could the founding
fathers of the U.S.most of whom owned slaves themselvesreconcile the ideals of liberty for which they were fighting
with the existence of a system that represented the exact negation of liberty? The ideology of
white supremacy fit the bill. We know today that all men didnt include women, Indians, or most
Blacks. But to rule Black slaves out of the blessings of liberty, the leading head-fixers of the time
argued that Blacks werent really men, they were a lower order of being. Jeffersons Notes from

Virginia, meant to be a scientific catalog of the flora and fauna of Virginia, uses arguments that anticipate the scientific racism of
the 1800s and 1900s. With few exceptions, no major institutionsuch as the universities, the churches, or the newspapers of the
timeraised criticisms of white supremacy or of slavery. In fact, they helped

pioneer religious and academic

justifications for slavery and Black inferiority. As C.L.R. James put it, [T]he conception of dividing
people by race begins with the slave trade. This thing was so shocking, so opposed to all the
conceptions of society which religion and philosophers had that the only justification by which
humanity could face it was to divide people into races and decide that the Africans were an inferior race.23
White supremacy wasnt only used to justify slavery. It was also used to keep in line the twothirds of Southern whites who werent slaveholders. Unlike the French colony of St. Domingue or the British
colony of Barbados, where Blacks vastly outnumbered whites, Blacks represented a minority in the slave South. A tiny
minority of slave-holding whites, who controlled the governments and economies of
the Deep South states, ruled over a population that was roughly two-thirds white farmers and workers and
one-third Black slaves. The slaveholders ideology of racism and white supremacy helped
to divide the working population, tying poor whites to the slaveholders. Slavery afforded
poor white farmers what Fields called a social space whereby they preserved an illusory
independence based on debt and subsistence farming while the rich planters continued to dominate Southern politics and
society. A caste system as well as a form of labor, historian James M. McPherson wrote, slavery elevated all whites to
the ruling caste and thereby reduced the potential for class conflict.24 The great abolitionist

Frederick Douglass understood this dynamic: The hostility between the whites and blacks of the
South is easily explained. It has its root and sap in the relation of slavery, and was incited on
both sides by the poor whites and the blacks by putting enmity between them. They divided both
to conquer each.[Slaveholders denounced emancipation as] tending to put the white working man on an equality with
Blacks, and by this means, they succeed in drawing off the minds of the poor whites from the real fact, that by the rich slave-master,
they are already regarded as but a single remove from equality with the slave.25

--at: Humans are self-interested

Theres no human nature our selfish capitalist tendencies can be
transformed
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social
Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 7, pg 116, 2009//MG)

For Marxists, there is no such thing as 'human nature'. Marxists believe that our
individual natures are not ahistorical givens, but products of the circumstances
into which we are socialized, and of the society or societies in which we live or
have lived (including crucially the social class position we occupy therein). While it is true that babies and infants, for example,
may act selfishly in order to survive, as human beings grow up they are strongly influenced by
the norms and values that are predominant in the society in which they live. Thus in
societies which encourage selfishness, greed and competitiveness (Thatcherism is a perfect example) people will tend to
act in self-centered ways, whereas in societies which discourage these values and
promote communal values (Cuba is a good example) people will tend to act in ways that
consider the collective as well as their own selves, the international, as well as the
national and local.6 As Marx (1845) put it, '[l]ife is not determined by consciousness, but
consciousness by life'. Unlike animals, we have the ability to choose our actions, and
change the way we live, and the way we respond to others. Hence, in capitalist
society, the working class is capable of transcending false consciousness and
becoming, 'class for itself' (Marx, 1847 [1995]), as well as 'a class in itself' (Bukharin, 1922 cited in Mandel, 1970
[2008]), that is to say, pursuing interests which can ultimately lead to a just society. Socialism
does not require as a precondition that we are all altruistic and selfless; rather, as Bowles and Gintis (1976, p. 267) argue, the
social and economic conditions of socialism will facilitate the development of such
human capacities.

--at: no one would do crap jobs

Menial jobs would be communal under socialism
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social
Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 7, pg 119, 2009//MG)
Someone Has to Do the Drudge Jobs, and How Could that Be Sorted Out in a Socialist World.

Technology already has the potential to eliminate most of the most boring and/or
unpleasant jobs. Some of those that remain could be done on a voluntary rota basis, so that no one would have to do
drudge jobs for longer than a very brief period (utopian socialist Charles Fourier had a similar idea-see Cole, 2008d, pp. 17-20).

Voluntary work under capitalism in the public sector abounds, and there is every
reason to assume that such work would flourish much more under socialism.

--at: Gilborn
Critiques of a Marxist perspective on race are flawed- 5 reasons
Cole 09 (Mike, professor in Education, Emeritus Research Professor in Education and
Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include research and publications,
PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate teaching, 3/31, Critical Race
Theory and Education: A Marxist Response (Marxism and Education)
In true postmodern style the Chronicle also allows the Professor (partly Gillborn, but not totallyp. 5)4 to introduce CRT, and outline the chapters of Gillborn's book. It is in the section entitled
Critical Race Theory, which is the Professor's/Gillborn's introduction to CRT, that I find my first
major disagreement with the Professor/Gillborn (p. 13). The Professor states 'I don't think
there's anything in CRT that a serious antiracist would have a problem with' (p. 13). My
disagreement stems from the fact that I very much consider myself a serious antiracist, and from
a number of conversations and correspondences over the years with Dave Gillborn, I know that
he would concur with this. He would also acknowledge that I have been engaged in writing
Marxist critiques of CRT, of which this present volume forms part, and therefore that there most
definitely isa lot in CRT that certain antiracists would have a number of problems with. Indeed
in the second chapter of his book, Gillborn (p. 20) makes reference to such a critique, a paper by
Alpesh Maisuria and myself (Cole and Maisuria, 2007). Unfortunately in stating that in this
paper, our position is that CRT 'gives undue attention to racism rather than class divisions', he
greatly oversimplifies our argument. What we actually set out to do, in similar fashion to my
arguments in chapter 2 of this volume, is to make the case, in order to facilitate a serious
and in-depth understanding of racism, that CRT, in its advocacy of 'white
supremacy', and in its pre-eminence of 'race' over class (Cole and Maisuria, 2007), is
not able to attain such an understanding. As in chapter 2 ofthis volume, in Cole and
Maisuria (2007) we commend the Marxist concepts of racialization and xenoracialization as having the best purchase in explaining manifestations ofracism,
Islamophobia and xeno-racism in contemporary Britain Gillborn (p. 37) further
misrepresents our position, when, in referring to Cole and Maisuria (2007) he states
that 'a conceptual debate with Marxist orthodoxy may simply be redundant
because by definition Marxists place class in a position that supersedes all other
forms of exclusion'. There are two responses I would like to make to this assertion.The first is
that Gillborn knows that Maisuria and I are keen to debate racism with critical race
theo- rists.5 I believe that a conceptual debate between Marxism and critical race
theory is very important. Indeed, I have engaged in such a debate with Gillborn and other
Critical Race Theorists, both face-to-face, and in writ- ten form (e.g., Cole, 2008e, 2009a,
2009d; Mills, forthcoming, 2009) for several years. Moreover, as should be clear by now, this is
one of the major purposes of this volume: to engage in a conceptual debate with Critical Race
Theorists. My second response is that Gillborn is also fully aware that an analysis of
racism from a Marxist perspective, rather than an analysis of class, has been one
of the central features of my writing over a period of over two decades (I recently (Cole,
2007c, p. 14) described racism as 'one of the key issues facing the world in the twenty-first
century'), and thus there are ample opportunities for him to debate with me my Marxist
analyses of 'race' and racism, and, of course, the analyses of other writers. As ifto further
alienate Marxists, Gillborn (pp. 37- 38) goes on to approv- ingly quote Ricky Lee Allen (2006)
who, according to Gillborn (2008, p. 37), 'views contemporary academic Marxism as an exercise
of White power'. Arguing stridently against any alliance with Marxists, Allen describes the
ascendancy of CRT as a historic rift and a 'much needed shift' (2006, p. 9, cited in Gillborn,
2008, p. 37).6 It is disappointing that Gillborn seems to want to foreclose discussion
with Marxists. Gillborn's hostility to Marx is underlined when he refers to some of Mills' work

on the relationship between 'White Marxism and Black Radicalism'. He cites Mills (2003, p.
xvii) as claiming: critical race theory is far from being an adjunct to, or outgrowth of, critical
class theory; in fact, it long predates it, at least in its modern Marxist form. Long before Marx
was born, Africans forcibly transported as slaves to the New World were struggling desperately
to understand their situation; they were raising the issues of social critique and transformation
as radically as-indeed even more radically than-the white European working class, who were
after all beneficiaries of and accessories to the same system oppressing blacks. (cited in Gillborn,
2008 , p. 38) Gillborn's (2008, p. 38) comment is that 'Mills' point is extremely powerful'.
Gillborn goes on point out that Marx moved to London in 1849, more than a decade before
slavery was abolished in U.S. territories (ibid.). 'These simple facts', Gillborn states, 'make the
minimal presence of race in Marx's analyses all the more damning' (ibid.). It is difficult to
understand what both Mills and Gillborn are implying. I will deal with Mills' quote and
Gillborn's comments on the quote in turn. With respect to the quote, Mills seems to be
suggesting five things: (1) that the struggle against racism predates the modern
European class struggle; (2) that slaves' analyses and struggles were an early form
of critical race theory; (3) that slaves were more radical that the white European
working class; (4) that the white working class were beneficiaries of slavery; and
(5) that they were accessories to it. With respect to (1), this seems to be truism. As
far as (2) is concerned, given that critical race theory grew out of critical legal
studies in the 1980s, a fact heralded by those central to the movement (see chapter 2 ofthis
volume), it is difficult to make sense ofMills' assertion. That slaves were more
radical than the white working class (3) is difficult to quantify. It really depends
what Mills means by 'radical'. With respect to (4), that the white working class were
beneficiaries to slavery, this is true in the sense that they accrued some benefits from capitalist
plunder. Finally, whether the white working class were accessories (5) needs to be
seen in the context of the success of the interpellation process (interpellation is
discussed in chapter 1 of this volume). To merely list the class as 'accessories'
implies conscious rational choice outside the confines of ideological processes. If
my response to these five points makes any sense, it is difficult to understand why
Gillborn finds them 'extremely powerful'. As to his devel- opment of Mills' assertions,
while I accept Gillborn's point that there is a minimal presence of'race' in Marx's writing,
Gillborn seems to be implying that, given that slavery existed in the U.S. territories
when Marx arrived in London, that Marx should have written about it, but did not,
and should therefore be 'damned' for it. In actual fact, Marx, a leading European
abo- litionist, was London Correspondent for the radical anti-slavery 'New York Daily
Tribune' (Laskey, 2003, p. 1). During the U.S. Civil War, Marx urged and organized
English textile workers to support the blockade against the Confederacy, even
though it was not in their immediate economic interests and also led to massive
layoffs as a result of the cut off of imported cotton (Marx, 1862, p. 153). Writing about the
importance ofworking class extra- parliamentary activity, Marx described working class
disgust and action against the Confederacy as 'admirable', 'incredible', and as
'more striking' than other demonstrations (e.g., against the Corn Laws and the Ten
Hours Bill) because of its unambiguous spontaneity and persistence (ibid.). Marx saw the action
as 'new, brilliant proof of the indestructible staunchness of the English popular masses' (ibid.),
and reported with great enthusi- asm on 'a great workers) meeting in Marylebone, the most
populous dis- trict of London' (ibid.) which served 'to characterise the "policy" of the working
class' (ibid.). At that meeting, the following motion was passed unanimously:

--at: Race focus first

Racism needs to be integrated to socio-political theory, and NOT be
the focus
Cole 9 (Mike Cole, Mike Cole is a Professor in Education, and is also an Emeritus Research
Professor in Education and Equality at Bishop Grosseteste University. His duties at UEL include
research and publications, PhD supervision and occasional doctoral and undergraduate
teaching. He also has a PhD in Philosophy. June 9, 2009, Critical Race Theory comes to the
UK: A Marxist response, http://etn.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/9/2/246.)//ky
As we have seen, for Mills (2003: 160), White Marxism [is] predicated on colorless classes in
struggle. Mills argues that if socialism is to come then white supremacy/majoritarian
domination must be overthrown first in the struggle for social democracy. Only after white
supremacy has been overthrown and social democracy established is the next stage socialism
possible. This seems to be in line with Mills argument that a non-whitesupremacist
capitalism is morally and politically preferable to . . . whitesupremacist capitalism (Mills, cited
in Pateman and Mills, 2007: 31), something with which I would totally concur. However, given
the massive advantages to capitalism of racialized capitalism, capitalism without racism (or
sexism), as I have suggested earlier, is almost inconceivable. Mills argues that part of the process
of achieving the necessary consciousness to move forward is to place side by side with the
existing political structures familiar to all of us . . . an unnamed global political structure
global white supremacy (Mills, 1997: 125). Until the system is named and seen as such, no
serious theoretical appreciation of [its] significance . . . is possible (Mills, 1997: 125). The
Racial Contract sees that race and white supremacy are . . . critical theoretical terms that
must be incorporated into the vocabulary of an adequate sociopolitical theory (Mills, 1997: 126).

ID Politics Bad

Identity Politics Bad

Generic
Turn their politics furthers antagonism by elevating group identity
to the level of the individual
Gergen 99 (Kenneth J. Gergen American psychologist and professor at Swarthmore College, Social Construction and the
Transformation of Identity Politics, End of knowing: A new developmental way of learning (1999) // JJ)
In important degree, identity politics is a descendent of western, individualist ideology. No, it is

not the
single individual who commands our interest. Rather, as we have seen, individual identity is
conflated with group identity: individual and group interests (and rights) are one. In this way, the
group replaces the individual as the center of concern, but the discourse of individuality is not
thereby disrupted. Rather , the group is treated in much the same way discursively as
the individual : imbued with good and evil intent, held blameworthy, deemed worthy of
rights, and so on. In spite of the shift toward the social, we thus inherit the problems of individualism yet once again simply one step removed. Rather than a society of isolated and alienated individuals - a potential war
of all against all in the individualist sense - we have a battlefield of antagonistic groups. As James
Hunter's (1991) puts it, we are now engaged in "culture wars." Advocates of identity politics
are now becoming keenly aware of the problematics of separation. As they point out, the dominant
culture is already prone toward objectification of the Other. In du Preez' (1980) terms, the other is
forced into identity traps that confirm the dominant culture's sense of superiority and selfrighteousness. It is in this light that we can understand the attempt by black intellectuals to blur the distinction between self
and other. For example, in his volume, Race Matters, Cornel West warns against the delineation of a distinct black culture, and
seeks a "frank acknowledgment of the basic humanness and Americanness of each of us." Similarly, Stanley Crouch in Notes of a
Hanging Judge, argues that politics must involve African-Americans "not as outsiders" - a distinct group unto itself - but as
participants in broad-ranging enclaves of society, for example as "voters, taxpayers, and sober thinkers." In a similar vein, Todd
Gitlin (1993) speaks of commonality politics, oriented around understanding differences "against the background of what is not
different, what is shared among groups."(p.173)

Alterity
Self-writing and identity politics contribute to the regulation and
objectification of alterity
Chow 98 (Rey Chow Anne Firor Scott Professor of Literature, Duke University, Ethics After Idealism: Theory, Culture,
Ethnicity, Reading, Theories of Contemporary Culture, Indiana University Press (1999), pp. 30-32 // JJ)

The machines of surveillance here are not war airplanes but the media the
networks of communication, which, in the academic world, include the classroom,
conferences, publications, funding agencies, and even letters of recommendation.
With the large number of students (rightly) eager for alternative histories, of academic conferences (rightly) devoted to the
constructions of differences, and of publishers (rightly) seeking to publish new, unexplored materials, fascism has

reasserted itself in our era. And, as even my brief discussion shows, fascisms new mode is very much complicated

by postcoloniality. The question facing intellectuals in the contemporary West is how to deal with peoples who were once colonized
and who are now living and working in the first world as others. In the early days of colonialism, when

actual territorial conquests were made and relocation from the mother country
to the colonies was a fact of life for those from what eventually came to be called
the first world, the questions for white people finding themselves removed from home were
questions of what Nancy Armstrong and Leonard Tennenhouse call the imaginary puritan: how to preserve
whiteness while in the brown and black colonies? How to stay English in America?
How to fabricate a respectable national origin against the onslaught of barbaric
nativesthat is, how to posture as the invaded and colonized while invading and
colonizing others? All in all, these questions amount to: how not to go native? As Armstrong and Tennenhouse argue,
the English novel, which was conceptually based not so much on previous cultural developments in Europe but rather on the
captivity narratives that found their way back to Europe from the New World, bears symptoms of this white anxiety about cultural
purity. In this sense, the English novel is perhaps the earliest exampleto use Fredric Jamesons classic pronouncement on third
world literatureof a national allegory. Toward the end of the twentieth century, as the

aftermath of the grand imperialism eras brings about major physical migrations of
populations around the globe, it is no longer a question of white people going to
the colonies, but rather of formerly colonized peoples settling permanently in
their former colonizers territories. The visible presence of these formerly
colonized peoples in the first world leads to violent upheavals in Western
thought. The overriding preoccupation among first world intellectuals has now
become: how to become other? How to claim to be a minorityto claim to be
black, Native American, Hispanic, or Asian, even if one has only 1/64th share of
these other origins? In other words, how to go native? Instead of imagining themselves to be
a Pamela or Clarissa being held captive, resisting rape, and writing volumes in order to preserve the purity of their souls (and thus
their origins),

first world intellectuals are now overtaken by a new kind of desire:

Make me other! And so, with expediency, we witness the publication of essays which are studded with names of
nations and territories in order to convey a profile of cosmopolitanism; journals which amass the most superficial matierials about
lesser known cultures and ethnicities in the name of being public, global, or trans-national; and book series which (en)list
indigenous histories and narratives in the manner of a world fairall this, while so-called postcolonial
criticisms of former European imperialist strategies of representing, objectifying,
and exhibiting the other are going on.

Liberal identity politics reinforce alterity by producing identity as

contrary to the hegemonic we
Brown 93 (Wendy First Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, Wounded Attachments,
Political Theory, Vol. 21, No. 3 (August 1993), pp. 390-410 // JJ)
The tension between particularistic "I's" and a universal "we" in liberal- ism is sustainable as long as the constituent terms of the "I"
remain un- politicized indeed, as long as the "I" itself remains unpoliticized on one hand, and the state (as the expression of the

ideal of political universality) remains unpoliticized on the other. That is, the

latent conflict within liberalism

between universal representation and individualism remains latent, remains unpoliticized, as
long as differential powers in civil society remain natural- ized and as long as the "I" is
subordinated to the abstract "we" encoded in the state's guarantee of universal freedom and
equality. This subordination is achieved either by the "I" abstracting from itself in its political
represen- tation, thus trivializing its "difference" so as to remain part of the "we" (as in homosexuals
who are "just like everyone else except for whom we sleep with") or by the "I" accepting its construction as a
supplement, complement, or partial outsider to the "we" (as in homosexuals who are just "a little different," a

bit "queer"). The history of liberalism's management of its inherited and constructed "others" could be read as a history of
variations on and vacillations between these two strategies. The abstract character of liberal political membership and the
ideologi- cally naturalized character of liberal individualism together work against politicized identity formation in liberal regimes.
A formulation of the political state and of citizenship that, as Marx put it in the "Jewish Question," abstracts from the substantive
conditions of our lives, works to prevent recognition or articulation of differences as political-as effects of power-in their very
construction ad organization; they are at most the stuff of divergent political or economic interests.2 Equally important, to the
extenthat political mem- bership in the liberal state involves abstracting from one's social being, it involves abstracting not only
from the contingent productions of one's life circumstances but from the identificatory processes constitutive of one's social
construction and position. Whether read from the frontispiece of Hobbes' Leviathan, in which the many are made one through the
unity of the sovereign, or from the formulations of tolerance codified by John Locke, John Stuart Mill, and, more
contemporaneously, George Kateb, in which the minimalist liberal state is cast as precisely what enables our politically unfettered
individuality, we are invited to seek equal deference-equal blindness from-but not equalizing recognition from the state, liberalism's
universal moment.3 As Marx discerned in his critique of Hegel, the univer- sality of the state is ideologically achieved by turning
away from and thus depoliticizing, yet at the same time presupposing our collective particulars, not by embracing them, let alone
emancipating us from them.4 In short, "the political" in liberalism is precisely not a domain for social

identification: expected to recognize our political selves in the state, we are not led to expect
deep recognition there. Indeed, in a smooth and legitimate liberal order, the particularistic "I's"
must remain unpoliticized, and the universalistic "we" must remain without specific content or
aim, without a common good other than abstract universal representation or pluralism. The
abstractness of the "we" is precisely what insists upon, reiterates, and even
enforces the depoliticized nature of the "I." In Ernesto Laclau's formulation, "if democracy is
possible, it is because the universal does not have any necessary body, any necessary content.'"5
Although this detente between universal and particular within liberalism is potted with volatile conceits, it is rather thoroughly
unraveled by two features of late modernity, spurred by developments in what Marx and Foucault, respectively, reveal as
liberalism's companion powers: capitalism and disciplinarity. On one side, the state loses even its guise of universality as it
becomes ever more transparently invested in particular economic interests, political ends, and social formations. This occurs as it
shifts from a relatively minimalist "night watchman" state to a heavily bureaucratized, managerial, fiscally complex, and highly
interventionist welfare-warfare state, a transmogrification occasioned by the combined imperatives of capital and the
autoproliferating characteristics of bureaucracy.6 On the other side, a range of economic and political forces

increasingly disinter the liberal subject from substantive nation-state identification:

deterritorializing demo- graphic flows; disintegration from within and invasion from without of
family and community as (relatively) autonomous sites of social production and identification;
consumer capitalism's marketing discourse in which individual (and subindividual) desires are
produced, commodified, and mo- bilized as identities; and disciplinary productions of a
fantastic array of behavior-based identities ranging from recovering alcoholic professionals to unrepentant crack
mothers. These disciplinary productions work to conjure and regulate subjects
through classificatory schemes, naming and normalizing social behaviors as
social positions. Operating through what Foucault calls "an anatomy of detail," "disciplinary power" produces
social identities (available for politicization because they are deployed for purposes of political regulation) that crosscut
juridical identities based on abstract right. Thus, for example, the welfare state's production of welfare subjectsthemselves subdi- vided through the socially regulated categories of motherhood, disability,
race, age, and so forth-potentially produce political identity through these categories, produce
identities as these categories.

Capitalism
Identity politics only has the potential to advance the self within a
system of values created by capitalism, and thus guarantees classbased oppression.
Libcom 12 (Blogging site that focuses on political/social issues. Identity, politics, and antipolitics: a critical perspective May 17, 2012 http://libcom.org/library/identity-politics-antipolitics-critical-perspective .nt)
Introduction I am a _______________ who seeks the destruction of class society. That blank
can be filled with a variety of words, from worker to queer to individual to mixed-race person to
anarchist. What each of these terms has in common is that they each signify a certain identity.
While identity politics have gained traction in both anarchist/radical scenes and society more
generally, the very idea of identity politics is a problem. Identity politics , as a
political force, seeks inclusion into the ruling classes, rather than act-ing as a
revolutionary force for the destruction of class society. How-ever, this does not mean
we should dismiss identity or identity-based organizing and action. The institu-tions that
create and enforce class society (capital, work, the state, police) rely on identities in
their strategy of control, by attacking some identities and not others, or by pitting
various identities at odds to compete for access to the privi-lege of acceptance by the
dominant classes. In their use of repression based on identities, those in pow-er also create
affinity among the dominated. Let this be made clear: I do not contend that every person who
identifies with or is identified by a particular social identity has a common experience. Similarly,
I do not argue that these identities are anything other than socially constructed. However, I do
argue that people who share an identity can find stronger affinity with oth-ers who
share that identity. This is due to the ways that capitalism and the state enforce
identities. While these identities are socially con-structed, this does not lessen their
importance or their reality. Indeed, it is critical in the struggle for total liberation to
understand the ways identities are constructed to subju-gate people. The academics
have been speaking for years of the Other as the most abstract identity, defined in opposition
to the dominant forces. While this abstraction works in the most general comparisons of
vari-ous identities, it is in the specifici-ties of distinct identities that affini-ties are built. A
discussion of every socially-enforced identity would be impossible; instead, I will focus on an
analysis of queer identity. Spe-cifically, I will attempt to articulate an anti-assimilationist and
anar-chist/communist perspective on queer identity, with implications for other identities as
well. This is a perspective critical of identity poli-tics as well as a false unity under any one
identity (citizen, human race, proletariat). It is critical of as-similationist politics and practice,
and perhaps most importantly, it is explicitly anti-state and anti-capi-talist. 1: Social
construction and social facts To understand identity in the con-text of the present social
order, one must understand the concept of social construction . This concept, in short,
refers to the ways in which social institutions establish, regu-late, and enforce various identities.
One especially telling example is the way in which those labeled insane are then
forced into institu-tions which serve only to reaffirm a supposed insanity.
Homosexuality was once considered a mental dis-order, after all. The term socially constructed
car-ries an unfortunate connotation, however. It is assumed that if an identity is socially

constructed, then it differs in some way from a more authentic, natural identity. This
assumption resembles religious dogma in that we are asked to accept an unchanging human
nature as defined by someone else. In real-ity, to say identity is a social construction
means that identities are defined and en-forced by social insti-tutions such as
govern-ments and businesses . Thus, identity becomes social fact in the sense that
it materially affects people . From queer-bashing to abortion bans, certain identities carry
with them material disad-vantages. From property rights to Jim Crow, certain identities carry
with them material advantages. These identities are socially con-structed, and thus become
social facts. These inequalities are not expressions of some pre-existing natural order. Instead,
the cause of these material inequalities can be traced to the socio-economic context in which
they existed. This context is determined by the dominant social order, which
continues to be that of capitalism and state power. Not every act of discrimination or
oppression, however, can be con-sidered a direct act of the state or capital. This is particularly
true when one considers specific man-ifestations of patriarchy. Sexual assault and domestic
violence are often considered interpersonal disputes, rather than having a larger meaning in the
context of a deeply patriarchal social order. However, even if there is not an agent of the state or
an agent of capital directly involved, one can-not ignore the social framework which normalizes
such behavior. One must only consider the fact that the institution of marriage was originally a
property relation-ship, and even until recent de-cades rape was acceptable, as long as it was in
the context of mar-riage. This is not to say that per-petrators have any excuse. They still enforce
the social system of patriarchy, despite (usually) not acting in an official capacity on behalf of
the state or capital. We can thus trace identity-based oppression to either the official
business of state power and capitalism , or else to the power of the stat-ist, capitalist
social order. The distinc-tion, however, be-comes academic. The problem clearly lies in this
society, in the so-cial order and the in-stitutions that create, maintain, and enforce it. Much as
identity is social, so is the op-pression around it: it is a result of human interactions, not any sort
of higher power. The term social con-struction means also that identity is not fixed, but rather
changes according to a variety of factors. Particularly, there exists a ten-sion between those who
benefit from inequality, and those who are oppressed by inequality. In the United States, this
tension is demonstrated by the range of identity-liberation movements that have been active in
the United States. With a few notable exceptions (womens suffrage being one), identitymovements rose to prominence in the 1960s, as chants of black power, gay is good, and
sisterhood is powerful became fixtures at demonstra-tions and protests. These demon-strations
and conflicts were sites of struggle over what was meant when the terms black, gay, or woman
were used. To be assigned any of these terms meant that one was not fully human,
that there was a defect that nobody could correct . The Black Power, Queer Liberation,
and Womens Liberation movements contested the idea that people were to be defined by these
identities and thus undeserving of equality. These contesta-tions (as each movement was, to a
large degree, fo-cused only on one specific identity) meant that not only could political
inequality be challenged, but also the very definitions of identity. In other words, people
began to actively and consciously construct their identities and explore identity in
relationship to the larger social structure. The initial exploration of identity proved
useful, providing a greater understanding of the ways in which domination and its specific
manifestations (racism, sexism, homophobia) are connected to the state and capitalism. The
1960s were also years of re-sistance and uprising more generally. These events did not happen
separately; instead, they were a part of a larger discontent with society as a whole. How-ever,
much as the energy of the 1960s was dissipat-ed into the traditional, rigid forms of activism and

managed dissent, so was the revolutionary potential of exploring identity. Over time, these
movements have left us with or-ganizations such as the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Hu-man Rights Campaign (HRC), and National
Orga-nization for Women (NOW) as the self-proclaimed leaders in the struggle for equality
under the law. However, what is interesting to note is that these organizations serve as explicitly
political organiza-tions, seeking political equality through political processes. These groups can
thus be understood to engage in identity politics. 2: Identity Politics and Anti-Identity Politics
Given the political effectiveness of these organi-zations, their model has been
emulated by oth-ers seeking to reform the current socio-economic order . This
has led to identity politics becoming a central part of the contemporary United
States political order . This is especially true in the liberal reformist movement, where
organizations such as the NAACP, HRC, and NOW are prominent. With their successes in
political reform, they (and many other identity-politics organizations ) have become
embedded in the dominant political discourse. It is here that we encounter one of
the main problems of identity politics: the groups which sought to challenge
identity-based oppression have instead merely entered into a partnership with
those who benefit from oppression . This partnership concerns the ability to define the
political agenda for a certain identity. This is clearly demonstrated in the queer community by
the HRC, with their push for hate crime laws, marriage, and military service. These demands
show that the HRC has accepted the logic of and requested partnership in the government and
the marketplace. Essentially, the HRC is fight-ing for assimilation into, rather than
the destruc-tion of, a system that creates and enforces the very oppression they
are allegedly struggling against. However, even identity politics does not have unfet-tered
power in the political mainstream. Even the appearance of altering power relations in this
soci-ety is, to some, a threat. These reactionaries claim that identity politics seeks special rights
for certain groups. This flawed logic rests on the idea that, since people are guaranteed equality
under the Constitu-tion, then the problem of legal inequality is non-existent. Even if one accepts
the logic of the state, the discrepancy between legal/political equality and social equality is
telling. Another reaction to the Lefts adoption of identity politics is the rise of
hard-Right identity politics. This leads to absurdities such as mens rights movements,
white rights movements, and groups dedi-cated to preserving Christian culture and identity.
One can see a connection between these two reac-tionary positions, despite their
apparent contradic-tions. Each position represents a different tactic towards the
same goal: maintaining a class-based society along with the homophobic, whitesuprem-acist, and patriarchal structures that uphold it. This stands in contrast to identity
politics, which seeks to mildly reform class society and its institutions.

Identity politics inherently creates antagonism within the greater

structure of those oppressed by capitalism - this allows the oppressive
upper class to continue ruling un-opposed.
International Socialist Review 2008 (The ISR is dedicated to advancing socialist theory and
practice in the United States The Politics of Identity February 2008 ISR Issue 57
http://www.isreview.org/issues/57/feat-identity.shtml accessed 7.11.14 .nt)

As the experience of the 1960s shows, it is not necessary to personally experience a

form of oppression to become committed to opposing it . Yet the central premise
of the theory of identity politics is based on precisely the opposite conclusion:
Only those who actually experience a particular form of oppression are capable of
fighting against it. Everyone else is considered to be part of the problem and
cannot become part of the solution by joining the fight against oppression . The
underlying assumption is that all men benefit from womens oppression, all
straight people benefit from the oppression of the LGBT6 community, and all
whites benefit from racism. The flip side of this assumption, of course, is the idea that each
group that faces a particular form of oppressionracism, sexism, or homophobiais united in
its interest in ending it. The theory of identity politics locates the root of oppression
not with a capitalist power structure but with a white male power structure.
The existence of a white male power structure seems like basic common sense
since , with rare exceptions, white men hold the reigns of the biggest corporations
and the highest government posts. That is true, but it only tells half the story . It would
be highly inaccurate to assume that all oppressed people are powerless in U.S.
society today . Since the movements of the 1960s and 1970s, a significant number of women,
gays, Blacks, and other racially oppressed minorities have managed to climb up the corporate
and political ladder and become absorbed into various power structures. These individuals have
achieved a fair amount of power in their own right. In the upcoming 2008 presidential election,
the two Democratic Party frontrunners are a woman (Hillary Rodham Clinton) and an African
American (Barack Obama). The speaker of the House of Representatives is a woman, Nancy
Pelosi. The U.S. secretary of state is a Black woman, Condoleezza Rice. One of the most powerful
politicians in Washington is openly gay Congressman Barney Frank. Whose interests have
these women, gays, and African Americans represented once they have achieved
some power within the system ? The answer is fairly plain to seenot necessarily by
believing their rhetoric, but by judging their actions. Rather than fighting against the
racist, sexist, and homophobic policies of the system, they become part of
enforcing them . For example, when the city of San Francisco began handing out same-sex
marriage licenses in 2005, did openly gay Barney Frank embrace it as a step forward for civil
rights? On the contrary, Frank called a press conference to attack gay marriage as divisive.7
Has Senator Barack Obama rushed forward to defend the six Black youths victimized by racists
in Jena, Louisiana? The candidate did not make an appearance at the historic civil rights protest
in Jena on September 20, 2007.8 Yet Obama has devoted ample time on his recent speaking
circuit to exhort Black men to become better fathers, as he did in June 2005 addressing Black
worshippers at Chicagos Christ Universal Temple: There are a lot of folks, a lot of brothers,
walking around, and they look like men...they might even have sired a child.... But its not clear
to me that theyre full-grown men.9 If a white politician had delivered a similar lecture, it
would have immediatelyand accuratelybeen denounced as utterly racist. Nor does
Condoleezza Rice hesitate to perform her duty as she wanders the globe in her role as U.S.
imperialisms key international enforcertraveling to the Middle East, for example, to enforce
Israels racist apartheid policies against its occupied Palestinian population. Iranian people will
be no better off if and when the U.S. decides to bomb them if Clinton or Obama occupy the

White House than Iraqi people were when the Bush administration decided to invade their
country. What all of these examples show is that there is no such thing as a common,
fundamental interest shared by all people who face the same form of oppression .
Oppression isnt caused by the race, gender, or sexuality of particular individuals
who run the system, but is generated by the very system itselfno matter whos
running it. It goes without saying that we must confront incidents of sexism, racism,
and homophobia whenever they occur. But that alone is not going to change the racist,
sexist, and homophobic character that dominates the entire system.

Cooption
Their plea for solidarity in the face of victimization coopts the
struggle of those who lack the privilege to even speak
Chow 93 (Rey Chow Anne Firor Scott Professor of Literature, Duke University, Writing Diaspora: Tactics of Intervention
in Contemporary Cultural Studies, Indiana University Press (1993) // JJ)

While the struggle for hegemony remains necessary for many reasonsespecially in cases where
underprivileged groups seek equality of privilegeI remain skeptical of the validity of hegemony
over time, especially if it is a hegemony formed through intellectual power. The question for me
is not how intellectuals can obtain hegemony (a question that positions them in an oppositional
light against dominant power and neglects their share of that power through literacy, through
the culture of words), but how they can resist, as Michel Foucault said, "the forms of power that
transform [them] into its object and instrument in the sphere of 'knowledge,' 'truth,'
'consciousness,' and 'discourse.'" 26 Putting it another way, how do intellectuals struggle against a
hegemony which already includes them and which can no longer be divided into the state and civil society in

Gramsci's terms, nor be clearly demarcated into national and transnational spaces? Because "borders" have so clearly meandered
into so many intellectual issues that the more stable and conventional relation between borders and the "field" no longer holds,
intervention cannot simply be thought of in terms of the creation of new ''fields." 27 Instead, it is necessary to think primarily in
terms of bordersof borders, that is, as para-sites that never take over a field in its entirety but erode it slowly and tactically. The
work of Michel de Certeau is helpful for a formulation of this para-sitical intervention. De Certeau distinguishes between "strategy"
and another practice "tactic"in the following terms. A strategy has the ability to "transform the uncertainties of history into
readable spaces" (de Certeau, p. 36). The type of knowledge derived from strategy is "one sustained and determined by the power to
provide oneself with one's own place" (de Certeau, p. 36). Strategy therefore belongs to "an economy of the proper place" (de
Certeau, p. 55) and to those who are committed to the building, growth, and fortification of a "field." A text, for instance, would
become in this economy "a cultural weapon, a private hunting preserve," or "a means of social stratification" in the order of the Great
Wall of China (de Certeau, p. 171). A tactic, by contrast, is "a calculated action determined by the absence of a proper locus" (de
Certeau, p. 37). Betting on time instead of space, a tactic "concerns an operational logic whose models may go as far back as the
age-old ruses of fishes and insects that disguise or transform themselves in order to survive, and which has in any case been
concealed by the form of rationality currently dominant in Western culture" (de Certeau, p. xi). Why are "tactics" useful at

this moment? As discussions about "multiculturalism," "interdisciplinarity," "the third world

intellectual," and other companion issues develop in the American academy and society today,
and as rhetorical claims to political change and difference are being put forth, many deep-rooted,
politically reactionary forces return to haunt us. Essentialist notions of culture and history;
conservative notions of territorial and linguistic propriety, and the "otherness" ensuing from
them; unattested claims of oppression and victimization that are used merely to

guilt-trip and to control ; sexist and racist reaffirmations of sexual and racial diversities that
are made merely in the name of righteousnessall these forces create new "solidarities" whose ideological
premises remain unquestioned. These new solidarities are often informed by a strategic attitude which repeats what they seek to
overthrow. The weight of old ideologies being reinforced over and over again is immense. We need to remember as

intellectuals that the battles we fight are battles of words. Those who argue the oppositional
standpoint are not doing anything different from their enemies and are most certainly not
directly changing the downtrodden lives of those who seek their survival in metropolitan and
nonmetropolitan spaces alike. What academic intellectuals must confront is thus not their
"victimization" by society at large (or their victimization-in-solidarity-with-the-oppressed), but
the power, wealth, and privilege that ironically accumulate from their "oppositional" viewpoint,

and the widening gap between the professed contents of their words and the upward mobility they gain from such words. (When
Foucault said intellectuals need to struggle against becoming the object and instrument of power, he spoke precisely to this kind of
situation.) The predicament we face in the West, where intellectual freedom shares a history with economic enterprise, is that "if a
professor wishes to denounce aspects of big business, he will be wise to locate in a school whose trustees are big businessmen." 28

Why should we believe in those who continue to speak a language of alterity-as-lack while their
salaries and honoraria keep rising? How do we resist the turning-into-propriety of
oppositional discourses , when the intention of such discourses has been that of displacing
and disowning the proper? How do we prevent what begin as tacticsthat which is ''without any base where it could

stockpile its winnings" (de Certeau, p. 37)from turning into a solidly fenced-off field, in the military no less than in the academic
sense?

Turn the affirmatives attempt to define and politicize identity will

inevitably be coopted by the dominant discourse
Brown 93 (Wendy First Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, Wounded Attachments,
Political Theory, Vol. 21, No. 3 (August 1993), pp. 390-410 // JJ)

The story of the emergence of contemporary identity politics could be told in many other waysas the development of "new social antago- nisms" rooted in consumer capitalism's
commodification of all spheres of social life, as the relentless denaturalization of all social
relations occa- sioned by the fabrications and border violations of postmodern technolo- gies
and cultural productions, as a form of political consciousness precipitated by the black Civil
Rights movement in the United States. 12 I have told the story this way in order to emphasize the discursive political
comext of its emergence, its disciplinary, capitalist. and liberal parentage, and this in order to comprehend politicized
identity's genealogical struc- ture as comprising and not only opposing these very modalities of
politi- cal power. Indeed, if the ostensibly oppositional character of identity politics also render
them something of the "illegitimate offspring" of liberal, capitalist, disciplinary discourses, their
absent fathers are not, as Donna Haraway suggests. "inessential" but are installed in the very structure of
desire fueling identity-based political claims: the psyche of the bastard child is hardly independent ofits family of
origin. 13 And if we are interested in developing the politically subversive or transformative clements of idenritv-based claims, we need to know the implications of the particular genealogy
and production conditions of identity's desire for recognition. We need to be able to ask: Given
what produced it, given what shapes and suffuses it, what does politicized identity want? We might
profitably begin these investigations with a reflection on their curious elision by the philosopher who also frames them, Michel
Foucault. For Foucault, the constraints of emancipatory politics in late modern democracy pertain

to the ubiquity and pervasiveness of power- the impossibility of eschewing power in human
affairs-as well as to the ways in which subjects and practices are always at risk of being
resubordinated through the discourses naming and politicizing them. Best known for his
formulation of this dual problem in the domain of sexual liberation, Foucault offers a more generic theoretical account in his discussion of the disinterment of the "insurrectionary knowledges" of mar- ginalized populations and practices: Is the relation of forces
today still such as to allow these disinterred knowledges some kind of autonomous life? Can they be isolated by these means from
every subjugating relationship' What force do they have taken in themselves? ... Is it not perhaps the case that these
fragments of genealogies are no sooner brought to light, that the particular clements of the
knowledge that one seeks to disinter are no sooner accredited and put into circulation, than they
run the risk of re-codification, re-colonisation' In fact, those unitary discourses which first
disqualified and then ignored them when they made their appearance are, it seems, quite ready
now to annex them, to take them back within the fold of their own discourse and to invest them
with everything this implies in terms of their effects of knowledge and power. And if we want to
protect these only lately liberated fragments, are we not in danger of ourselves constructing,
with our own hands, that unitary discourse?l 4 Foucault's caution about the annexing, colonizing
effects of invariably unifying discourses is an important one. But the question of the emanci- patory
orientation of historically subordinated discourse is not limited to the risk of cooptation or
resubordination by extant or newly formed uni- tary discourses-whether those of humanism on one side, or
of cultural studies, multiculturalism, subaltern studies, and minority discourse on the other. Nor is it reducible to that unexamined
Frankfurt School strain in Foucault, the extent to which the Fouc:mltian subject originally de- sirous of freedom comes to will its
own domination, or (in Foucault's rubric) becomes a good disciplinary subject. Rather, I think that for Foucault, insofar as power
always produces resistance, even the disciplin- ary subject is perversely capable of resistance, and in practicing it, prac- tices
freedom. Discernible here is the basis of a curious optimism, even volunteerism in Foucault, namely his oddly physicalist and
insistently non psychic account of power, practices, and subject formation. His re- moval of the "will to power" ti-om Nietzsche's
complex psychology of need, frustration, impotence, and compensatory deeds is what permits Foucault to feature resistance as
always possible and as equivalent to prac- ticing freedom.

Turn the idealization of endangered experiences furthers their

exploitation
Chow 93 (Rey Chow Anne Firor Scott Professor of Literature, Duke University, Writing Diaspora: Tactics of Intervention
in Contemporary Cultural Studies, Indiana University Press (1993) // JJ)
As an issue of postcoloniality, the problem of the native is also

the problem of modernity and

modernity's relation to "endangered authenticities." 28 The question to ask is not whether we can return the

native to her authentic origin, but what our fascination with the native means in terms of the irreversibility of modernity. There are
many commendable accounts of how the native in the non-Western world has been used by the West as a means to promote and
develop its own intellectual contours. 29 According to these accounts, modernism, especially the modernism that we associate with
the art of Modigliani, Picasso, Gauguin, the novels of Gustave Flaubert, Marcel Proust, D. H. Lawrence, James Joyce, Henry Miller,
and so forth, was possible only because these "first world" artists with famous names incorporated into their "creativity" the culture
and artwork of the peoples of the non-West. But while Western artists continue to receive attention

specifically categorized in time, place, and name, the treatment of the works of non-Western
peoples continues to partake of systemic patterns of exploitation and distortion. Apart from the
general attribution of "anonymity" to native artists, "native works" have been bifurcated either as
timeless (in which case they would go into art museums) or as historical (in which case they would go into ethnographic
museums). While most cultural critics today are alert to the pitfalls of the ''timeless art" argument, many are still mired in
efforts to invoke "history," "contexts," and "specificities" as ways to resurrect the native. In
doing so, are they restoring to the native what has been stolen from her? Or are they in fact
avoiding the genuine problem of the native's status as object by providing
something that is more manageable and comforting namely, a phantom history

in which natives appear as our equals and our images, in our shapes and our forms?
Nancy Armstrong summarizes our predicament this way: The new wave of culture criticism still assumes that
we must either be a subject who partakes in the power of gazing or else be an object that is by
implication the object of a pornographic gaze. The strategy of identifying people according to "subject positions" in

a vast and intricate differential system of interests and needs is perhaps the most effective way we now have of avoiding the problem
incurred whenever we classify political interests by means of bodies inscribed with signs of race, class, and gender. But even the
"subject" of the critical term "subject position" tends to dissolve too readily back into a popular and sentimental version of the
bourgeois self. By definition, this self grants priority to an embodied subject over the body as an object. To insist on being "subjects"
as opposed to "objects" is to assume that we must have certain powers of observation, classification, and definition in order to exist;
these powers make "us" human. According to the logic governing such thinking as it was formulated in the nineteenth century, only
certain kinds of subjects are really subjects; to be human, anyone must be one of "us." 30 As we challenge a dominant discourse by
"resurrecting" the victimized voice/self of the native with our readingsand such is the impulse behind many "new historical"
accountswe step, far too quickly, into the otherwise silent and invisible place of the native and turn ourselves into living
agents/witnesses for her. This process, in which we become visible, also neutralizes the untranslatability of the native's experience
and the history of that untranslatability. The hasty supply of original "contexts" and "specificities" easily becomes complicitous with
the dominant discourse, which achieves hegemony precisely by its capacity to convert, recode, make transparent, and thus represent
even those experiences that resist it with a stubborn opacity. The danger of historical contextualization turning into cultural
corporations is what leads Clifford to say: I do not argue, as some critics have, that non-Western objects are properly understood
only with reference to their original milieux.

Ethnographic contextualizations are as problematic as

aesthetic ones, as susceptible to purified, ahistorical treatment . 31 The problem of modernity,

then, is not simply an "amalgamating" of "disparate experience" 32 but rather the confrontation between what are now called the
"first" and "third" worlds in the form of the diffrend, that is, the untranslatability of "third world" experiences into the "first world."
This is because, in order for her experience to become translatable, the "native" cannot simply

"speak" but must also provide the justice/justification for her speech, a justice/justification that
has been destroyed in the encounter with the imperialist. 33 The native's victimization consists in the fact that
the active evidencethe original witnessof her victimization may no longer exist in any intelligible, coherent shape. Rather
than saying that the native has already spoken because the dominant hegemonic discourse is
split/hybrid/different from itself, and rather than restoring her to her "authentic" context, we
should argue that it is the native's silence which is the most important clue to her
displacement. That silence is at once the evidence of imperialist oppression (the
naked body, the defiled image) and what, in the absence of the original witness to that

oppression, must act in its place by performing or feigning as the pre-imperialist

gaze.

Exploitation
Identity politics desire to subjectify means embracing the conditions
of ones own subordination that only furthers exploitation
Butler 97 (Judith Butler Maxine Elliot Professor in the Department of Rhetoric and Comparative Literature at the
University of California, Berkeley, The Psychic Life of Power: Theories in Subjection, Stanford University Press, pp. 9-10 // JJ)

If the subject is produced through foreclosure, then the subject is produced by a

condition from which it is, by definition, separated and differentiated. Desire will aim at
unraveling the subject, but be thwarted by precisely the subject in whose name it operates. A vexation of desire, one
that proves crucial to subjection, implies that for the subject to persist, the subject
must thwart its own desire. And for desire to triumph, the subject must be
threatened with dissolution. A subject turned against itself (its desire) appears, on this model, to be a condition of
the persistence of the subject. To desire the conditions of ones subordination is thus
required to persist as oneself. What does it mean to embrace the very form of
powerregulation, prohibition, suppressionthat threatens one with dissolution
in an effort, precisely, to persist in ones own existence. It is not simply that one requires the
recognition of the other and that a form of recognition is conferred through subordination, but rather that one is
dependent on power for ones very formation, that that formation is impossible
without dependency, and that the posture of the adult subject consists precisely in
the denial and reenactment of this dependency. The I emerges upon the condition that it deny its

formation in dependency, the conditions of its own possibility. The I, however, is threatened with disruption precisely by this
denial, by its unconscious pursuit of its own dissolution through neurotic repetitions that restage the primary scenarios it not only
refuses to see but cannot see, if it wishes to remain itself. This means, of course, that, predicated on what it refuses

to know, it is separated from itself and can never quite become or remain itself.

Facism
The idealizing, submissive tendencies inherent in identity politics
recreate fascism turns case
Chow 98 (Rey Chow Anne Firor Scott Professor of Literature, Duke University, Ethics After Idealism: Theory, Culture,
Ethnicity, Reading, Theories of Contemporary Culture, Indiana University Press (1999), pp. 30-32 // JJ)

If there is one thing that unites the early territorial colonialism and the contemporary white
liberalist intellectual trends that I am describing, it is the notion of a clear demarcation between self
and other, between us and thema demarcation that is mediated through the relations
between consciousness and captivity. The myth, in the days of territorial colonialism, was that (white)
consciousness had to be established in resistance to captivityeven while whites were holding other people
and lands captiveso that (white) cultural origins could be kept pure. In the postcolonial era, by contrast,
the myth is that (white) consciousness must itself surrender to or be held captive by the
otherthat (white) consciousness is nothing without this captivity called otherness. In both cases,
however, what remains constant is the belief that we are not them, and that white is not
other. This belief, which can be further encapsulated as we are not other, is fascism
par excellence. Emerging in postcoloniality, the new desire for our others displays the same
positive, projectional symptoms of fascism that I discussed in the preceding pagesa rebelliousness and a
monstrous aesthetics, but most of all a longing for a transparent, idealized image and an
identifying submission to such an image. Like the masses embrace of a Hitler or a
Mussolini, this fascism seeks empowerment through a surrender to the other as filmas the film that
overcomes me in the spell of an unmediated experience. The indiscriminate embrace of the
peoples of color as correct regardless of their differences and histories is ultimately
the desire for a pure-otherness-in-pristine-luminosity that is as dangerous as the
fascism of hateful discrimination from which we all suppose we are safely distanced. The
genealogical affinity of these two fascisms is perhaps best exemplified by the art of a Leni Riefenstahl, who progressed from
embracing Nazi racism to embracing the beautiful Nuba men of the southern Sudan. If the controversial label fascism
is indeed useful, as I think it is, for a radical critique of the contemporary intellectual culture in the West, it is because it helps

us
identify and problematize the good conscience and noble obligations of the new liberal fascism
with its multiculturalist modes and its sophisticated enterprises of visibility. Some will no doubt want to
disavow such ongoing fascist longings in our midst; others, hopefully, will not.

Attempts to increase the visibility of the other only reify

exploitation visual representations are, by nature, laid bare and on
display
Chow 93 (Rey Chow Anne Firor Scott Professor of Literature, Duke University, Writing Diaspora: Tactics of Intervention
in Contemporary Cultural Studies, Indiana University Press (1993) // JJ)

In the politics of identifying "authentic" natives, several strands of the word "identification" are
at stake: How do we identify the native? How do we identify with her? How do we construct the
native's "identity"? What processes of identification are involved? We cannot approach this
politics without being critical of a particular relation to images that is in question. In his volume of
essays exploring film culture, Fredric Jameson writes that "The visual is essentially pornographic. Pornographic
films are only the potentiation of films in general, which ask us to stare at the world as though
it were a naked body." 4 This straightforward definition of the visual image sums up many of the problems we encounter in
cultural criticism today, whether or not the topic in question is film. The activity of watching is linked by projection
to physical nakedness. Watching is theoretically defined as the primary agency of violence, an
act that pierces the other, who inhabits the place of the passive victim on display . The

image, then, is an aggressive sight that reveals itself in the other; it is the site of the aggressed.
Moreover, the image is what has been devastated, left bare, and left behind by
aggression hence Jameson's view that it is naked and pornographic. For many, the image is also the site of possible change.
In many critical discourses, the image is implicitly the place where battles are fought and
strategies of resistance negotiated. Such discourses try to inhabit this image-site by providing alternative sights,
alternative ways of watching that would change the image. Thus one of the most important enterprises
nowadays is that of investigating the "subjectivity" of the other-as-oppressed-victim.
"Subjectivity" becomes a way to change the defiled image, the stripped image, the
image-reduced-to-nakedness, by showing the truth behind/beneath/around it. The problem
with the reinvention of subjectivity as such is that it tries to combat the politics of the image, a
politics that is conducted on surfaces, by a politics of depths, hidden truths, and inner
voices . The most important aspect of the imageits power precisely as image and nothing
elseis thus bypassed and left untouched. 5 It is in this problematic of the image as the bad thing to be replaced that
I lodge the following arguments about the "native.'' The question in which I am primarily interested is: Is there a way of "finding"
the native without simply ignoring the image, or substituting a "correct" image of the ethnic specimen for an "incorrect" one, or
giving the native a "true" voice "behind" her "false" image? How could we deal with the native in an age when there is no possibility
of avoiding the reduction/abstraction of the native as image? How can we write about the native by not ignoring the defiled,
degraded image that is an inerasable part of her statusi.e., by not resorting to the idealist belief that everything would be all right if
the inner truth of the native is restored because the inner truth would lead to the "correct" image? I want to highlight the

nativenowadays often a synonym for the oppressed, the marginalized, the wrongedbecause I
think that the space occupied by the native in postcolonial discourses is also the space of error,
illusion, deception, and filth. How would we write this space in such a way as to refuse the
facile turn of sanctifying the defiled image with pieties and thus enriching ourselves
precisely with what can be called the surplus value of the oppressed, a surplus value that results
from exchanging the defiled image for something more noble?

Homogenization
Their act of breaking silence turns individual experiences into
regulatory discourses that homogenize resistance
Brown 96 (Wendy Brown First Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, Constitutions and
'Survivor Stories': In the 'folds of our own discourse' The Pleasures and Freedoms of Silence, The University of Chicago Law School
Roundtable (1996), lexis // JJ)
Again, let me emphasize that the problem I am seeking to delineate is not specific to MacKinnon or even

feminist legal reform. Rather, MacKinnon's and kindred efforts at bringing subjugated discourses into
the law merely constitute examples of what Foucault identified as the risk of re-codification and
re- colonisation of "disinterred knowledges" by those "unitary discourses, which

first disqualified and then ignored them when they made their appearance ." n23 They
exemplify how the work of breaking silence can metamorphose into new techniques of domination,
how our truths can become our rulers rather than our emancipators, how our confessions
become the norms by which we are regulated. If, taken together, the two passages from Foucault we have been
consider- ing call feminists to account in our compulsion to put everything about women into discourse, they do not yet exhaust the
phenomenon of being ensnared 'in the folds of our own discourses.' For if the problem I have been discussing is easy

enough to see--indeed, largely familiar to those who track techniques of co-optation--at the level
of legal and bureaucratic discourse, it is altogether more disquieting when it takes the form of
regulatory discourse in our own sub- and counter-cultures of resistance . . . when confessing
injury becomes that which attaches us to the injury, paralyzes us within it, and prevents us from
seeking or even desiring a status other than injured. In an age of social identification through attributes marked
as culturally significant--gender, race, sexuality, and so forth--confessional discourse, with its truth-bearing
status in a post-epistemological universe, not only regulates the confessor in the name of
freeing her as Foucault described that logic, but extends beyond the confessing
individual to constitute a regulatory truth about the identity group. Confessed
truths are assembled and deployed as "knowledge" about the group. This phenomenon would seem
to undergird a range of recurring troubles in feminism, from the "real woman" rejoinder to post-structuralist deconstructions of her,
to totalizing descriptions of women's experience that are the inadvertent effects of various kinds of survivor stories. Thus, for
example, the porn star who feels miserably exploited, violated and humiliated in her work invariably monopolizes the truth about
sex work; as the girl with math anxieties constitutes the truth about women and math; as eating disor- ders have become the truth
about women and food; as sexual abuse and viola- tion occupy the knowledge terrain of women and sexuality. In other words, even
as feminism aims to affirm diversity among women and women's ex- periences, confession as
the site of production of truth and its convergence with feminist suspicion and deauthorization
of truth from other sources tends to reinstate a unified discourse in which the story of greatest
suffering becomes the true story of woman. (I think this constitutes part of the rhetorical power of MacKinnon's
work; analytically, the epistemological superiority of confes- sion substitutes for the older, largely discredited charge of false
consciousness). Thus, the adult who does not suffer from her or his childhood sexual experi- ence, the lesbian who does not feel
shame, the woman of color who does not primarily or "correctly" identify with her marking as such--these figures are

excluded as bonafide members of the categories which also claim them. Their status within
these discourses is that of being "in denial," "passing" or being a "race traitor." This is the normmaking process in feminist traditions of "breaking silence" which, ironically, silence and exclude the very
women these traditions mean to empower. (Is it surprising, when we think in this vein, that there is so little feminist
writing on heterosexual pleasure?) But if these practices tacitly silence those whose experiences do not parallel those whose
suffering is most marked (or whom the discourse produces as suffering markedly), they also condemn those whose
sufferings they record to a permanent identification with that suffering. Here, we experience a
temporal ensnaring in 'the folds of our own discourses' insofar as we identify ourselves in speech
in a manner that condemns us to live in a present dominated by the past. But what if speech and silence
aren't really opposites? Indeed, what if to speak incessantly of one's suffering is to silence the possibilities of overcoming it, of living
beyond it, of identifying as something other than it? What if this incessant speech not only overwhelms the

experiences of others, but alternative (unutterable? traumatized? fragmentary? inassimilable?) zones of one's
own experience? Conversely, what if a certain modality of silence about one's suffering--and I am
suggesting that we must consider modalities of silence as varied as modalities of speech and discourse--is to articulate a
variety of possibilities not otherwise available to the sufferer?

Self-identification inevitably reinforces homogenized conceptions of

culture
Butler 90 (Judith Butler Maxine Elliot Professor in the Department of Rhetoric and Comparative Literature at the
University of California, Berkeley, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, Routledge, pp. 84-86 // JJ)
iv. Gender Complexity and the Limits of Identification The foregoing analyses of Lacan,Riviere,and Freuds The Ego and the Id
offer competing versions of how gender identifications workindeed, of whether they can be said to work at all. Can gender
complexity and dissonance be accounted for by the multiplication and conver- gence of a variety of culturally dissonant
identifications? Or is all identification constructed through the exclusion of a sexuality that puts those

identifications into question? In the first instance, multiple iden-

tifications can constitute a nonhierarchical

configuration of shifting and overlapping identifications that call into question the primacy of any univocal gender attribution.In
the Lacanian framework,identifica- tion is understood to be fixed within the binary disjunction of having or beingthe
Phallus,with the consequence that the excluded term of the binary continually haunts and disrupts the coherent posturing of any
one.The excluded term is an excluded sexuality that contests the self-grounding pretensions of the subject as well as its claims to
know the source and object of its desire. For the most part, feminist critics concerned with the psychoana- lytic

problematic of identification have often focused on the question of a maternal identification and
sought to elaborate a feminist episte- mological position from that maternal identification
and/or a mater- nal discourse evolved from the point of view of that identification and its
difficulties. Although much of that work is extremely significant and clearly influential, it has come to
occupy a hegemonic position within the emerging canon of feminist theory. Further, it tends
to reinforce precisely the binary, heterosexist framework that carves up genders
into masculine and feminine and forecloses an adequate description of the kinds of
subversive and parodic convergences that characterize gay and lesbian cultures. As a very partial effort
to come to terms with that maternalist discourse, however, Julia Kristevas description of the semiotic as a maternal subversion of
the Symbolic will be examined in the following chapter. What critical strategies and sources of subversion appear as the
consequence of the psychoanalytic accounts considered so far? The recourse to the unconscious as a source of subversion makes
sense, it seems, only if the paternal law is understood as a rigid and universal determinism which makes of identity a fixed and
phantasmatic affair. Even if we accept the phantasmatic content of identity,there is no rea- son to assume that the law which fixes
the terms of that fantasy is impervious to historical variability and possibility. As opposed to the founding Law of the

Symbolic that fixes identity in advance, we might reconsider the history of constitutive
identifica- tions without the presupposition of a fixed and founding Law.Although the universalityof

the paternal law may be contested within anthropo- logical circles, it seems important to consider that the meaning that the law
sustains in any given historical context is less univocal and less deterministically efficacious than the Lacanian account appears to
acknowledge. It should be possible to offer a schematic of the ways in which a constellation of identifications conforms or fails to
conform to culturally imposed standards of gender integrity. The

constitutive identifications of an

autobiographical narrative are always partially fabricated in the telling . Lacan claims
that

we can never tell the story of our origins, precisely because language bars the

speaking subject from the repressed libidinal origins of its speech ; however, the
foundational moment in which the paternal law institutes the subject seems to func- tion as a metahistory which we not only can
but ought to tell, even though the founding moments of the subject, the institution of the law, is as equally prior to the speaking
subject as the unconscious itself. The alternative perspective on identification that emerges from

psychoanalytic theory suggests that multiple and coexisting identifications produce conflicts,
convergences, and innovative dissonances within gender configurations which contest the fixity
of masculine and feminine placements with respect to the paternal law. In effect, the possibility of multiple
identifications (which are not finally reducible to primary or founding identifications that are fixed within masculine and feminine
positions) suggests that the Law is not deterministic and that thelaw may not even be singular.

Lack of culture leads to identity crisis

Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 8, pgs 136-137, 2009//SRSL)

While I agree that there is no such thing as 'white culture' per se, there are white
cultures. It is particularly important, given the scenario of continuing UK white working
class racism (exacerbated, as I have argued throughout this volume by sections of the tabloid press), that educators do not
deny the existence ofwhite working class cultures. Indeed, as I have argued
elsewhere with respect to such cultures (Cole, 2007c, 2008c), educational institutions
should be centrally involved in helping to identify and develop strategies to
promote good inclusive practice for all pupils/students, including the white
working class, non-racialized as well as racialized (see below). Sections of the white
working class in England have voted for the fascist British National Party (BNP) at recent
elections precisely because they feel that they are treated with less equality than
others. Ifwe were to teach white working class young people that they have no culture, or indeed if we were to treat them as if
they had no culture, that would be racist, would alienate white working class children even more, and would not be conducive to
effective socialist practice. The notion of such a lack of culture, which would surely lead to

identity crises (a point that fellow 'white abolitionist' Ricky Lee Allen (2007, p. 65) seems to revel in when
he states that critical educators need to create an environment which creates this)
would also rightly be massively contested, including by most ofthe Left in the
United Kingdom.

Polticization
The affirmatives call for recognition reinscribes the traumatized
subject by politicizing pain
Brown 93 (Wendy First Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, Wounded Attachments,
Political Theory, Vol. 21, No. 3 (August 1993), pp. 390-410 // JJ)
Revenge as a "reaction," a substitute for the capacity to act, produces

identity as both bound to the

history that produced it and as a reproach to the present that embodies that history. The will that
"took to hurting" in its own impotence against its past becomes (in the form of an identity whose very existence
is due to heightened consciousness of the immovability of its "it was," its history of subordination) a will
that makes not only a psychological but a political practice of revenge, a practice that reiterates the existence of an
identity whose present past is one of insistently unredeemable injury. This past cannot be
redeemed unless the identity ceases to be invested in it, and it cannot cease to be invested in it
without giving up its identity as such, thus giving up its economy of avenging and at the same
time perpetuating its hurt-"when he then stills the pain of the wound, he at the same time reinfects the wound."32 In
its emergence as a protest against marginalization or subordination, politicized identity thus
becomes attached to its own exclusion both because it is premised on this exclusion for its very
existence as identity and because the formation of identity at the site of exclusion, as exclusion,

augments or "alters the direction of the suffering" entailed in subordination or marginalization by finding a site of blame for it. But
in so doing,

it installs its pain over its unredeemed history in the very foundation of its

political claim , in its demand for recognition as identity. In locating a site of blame for its
powerlessness over its past, as a past of injury, a past as a hurt will, and locating a "reason" for the "unendurable
pain" of social powerlessness in the present, it converts this reasoning into an ethicizing politics, a politics
of recrimination that seeks to avenge the hurt even while it reaffirms it, discursively codifies it.
Politicized identity thus enunciates itself, makes claims for itself, only by entrenching,
dramatizing, and inscribing its pain in politics and can hold out no future-for itself or othersthat triumphs over this pain. The loss of historical direction, and with it the loss of futurity characteristic of the late
modern age, is thus homologically refigured in the structure of desire of the dominant political expression of the age-identity
politics. In the same way, the generalized political impotence produced by the ubiquitous yet discontinuous networks of late
modern political and economic power is reiterated in the investments of late modern democracy's primary oppositional political
formation.

Privilege
Privilege theory undermines revolutionary action- empirical track
record shows its ineffective, makes future generations of activists
ineffective
Sabcat 13 (Writer for dysphoria, an anarchist publication, Privilege Theory. The Politics of
Defeat, http://sabcat.com/privilege-theory-the-poltics-of-defeat/, 1/1/13, acc. 7/9/14, arh)
Ive been blissfully ignorant of these ideas of privilege and the concept of checking it until very
recently. It came across my radar after the fall out of a twitter row. A set of ideas were put
forward, and argument was made. The response to this argument boiled down to the person was
writing it from a perspective of white male privilege. The issues were side stepped. I assumed
that this was an abuse of a theory that I didnt understand, that privilege theory wasnt simply a
handy tool to dismiss an argument because you dont like the person making it. I asked on
twitter for some links so I could find out what this theory was really about. The most interesting
and by interesting I mean the most infuriating was A Class Struggle Anarchist Analysis of
Privilege Theory from the Womens Caucus. Before I explain my problems with the theory and
its uses Ill first briefly explain where Im coming from. Im a socialist. I believe in and strive for
a universally applied set of values that can be simply described as equality and freedom. For a
more complete explanation of these values AFEDs own aims and principles is as good place to
look. These aims and principles provide a lense to view the world through and a yard stick to
measure the validity or otherwise of ideas against. People Act in Their Material Interest The
AFED Aims and principles criticism of unions touches on this, the interests of union leadership
are often at odds with the interests of their members. The overthrow of the wage system, of
capitalism while in the interests of the members is not in the interests of the leadership .
Privilege theory takes no account of shifting material interests and instead is
concerned with fixed categories of identity. Once analysis moves away from the
material and into identity its almost impossible to reconcile it with class struggle
in all but the most crude terms. In their analysis of privilege theory AFED abandon class
struggle almost completely: The term privilege has a complex relationship with class struggle,
and to understand why, we need to look at some of the differences and confusions between
economic and social class. Social class describes the cultural identities of working class, middle
class and upper class. These identities, much like those built on gender or race, are socially
constructed, created by a society based on its prejudices and expectations of people in those
categories. Economic class is different. It describes the economic working and ruling classes, as
defined by Marx. It functions through capitalism, and is based on the ownership of material
resources, regardless of your personal identity or social status. This is why a wealthy, knighted
capitalist like Alan Sugar can describe himself as a working class boy made good. He is clearly
not working class if we look at it economically, but he clings to that social identity in the belief
that it in some way justifies or excuses the exploitation within his business empire. He confuses
social and economic class in order to identify himself with an oppressed group (the social
working class) and so deny his own significant privilege (as part of the economic ruling class).
Being part of the ruling class of capitalism makes it impossible to support struggles against that
system. This is because, unlike any other privileged group, the ruling class are directly
responsible for the very exploitation they would be claiming to oppose. This idea that the middle
class and working class are nothing more than socially constructed cultural identities is
convenient for privilege theory. Its reduced the class struggle in the material sense to Alan
Sugar and other owners of material resources oppressing everyone else. The middle class are
part of the oppressed group, its an identity no more or less significant than another. Its

complete none sense. The middle class and working class as well as cultural difference
experience different material conditions. The material and the cultural feed into each other in
the form of connections and opportunities for the middle class that the working class dont
enjoy. The interests of the working class and middle class are very different. People act on the
basis of their material interests. Just as the union leaderships dont share the same interests as
their membership, depending on the existing order for their material advantage and power so
the middle class exist and enjoy material advantage in the same way. Item 3 from Afeds aims
and principles: We believe that fighting systems of oppression that divide the working class,
such as racism and sexism, is essential to class struggle. Anarchist-Communism cannot be
achieved while these inequalities still exist. In order to be effective in our various struggles
against oppression, both within society and within the working class, we at times need to
organise independently as people who are oppressed according to gender, sexuality, ethnicity or
ability. We do this as working class people, as cross-class movements hide real class differences
and achieve little for us. Full emancipation cannot be achieved without the abolition of
capitalism. The twin issues of division and oppression are very real and need to be tackled. The
important part of that is We do this as working class people, as cross-class movements hide real
class differences and achieve little for us. The reason is that class is unique, other identity
categories can feed into the material conditions and interests of a person but on a shifting basis.
Thats not to say that patriarchy or racism are not real or that they can be dismissed but its not
possible except on single, narrowly framed issues to equate the interests of any group across
class lines. AFED claim this can achieve little for us. I go further and say that it ensures that
struggles rooted in identity and not class can never feed into a wider struggle against capitalism
because they are made up of people who dont share the same interests, class interests. The
overthrow of capitalism is not in the interests of the middle class whether theyre a cisgendered
white male or not. In their analysis of Privilege Theory AFED touch on racism: At other times
the benefits are more subtle and invisible, and involve certain pressures being taken off a
privileged group and focused on others, for example black and Asian youths being 28% more
likely to be stopped and searched by the police than white youths. The point here is not that
police harassment doesnt happen to white youths, or that being working class or a white
European immigrant doesnt also mean youre more likely to face harassment; the point is that a
disproportionate number of black and Asian people are targeted in comparison to white people,
and the result of this is that, if you are carrying drugs, and you are white, then all other things
being equal you are much more likely to get away with it than if you were black. In the UK, white
people are also less likely to be arrested or jailed, or to be the victim of a personal crime. Black
people currently face even greater unemployment in the UK than they do in the USA. The point
of quoting this is not to suggest we want a society in which people of all races and ethnicities face
equal disadvantage we want to create a society in which nobody faces these disadvantages. But
part of getting there is acknowledging how systems of oppression work, which means
recognising that, if black and ethnic minority groups are more likely to face these disadvantages,
then by simple maths white people are less likely to face them, and that means they have an
advantage, a privilege, including the privilege of not needing to be aware of the extent of the
problem. As they say, black and Asian youths are more likely to face police oppression, their
example that a white person is more likely to be able to carry drugs and not get
caught is odd and isnt privilege unless the police are harassing someone at all
times and if they stop doing so on grounds of race white people are at higher risk.
The unemployment statistics make more sense, black people are oppressed in this way. Thinking
of this in terms of privilege for white people isnt useful in terms of understanding it and is
positively counter productive in tackling it. What is described is a material reason for solidarity.
Theres a pile and some people are at the bottom of it, they belong to a variety of identity
categories. The only way out of this is recognition that the injustice is the existence

of the pile itself. Describing this in terms of white people being privileged fails to
recognise the material conditions at the root of the issue , that the real issue is a class
issue. Viewing it in terms of race only perpetuates the problem, the problem being the pile itself.
Capitalism. The last race riots in the UK were in 2005 in the Lozells area of Birmingham. The
fight between black and Asian people was caused by the multicultural policy of allocating
resources based on ethnicity. This is explored by Kenan Malik in his essay How to Make a Riot:
Once political power and financial resources became allocated by ethnicity, then people began to
identify themselves in terms of their ethnicity, and only their ethnicity. People are forced into a
very one-dimensional view of themselves by the way that equality policies work, says Joy
Warmington of the Birmingham Race Action Partnership, a council-funded but independent
equalities organization. People mobilize on the basis of how they feel they will get the resources
to tackle the issues important to them. And in Birmingham it helps to say youre campaigning
for the needs of your ethnic or faith community, because policies have tended to emphasize
ethnicity as a key to entitlement. If somebody in Handsworth or Lozells wants a community
centre or a health centre it is often easier to get funding if they say We want an Asian
community centre or We want an African-Caribbean health centre. They are forced to see
themselves in terms of their ethnicity, their race, their culture and so on rather than in broader
terms that might bring people together. The racism, the division of working class people had at
its roots material resources. The real grievances of those people who saw themselves as missing
out were not racial they were class issues. Privilege Theory does nothing to help us
understand let alone tackle this because there is no one with any actual privilege.
Privilege Theory is a tool for middle class people to tell people with no discernible privilege to
check their privilege. It provides nothing of any use to a working class movement and
undermines solidarity. It formalises an ad hominem argument when the issues arent
convenient to discuss. We dont need it, we have a set of ideas and values by which to measure
arguments against. What we dont have, as working class people is much in the way of privilege
unlike our middle class friends playing at being radical. Its not a game.

Privilege checking reinforces capitalist divisions and stigmatizes

activism
Bast and McClure 12 (Tabitha and Hannah, writers for Dsyphoria periodical,
http://libcom.org/book/export/html/45500, September 2012, acc. 7/8/14, arh)
Privilege. Now theres a word we are hearing a lot. The concept and finger-pointing of privilege
is coming to increasingly concern us as a problem and a poor semblance within the alternative
left. We feel not only embarrassed by the simplicity of this undisclosed and undefined
overarching theory but concerned that it further leads a stagnant movement down more dire
dead ends. And yet our disquiet is not because we believe interpersonal politics are less worthy
of our attention, nor because we are without awareness and rage about the oppressive power
structures within our lives and political milieus. We do not believe that these are minor details
that can wait til after the revolution. Whilst we are currently organising what is suspiciously like
a womens consciousness raising group, we dismiss those laughable and cringeworthy lists that
have gone viral in the social networking world. These might appear as conflicting positions, but
as we hope to explain, we do not find them so. As mentioned , we are confronted with
endless lists asking us to Check our Privilege . We have encountered the heterosexual
privilege checklist the cis privilege checklist and the able bodied checklist. (examples of
these checklists are included at the end of the article- the Eds.) We think you get the picture?
Soon we will be carrying around score cards wishing to be the most victimised person in the
world. This sort of privilege scorekeeping is tallied in our everyday encounters but most often

called out in a certain political context, such as a political meeting, discussion or lecture. We
now are presented with the manarchist who uses his male privilege taking up space in
meetings. Taking up space is not seen as only about the amount a person of privilege speaks but
often the language used. We see a growth in these subcultural movements in the UK of an
adherence to a new political language and analysis with a centrality of privilege as an
overarching ideology. We find an anti-intellectualism where both theorising and militancy are
seen as a privilege in and of themselves, as if acting on the front line as WELL as analysis are
only weapons of the oppressive rather than weapons of the oppressed. We find this dangerous
because it evokes that the most oppressed are helpless and weak, encourages a lack of activity
and analysis away from make do and mend circles, and further rarefies the notion of resistance.
Another vagary is the self-flagellating groups emerging that prop up a culture of shame. For
example, recent workshops have emerged under the theme of Men dealing with their
patriarchal shit. Whilst we want individuals to examine, analyse and challenge their own
behaviour in political terms these punkier than thou equal ops sessions reinforce the holier than
thou attitude of the attendees.and the ones who could do with it rammed down their hairy
throats wouldnt dream of attending. These examples of new emerging themes demonstrate that
on one side of the coin you have a points based oppression outlook (weve made the complexities
of power into a handy ticklist for you!) and on the other you have individualised guilt and selfvictimisation (which is another way of re-focusing on the more privileged ironically). This focus
on the individual and self as the problem is a product of privilege leading us nowhere. Its a dead
end. We feel a political lens of privilege is divisive and unhelpful when we are part and parcel of
a system that already thrives on the division of the working classes, through gender, class and
sexual oppression.

Privilege checks focus on who speaks rather than what they sayannihilates resistance
Bast and McClure 12 (Tabitha and Hannah, writers for Dsyphoria periodical,
http://libcom.org/book/export/html/45500, September 2012, acc. 7/8/14, arh)
We recognise the well meaningness of checking your privilege. We too understand that people
are silenced not just as individuals but due to identities. However, we perceive wrong footed
attempts to right this balance. In meetings we witness call outs where someone will announce
that six men have spoken and no women. This is an attempt to expose the hidden subtleties of
patriarchy and male dominance, and to empower women. We have never seen this work
to readdress power relations . This call of male privilege may serve to quieten the six men
who have spoken, but it does not give more voice to the silenced. More awkwardly, it is often
uncomfortable for the women in the group who may feel, as we do in this scenario, an obligation
to speak, but with it comes an unnatural sense of representation. The opposite usually
takes place; a silencing of people rather than the growth of new conversations .
One that is forced, fake and full of disdain. Whilst the next person, woman, is to speak but feels
an artificial pressure of representation that we are supposed to be speaking on behalf of all
women, from an identity as woman, and only as woman. And when we, or she, speaks, it is of
course as a woman within patriarchy and to a room where she is being observed and judged by
the six men who have spoken, under a political male gaze. Because of these things, and more, we
do not see these clumsy attempts moving any steps toward challenging sexist oppression. To do
that we need first to acknowledge intersectionality of power, history and privilege. With a
singular identification of privilege we reduce the myriad of power relations within the group to a
straightforward visible one. We dont want a politics that reduces and simplifies
power into an ideology of privilege. Intersectionalities of power, oppression and

privilege need to be examined mixed with relations of capital . Analysing and

pinpointing privilege to an obsessive extent in political circles can be demobilising as well as
futile. But most damaging of all, these performances of privilege call out, mislead us
into believing that challenging patriarchy within our interpersonal relations
occurs within the formalities of a meeting and it is who speaks rather than what
they say.

Privilege creates new restrictive identity binaries - reinforces

oppression and greases the wheels for capitalist exploitation
Bast and McClure 12 (Tabitha and Hannah, writers for Dsyphoria periodical,
http://libcom.org/book/export/html/45500, September 2012, acc. 7/8/14, arh)
Because ultimately, it is not womans voice we should be seeking but feminist voice. A feminist
voice is not one based on identity but rather on a shared transformative politics. A feminist voice
is a stance rather than a given. As bell hooks reminds us; feminism is the struggle to end sexist
oppression. We suggest this will often be best realised through those most facing sexist
oppression but also we are vigilant to note that not all oppressed are resisting, subverting or
fighting this oppression, nor are those who seem to benefit in ways from it always or
automatically in alignment with the oppressive forces. So where does that leave identity and
privilege in the struggle for freedoms? Understanding politics through the lens of privilege is
intrinsically entangled with identity politics. And, for reasons stated, we find identity politics a
monolithic and restrictive way to understand the world. We are our identities but we are never
just one identity, we are a complexity of them. And identities do not line up in a straightforward
ABC of oppression, no matter how much the privilegists want them to. This just falls into
binaries that we are attempting to escape from, or creates more. The queer movement
challenges the notions of men and women yet seems to be opting instead for cis or trans
giving new permanence and boundaries to our gender. This is not to downplay the struggles but
we believe that these fixed linear positions are not just unhelpful but often false. Cis gender may
not seem intrinsically a privilege to the women killed by domestic violence or childbirth. Nor
male privilege to a gay Ugandan. The relationality of power has to be optimistically understood
if we are to move beyond an idle determinism and singular identity code. But, also, to resist we
must understand our power; the strength in our collective power rather than this frugal analysis
of power where privilege divides us into mundane categories of oppression. We need to
galvanise on our power as a class, as this class being fucked over by capital within all its facets of
everyday life. Rather than creating new prisons and new boxes to further tear ourselves to pieces
within, we need to analyse and act with fluidity and creativity in terms of our intersectional
identities in the kitchens, the bedrooms, the meeting spaces, the pubs and in the streets we
demand to occupy.

Reduction
Intersectionaltiy reduces identity to a mere social role
Ross 2k [Marlon B. Ross, University of Michigan, Professor of English Language and Literature & African and African
American Studies, New Literary History, Vol. 31, No. 4, Is There Life after Identity Politics? (Autumn, 2000), pp. 827-850,
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20057638] l.gong
Perhaps Palumbo-Liu, understandably, feels restless hemmed in by externalizing theories of the body,

spectatorship, performativity, hybridity, resistance, and intersectionality. Such theories tend to

reduce identities to social roles that can be put on and taken off, mixed and matched, almost at will. Or they
overdetermine exceptional cases of passing to explain the rules of racial identification, or they
credential closeting, crossdressing, and trans-sexuality to explain all the rules of sexual
identification. As others have pointed out, such theories silently rely on the solidity of the sexual
anatomy beneath the poses and custom (e) s and on the substratum of racial embodiment against
which passing identity can seem playfully deconstructive. Although such theories, to their credit,
occasionally highlight the delights of cross identification, they do so at the expense of understanding
the intractability of identity norms, many of which remain untouched by crossdressers, passers, and the like.
Identities may not be fixed and static, but they are ingrained and iterative. Even cross-dressers
repeat the same maneuvers, styles, attitudes over generationsironically forging normative expectations for
putatively abnormal gender-bending. If these theories do not take us far enough "behind" the social roles that they
critique, Palumbo Liu's attempt to siphon off social roles from identity, the collective form from the individual
"inside," does not go far enough inside the institutionality of the individual.

Identity politics bad their approach is premised on realism,

essentialism, and ethical foundationalism
Gergen 99 (Kenneth J. Gergen American psychologist and professor at Swarthmore College, Social Construction and the
Transformation of Identity Politics, End of knowing: A new developmental way of learning (1999) // JJ)
If identity politics were not sufficiently embattled by the vicissitudes of cultural history, it has also

begun to feel a
certain suffocating presence from its constructionist paramour. For, while social constructionism
supplies vibrant discursive resources for building internal strength and undermining the
opposition, it also plays havoc with central tenets of identity politics. In particular, constructionism offers
strong arguments against the realism, essentialism, and ethical foundationalism endemic to much of the discourse of identity
politics. In the first instance, the social critiques developed within identity politics are typically lodged

within a realist discourse, a discourse which privileges its critique with the capacity
for truth beyond perspective. In characterizing the barriers of class, the glass ceiling,
homo-phobia, the effects of pornography on rape, and the embryonic fetus as a human being,
for example, claims are being about the state of nature independent of our interpretive
proclivities. For the constructionist, of course, the such claims are not so much reflections of nature as
the outcome of social process . The descriptions are inherently positioned both historically and culturally, and
myriad alternatives are both possible and creditable from other societal locations. The realist posture is all the more ironic, the
constructionist reasons, because such critiques are often coupled with a deconstruction of the opposition's objectivity. The

constructed character of the dominant discourse is used by the identity politician to pave the
way for the marginalized alternative, with the latter position then treated as if transparent.
Closely related to a problematic realism is the essentialist presumption implicit in much
identity politics. To make claims for the rights of women, children, the aged, the poor, the
insane, and so on typically implies the existence of an essential entity a group unified
by its distinctive features . The group name is treated as referential - derived from
characteristics existing in nature, independent of the name itself. For the constructionist, of course,

reference is preeminently a social achievement and thus inherently defeasible. The reality of history, ethnicity, class, and so on is
generated within contemporary cultural life, and could be otherwise. As Henry Louis Gates (1994) proposes, blackness is "not a
material object, an absolute, or an event," but only "a trope." And lodging the argument in social process, he goes on, "Race is

only a sociopolitical category, nothing more." As this sociopolitical category is applied to

individuals it also acts as a reductive agent, circumscribing one's identity, and
reducing one's potential to be otherwise . In his Reflections of an Affirmative Action Baby, Stephen Carter
proposes that such labels operate as problematic stereotypes, covering over complexities and
generating misleading social policies.(See also Calhoun, 1994) Finally, constructionist thought also
militates against the claims to ethical foundations implicit in much identity politics - that higher
ground from which others can so confidently be condemned as inhumane, self-serving, prejudiced, and unjust.

Constructionist thought painfully reminds us that we have no transcendent rationale upon

which to rest such accusations, and that our sense of moral indignation is itself a product of
historically and culturally situated traditions. And the constructionist intones, is it not possible that those we

excoriate are but living also within traditions that are, for them, suffused with a sense of ethical primacy? As we find, then, social
constructionism is a two edged sword in the political arena, potentially as damaging to the wielding hand as to the opposition.

Regulation
Turn their confessional discourse fails to liberate instead, it
regulates identity by universalizing specific experiences
Brown 96 (Wendy Brown First Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, Constitutions and
'Survivor Stories': In the 'folds of our own discourse' The Pleasures and Freedoms of Silence, The University of Chicago Law School
Roundtable (1996), lexis // JJ)
Here, Foucault's concern is less with disrupting the conventional modernist equation of power with speech on one side, and
oppression with silence on the other, than with

the ways in which insurrectionary discourse borne of

exclusion and marginalization can be colonized by that which produced it much as countercultural fashion is routinely commodified by the corporate textile industry. While "disqualified"
discourses are an effect of domination, they nevertheless potentially function as oppositional
when they are deployed by those who inhabit them. However, when "annexed" by those
"unitary" discourses which they ostensibly oppose, they become a particularly potent source of
regulation, carrying as they do intimate and detailed knowledge of their subjects .
Thus, Foucault's worry would appear to adhere not simply to the study of but to the overt political mobilization of oppositional
discourses. Consider the way in which the discourse of multiculturalism has been annexed by

mainstream institutions to generate new modalities of essentialized racial discourse; how "premenstrual syndrome" has been rendered a debilitating disease in medical and legal discourses;
n17 how "battered women's syndrome" has been deployed in the courtroom to defend women
who strike back at their assailants by casting them as sub-rational, egoless victims of male
violence; n18 or how some women's response to some pornography was generalized by the Meese
Commission on pornography as the violence done to all women by all pornography. n19 Consider,
more generally, attempts at codifying feminist discourses of women's experience in the unitary and universal discourse of the law.
What happens when legal universalism's silence about women, when its failure to recognize or remedy the material of women's
subordination, is remedied with discourses specifying women's experience and codifying the category of women through this
specification? In pursuing this question, I will focus briefly on Catharine MacKinnon's work, but the questions I am raising about
this kind of feminist legal reform are not limited to her work. n20 MacKinnon expressly aims to write "women's

experience into law," but as so many other feminists have remarked, this begs the question
of which women's experience(s) , drawn from which historical moments, culture,
race, and class strata . n21 Indeed, what does it mean to write historically and culturally circumscribed experience into
an ahistorical discourse, the universalist discourse of law? Is it possible to do this without rendering "experience" as ontology,
"perspective" as Truth, and without encoding this ontology and this Truth in law as the basis of women's rights? What if, for
example, the identity of women as keyed to sexual violation is an expressly late twentieth century and white middle-class
construction of femininity, consequent to a radical deprivatization of sexuality on the one side, and the erosion of other elements of
compulsory heterosexuality n22 --such as a severely gendered division of social labor--on the other? Moreover, does a

definition of women as sexual subordination, and the encoding of this definition in law, work to
liberate women from sexual subordination, or does it, paradoxically, legally reinscribe
femaleness as sexual violability? If the law produces the subjects it claims to protect or
emancipate, how might installation of women's experience as "sexual violation" in the law
reiterate rather than repeal this identity? And might this installation be particularly
unemancipatory for women whose lived experience is not that of sexual subordination to men
but, for example, that of sexual outlaw? These questions suggest that in legally codifying a fragment of
an insurrectionary discourse as a timeless truth, interpellating women as unified in their
victimization, and casting the "free speech" of men as that which "silences" and thus subordinates women, MacKinnon not only
opposes bourgeois liberty to substantive equality, but potentially intensifies the regulation of gender and sexuality
in the law, abetting rather than contesting the production of gender identity as sexual. In short, as
a regulatory fiction of a particular identity is deployed to displace the hegemonic
fiction of universal personhood, the discourse of rights converges insidiously with the

discourse of disciplinarity to produce a spectacularly potent mode of juridicalregulatory domination .

By seeking subjectivity through external recognition, their politics

regulate and govern identity
Butler 97 (Judith Butler Maxine Elliot Professor in the Department of Rhetoric and Comparative Literature at the
University of California, Berkeley, The Psychic Life of Power: Theories in Subjection, Stanford University Press, pp. 21-22 // JJ)
How is it that the subject is the kind of being who can be exploited, who is, by virtue of its own formation, vulnerable to subjugation?

Bound to seek recognition of its own existence in categories, terms, and names
that are not of its own making , the subject seeks the sign of its own existence
outside itself, in a discourse that is at once dominant and indifferent. Social
categories signify subordination and existence at once. In other words, within subjection the price
of existence is subordination. Precisely at the moment in which choice is impossible, the subject pursues subordination as the
promise of existence. This pursuit is not choice, but neither is it necessity. Subjection exploits the desire for existence, where
existence is always conferred from elsewhere; it marks a primary vulnerability to the Other in order to be. Assuming

terms of power that one never made but to which one is vulnerable on which one depends in
order to be, appears to be a mundane subjection at the basis of subject formation. Assuming power is no simple process, however,
for power is not mechanically reproduced when it is assumed. Instead, on being assumed, power runs the

risk of assuming another form and direction. If conditions of power do not unilaterally produce subjects,
then what is the temporal and logical form that the assumption of power takes? A redescription of the domain of psychic subjection
is needed to make clear how social power produces modes of reflexivity oat the same time as it limits forms of sociality. In other
words, to

the extent that norms operate as psychic phenomena, restricting and

producing desire, they also govern the formation of the subject and circumscribe
the domain of a livable sociality. The psychic operation of the norm offers a more
insidious route for regulatory power than explicit coercion, one whose success
allows its tacit operation within the social. And yet, being psychic, the norm does not
merely reinstate social power, it becomes formative and vulnerable in highly
specific ways. The social categorizations that establish the vulnerability of the
subject to language are themselves vulnerable to both psychic and historical
change. This view counters an understanding of a psychic or linguistic normativity
(as in some versions of the Symbolic) that is prior to the social or sets constraint on the social. Just
as the subject is derived from conditions of power that precede it, so the psychic operation of the norm is derived, though not
mechanically or predictably, from prior social operations.

The confessional nature of standpoint identity discourse obscures the

way in which identities are constructed, assigned, and regulated
DCruz 8 (Carolyn DCruz Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at La Trobe University, Melbourne, Identity Politics
in Deconstruction; Calculating with the Incalculable, Ashgate Publishing Ltd (2008) // JJ)

Despite the practical, political and philosophical impossibility of articulating a unified identity
from which to base its emancipatory projects, identity movements continue to situate the
problem of essences and foundations as something that they can overcome. One of the more enduring

debates around this problem has its roots in how particular historians have responded to what has been described as the linguistic
turn in the humanities and social sciences, and finds its focal point of contention emerging from Joan Scotts widely cited and
commented upon essay, The Evidence of Experience. Joan Scott delivered and published her paper on experience in an
environment in which marginalised identities seeking to resurrect their lost voices in the dominant narratives of history had become
prevalent. Scott identifies such corrective writing in Samuel Delaneys autobiography, The Motion of Light in Water, where the
latter reveals a cognitive dissonance between the prevailing representation of homosexuals in the 1950s as isolated perverts and his
experience of entering a bathhouse in 1963, which suggested a much more pervasive population of (well adjusted) gay men. Scott
describes Delaneys revelation in terms that readily fit identity based movements aim to bring to visibility previously suppressed
perspectives in the construction of reality in this case, the construction of homosexuality. It also fits well with narratives of
consciousness-raising, recently revived for critical analysis among post-positivist realists. But while such corrective

accounts of history open the door to alternative perspectives that enlarge and challenge
normative narratives in the history of sexuality, Scott argues that such evidence still accepts a

referential account of history. For Scott, the concept of experience, as what one has lived
through, becomes the origin of knowledge, which fails to account for the constructed nature of
experience. Scott claims that Delaneys approach renders experience as transparent and does
not challenge the ideological systems that presume a natural opposition between heterosexuality
and homosexuality, sexual practices and sexual conventions. In order to challenge rather than
reproduce the repressive mechanisms of ideology, Scott calls for attending to how historical
processes are bound to discourses that position and produce a subjects experiences. While Scott
does not explicitly define discourse, it appears that she is employing the term in the Foucauldian sense as described in the previous
chapter. This alliance to Foucault is evident in Scotts conclusion, where she advocates the formers genealogical

approach to history as the most productive way for the historian to relate the past not by
presuming the capacity to re-enact somebodys past experience, but through analysing changing
concepts that make possible the evidence by which experience can be grasped. 11 Scott settles on this

discursive approach after surveying various other historians approaches to experience. What Scott finds problematic in the
approaches of Raymond Williams, E. P Thompson and C. G. Collingwood is that they assume that experience is something that one
has rather than asking how the experiences of subjects themselves are produced. It might have been useful at this point to
distinguish between personal lived experiences Erlebnis, on the one hand and Erfahrung, the traditions to which this subjugated
identity have been inserted, on the other. For even if one concedes that experiences are produced which might a collective
identity it is hard to remove the grammar of experience, to borrow Peggy Kamufs phrase from a different context, which occur[s]
most readily in clauses with the verb to have. 12 This is perhaps why Scotts criticisms of previous accounts

of experience were read as if the production of experience discounted the ability to talk about
ones own lived experience. This interpretation is captured in the bizarre title of Laura Downss article, If Woman is Just
an Empty Category, Then Why Am I Afraid to Walk Alone at Night? Identity Politics Meets the Postmodern Subject. 13 Focusing on
the title alone, we might wonder how Scotts call to analyse the substitution of one interpretation for another in the history of the
interplay between identity and experience could suggest that (any) identity is an empty category. On the contrary, it seems that Scott
is indicating that interpretations of identity and experience are in fact rife with multiple and

contradictory meanings. Moreover, to make any sense of Downss title at all, we would have to presume a totally reducible

relationship between the level of conceptuality (such as with the concept of woman) and the order of actuality (lived experience). As
we will see, this chapter comes up against the impossibility of reducing the relationship between the

ideality of a concept and the materiality of bodies to an essentialised and generalised form that
can name a point of origin that privileges one order either the material or the ideal over the
other. Scott does not appear to pursue this question, so I will leave it for now and return to her article. Scott further argues that the
aforementioned historians fail to put into question the foundational status of experience as a means for social transformation.

Whether the historian is concerned with women or African-American or lesbian or homosexual

[or] working class, the problem is the same. 14 This is to say, corrective history often equates
personal experience with an automatic position from which to direct a politics of
resistance. To give this criticism a wider context, I will outline its applicability to proponents of feminist standpoint theory,
which despite undergoing several revisions over the last three decades, maintains the same basic premise that the lived
experiences of the subjugated are the best sources for constructing a socially transformative knowledge. 15 With its Marxist
roots, standpoint theory began by extending the category of industrial labour which invests
the interests of oppressed workers with a privileged perspective from which to transform the
world to include the category of domestic labour, predominantly comprised of women. Revisions of standpoint
theory attempted to rectify previous feminist blindness to issues of race, and sexuality by
attempting to add these perspectives of devalued and neglected lives into a stronger concept of
objectivity from that associated with the master position (identified as white, capitalist and
male). 17 Despite protests to the contrary, standpoint theory unwittingly implies that the subject
with the most markers of oppression would occupy the most privileged perspective to construct
objective knowledge (a black, third world lesbian with a disability, for instance). For Scott, such investments in
privileging perspectives from the lived experiences of the subjugated obscures
the contradictory and contested process by which [such categories were
themselves] conceptualised and by which diverse kinds of subject positions were assigned,
felt, contested, or embraced.

Identity politics reify hegemonic structures by defining and regulating

identities as distinct from an idealized majority
Brown 93 (Wendy First Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, Wounded Attachments,
Political Theory, Vol. 21, No. 3 (August 1993), pp. 390-410 // JJ)

Contemporary politicized identity contests the terms of liberal discourse insofar as it challenges
liberalism's universal "we" as a strategic fiction of historically hegemonic groups and asserts
liberalism's "I" as social-both relational and constructed by power-rather than contingent, private, or autarkic. Yet it
reiterates the terms of liberal discourse insofar as it posits a sovereign and unified "I" that is
disenfranchised by an exclusive "we." Indeed, I have suggested that politicized identity emerges and
obtains its unifying coherence through the politicization of exclusion from an ostensible
universal, as a protest against exclusion, a protest premised on the fiction of an inclusive/universal
community, a protest that reinstalls the humanist ideal- and a specific white, middleclass, masculinist expression of this ideal-insofar as it premises itself on
exclusion from it. Put the other way around, politicized identities generated out of liberal,
disciplinary societies, insofar as they are premised on exclusion from a universal ideal, require
that ideal, as well as their exclusion from it, for their own perpetuity as identities. 3 Politicized
identity is also potentially reiterative of regulatory, disciplin- ary society in its configuration of a
disciplinary subject. It is both produced by and potentially accelerates the production of that
aspect of disciplinary society that "ceaselessly characterizes, classifies, and
specializes," that works through "surveillance, continuous registration, perpetual
assessment, and classification," through a social machinery "that is both immense and
min- ute." 14 A recent example from the world of local politics makes clear politicized identity's imbrication in disciplinary
power, as well as the way in which, as Foucault reminds us, disciplinary power "infiltrates" rather than replaces
liberal juridical modalities.'5 Last year, the city council of my town reviewed an ordinance, devised and promulgated by a

broad coalition of identity-based political groups, which aimed to ban discrimination in employment, housing, and public
accommodations on the basis of "sexual orientation, transsexual- ity, age, height, weight, personal appearance, physical
characteristics, race, color, creed, religion, national origin, ancestry, disability, marital status, sex or gender."'6 Here is a perfect

instance of the universal juridical idea of liberalism and the normalizing principle of
disciplinary regimes conjoined and taken up within the discourse of politicized identity. This
ordinance- variously called the "purple hair ordinance" or the "ugly ordinance" by national news media-aims to count every
difference as no difference, as part of a seamless whole, but also to count every potentially subversive rejection of culturally
enforced norms as themselves normal, as normaliz- able, and as normativizable through law. Indeed, through the

definitional, procedural, and remedies section of this ordinance (e.g., "sexual orientation shall mean
known or assumed homosexuality, heterosexuality, or bisexual- ity"), persons are reduced to observable
social attributes and practices; these are defined empirically, positivistically, as if
their existence were intrinsic and factual, rather than effects of discursive and
institutional power ; and these positivist definitions of persons as their attributes and
practices are written into law, ensuring that persons describable according to them will now
become regulated through them. Bentham couldn't have done it better. Indeed, here is a perfect instance of
how the language of unfreedom, how articulation in language, in the context of liberal and
disciplinary discourse, becomes a vehicle of subordination through individualization,
normaliza- tion, and regulation, even as it strives to produce visibility and acceptance. Here, also,

is a perfect instance of the way in which differences that are the effects of social power are neutralized through their articulation as
attributes and their circulation through liberal administrative discourse: what do we make of a document that renders as juridical
equivalents the denial of employment to an African American, an obese man, and a white middle-class youth festooned with
tattoos and fuschia hair?

Turn their performance of identity reinforces regulatory,

universalized notions of culture
Butler 90 (Judith Butler Maxine Elliot Professor in the Department of Rhetoric and Comparative Literature at the
University of California, Berkeley, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, Routledge, pp. 172-174 // JJ)
The redescription of intrapsychic processes in terms of the surface politics of the body implies a corollary redescription of gender as
the disciplinary production of the figures of fantasy through the play of presence and absence on the bodys surface, the
construction of the gendered body through a series of exclusions and denials, signifying absences.But what determines the

manifest and latent text of the body politic? What is the prohibitive law that generates the
corporeal styliza- tion of gender, the fantasied and fantastic figuration of the body? We have already
considered the incest taboo and the prior taboo against homosexuality as the generative moments of gender identity, the
prohibitions that produce identity along the culturally intelligible grids of an idealized and
compulsory heterosexuality.That disciplinary production of gender effects a false stabilization of
gender in the interests of the heterosexual construction and regulation of sexuality within the
reproductive domain. The construction of coherence conceals the gender discontinuities that run
rampant within heterosexual, bisexual, and gay and lesbian contexts in which gender does not
necessarily fol- low from sex, and desire, or sexuality generally, does not seem to fol- low from
genderindeed, where none of these dimensions of significant corporeality express or reflect one another.When the
disorganization and disaggregation of the field of bodies disrupt the regulatory fiction of
heterosexual coherence, it seems that the expressive model loses its descriptive force. That
regulatory ideal is then exposed as a norm and a fiction that disguises itself as a
developmental law regulating the sexual field that it purports to describe .
According to the understanding of identification as an enacted fantasy or incorporation,
however, it is clear that coherence is desired, wished for,idealized,and that this idealization is an
effect of a corpore- al signification. In other words, acts, gestures, and desire produce the effect of an internal core or
substance,but produce this on the surface of the body, through the play of signifying absences that suggest, but
never reveal, the organizing principle of identity as a cause. Such acts,
gestures,enactments,generally construed,are performative in the sense that the essence or
identity that they otherwise purport to express are fabrications manufactured and sustained
through corporeal signs and other discursive means.That the gendered body is performative sug- gests that it

has no ontological status apart from the various acts which constitute its reality.This also suggests that if that reality is fabricated as
an interior essence, that very interiority is an effect and function of a decidedly public and social discourse, the public regulation of
fan- tasy through the surface politics of the body,the gender border control that differentiates inner from outer, and so institutes the
integrity of the subject.In other

words, acts and gestures, articulated and enacted desires

create the illusion of an interior and organizing gender core, an illusion

discursively maintained for the purposes of the regulation of sexuality within the
obligatory frame of reproductive heterosexuality . If the cause of desire, gesture, and act can be
localized within the self of the actor, then the political regulations and disciplinary practices which produce that ostensibly
coherent gender are effective- ly displaced from view.The displacement of a political and discursive origin of

gender identity onto a psychological core precludes an analysis of the political constitution of
the gendered subject and its fabricated notions about the ineffable interiority of its sex or of its
true identity.

The privileging of embodied pain narratives replicates colonialist

ideologies that regulate authenticity
Tuck and Yang 14 (Eve Tuck Assistant Professor of Educational Foundations and Coordinator of Native American
Studies at the State University of New York at New Paltz, K. Wayne Yang Assistant Professor of Ethnic Studies and Affiliated
Professor of Urban Studies and Planning at the University of California, San Diego, R-Words: Refusing Research, Humanizing
Research, pp. 223-247 // JJ)
An initial and partial answer is because settler colonial ideology believes that, in fiction author Sherril Jaffes
words, scars

make your body more interesting, (1996, p. 58). Jaffes work of short, short of fiction bearing
exquisite crossing of wounds and curiosity and pleasure.

that sentiment as title captures the

Settler colonial ideology, constituted by its conscription of others, holds the

wounded body as more engrossing than the body that is not wounded (though the
person with a wounded body does not politically or materially benefit for being
more engrossing). In settler colonial logic, pain is more compelling than privilege, scars
more enthralling than the body unmarked by experience. In settler colonial ideology, pain is
evidence of authenticity, of the verifiability of a lived life . Academe, formed and
informed by settler colonial ideology, has developed the same palate for pain.

Emerging and established social science researchers set out to document the problems faced by communities, and often in doing so,
recircu- late common tropes of dysfunction, abuse, and neglect. Scholars of qualitative research Alecia Youngblood Jackson and
Lisa Mazzei (2009) have critically excavated the privileging of voice in qualitative research,

because voice is championed as true and real, and almost a mirror of the soul,
the essence of self, (p. 1). The authors interpret the drive to make voices heard and
understood, bringing meaning and self to consciousness and creating tran-
scendental, universal truths as gestures that reveal the primacy of voice in con-
ventional qualitative research (p. 1). We contend that much of what counts as voice and makes voice count is

pain. In an example drawn from outside of social science research, in Waynes work as a writing instructor with Southeast Asian
refugee students, he learned from them that much of the writing they were encouraged to do followed a rarefied narrative pattern of
refugee-as-victim. As it were, youth and young adults learn these narratives in schools, in which time and again refugee-

victim stories are solicited by well-intentioned ESL teachers who argue that such
narratives are poetic, powerful, and represent the authentic voice of the
student. Similarly, Robin Kelley (1997), speaking about the Black experience in Harlem in the 1960s, describes White liberal
teachers as foot sol- diers in the new ethnographic army (p. 20), soliciting stories from their students
about pain in their lives and unwittingly reducing their students to cardboard
typologies who fit neatly into their own definition of the underclass (p. 17). Such
examples of teachers solicitations of youth narratives of pain confirm the deep relationship between writing or talking about
wounds, and perceptions of authenticity of voice.

Traumatization
Their representations idealize trauma and thus reify the traumatized
subject turns case
Brown 96 (Wendy Brown First Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, Constitutions and
'Survivor Stories': In the 'folds of our own discourse' The Pleasures and Freedoms of Silence, The University of Chicago Law School
Roundtable (1996), lexis // JJ)
In The Drowned and the Saved, n24 Primo Levi offers drowning as a metaphor for the initial experience of

entering concentration camps, particularly for those who did not speak German or Polish: " . . . filled with a
dreadful sound and fury signifying nothing: a hubbub of people without names or faces drowned
in a continuous, deafening background noise from which, however, the human word did not surface." n25 This is a
drowning in a world of unfa- miliar as well as terrifying words and noise, a world of no civil structure but so much humanity that
one's own becomes a question. Primo Levi thus makes drowning function as a symbol for a lost linguistic

order and as a sign of a lost civil order, for being at sea in words which do not communicate and
by which one cannot communicate. n26 In a radically different context, Adrienne Rich also relates drowning to speech:

"your silence today is a pond where drowned things live." n27 Allowing, perhaps perversely, the Rich to rest on the Levi, I wonder if
Rich's line need only be read in its most obvious meaning-- as an injunction to speak or die, a mandate to speak in order to recover
the drowned things, recover life. What if the accent marks were placed differently so that silence becomes a place where drowned
things live, a place where Levi's drowning inmates survive despite being overwhelmed by the words which fill and consume the air
necessary for life? What if the drowned things live in the pond, where it is silent, as they could not survive if brought back into the
exposure of light and air, the cacophony of the Camp? What if silence is a reprieve from drowning in words which do not
communicate or confer recognition, which only bombard or drown? n28 Of course, this possibility is heavy with paradox insofar as
drowning already signals death and a pond where drowned things live therefore harbors death rather than life. But this paradox may
also serve the other point I am after here: perhaps there are dead or deadening (anti-life) things which must

be allowed residence in that pond of silence rather than surfaced into discourse if life is to be
lived without being claimed by their weight. Certain experiencesconcentration camp existence
or childhood abusemay conservatively claim their subjects when those experiences are
incessantly remembered in speech, when survivors can only and always speak of what they
almost did not survive and thus cannot break with that threat to live in a present not

dominated by it . And what if this endless speaking about one's past of suffering is a means of
attempting to excoriate guilt about what one did not do to prevent the suffering, an attempt
which is doomed insofar as the speaking actually perpetuates by disavowing the guilt? n29 If to
speak repeatedly of a trauma is a mode of encoding it as identity, it may be the case that drowned things
must be consigned to live in a pond of silence in order to make a world--a future--that is other than them. Put slightly differently by
Primo Levi, "a memory evoked too often, and in the form of a story, tends to become fixed in a

stereotype . . . crystallized, perfected, adorned, installing itself in the place of the raw
memory and growing at its expense ." n30 Many feminist narratives of suffering would seem to bear precisely
this character; rather than working through the "raw memory" to a place of an emancipation, our
discourses of survivorship become stories by which we live, or refuse to live, in the present.
There is a fine but critical distinction here between on the one hand, re-entering a trauma, speaking its
unspeakable elements, even politicizing it, in order to reconfigure the trauma and the
traumatized subject, and on the other, retelling the trauma in such a way as to preserve by
resisting the pain of it, and thus to preserve the traumatized subject. While such a distinction is probably
not always sustainable, it may be all that secures the possibility that we dwell in neither a politics of pain nor of pain's disavowal.

Cant Solve
Identity politics cedes potential for radical change to decentralized,
horizontal forms of action.
Marcus 12 (David editor of Dissent Magazine. The Horizontalists Fall 2012 Dissent
Magazine http://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/the-horizontalists) accessed 7/13/14 .nt)
The seemingly spontaneous movement that emerged after the first general assemblies in
Zuccotti Park was not, then, sui generis but an elaboration of a much larger turn by the Left. As
occupations spread across the country and as activists begin to exchange organizational tactics,
it was easy to forget that what was happening was, in fact, a part of a much larger shift in the
scale and plane of Western politics: a turn toward more local and horizontal patterns of life, a
growing skepticism toward the institutions of the state, and an increasing desire to seek out
greater realms of personal freedom. And although its hibernation over the summer has,
perhaps, marked the end of the Occupy movement, OWS has also come to represent an
importantand perhaps more lastingbreak. In both its ideas and tactics, it has given us a new
set of desires autonomy, radical democracy, direct action that look well beyond the
ideological and tactical tropes of socialism. Its occupations and general assemblies, its flash
mobs and street performances, its loose network of activists all suggest a bold new set of
possibilities for the Left: a horizontalist ethos that believes that revolution will
begin by transforming our everyday lives. It can be argued that horizontalism is , in
many ways, a product of the growing disaggregation and individuation of Western
society; that it is a kind of free-market leftism: a politics jury-rigged out of the very
culture it hopes to resist. For not only does it emphasize the agency of the
individual, but it draws one of its central inspirations from a neoclassical image:
that of the self-managing societythe polity that functions best when the state is
absent from everyday decisions. But one can also find in its anti-institutionalism an
attempt to speak in todays language for yesterdays goals. If we must live in a society that
neither trusts nor feels compelled by collectivist visions, then horizontalism
offers us a leftism that attempts to be , at once, both individualist and egalitarian ,
anti-institutional and democratic, open to the possibilities of self-management and yet also
concerned with the casualties born out of an age that has let capital manage itself for far too
long. Horizontalism has absorbed the crisis of knowledgewhat we often call
postmodernismand the crisis of collectivismwhat we often call neoliberalism. But
instead of seeking to return to some golden age before our current moment of fracture , it
seeks for better and worse to find a way to make leftist politics conform to our
current age of anti-foundationalism and institutionalism. As Graeber argued in the
prescriptive last pages of his anthropological epic, Debt: The First 5,000 Years, Capitalism has
transformed the world in many ways that are clearly irreversible and we therefore need to give
up the false choice between state and market that [has] so monopolized political ideology for
the last centuries that it made it difficult to argue about anything else. We need , in other
words, to stop thinking like leftists. But herein lies the problem. Not all possible forms
of human existence and social interaction, no matter how removed they are from
the institutions of power and capital, are good forms of social organization.

Although it is easy to look enthusiastically to those societiesancient or modern, Western or

non-Westernthat exist beyond the structures of the state, they, too, have their own
patterns of hierarchy , their own embittered lines of inequality and injustice. More
important, to select one form of social organization over the other is always an act
of exclusion. Instituting and then protecting a particular way of life will always require a
normative commitment in which not every value system is respectedin which, in other words,
there is a moral hierarchy. More problematically, by working outside structures of power
one may circumvent coercive systems but one does not necessarily subvert them.
Localizing politics stripping it of its larger institutional ambitionshas, to be sure, its
advantages. But without a larger structural vision, it does not go far enough .
Bubbles of freedom , as Graeber calls them, may create a larger variety of noninstitutional life. But they will always neglect other crucial avenues of freedom: in
particular, those social and economic rights that can only be protected from the
top down . In this way, the anti-institutionalism of horizontalism comes
dangerously close to that of the libertarian Right. The turn to previous eras of social
organization, the desire to locate and confine politics to a particular regional space, the deep
skepticism toward all forms of institutional life not only mirror the aspirations of
libertarianism but help cloak those hierarchies spawned from non-institutional
forms of power and capital. This is a particularly pointed irony for a political ideology that
claims to be opposed to the many injustices of a non-institutional marketin particular, its
unregulated financial schemes. Perhaps this is an irony deeply woven into the theoretical quilt of
autonomy: a vision that, as a result of its anti-institutionalism, is drawn to all sites of individual
liberationeven those that are to be found in the marketplace. As Graeber concludes in Debt,
Markets, when allowed to drift entirely free from their violent origins, invariably begin to grow
into something different, into networks of honor, trust, and mutual connectedness, whereas
the maintenance of systems of coercion constantly do the opposite: turn the products of human
cooperation, creativity, devotion, love and trust back into numbers once again. In many ways,
this is the result of a set of political ideas that have lost touch with their origins .
The desire for autonomy was born out of the socialistif not also often the Marxisttradition
and there was always a guarded sympathy for the structures needed to oppose organized
systems of capital and power. Large-scale institutions were, for thinkers such as Castoriadis,
Negri, and C.L.R. James, still essential if every cook was truly to govern. To only try to
create spaces of freedom alongside of the State meant , as Castoriadis was to argue
later in his life , to back down from the problem of politics. In fact, this was, he
believed, the failure of 1968: the inability to set up new, different institutions and
recognize that there is no such thing as a society without institutions. This is
and will be a problem for the horizontalist Left as it moves forward. As a leftism readymade for an age in which all sides of the political spectrum are arrayed against the regulatory
state, it is always in danger of becoming absorbed into the very ideological
apparatus it seeks to dismantle . For it aspires to a decentralized and organic
politics that, in both principle and practice, shares a lot in common with its

central target. Both it and the free market are anti-institutional. And the latter will remain
so without larger vertical measures. Structures, not only everyday practices, need to be
reformed. The revolution cannot happen only on the ground; it must also happen
from above. A direct democracy still needs its indirect structures, individual
freedoms still need to be measured by their collective consequences, and notions
of social and economic equality still need to stand next to the desire for greater
political participation. Deregulation is another regulatory regime, and to replace it requires
new regulations: institutions that will limit the excesses of the market. As Castoriadis insisted in
the years after 1968, the Lefts task is not only to abolish old institutions but to
discover new kinds of relationship between society and its institutions .
Horizontalism has come to serve as an important break from the static strategies and categories
of analysis that have slowed an aging and vertically inclined Left. OWS was to represent its
fullest expression yet, though it has a much longer back story and stillone hopesa promising
future. But horizontalists such as Graeber and Sitrin will struggle to establish spaces
of freedom if they cannot formulate a larger vision for a society. Their vision is not
as several on the vertical left have suggestedtoo utopian but not utopian enough: in seeking
out local spaces of freedom, they have confined their ambitions; they have, in fact,
come, at times, to mirror the very ideology they hope to resist. In his famous retelling
of the turtle parable, Clifford Geertz warned that in the search of all-too-deep-lying turtles,
we have to be careful to not lose touch with the hard surfaces of lifewith the
political, economic, stratificatory realities within which men are everywhere
contained. This is an ever-present temptation, and one that, in our age of ever
more stratification, we must resist.

A politics of pain forecloses any chance of resistance if victimhood

becomes the prerequisite for change, then inversely, agency
represents a threat
Tuck and Yang 14 (Eve Tuck Assistant Professor of Educational Foundations and Coordinator of Native American
Studies at the State University of New York at New Paltz, K. Wayne Yang Assistant Professor of Ethnic Studies and Affiliated
Professor of Urban Studies and Planning at the University of California, San Diego, R-Words: Refusing Research, Humanizing
Research, pp. 223-247 // JJ)
Elsewhere, Eve (Tuck, 2009, 2010) has argued that educational research and much of social science research has been concerned
with documenting damage, or empirically substantiating the oppression and pain of Native communities, urban communities, and
other disenfranchised communities. Damage-centered researchers may operate, even

benevolently, within a theory of change in which harm must be recorded or

proven in order to convince an outside adjudicator that reparations are deserved.
These reparations presumably take the form of addi- tional resources, settlements, affirmative actions, and other material,
political, and sovereign adjustments. Eve has described this theory of change 1 as both colonial

and flawed, because it relies upon Western notions of power as scarce and
concentrated , and because it requires disenfranchised communities to position
themselves as both singularly defective and powerless to make change (2010). Finally,
reparations rarely become reality, and that in many cases,
communities are left with a narrative that tells them that they are broken. Similarly, at
Eve has observed that won

the center of the analysis in this chapter is a concern with the fixation social science research has exhibited in eliciting pain stories
from com- munities that are not White, not wealthy, and not straight. Academes demon- strated fascination

with telling and retelling narratives of pain is troubling, both for its voyeurism
and for its consumptive implacability. Imagining itself to be a voice, and in some
disciplinary iterations, the voice of the colonised (Simpson, 2007, p. 67, emphasis in the original) is
not just a rare historical occurrence in anthropology and related fields. We observe that
much of the work of the academy is to reproduce stories of oppression in its own
voice. At first, this may read as an intolerant condemnation of the academy, one that refuses to forgive past blunders and see
how things have changed in recent decades. However, it is our view that while many individual scholars have cho- sen to pursue
other lines of inquiry than the pain narratives typical of their disciplines, novice researchers emerge from doctoral programs eager
to launch pain-based inquiry projects because they believe that such approaches embody what it means to do social science. The

collection of pain narratives and the theories of change that champion the value of
such narratives are so prevalent in the social sciences that one might surmise that
they are indeed what the academy is about. In her examination of the symbolic violence of the academy,
bell hooks (1990) portrays the core message from the academy to those on the
margins as thus: No need to hear your voice when I can talk about you better than
you can speak about yourself. No need to hear your voice. Only tell me about your
pain. I want to know your story. And then I will tell it back to you in a new way.
Tell it back to you in such a way that it has become mine, my own. Re-writing you I
write myself anew. I am still author, authority. I am still colonizer the speaking
subject and you are now at the center of my talk. (p. 343) Hookss words resonate with our
observation of how much of social science research is concerned with providing recognition to the presumed voiceless, a
recognition that is enamored with knowing through pain. Further, this passage describes the ways in which the

researchers voice is constituted by, legitimated by, animated by the voices on the
margins. The researcher-self is made anew by telling back the story of the
marginalized/subaltern subject. Hooks works to untangle the almost imperceptible
differences between forces that silence and forces that seemingly liberate by
inviting those on the margins to speak, to tell their stories. Yet the forces that
invite those on the margins to speak also say, Do not speak in a voice of
resistance. Only speak from that space in the margin that is a sign of deprivation, a
wound, an unfulfilled longing. Only speak your pain (hooks, 1990, p. 343). The costs of a
politics of recognition that is rooted in naming pain have been critiqued by recent
decolonizing and feminist scholars (Hartman, 1997, 2007; Tuck, 2009). In Scenes of Subjection, Sadiya
Hartman (1997) discusses how rec- ognizing the personhood of slaves enhanced the power of
the Southern slave- owning class. Supplicating narratives of former slaves were
deployed effectively by abolitionists, mainly White, well-to-do, Northern women,
to generate portraits of abuse that ergo recognize slaves as human (Hartman, 2007). In
response, new laws afforded minimal standards of existence, making personhood coterminous with injury (Hartman, 1997, p.
93), while simultaneously authorizing necessary violence to suppress slave agency. The slave emerges as a legal person only when
seen as criminal or a violated body in need of limited forms of protection (p. 55). Recognition humanizes the

slave, but is predicated upon her or his abjection. You are in pain, therefore you
are. [T]he recognition of humanity require[s] the event of excessive violence, cruelty beyond the limits of the socially tolerable,
in order to acknowledge and protect the slaves person (p. 55). Furthermore, Hartman describes how slave-as-victim as
human accordingly establishes slave-as-agent as criminal . Applying Hartmans analysis, we note
how the agency of Margaret Garner or Nat Turner can only be viewed as outsider violence that humane society must
reject while simultaneously upholding the legitimated violence of the state to
punish such outsider violence. Hartman asks, Is it possible that such recognition effectively forecloses agency as
the object of punishment . . . Or is this limited conferral of humanity merely a reinscription of
subjugation and pained existence? (p. 55).

Zizek
Political movements founded upon identity politics are inauthentic
and cannot create change against the forces of capital
Zizek 99 (slavoj, senior researcher at the Institute for Sociology and Philosophy, University of
Ljubljana, Slovenia, international director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, and
general badass, The Ticklish Subject: The Absent Centre of Political Ontology, pg. 210, wcp)
Here, however, one must fully endorse Badiou's point that these 'returns to the Substance' are
themselves impotent in the face of the global march of Capital: they are its inherent supplement,
the limit/ condition of its functioning, since - as Deleuze emphasized years ago - capitalist
'deterritorialization' is always accompanied by re-emerging 'reterritorializations'. More
precisely, there is an inherent split in the field of particular identities themselves caused by the
onslaught of capitalist globalization: on the one hand, the so-called 'fundamentalisms', whose
basic formula is that of the Identity of one's own group, implying the practice of excluding the
threatening Other (s ) : France for the French (against Algerian immigrants), America for
Americans (against the His- panic invasion ) , Slovenia for Slovenians ( against the excessive
presence of 'Southerners', immigrants from the ex-Yugoslav republics);39 on the other hand,
there is postmodern multiculturalist 'identity politics', aiming at the tolerant coexistence of evershifting, 'hybrid' lifestyle groups, divided into endless subgroups ( Hispanic women, black gays,
white male AIDS patients, lesbian mothers . . .). This ever-growing flowering of groups and
subgroups in their hybrid and fluid, shifting identities, each insisting on the right to assert its
specific way of life and/or culture, this incessant diversification, is possible and thinkable only
against the background of capitalist globalization; it is the very way capitalist globalization affect
our sense of ethnic and other forms of community belonging: the only link connecting these
multiple groups is the link of Capital itself, always ready to satisfy the specific demands of
each group and subgroup (gay tourism, Hispanic music . . .) . Furthermore, the opposition
between fundamentalism and postmodern pluralist identity politics is ultimately a
fake, concealing a deeper solidarity (or, to put it in Hegelese, speculative identity): a
multiculturalist can easily find even the most 'fundamentalist' ethnic identity attractive, but only
in so far as it is the identity of the supposedly authentic Other (say, in the USA, Native American
tribal identity); a fundamentalist group can easily adopt, in its social functioning, the
postmodern strategies of identity politics, presenting itself as one of the threatened minorities,
simply striving to maintain its specific way of life and cultural identity. The line of separation
between multiculturalist identity politics and fundamentalism is thus purely formal; it often
depends merely on the different perspective from which the observer views a movement for
maintaining a group identity.

Their obsession with ethnic conflict is capitalisms attempt to

whitewash the political multiculturalist notions of change
rationalize the capitalist status quo by eliminating the question of
workers exploitation from political discourse.
Zizek 00 (slavoj, senior researcher at the Institute for Sociology and Philosophy, University
of Ljubljana, Slovenia, international director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, and
general badass, The Fragile Absolute: Or, Why is the Christian Legacy Worth Fighting For?, pg
10-11, wcp)
So the more today's social theory proclaims the end of Nature and/or Tradition and the rise of
the 'risk society', the more the implicit reference to 'nature' pervades our daily discourse: even
when we do not mention the 'end of history', do we not convey the same message when we claim
that we are entering a 'post-ideological' pragmatic era, which is another way of claiming that we

are entering a post-political order in which the only legitimate conflicts are ethnic/cultural
conflicts? Typically, in today's critical and political discourse, the term 'worker' has disappeared,
supplanted and/or obliterated by 'immigrants [immigrant workers: Algerians in France, Turks
in Germany, Mexicans in the USA]' - in this way, the class problematic of workers'
exploitation is transformed into the multiculturalist problematic of the
'intolerance of Otherness', and so on, and the excessive investment of multiculturalist
liberals in protecting immigrants' ethnic rights clearly draws its energy from the 'repressed' class
dimension. Although Francis Fukuyama's thesis on the 'end of history' quickly fell into
disrepute, we still silently assume that the liberal-democratic capitalist global order is somehow
the finally found 'natural' social regime; we still implicitly conceive of conflicts in Third World
countries as a subspecies of natural catastrophes, as outbursts of quasi-natural violent passions,
or as conflicts based on fanatical identification with ethnic roots (and what is 'ethnic' here if not
again a codeword for nature?). And, again, the key point is that this all-pervasive
renaturalization is strictly correlative to the global reflexivization of our daily lives. For that
reason, confronted with ethnic hatred and violence, one should thoroughly reject the standard
multiculturalist idea that, against ethnic intolerance, one should learn to respect and live with
the Otherness of the Other, to develop a tolerance for different lifestyles, and so on - the way to
fight ethnic hatred effectively is not through its immediate counterpart, ethnic tolerance; on the
contrary, what we need is even more hatred, but proper political hatred: hatred
directed at the common political enemy.

Identity does not exist under globalization coalition building and a

politics grounded in identity are impossible due to inherent nature of
modern capital to fragment individual identities in favor of large
systematic exploitation
Zizek 00 (slavoj, senior researcher at the Institute for Sociology and Philosophy, University
of Ljubljana, Slovenia, international director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, and
general badass, The Fragile Absolute: Or, Why is the Christian Legacy Worth Fighting For?, pg
11-15, wcp)
So where are we, today, with regard to ghosts? The first paradox that strikes us, of course, is that
this very process of global reflexivization that mercilessly derides and chases the ghosts of the
past generates not only its own immediacy but also its own ghosts, its own spectrality. The most
famous ghost, which has been roaming around for the last 150 years, was not a ghost of the past,
but the spectre of the (revolutionary) future - the spectre, of course, from the first sentence of
The Communist Manifesto. The automatic reaction to The Manifesto of today's enlightened
liberal reader is: isn't the text simply wrong on so many empirical accounts - with regard to its
picture of the social situation, as well as the revolutionary perspective it sustains and
propagates? Was there ever a political manifesto that was more clearly falsified by subsequent
historical reality? Is not The Manifesto, at its best, the exaggerated extrapolation of certain
tendencies discernible in the nineteenth century? So let us approach The Manifesto from the
opposite end: where do we live today, in our global 'post . . .' (postmodern, post-industrial)
society? The slogan that is imposing itself more and more is 'globalization': the brutal imposition
of the unified world market that threatens all local ethnic traditions, including the very
form of the nation state. And in view of this situation, is not the description of the social
impact of the bourgeoisie in The Manifesto more relevant than ever? The bourgeoisie cannot
exist without constantly revolutionizing the instruments of production, and thereby the relations
of production, and with them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes of
production in unaltered form was, on the contrary, the first condition of existence for all earlier
industrial classes. Constant revolutionizing of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all
social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all
earlier ones. All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices

and opinions, are swept away, all new- formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify.
All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face
with sober senses his real condition in life, and his relations with his kind. The need of a
constantly expanding market for its products chases the bourgeoisie over the whole surface of
the globe. It must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, establish connections everywhere. The
bourgeoisie has through its exploitation of the world market given a cosmopolitan character to
production and consumption in every country. To the great chagrin of Reactionists, it bas drawn
from under the feet of industry the national ground on which it stood. All old-established
national industries have been destroyed or are daily being destroyed. They are dislodged by new
industries, whose introduction becomes a life and death question for all civilized nations, by
industries that no longer work up indigenous raw material, but raw material drawn from the
remotest zones; industries whose products are consumed, not only at home, but in every quarter
of the globe. In place of the old wants, satisfied by the productions of the country, we find new
wants, requiring for their satisfaction the products of distant lands and climes. In place of the
old local and national seclusion and self-sufficiency, we have intercourse in every direction,
universal inter-dependence of nations. And as in material, so also in intellectual production. The
intellectual creations of individual nations become common property. National one-sidedness
and narrow-mindedness becomes more and more impossible, and from the numerous national
and local literatures, there arises a world literature.6 Is this not, more than ever, our reality
today? Ericsson phones are no longer Swedish, Toyota cars are manufactured 60 per cent in the
USA, Hollywood culture pervades the remotest parts of the globe.... Furthermore, does not the
same go also for all forms of ethnic and sexual identities? Should we not supplement
Marx's description in this sense, adding also that sexual 'one- sidedness and narrow-mindedness
become more and more impossible'; that concerning sexual practices also, 'all that is solid melts
into air, all that is holy is profaned', so that capitalism tends to replace standard
normative heterosexuality with a proliferation of unstable shifting identities
and/or orientations? From time to time Marx himself underestimates this ability of the
capitalist universe to incorporate the transgressive urge that seemed to threaten it; in his
analysis of the ongoing American Civil War, for example, he claimed that since the English
textile industry, the backbone of the industrial system, could not survive without the supply of
cheap cotton from the American South rendered possible only by slave labour, England would
be forced to intervene directly to prevent the abolition of slavery. So yes, this global dynamism
described by Marx, which causes all things solid to melt into air, is our reality- on condition that
we do not forget to supplement this image from The Manifesto with its inherent dialectical
opposite, the 'spiritualization' of thievery material process of production. While capitalism does
suspend the power of the old ghosts of tradition, it generates its own monstrous ghosts. That is
to say: on the one hand, capitalism entails the radical secularization of social life- it
mercilessly tears apart any aura of authentic nobility, sacredness, honour, and so
on: It has drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervour, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of
philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation. It has resolved personal
worth into exchange value, and in place of the numberless indefeasible chartered freedoms, has
set up that single, unconscionable freedom - Free Trade. In one word, for exploitation, veiled by
religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation.7
However, the fundamental lesson of the 'critique of political economy' elaborated by the mature
Marx in the years after The Manifesto is that this reduction of all heavenly chimeras to brutal
economic reality generates a spectrality of its own. When Marx describes the mad selfenhancing circulation of Capital, whose solipsistic path of self-fecundation reaches its apogee in
today's meta-reflexive speculations on futures, it is far too simplistic to claim that the spectre of
this self-engendering monster that pursues its path regardless of any human or environmental
concern is an ideological abstraction, and that one should never forget that behind this
abstraction there are real people and natural objects on whose productive capacities and

resources Capital's circulation is based, and on which it feeds like a gigantic parasite. The
problem is that this 'abstraction' does not exist only in our (financial specula- tor's)
misperception of social reality; it is 'real' in the precise sense of determining the
very structure of material social processes: the fate of whole strata of populations, and
sometimes of whole countries, can be decided by the 'solipsistic' speculative dance of Capital,
which pursues its goal of profitability with a blessed indifference to the way its movement will
affect social reality. That is the fundamental systemic violence of capitalism, which is
much more uncanny than direct pre-capitalist socio-ideological violence: this
violence is no longer attributable to concrete individuals and their 'evil'

Turns
Identity politics result in a crippling interpassivity that only functions
through violence
Zizek 97 (slavoj, senior researcher at the Institute for Sociology and Philosophy, University
of Ljubljana, Slovenia, international director of the Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, and
general badass, The Plague of Fantasies, pg. 146, wcp)
In the political domain, one of the recent outstanding examples of 'interpassivity' is the
multiculturalist Leftist intellectual's 'apprehension' about how even the Muslims, the great
victims of the Yugoslav war, are now renouncing the multi-ethnic pluralist vision of Bosnia and
conceding to the fact that if the Serbs and Croats want their clearly defined ethnic units, they too
want an ethnic space of their own. This Leftist's 'regret' is multiculturalist racism at its worst: as
if the Bosnians were not literally pushed into creating their own ethnic enclave by the way that
the liberal' West has threatened them in the last five years. What interests us here, however, is
how the 'multi-ethnic Bosnia' is only the latest in the series of mythical figures of the Other
through which Western Leftist intellectuals have acted out their ideological fantasies: this
intellectual is 'multi-ethnic' through Bosnians, breaks out of the Cartesian paradigm by
admiring Native American wisdom, and so on just as in past decades, when they were
revolutionaries by admiring Cuba, or 'democratic socialists' by endorsing the myth of Yugoslav
'self- management' Socialism as 'something special', a genuine democratic breakthrough . . . In
all these cases, they have continued to lead their undisturbed upper-middle-class
academic existence, while doing their progressive duty through the Other. This
paradox of interpassivity, of believing or enjoying through the other, also opens up a new
approach to aggressivity: aggressivity is provoked in a subject when the other
subject, through which the first subject believed or enjoyed, does something which
disturbs the functioning of this transference. Look, for example, at the attitude of some
Western Leftist academics towards the disintegration of Yugoslavia: since the fact that the
people of ex-Yugoslavia rejected ('betrayed') Socialism disturbed the belief of these academics that is, prevented them from persisting in their belief in 'authentic' self-management Socialism
through the Other which realizes it - everyone who did not share their Yugo-nostalgic attitude
was dismissed as a proto-Fascist nationalist3

****Race****

Impact

Scenarios

Exclusion
Blacks face a different type of historical experiencewhereas other
groups faced discrimination, blacks faced exclusion
Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy, Civil Rights and Race and Public
Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong
Assimilationist and Pluralist Theories Assimilationist and pluralist theories focus on patterns

of
interaction among racial and ethnic groups. Assimilationists see racial and ethnic differences
disappearing and racial conflicts evolving into patterns of racial integration. As pluralists see it, racial
and ethnic differences persist, but conflicts are resolved in the political arena. Assimilationists identify

stages or cycles of interracial conflict, ending in assimilation. Park (1974), for example, identified the following stages: Initial contact
between racial or ethnic groups Competition between these groups Accommodation Assimilation He saw racial or ethnic conflict as
only one stage of historical development, a stage that inevitably progresses toward accommodation and assimilation.

Contentious racial groups become more tolerant and adjust to their differences in the
accommodation stage. Finally, separate racial interests disappear, and a common identity arises
in the assimilation stage. The cycle repeats itself with the introduction of new racial or ethnic
groups. Gordon (1964) divided assimilation into finer stages, which include the following: Cultural assimilation; the acceptance of
the dominant culture Marital assimilation; interracial marriages occurring in large numbers Prejudicefree
assimilation; the disappearance of belief in racial or ethnic superiority The final stage of assimilation,
according to Gordon, is civic assimilation, which occurs when special racial or ethnic demands or interests disappear. Nathan Glazer
and Daniel Patrick Moynihan (1970) rejected the assimilationist thesis and set forth a theory of immigration, ascension, and group
politics in its place. In their book, Beyond the Melting Pot, they examined racial and ethnic groups in New York City: Italians, Irish,
Jews, Puerto Ricans, and African Americans. They suggested that African Americans will overcome

prejudices against them and rise in social status just as the Italians, Irish, and Jews did in earlier
periods. According to Glazer and Moynihan, blacks will not assimilate, but they will become more involved in pluralist politics.
The assimilationist and pluralist paradigms are fundamentally different from our model. These
paradigms anticipate conflict and accommodation among groups and presuppose a natural process of ethnic ascension. That is,
these paradigms assume that ethnic and racial groups that start at the bottom of the social
ladder will naturally climb to the top over time. We reject this assumption because the social and
historical experiences of blacks are fundamentally different from those of European ethnic
groups. Whereas European immigrants faced discrimination, blacks have suffered exclusion.
Whereas European immigrants struggled to move up the social ladder in the North, blacks
remained trapped in slavery and debt peonage in the South. In the North, black city dwellers whose
forefathers had lived in this country for centuries were excluded from the same skilled trade jobs
open to firstgeneration immigrants (Pinderhughes 1987; Steinberg 1989). We do not assume that ethnic
and racial groups naturally rise up the social ladder. The social and historical experiences of
African Americans suggest this is not the case. Our model attempts to explain why blacks were subjugated so long
in this country. It focuses on social, economic, and political processes that explain the persistence of
racial oppression.

Anthropocentrism
Anthropocentrism is the root causewhen the slavemasters needed
to justify slavery, they made the slave inhuman
Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy, Civil Rights and Race and Public
Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong
Radical Psychoanalytical Approach The radical psychoanalytical approach associates oppressive modes of production and relations
of production with psychological processes that explain the formation of oppressive social character

types and cultural forms. For example, this framework sees a strong association between the slave mode of
Page 35 production and the formation of the sadistic character type. This mode of production required the
master to exercise intense, direct, and incessant control over the slave. The sadistic character type was
most successful in operating a slave plantation. Hence, it emerged as the dominant social character
associated with the slave mode of production. The psychoanalytical approach also connects the
formation of racial images to particular psychological needs and processes. For example, the image of
blacks as sexually promiscuous is connected to the process of repression/projection; the white racist
mind represses its own sexual impulses and projects them onto blacks. The image of the black
cannibal is connected to whites' intense fear of those blacks who are unrestrained by white society. The
image of the childlike Black Sambo is related to the white racist mind's need to see the controlled
black slave as innocuous. The psychoanalytical approach associates the formation of racist discourse and images with the
fulfillment of ego needs. For example, in order for the slave master to live with himself and to see himself as a
good, decent Christian after brutalizing the slave, the master had to dehumanize the slave. The master's ego, his
image of himself as a decent human being, required that he see the slave as less than human, as a subspecies,
like an ape or a monkey. His ego needed ideas and discourse that justify slavery as a natural,
rational, and legitimate arrangement.

Root Cause

Generic
Racism is a modern phenomenonno prior incidents
Wilson 96 [Wilson, Carter A. Ph.D., M.A., B.A., Wayne State University in Public Policy, Civil Rights and Race and Public
Policy. 1996. Racism: from slavery to advanced capitalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.] l.gong
Racism and Ancient Civilization A number of scholars who have examined the history of the concept

of race and race

prejudice suggest that there are few examples of race prejudice in ancient civilizations. Du Bois
presents evidence of race prejudice emerging in India about 5,000 years ago, after the
lightskinned Aryans conquered the darkerskinned inhabitants. The lighterskinned people
despised the darker in caste skinned ones. However, Du Bois (1969a, p. 177) concluded, "The whites
long held the conquered blacks servitude, but eventually the color line disappeared before
commerce and industry, intermarriage, and defense against enemies from without.'' Underscoring Du
Bois's view, Gossett (1971, p. 7) said, "If race ever was the original basis of caste in India it did not remain
so." Although the Greeks were aware of differences in skin color, these differences did not have the
same connotation they have in modern society. The Greeks, for example, referred to Africa as the
land of the burnt faces, but they never attached a stigma to darker skin color (Du Bois 1969b). The Greeks
were suspicious of foreigners, and they were chauvinistic, but they treated foreigners who became
part of their society, including Africans, much as they treated their own people. Although the Greeks divided
people into Greeks and barbarians, this division was nonracial. It was based on membership in society

rather than racial or ethnic origin. Arguing this point more succinctly, Cox (1970, p. 323) said, The Greeks knew that they had a
superior culture to those of the barbarians, but they included Europeans, Africans, and Asiatics in the concept Hellas as these
peoples acquired a working knowledge of the Greek culture. . . . The experience of the later Hellenistic empire of Alexander tended to
be the direct contrary of modern racial antagonism. The Greek myth of Phathon, the son of the god Helios, illustrates the point that
Greek culture explains differences in skin color as a function of different levels of exposure to the sun. According to this legend,
Phathon convinced his father to allow him to pilot the sun chariot across the sky. Phathon lost control of the chariot and drove it
"too close to the earth in some regions, burning the people there black, and drove it too far from the earth in other regions, whose
inhabitants turned pale from the cold" (Gossett 1971, p. 6). In Greek culture, darker skin meant closer exposure

to the sun and little else. The Greek philosopher Aristotle wrote about slavery and race. Although his
writings were used to justify black slavery in 19thcentury United States, his views are profoundly
different from those of modern racists. In the early 1800s, supporters of slavery in the United States interpreted
Aristotle as saying that some races are naturally suited for slavery. Indeed, in his Politics, Aristotle (1969, p. 11) said, "For
there is one rule exercised over subjects who are by nature free, another over subjects who are
by nature slaves." He added, "The master is not called a master because he has science, but because
he is of a certain character, and the same remark applies to the slave and the freeman" (p. 12). Page 39 Although Aristotle
justified slavery, he offered some criticisms. He conceded that it is possible for powerful nations to engage
in unjust wars and make slaves of the nobility of the conquered nations. He intimated that slavery should not be a
permanent state and that slaves should be rewarded with liberty (Aristotle 1969, p. 191). Moreover, he suggested
that constitutional governments, which rule by law rather than by nature, are inconsistent with slavery (pp.
1112). Aristotle maintained that racial differences are products of climatic and environmental
differences and that slaves taken in war are often more intelligent than their captors. Specifically he said, Those who live in a
cold climate and in Europe are full of spirit, but wanting in intelligence and skill; and there they retain comparative freedom, but
have no political organization, and are incapable of ruling over others. Whereas the natives of Asia are intelligent and inventive, but
they are wanting in spirit, and therefore they are always in a state of subjection and slavery. But the Hellenic race, which is situated
between them, is likewise intermediate in character, being highspirited and also intelligent. Hence it continues free, and is the
bestgoverned of any nation, and if it could be formed into one state, would be able to rule the world. (Aristotle's Politics, quoted in
Gossett 1971, p. 6) Aristotle did not see slaves as less intelligent, less virtuous, or less human than others.
In contrast, modern racism stigmatizes oppressed racial groups as less intelligent, less virtuous, and less human than the dominant
racial groups. Like the Greeks, the Romans were chauvinistic but not racist. Commenting on the Romans, Cox (1970, p. 324) said,
In this civilization also we do not find racial antagonism, for the norm of superiority in the Roman system
remained a culturalclass attribute. . . . Sometimes

the slaves, especially the Greeks, were the teachers of

their masters; indeed, very much of the cultural enlightenment of the Romans came through slaves from the East. Because

slavery did not carry a racial stigma, educated freedmen, who were granted citizenship upon emancipation, might rise to high
positions in government or industry. There were no interracial laws governing the relationship of the great mass of obscure common
people of different origin. A number of historians corroborate Cox's contention that the type of color prejudice found in modern
America and in Western society simply did not exist in the ancient world. For example, Snowden (1983, p. 63) said, Yet nothing

comparable to the virulent color prejudice found in modern times existed in the ancient world.

This is the view of most scholars who have examined the evidence and who have come to conclusions much as these: the ancients did
not fall into the error of biological racism; black skin color was not a sign of inferiority, Greeks and Romans did not
establish color as an obstacle to integration in society; and ancient

society was one that, for all its faults and

failures, never made color the basis for judging a man. Snowden concluded that Greek and Roman
culture portrayed a favorable image of blacks. This favorable image is evident in the works of Greek and Roman

artists, historians, philosophers, poets, and writers, including Ovid and Homer. Commenting on the integration of African characters
into Greek and Roman mythology, Snowden (1983, p. 94) said that Zeus, "called the Ethiopian by the inhabitants of Chios, may have
been the black or dark faced stranger in the Inachus of Sophocles (c. 496406 B.C.) and may have appeared as a Negro in the
dramatist's satyrplay." Other black figures include Delphos, the founder of the Delphi, whose name

means the Black Woman, and Andromeda, wife of Perseus, who was the daughter of an
Ethiopian king. Although these figures were depicted as black, their images have been positive
and wellintegrated in Greek culture. Color for the Greeks and Romans did not have the same connotation that it had
for the Western world after the 17th century. For example, Africans intermarried with Greeks and Romans and held prominent
positions in these societies. In contrast, during the 19th and 20th centuries, U.S. laws prohibited interracial marriages, black skin
was a stigma of inferiority, and slavery or sharecropping were fixed social stations. For the most part, incorporation and

accommodation followed conquest in ancient societies. When the Greeks conquered the Egyptians, they

incorporated Egyptian culturescience, mathematics, philosophy, and technology and advanced Greek culture well beyond its
preconquest state. The Romans advanced their culture after conquering, incorporating, and accommodating the Greeks. Both
Romans and Greeks struggled to maintain cultural unity in the midst of color diversity. This pattern began to break down in late
feudalism, especially during the Crusades.

Capitalism Generic
Race pre-figures the issue of capitalism
Mills 97 (Charles, author and advocate of blackness, The Racial Contract, pp. 31-40, acc.
7/13/14, arh)
The classic social contract, as I have detailed, is primarily moral/political in nature. But it is also economic in the background sense
that the point of leaving the state of nature is in part to secure a stable environment for the
industrious appropriation of the world. (After all, one famous definition of politics is that it is about who gets what and why.) Thus even in Locke's moralized state of

nature, where people generally do obey natural law, he is concerned about the safety of private property, indeed proclaiming that "the great and chief end therefore, of Mens uniting into Commonwealths, and
putting themselves under Government, is the Preservation of their Property."42 And in Hobbes's famously amoral and unsafe state of nature, we are told that "there is no place for Industry; because the fruit

So part of the point of bringing society into existence, with its

laws and enforcers of the law, is to protect what you have accumulated. / What, then, is the nature of the economic system of
thereof is uncertain; and consequently no Culture of the Earth."43

the new society? The general contract does not itself prescribe a particular model or particular schedule of property rights, requiring only that the "equality" in the prepolitical state be somehow preserved. This
provision may be variously interpreted as a self-interested surrender to an absolutist Hobbesian government that itself determines property rights, or a Lockean insistence that private property accumulated in the
moralized state of nature be respected by the constitutionalist government. Or more radical political theorists, such as socialists and feminists, might argue that state-of-nature equality actually mandates class or

different political interpretations of the initial moral egalitarianism can be

advanced, but the general background idea is that the equality of human beings in the state of
nature is somehow (whether as equality of opportunity or as equality of outcome) supposed to carry over into the economy of the
created sociopolitical order, leading to a system of voluntary human intercourse and exchange in
which exploitation is precluded. / By contrast, the economic dimension of the Racial Contract is
the most salient, foreground rather than background, since the Racial Contract is calculatedly
aimed at economic exploitation. The whole point of establishing a moral hierarchy and
juridically partitioning the polity according to race is to secure and legitimate the privileging of
those individuals designated as white/persons and the exploitation of those individuals
designated as nonwhite/subpersons. There are other benefits accruing from the Racial Contractfar greater political influence, cultural hegemony, the psychic payoff
that comes from knowing one is a member of the Herrenvolk (what W. E. B. Du Bois once called "the wages of whiteness")44but the bottom line is material advantage. Globally, the Racial
Contract creates Europe as the continent that dominates the world; locally, within Europe and
the other continents, it designates Europeans as the privileged race. / The challenge of explaining
what has been called "the European miracle"the rise of Europe to global domination has long exercised both academic
and lay opinion.45 How is it that a formerly peripheral region on the outskirts of the Asian land
mass, at the far edge of the trade routes, remote from the great civilizations of Islam and the
East, was able in a century or two to achieve global political and economic dominance? The
explanations historically given by Europeans themselves have varied tremendously, from the straightforwardly
racist and geographically determinist to the more subtly environmentalist and culturalist. But
what they have all had in common, even those influenced by Marxism, is their tendency to
depict this development as essentially autochthonous, their tendency to privilege some set of
internal variables and correspondingly-downplay or ignore altogether the role of colonial
conquest and African slavery. Europe made it on its own, it is said, because of the peculiar characteristics of Europe and Europeans. / Thus whereas no reputable historian today
gender economic egalitarianism in society. So,

would espouse the frankly biologistic theories of the past, which made Europeans (in both pre- and post-Darwinian accounts) inherently the most advanced race, as contrasted with the backward/less-evolved
races elsewhere, the thesis of European specialness and exceptionalism is still presupposed. It is still assumed that rationalism and science, innovativeness and inventiveness found their special home here, as
against the intellectual stagnation and traditionalism of the rest of the world, so that Europe was therefore destined in advance to occupy the special position in global history it has. James Blaut calls this the
theory, or "super-theory" (an umbrella covering many different versions: theological, cultural, biologistic, geographical, technological, etc.), of "Eurocentric diffusionism," according to which European progress is
seen as "natural" and asymmetrically determinant of the fate of non-Europe." Similarly, Sandra Harding, in her anthology on the "racial" economy of science, cites "the assumption that Europe functions
autonomously from other parts of the world; that Europe is its own origin, final end, and agent; and that Europe and people of European descent in the Americas and elsewhere owe nothing to the rest of the

Third World theorists have traditionally dissented from this notion of happy
European dispensation. They have claimed, quite to the contrary, that there is a crucial causal
connection between European advance and the unhappy fate of the rest of the world. One classic
example of such scholarship from a half century ago was the Caribbean historian Eric Williams's Capitalism and Slavery,
which argued that the profits from African slavery helped to make the industrial revolution
possible, so that internalist accounts were fundamentally mistaken.48 And in recent years, with decolonization, the rise of the New
world."47 / Unsurprisingly, black and
divine or natural

Left in the United States, and the entry of more alternative voices into the academy, this challenge has deepened and broadened. There are variations in the authors' positionsfor example, Walter Rodney, Samir

the exploitation of the empire (the bullion from the great

gold and silver mines in Mexico and Peru, the profits from plantation slavery, the fortunes made
by the colonial companies, the general social and economic stimulus provided by the opening up
of the "New World") was to a greater or lesser extent crucial in enabling and then consolidating the takeoff of
what had previously been an economic backwater. It was far from the case that Europe was
Amin, Andre Guilder Frank, Immanuel Wallerstein9but the basic theme is that

specially destined to assume economic hegemony; there were a number of centers in Asia and
Africa of a comparable level of development which could potentially have evolved in the same
way. But the European ascent closed off this development path for others because it forcibly
inserted them into a colonial network whose exploitative relations and extractive mechanisms
prevented autonomous growth. / Overall, then, colonialism "lies at the heart" of the rise of Europe. 50

The economic unit of analysis needs to be Europe as a whole, since it is not always the case that the colonizing nations directly involved always benefited in the long term. Imperial Spain, for example, still feudal in
character, suffered massive inflation from its bullion imports. But through trade and financial exchange, others launched on the capitalist path, such as Holland, profited. Internal national rivalries continued, of
course, but this common identity based on the transcontinental exploitation of the non-European world would in many cases be politically crucial, generating a sense of Europe as a cosmopolitan entity engaged in
a common enterprise, underwritten by race. As Victor Kiernan puts it, "All countries within the European orbit benefited however, as Adam Smith pointed out, from colonial contributions to a common stock of
wealth, bitterly as they might wrangle over ownership of one territory or another... [T]here was a sense in which all Europeans shared in a heightened sense of power engendered by the successes of any of them, as
well as in the pool of material wealth... that the colonies produced."51 / Today, correspondingly, though formal decolonization has taken place and in Africa and Asia black, brown, and yellow natives are in office,
ruling independent nations, the global economy is essentially dominated by the former colonial powers, their offshoots (Euro-United States, Euro-Canada), and their international financial institutions, lending
agencies, and corporations. (As previously observed, the notable exception, whose history confirms rather than challenges the rule, is Japan, which escaped colonization and, after the Meiji Restoration,
successfully embarked on its own industrialization.)

Thus

one could say that

the world is essentially dominated by white capital.

Global figures on income and property

if a transnational racial disaggregation were to be done, it

would reveal that whites control a percentage of the world's wealth grossly disproportionate to
their numbers. Since there is no reason to think that the chasm between First and Third Worlds
(which largely coincides with this racial division) is going to be bridgedvide the abject failure of various United Nations plans
from the "development decade" of the 1960s onwardit seems undeniable that for years to come, the planet will be white
dominated. With the collapse of communism and the defeat of Third World attempts to seek
alternative paths, the West reigns supreme, as celebrated in a London Financial Times headline: "The fall of the Soviet bloc has left the IMF and G7 to rule the
world and create a new imperial age."52 Economic structures have been set in place, causal processes established,
whose outcome is to pump wealth from one side of the globe to another, and which will continue
to work largely independently of the ill will/good will, racist/antiracist feelings of particular
individuals. This globally color-coded distribution of wealth and poverty has been produced by
the Racial Contract and in turn reinforces adherence to it in its signatories and beneficiaries. /
Moreover, it is not merely that Europe and the former white settler states are globally dominant but
that within them, where there is a significant nonwhite presence (indigenous peoples, descendants of imported slaves, voluntary
nonwhite immigration), whites continue to be privileged vis-a-vis non-whites. The old structures of formal, de jure exclusion have largely been
dismantled, the old explicitly biologistic ideologies largely abandoned53the Racial Contract, as will be discussed later, is continually being rewrittenbut opportunities for
nonwhites, though they have expanded, remain below those for whites. The claim is not, of course, that
all whites are better off than all nonwhites, but that, as a statistical generalization, the objective
life chances of whites are significantly better. / As an example, consider the United States. A series of books has recently documented the decline of the
integrationist hopes raised by the 1960s and the growing intransigence and hostility of whites who think they have "done enough," despite the fact
that the country continues to be massively segregated, median black family incomes have begun
falling by comparison to white family incomes after some earlier closing of the gap, the so-called "black underclass"
has basically been written off, and reparations for slavery and post-Emancipation discrimination have
never been paid, or, indeed, even seriously considered.54 Recent work on racial inequality by Melvin Oliver and Thomas Shapiro suggests that wealth
is more important than income in determining the likelihood of future racial equalization, since
it has a cumulative effect that is passed down through intergenerational transfer, affecting life
chances and opportunities for one's children. Whereas in 1988 black households earned sixty two cents for every dollar earned by white households, the
comparative differential with regard to wealth is much greater and, arguably, provides a more realistically negative picture of the prospects for closing the racial gap: "Whites possess
nearly twelve times as much median net worth as blacks, or $43,800 versus $3,700. In an even starker contrast, perhaps, the average white
household controls $6,999 in net financial assets while the average black household retains no NFA nest egg whatsoever." Moreover, the analytic focus on wealth rather than
income exposes how illusory the much-trumpeted rise of a "black middle class" is: "Middle class
blacks, for example, earn seventy cents for every dollar earned by middle-class whites but they
possess only fifteen cents for every dollar of wealth held by middle-class whites." This huge
disparity in white and black wealth is not remotely contingent, accidental, fortuitous; it is the
direct outcome of American state policy and the collusion with it of the white citizenry. In effect,
"materially, whites and blacks constitute two nations,"55 the white nation being constituted by
the American Racial Contract in a relationship of structured racial exploitation with the black
(and, of course, historically also the red ) nation. / A collection of papers from panels organized in the 1980s by the National Economic Association, the
ownership are, of course, broken down nationally rather than racially, but

professional organization of black economists, provides some insight into the mechanics and the magnitude of such exploitative transfers and denials of opportunity to accumulate material and human capital. It
takes as its title The Wealth of Racesan ironic tribute to Adam Smith's famous book The Wealth of Nationsand analyzes the different varieties of discrimination to which blacks have been subjected: slavery,
employment discrimination, wage discrimination, promotion discrimination, white monopoly power discrimination against black capital, racial price discrimination in consumer goods, housing, services,
insurance, etc.56 Many of these, by their very nature, are difficult to quantify; moreover, there are costs in anguish and suffering that can never really be compensated. Nonetheless, those that do lend themselves
to calculation offer some remarkable figures. (The figures are unfortunately dated; readers should multiply by a factor that takes fifteen years of inflation into account.) If one were to do a calculation of the
cumulative benefits (through compound interest) from labor market discrimination over the forty-year period from 1929 to 1969 and adjust for inflation, then in 1983 dollars, the figure would be over $1.6
trillion.57 An estimate for the total of "diverted income" from slavery, 1790 to 1860, compounded and translated into 1983 dollars, would yield the sum of $2.1 trillion to $4.7 trillion.58 And

if one

were to try to work out the cumulative value, with compound interest, of unpaid slave labor
before 1863, underpayment since 1863, and denial of opportunity to acquire land and natural
resources available to white settlers, then the total amount required to compensate blacks "could
take more than the entire wealth of the U nited S tates"59 / So this gives an idea of the centrality of racial
exploitation to the U.S. economy and the dimensions of the payoff for its white beneficiaries from one
nation's Racial Contract. But this very centrality, these very dimensions render the topic taboo, virtually
undiscussed in the debates on justice of most white political theory. If there is such a backlash against affirmative action, what
would the response be to the demand for the interest on the unpaid forty acres and a mule? These issues cannot be raised because they go to the
heart of the real nature of the polity and its structuring by the Racial Contract. White moral
theory's debates on justice in the state must therefore inevitably have a somewhat farcical air,
since they ignore the central injustice on which the state rests. (No wonder a hypothetical contractarianism that evades the actual
circumstances of the polity's founding is preferred!) / Both globally and within particular nations, then, white people, Europeans and their descendants, continue to benefit from the Racial Contract, which creates
a world in their cultural image, political states differentially favoring their interests, an economy structured around the racial exploitation of others, and a moral psychology (not just in whites but sometimes in
nonwhites also) skewed consciously or unconsciously toward privileging them, taking the status quo of differential racial entitlement as normatively legitimate, and not to be investigated further.

Capitalism needs racism to work

Manuela Bojadijev 11/29/06 Translate Does Contemporary Capitalism Need Racism?
http://translate.eipcp.net/strands/02/bojadzijev-strands01en#redir (MG)
Integration, Integration, Integration. Wherever you look at you can find Anti-discrimination programmes, new initiatives for
migration legislation, language course programmes, citizenship tests etc. These services represent a mixture of incentives and
coercions to deal with the constant recomposition of migration within and to Europe. Integration seems to provide the magic
formula, a new chorus line that bans all dissonance and creates a deep-rooted consensus between those who are supposed to belong
to and those, who want to give admittance to their participation. How are we to understand racism in a situation where consensus
dictates that racism has been eliminated from modern societies? How do we make sense of racism at a moment when integration
promises to deal with the residual frictions and contradictions in our immigration societies? There are voices that do not accept this
consensus and that question the paradigm of integration. They doubt that a respective form of society can be conceptualised
according to its ability to balance governmental, economic, and social means for managing and regulating processes of immigration
on the one hand and, on the other hand, facilitating the step by step integration of migrants. Rightly, these critics point to the
asymmetry reproduced time and again by integration as a governmental imperative. What if we bear this critic in mind but switch
the perspective for a moment? What if we understand the current debates around integration as inadequate to speak of exploitation
and racism? Let me take that inadequacy as a starting point for discussing the given question on the relation between Capitalism and
Racism today. Let me begin by recalling a couple of crucial objections to and presumptions within the integration question. I will
argue that these flaws in the integration debate make problematic a functional relation between

Capitalism and Racism even if I am running the risk of stating the obvious. a) There is no consistent subject of
Capitalism that needs Racism; b) there is not even a consistent subject as 'the State' that needs
Racism; c) we cannot speak of Racism as one ideology (but rather of ideological race
constructions). I've always found the book 'The Invention of the White Race' by Theodor W. Allen particularly useful in
illuminating the shortcomings of a functionalist explanation of the relation between capitalism and racism. Allen defines two
schemas of explanation in the historiography of slavery and racism: the psycho-cultural schema
and the socio-economic schema. Following the explanation of the psycho-cultural schema, the enslavement of
blacks was a result of a given psycho-cultural stance of the colonisers. Allen objects that at the beginning of
slavery there existed no racist segregation of the work force. Both blacks and Whites had been subordinated by temporary bondage.
The psycho-cultural approach presupposes racism prior to slavery. Or more accurately, this schema

presupposes an ideological race construction before racism and its historical mode of existence
(in this case: slavery). Rather than explaining the conditions for the constitution of racism, the psycho-cultural approach
induces and historically deduces its object of analysis. Therewith perpetual race struggles are postulated. Conversely, the socioeconomic approach attempts to explain racism through slavery. Thus, Racism is a result of
slavery. But this approach, on the other hand, cannot take into account specific forms of exploitation and racist oppression.
According to this explanation, the exploitation of bondslaves gave way to slavery because an African
work force was cheaper. But this argumentation implies a tautology: An African work force was
cheaper because it was enslaved, and before it was enslaved it was cheaper. The socio-economic

approach leaves the relation between economy and outer-economic forces, that is racism, unsolved and often falls back into psychocultural modes of explanation. Additionally, slaves become fixed capital and are no longer perceived as the

rebellious work force, that they were. The aspect of social control remains neglected. If these schemas of explanation
remain unsatisfactory then how are we to explain historical conjunctures of racism Before I attempt to approach this question, let
me take a random sample of what we can observe in current capitalism. If it is not possible to say that capitalism needs

racism, perhaps we can at least state that capitalism does not now nor has it ever existed
without labour force mobility . Wherein contemporary global capitalism in its new contours allows us to really
grasp the sheer scale of migratory movements, we do need new metaphors and concepts. The traditional distinctions between
economy, politics and culture have become obsolete. It is simply no longer possible to speak of exploitation, or the realisation of
capital, without raising the question of the transformation of borders and concepts of citizenship. Similarly, it is no longer

possible to speak of the working class without at the same time understanding the process of
dissolution that has affected the whole 'milieu', transforming subjectivity in the very process. It
seems that in the context of contemporary capitalism, migration allows us to spot lots of these aspects that intersect here. The
regime over migration movements (that is, the mobility of the work force) plays a key role in
reconstructing the oppression of living labour under capital as a whole. We cannot begin to
understand the transformations in class composition without considering the management and
regulation of migration. As we research migration we detect a subjective figure for whom the highest degree of labour

flexibility, as expressed by the social attitude of migrant workers, encounters the effects arising from the brutal control of that
flexibility. This is not to say that migrants form a potential vanguard in class composition. Rather, - from the perspective of a specific
subject position - we can understand the current composition of living labour as a whole articulated

within a new interplay of flexibility, mobility and control on different levels. The common sense category
of the labour market as characterised by specific segmentations, then shows its perfect fragility, its mere metaphorical value. If we
perceive migration as a social movement, we can start to think about the nature of the
"encounter" between labour and capital. Speaking of the attempts to control migration as well as
its constitutional force/violence, brings into play the relations of domination and exploitation
characterizing that "encounter." It is true, were I to reduce racism by definition I would be tempted
to relate it to the capitalist form of socialisation. But even if we presume the permanency of
racism, in the same way that we take for granted the permanency of exploitation, we cannot
assume continuities. Rather we would have to acquire an understanding of the concurrency and ubiquitousness of different
ideological race formations. The current conjuncture before all sociological descriptions and even before all descriptions of
discrete forms of existence of racisms would then have to be defined as a form (in the materialist sense), or rather as a new
dominating form that defines ideological race constructions on the whole.

Turn: America is only what it is today because of the capitalism that

slavery caused in the north
Beckert and Rockman 7/4/11 HSozUKult Slaverys Capitalism: A New History of American Economic
Development http://hsozkult.geschichte.hu-berlin.de/tagungsberichte/id=3665 (Sven Beckert, Harvard University; Seth Rockman,
Brown University) (MG)
For generations, historians have struggled to excavate the roots of what Kenneth Pomeranz has called the Great Divergence:
namely, how and why did the nineteenth century see northwestern Europeand later, the United Statesso abruptly burst forth in
an unprecedented explosion of industrial growth while so much of the world lagged behind in a preindustrial past. Pomeranz himself
pointed to two key dissimilarities: access to coal, and access to the vast resources of the American continent cultivated largely
through coerced and slave labor. Yet despite Pomeranzs provocative insight, historians have been ultimately reticent

to chart a common history of these two institutions that so indelibly marked the global history of
the nineteenth century: capitalism and slavery. Moreover, since the end of the American Civil War, American
historians have been only too eager to make slavery out to be merely a southern problem,
thereby conveniently exculpating the north from its role in the development and promulgation
of this abhorrent institution. Indeed, the northern United States, it is so often claimed, represented the modernizing
impulse of industrialization itself: the infinite productive capacity of free laborers and yeoman farmers in
an open market. The south, on the other hand, was locked in hopeless stagnationinextricably
wedded to its endless wealth of homegrown cotton founded upon the sweltering sin of its
peculiar institution: slavery. Only the cataclysm of Civil War could have possibly brought the simmering conflict between
these two oppositional systems to a head, and thus pave the way towards the ascendance of liberal capitalism. Yet in the last two
decades, popular consciousness has increasingly diverged from the discourse of many American

historians. Indeed, just as many Americans before the Civil War candidly acknowledged the ways
in which slave-grown cotton was at the foundation of Americas growing industrial ascendance
it was, after all, the United States most valuable export, as well as the essential resource
bringing specie into the nations fledgling bankspopular discourse has once more returned to
seeing the reverberations of slaverys past all around us. Activists from the reparations movement have exposed

the ways in which Northern

companies directly benefited from it; American universities have dug into
their archives, consciously striving to disentangle their own links to it; and economists have
produced a veritable corpus of econometric research compellingly demonstrating how slave
labor undergirded Americas industrial revolution. American historians, however, have
remained strangely aloof from these developments. Curiously, the connections between modern
institutions and slaverys past had become so patently self-evident that it seemed to warrant
little further research. Yet nothing could be less true. Indeed, highly charged statements of northern
complicity in southern slavingwhether true or notmask a far more complicated,
contradictory, and often disconcerting historical reality. And although much is already known about
the abstract linkages between northern industry and southern slavery, there still exists little
scholarly research on the precise connections between these two key enterprises once central to
American economic development. With these questions in mind, Sven Beckert, Laird Bell Professor of History at
Harvard University, and Seth Rockman, Professor of History at Brown University, brought together seventeen scholars for a
conference aimed at painting a very different picture of American economic development. Indeed, how might American

history look different once we invite the possibility that perhaps the industrialization of the
north and the proliferation of slavery in the south were not rival developments, but rather,
transformations deeply embedded within one another? What were the precise connections between the

burgeoning economic institutions of the northbanks, merchant establishments, trading firms, commercial shippers, and industrial
manufacturersand the slave plantations of the south? And ultimately, how might an understanding of slaverys capitalism alter our
understandings of the development of the American economy and its particular place in world history? The conference opened at
Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island on April 7 to a wonderfully provocative keynote address by Brown University
President RUTH SIMMONS (Providence) on how the university itself can play a key role in fostering open, public dialogueeven on
contentious issues like the history of slavery. After three days and six panels, the conference ended at Harvard University in
Cambridge, Massachusetts on April 9, 2011. The first panel, Finance, explored the intricacies of how slavery was capitalized and
funded. First, JOSHUA D. ROTHMAN (Tuscaloosa) traced the ways in which speculation in slave labor further inflated the financial
bubble of the 1830s that culminated in the Panic of 1837. Indeed, Rothman detailed the ways in which northern financial markets
supplied the loans (based on the potential return, in labor, of plantation slaves) which effectively made this speculative economic
boomand subsequent bustpossible. BONNIE MARTIN (University Park) then interrogated the ways in which the

mortgaging (often repeated mortgaging) of slaves brought in much-needed cash and capital to
the south. Yet Martin ultimately emphasized that northern banks and merchants were actually much less involved in this process
than the complex neighbor-to-neighbor networks which permeated local southern communities. Finally, KATHRYN BOODRY
(Cambridge) compellingly detailed the ways in which slavery was just one part of a larger, integrated Atlantic

economy of cotton, capital, and textile manufacturing. The second panel, Development, explored the

institutional force and coherence of slavery. First, JOHN MAJEWSKI (Santa Barbara) presented a paper that sought, if not for just a
moment, to take Abraham Lincoln seriously in his fears that slavery might have spread north . Indeed,
Majewski showed how in the so-called limestone southnorthern Virginia, the Kentucky Bluegrass region, and the Tennessee
Nashville Basinthe natural, built, and cultural environment did not look all too different from the north. Thus, he concluded that

slavery perhaps did have the potential to be a national institution, arguing that the defining
factor that inhibited its growth in any given area was not climate or economics, but conscious
political decision-making. STANLEY ENGERMAN (Rochester) then presented, arguing that although it was
undoubtedly true that northern merchants were involved in the financing of slavery, whether or
not the slave trade was necessary to northern economic development is a very different and far
more complicated question. Indeed, Engerman pointed out that many other national economies thrived in this period

without slavery. Thus, he ultimately asked whether slavery undergirded New Englands industrial ascendance, or whether it was the
very success of New Englands economy that made slavery such a thriving institution. Before the next panel started, conference coconvener Seth Rockman reminded the audience that we should be hesitant to rush into abstruse theoretical debates about questions
of what exactly is capitalism? and to what degree it is merely synonymous with economic

development. He argued that although, historically, there may have been other nations exhibiting
capitalism without slavery, this does not preclude the simple fact that nineteenth-century
America did indeed witness the institutional development of both slavery and capitalism. Thus,

Rockman argued that we should continue to keep our sights set on telling a better American economic history, not on redefining the
very theoretical foundations of capitalism itself. In the last panel of the day, Commerce, ERIC KIMBALL (Greensburg) asked how
we might then quantify complicity: which is to say, how might we quantify the level of involvement most northerners had with the
slave trade? By exploring the connections between West-Indian sugar plantations and northern

industries like lumber and whaling, Kimball made a compelling argument that northern
manufacturing and resource extraction was indelibly linked to slaverys profitability. Next, CALVIN
SCHERMERHORN (Phoenix) showed how the coastwise slave trade was itself an integral part of United States developing
commercial shipping network. Finally, DANIEL ROOD (Worcester) detailed the ways in which the wheat-

flour economy of the antebellum era was instrumental in pioneering new methods of business
integration, foreign trade, and technological change.

Capitalism White Supremacy

White supremacy is the root cause of Capitalism and colonialism
Rabaka 7 (Reiland Rabaka, Professor of African, African American, and Caribbean Studies in
the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder, Ph.D., Temple
University, 8/4/7, The Souls of White Folk: W.E.B. Du Boiss Critique of White Supremacy and
Contributions to Critical White Studies,
http://link.springer.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/article/10.1007%2Fs12111-007-90118/fulltext.html.)//ky
Traditionally white supremacy has been treated in race and racism discourse as white
domination of and white discrimination against non-whites, and especially blacks. It is a term
that often carries a primarily legal and political connotation, which has been claimed time and
time again to be best exemplified by the historic events and contemporary effects of: African
holocaust, enslavement and colonization; the failure of reconstruction, the ritual of lynching
and the rise of Jim Crow segregation in the United States; and, white colonial and racial rule
throughout Africa, and especially apartheid in South Africa (Cell 1982; Fredrickson 1981; Marx
1998; Shapiro 1988). Considering the fact that state-sanctioned segregation and black political
disenfranchisement have seemed to come to an end, white supremacy is now seen as classical
nomenclature which no longer refers to contemporary racial and social conditions. However,
instead of being a relic of the past that refers to an odd or embarrassing moment in the United
States and South Africas (among many other racist nations and empires) march toward
multicultural democracy, it remains one of the most appropriate ways to characterize current
racial national and international conditions. Which, in other words, is to say that white
supremacy has been and remains central to modernity (and postmodernity) because
modernity (especially in the sense that this term is being used in European and American
academic and aesthetic discourse) reeks of racial domination and discrimination (Goldberg
1993; Gordon 1997, 2000a; Outlaw 1996). It is an epoch (or aggregate of eras) which symbolizes
not simply the invention of race, but the perfection of a particular species of global racism: white
supremacy. Hence, modernity is not merely the moment of the invention of race, but more, as
Theodore Allen argues in The Invention of the White Race (1994, 1997), it served as an
incubator for the invention of the white race and a peculiar pan-Europeanism predicated on the
racial ruling, cultural degradation and, at times, physical decimation of the life-worlds of people
of color. In The Souls of White Folk, which was initially published in the Independent in 1910,
then substantially revised and published in Darkwater (1920), Du Bois stated, Everything
considered, the title to the universe claimed by White Folk is faulty (1995a, p. 454). Long before
the recent discourse on racism and critical white studies, Du Bois called into question white
superiority and white privilege, and the possibility of white racelessness and/or white racial
neutrality and universality. He was one of the first theorists to chart the changes in race
relations from de jure to de facto forms of white supremacy, referring to it, as early as 1910, as
the new religion of whiteness (454). White supremacy would or will not end unless and until
the values and views endemic to it and associated with it were or are rejected and replaced by
radical and, I am wont to say, following Peter McLaren, revolutionarymulticultural and
uncompromising ethical views and values (McLaren 1994, 1997, 1999a, b; see also Goldberg
1994; May 1999). The rejection of white supremacy and the replacement of white supremacist
views and values involves not only blacks and other people of color, but whites as well. As the
examples of the Emancipation Proclamation, Reconstruction, and the Civil Rights movement
indicate, changes in the law and its interpretation and application do not always translate into
racial justice and social transformation (Berry 1994; Higginbotham 1978, 1996; D. King 1995).
White supremacist social views and values linger long after amendments have been made 2 J Afr
Am St (2007) 11:115 and laws changed. Therefore, law-focused critical white studies and

critical race theory provide at best only part of the picture (Bonilla-Silva 2001; Delgado 1995;
Delgado and Stefancic 1997). The conception and critique of white supremacy that I develop
here does not seek to sidestep socio-legal race discourse as much as it intends to supplement it
with the work of Du Bois and others in radical politics and critical social theory (Rabaka 2002,
2003a,b,c,d, 2005a,b,c). One of the main reasons this supplemental approach to critical white
studies (and critical race theory) is important is because typically legal studies of race confine
theorists to particular national social and political arenas, which is problematic considering the
fact that white supremacy is an international or global racist system (Mills 1999; Rabaka
2006a,b,c). Du Bois declared, whiteness is the ownership of the earth forever and ever, Amen!
(1995a, p. 454). Here he is sardonically hinting at the cardinal difference between white
supremacy and most other forms of racism: its worldwide historical, cultural, social, political,
legal, and economic influence and impact. White supremacy serves as the glue that connects and
combines racism to colonialism, and racism to capitalism. It has also been illustrated that it
exacerbates sexism by sexing racism and racing sexism, to put it unpretentiously. Thus, white
supremacy as a global racism intersects and interconnects with sexism, and particularly
patriarchy as a global system that oppresses and denies womens human dignity and right to be
humanly different from men, the ruling gender (Davis 1981, 1989; hooks 1981, 1984, 1991, 1995;
J.A. James 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999; Lorde 1984, 1988; Rabaka 2003e, 2004).

White supremacy is the symbol of economic exploitation and

establishes racism in capitalist greed, resulting in the looting of
colored culture and knowledge
Rabaka 7 (Reiland Rabaka, Professor of African, African American, and Caribbean Studies in
the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder, Ph.D., Temple
University, 8/4/7, The Souls of White Folk: W.E.B. Du Boiss Critique of White Supremacy and
Contributions to Critical White Studies,
http://link.springer.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/article/10.1007%2Fs12111-007-90118/fulltext.html.)//ky
From Du Boiss optic, blacks had been unable to give civilization the full spiritual message
which they are capable of giving primarily because of white supremacy and its enormous and
unfathomable effects on Africana life-worlds and lived-experiences. His early uncertainty
regarding the African origins of ancient Egyptian civilization was laid to rest as a result of the
research of Franz Boas, Leo Frobenius, and Harry Johnston, among others. If Egypt,
undoubtedly one of the greatest classical civilizations, was African or, at the least, initiated by
Africansas Du Bois documented in The Negro, Black Folk Then and Now, and The World and
Africathen, it would be a great disservice to modern Africana people to argue that they have
given no message to the world. As he studied and learned more of Africas ancient and precolonial past, Du Boiss gift theory shifted its emphasis from Africana people giving the full,
complete Negro message...to the world, to accenting and highlighting classical African
contributions to culture and civilization with an eye toward: first, confronting and combating
the white supremacist theses of, of course, white superiority and black inferiority and, also,
blacks purported lack of history and culture; second, providing contemporary Africana people
with classical Africana cultural paradigms and traditional motifs; and, finally, offering a caveat
to continental and diasporan Africans that their task is not so much to give the definitive
Africana message to the world (something, on second thought, that may never really be
possible), but to contribute to and continue the Africana struggle for freedom and justice in their
age and leave a legacy for succeeding generations. Generic racism, if there is such a thing,
essentially entails racial domination and discrimination. White supremacy does not simply
racially oppress, as Du Bois asserts above. Being the fraternal twin (or, at the least, a sibling of
some sort) of capitalism it racially oppresses in the interest of nonpareil racialized economic
exploitation. It symbolizes the intensification of economic exploitation by adding a racist

dimension to capitalist greed and colonial gain. Hinging on a diabolical dialectic that sees whites
as superior and non-whites as inferior, white supremacy consumes the world of color and claims
non-whites contributions to human culture and civilization as European or white contributions
to culture and civilization. This is so because from the white supremacist point of view, nonwhites do not now and have never possessed culture and civilization and, therefore, could not
possibly contribute to the (re) construction of something they do not now and have never
possessed. Further, white supremacy enables and utterly encourages whites to theoretically and
culturally loot the knowledge banks and cultural treasure troves of the colored world, similar to
the way whites did when they established racial colonialism and colonial capitalism, because it is
a global system that rewards based on the embrace of white hegemonic views and values, white
conquest and racialized colonization.

Class Struggle
Capitalist society is dependent on racism
Pamela Brown No Date Alter Net Can We Have Capitalism Without Racism? The Invisible Chains of Debt and the
Catastrophic Loss of African American Wealth http://www.alternet.org/economy/can-we-have-capitalism-without-racisminvisible-chains-debt-and-catastrophic-loss-african?page=0%2C1 (MG)

Years after Thomas Jeffersons famous words all men are created equal began to ring as a call
to conscience, he himself must have felt every bit of their hollowness. Polish Revolutionary War hero

Thaddeus Kosciuszko bequeathed Jefferson enough money to free his slaves, as well as to set them off with land and farming
equipment of their own, but Jefferson refused this gift. Instead, he died with a debt hanging over Monticello a kind of debt that he
was the first to incur through monetizing his slaves for use as collateral for the loan to build his estate (Weincek 2012: 96). The

slave families, who resided on Jeffersons estate as intact families, were separated and sold to
pay the outstanding debt such that the estate could be passed down to its rightful heir. In spite
of words we have no reason not to believe were heartfelt, and in spite of fathering six black
children, Jefferson was not able to rise to the call of his words in the end, leaving as mixed a
legacy as the American history that has followed. And in spite of generations of black
descendants, no reparation has ever been paid to them; they remain a forgotten part of this
legacy. As the story is most commonly told, there is only mention made to a legitimate debt paid with the bodies, blood and breath

of Jefferson slaves, but no mention of any owing to them. Unfortunately, this telling of Jeffersons story not only exposes the power
dynamics of the past, but also discloses a fundamental understanding of the world that continues to rear its ugly head today. During
Jeffersons life, Wall Street was already expanding on and experimenting with the monetization of human life through debt. In 1804,
well before the battle for abolition was won here in America, but only after a bloody 13-year struggle, Haitian slaves liberated
themselves by successfully defeating Napoleon. President Jefferson was the first to refuse to recognize their independence from
France. As a result, over twenty years later, the French reminded the Haitians that they, themselves, constituted a debt. The Haitians
did the only thing they could to retain their physical freedom and borrowed the equivalent of $150 million (almost double the cost of
Louisiana) from Wall Street to pay reparations to the French. Of course, this original predatory debt reaped

enormous rewards and in the end they paid the equivalent of $20 billion dollars for their
freedom something that never should have been for sale. And all the way up until 1947, 80% of
Haitis economy went to pay off this debt to National City Bank known today as Citibank. Of
course, the price of freedom was unrelenting poverty, the permanent loss of opportunity to
develop infrastructure, and the seemingly never-ending suffering in enslavement of another
form. Yet, when we talk about debt, mostly we talk about it as a thing as the kind of thing that
hangs from the body like a ball and chain or from our necks like an albatross. We talk a lot about
how debt makes us feel: atomized, isolated, alone. But, we dont often talk about how the
neoliberal construct of perpetual indebtedness to non-human financial entities has created a
populace so focused on debts owed to Wall Street that we have no collective memory of any
other kinds of debts. But, once we open Pandoras box to take a look at the intersections of debt
and race, we are forced to ask ourselves how it is that we have forgotten so much. Could it be that
alongside the rise of the neoliberal social order characterized by the isolation of the invisible
chains of debt, a parallel practice of colorblindness arose that produces the invisibility of race ?
And if Malcolm X was correct that we cannot have capitalism without racism, we have to ask ourselves
whether racism has really declined with colorblindness, or whether colorblindness might be
neoliberalisms corollary. It has been under a gray monotone cloud that a predatory debt system has been advanced, one
that stripped African Americans of all economic gains subsequent to Civil Rights, and that spread throughout the rest of the
economy, impacting generations to come. Theres plenty of evidence of racism in spite of all the talk about

post-racial America. Still, it comes as a big surprise that while we have been declaring race dead,
structural racism has clearly increased. In fact 50 years after Civil Rights, 150 years after the
Emancipation Proclamation, and during the first black presidency, white Americans currently
hold at least 19 times the wealth of African-Americans (Kochhar 2010: 3). Put into perspective, in 1984 the
ratio was 12 to 1, dipping to 7 to 1 in 1995, jumping to an astonishing 19 to 1 in 2009, and is
probably even greater now. In practical terms this means that the average middle income black family
has less wealth than the average white family with earnings below the poverty line (Shapiro 2004: 7).
According to a 2010 Brandeis University study, in the last 23 years, the racial wealth gap increased by 75K from

20K to 95K (Shapiro 2010: 2). Even within the highest income African Americans, wealth has fallen
from 25K to 18K, whereas the wealth of whites in a similar class surged to 240K (Shapiro 2010: 2).
White families saw a dramatic growth of financial assets excluding home value from 22K to
100K, while African Americans saw very little increase at all (Shapiro 2010: 1). Because family wealth is the
biggest predictor of personal wealth, and wealth is used to pay for education, this gap assures racial inequality for at least the next
generation. Already 81% of African American students are graduating from college an average of

29K in the hole (Johnson, 2012: 21). And already the average middle income African American worker
would have to spend an additional twelve weeks per year working to earn the same amount as a
white worker (Shapiro 2004: 7). As a result, between 1984 and 2007 African Americans actually doubled
their debt burden as measured by assets against liabilities. At the rate blacks have been falling behind since the
mid 90s, black and white median wealth will never ever reach parity, and unless something is
done, these paths will continue to diverge.

Colonialism
Racism was a result of the political economy, where it was essential to
European dominance and globalization
Rabaka 7 (Reiland Rabaka, Professor of African, African American, and Caribbean Studies in
the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder, Ph.D., Temple
University, 8/4/7, The Souls of White Folk: W.E.B. Du Boiss Critique of White Supremacy and
Contributions to Critical White Studies,
http://link.springer.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/article/10.1007%2Fs12111-007-90118/fulltext.html.)//ky
Materialist accounts of race, which are primarily inspired by Marxist theory, maintain that
racism does not have to do with culture as much as it does with political economy. Europeans
needed a cheap labor force to extra-exploit and work their newly and imperially acquired
continents, countries, colonial settlements and plantations. For the racial materialists it was not
about religion or civilization or science, but an economics and politics reduced to its lowest and
most racist level (Cox 1959, 1987; Genovese 1965, 1969, 1974, 1979; C.L.R. James 1963, 1995,
1996; E. Williams 1966). Finally, racial constructionists contend that race is an outgrowth of
human beings inherent ethnocentrism, but that racism is a result of Europes push for global
dominance. In this view, no matter who invented race, its reasons for J Afr Am St (2007) 11:115
3 origination, and whether it is scientifically sound, it is an artifact that most modern (and
postmodern) human beings use, either consciously or unconsciously, to make interpersonal,
socio-cultural and politico-economic decisions. Whites and nonwhites do not exist prior to
the imperial expansion that helped to birth, raise and rear European modernity. But, this is all
beside the point to the constructionists. What is relevant is the invention of whiteness and its
classical and contemporary uses and abuses, and the ways it has evolved over several centuries,
transitioning from de jure to de facto form, and transforming the racial rules and ethnic ethics of
who counts as white and non-white (Allen 1994, 1997; Goldberg 1997; Harris 1999; Lopez
1995, 1996; Omi and Winant 1994; Roediger 1994, 1999).

Neoliberalism
Racism fuels neoliberalism
Pamela Brown No Date Alter Net Can We Have Capitalism Without Racism? The Invisible Chains of Debt and the
Catastrophic Loss of African American Wealth http://www.alternet.org/economy/can-we-have-capitalism-without-racisminvisible-chains-debt-and-catastrophic-loss-african?page=0%2C1 (MG)

Because the predominant underlying colorblind assumptions have been that a culture of
financial illiteracy or class based lower credit rating, these products were allowed to take hold in
ways they would not have been allowed to had racism been considered a possibility. A study
conducted by Ethan Cohen-Cole of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston demonstrates that racial bias is a factor in the amount of
credit offered even when other possible factors are eliminated. The study shows that the same individual in an

80% white area would receive about $7000 more dollars in credit than an individual living in an
80% black area (Cohen-Cole 2009: 14). And a 1% increase in the percentage of blacks in an area
corresponds to a $117 dollar reduction in credit (Cohen-Cole 2009: 14). Further, even high quality credit
individuals receive less credit if they simply live near a payday lender. Because available credit
corresponds to credit score, the reduction of available credit automatically means that credit
scores are stratified racially. Therefore, its typical for African-American borrowers with equal
credentials to have a lower credit scores simple by virtue of where they live. This impacts both
the available credit products, insurance rates and also may impact employment, as 60% of
employers now use credit score in hiring decisions. Of course, this also means that predatory credit
products like payday and auto title loans are frequently the only available products for even
higher quality borrowers. In essence, this is a combination strategy of first redlining to offer less
credit and then reverse redlining to offer subprime and high-risk products. Because colorblindness
normalizes racial disparity as related to class or culture, and minimizes the possibility of racism,
a cloak of invisibility hides the reality of the economic hate crime being committed. Rather than
being polite and innocuous, colorblindness is really a dangerous new form of racism that grants
neoliberalisms wealth moving tactics momentum and power.

Anti-blackness
Capitalism began through the destruction of the black body racism
was the precondition that made capitalism profitable
Wilderson, 2003 (Frank B., Professor UCI, The Prison Slave as Hegemonys
(Silent) Scandal, Soc Justice 30 no2 2003, arh)
The theoretical importance of emphasizing this in the early 21st century is twofold. First, capital
was kick-started by approaching a particular body (a black body) with direct relations of force,
not by approaching a white body with variable capital. Thus, one could say that slavery is closer
to capital's primal desire than is exploitation. It is a relation of terror as opposed to a relation of
hegemony. Second, today, late capital is imposing a renaissance of this original desire, the direct
relation of force, the despotism of the unwaged relation. This renaissance of slavery, i.e., the
reconfiguration of the prison-industrial complex has, once again, as its structuring metaphor
and primary target the Black body. The value of reintroducing the unthought category of the
slave, by way of noting the absence of the Black subject, lies in the Black subject's potential for
extending the demand placed on state/capital formations because its reintroduction into the
discourse expands the intensity of the antagonism. In other words, the positionality of the slave
makes a demand that is in excess of the demand made by the positionality of the worker. The
worker demands that productivity be fair and democratic (Gramsci's new hegemony, Lenin's
dictatorship of the proletariat, in a word, socialism). In contrast, the slave demands that
production stop, without recourse to its ultimate democratization. Work is not an organic
principle for the slave. The absence of Black subjectivity from the crux of radical discourse is
symptomatic of the text's inability to cope with the possibility that the generative subject of
capitalism, the Black body of the 15th and 16th centuries, and the generative subject that
resolves late capital's over-accumulation crisis, the Black (incarcerated) body of the 20th and 21
st centuries, do not reify the basic categories that structure conflict within civil society: the
categories of work and exploitation.

Slavery
Racism is the root cause of slavery
West 13, az lyrics http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/kanyewest/newslaves.html (Kanye, victim of anti-blackness and worldwide
ranked rap artists, verse 1, slightly edited for racist language) MG

My momma was raised in an era when, Clean water was only served to the fairer skin Doing
clothes you would have thought I had help But they wasn't satisfied unless I picked the cotton
myself. You see it's broke nigga [black people] racism That's that "Don't touch anything in the
store" And there's rich nigga [black people] racism That's that "Come here, please buy more" What you want a Bentley, fur coat

and diamond chain? All you blacks want all the same things Used to only be niggas [black peoples] now everybody play me Spending
everything on Alexander Wang New Slaves

Slavery led to modern capitalism Slave owners realized that they

could sell the work of their slaves for money
Steven Beckert and Seth Rockman 2/24/14 Huffington Post How Slavery Led to Modern Capitalism
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/24/slavery_n_4847105.html (Sven Beckert and Seth Rockman, historians at Harvard
University and Brown University respectively, are co-editing "Slavery's Capitalism: A New History of American Economic
Development," to be published by University of Pennsylvania Press in 2013. The opinions expressed are their own.) MG
Bloomberg View: When the New York City banker James Brown tallied his wealth in 1842, he had to look far below Wall Street to
trace its origins. His investments in the American South exceeded $1.5 million, a quarter of which was directly bound up in the
ownership of slave plantations. Brown was among the world's most powerful dealers in raw cotton, and

his familys firm, Brown Brothers & Co., served as one of the most important sources of capital
and foreign exchange to the U.S. economy. Still, no small amount of his time was devoted to managing slaves from
the study of his Leonard Street brownstone in Lower Manhattan. Brown was hardly unusual among the capitalists
of the North. Nicholas Biddle's United States Bank of Philadelphia funded banks in Mississippi to promote the expansion of
plantation lands. Biddle recognized that slave-grown cotton was the only thing made in the U.S. that
had the capacity to bring gold and silver into the vaults of the nation's banks. Likewise, the
architects of New England's industrial revolution watched the price of cotton with rapt
attention, for their textile mills would have been silent without the labor of slaves on distant
plantations. The story we tell about slavery is almost always regional, rather than national. We remember it as a cruel institution
of the southern states that would later secede from the Union. Slavery, in this telling, appears limited in scope, an unfortunate
detour on the nation's march to modernity, and certainly not the engine of American economic prosperity. Yet to understand

slavery's centrality to the rise of American capitalism, just consider the history of an antebellum
Alabama dry-goods outfit called Lehman Brothers or a Rhode Island textile manufacturer that
would become the antecedent firm of Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Reparations lawsuits (since
dismissed) generated evidence of slave insurance policies by Aetna and put Brown University
and other elite educational institutions on notice that the slave-trade enterprises of their early
benefactors were potential legal liabilities. Recent state and municipal disclosure ordinances have forced firms such
as JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Wachovia Corp. to confront unsettling ancestors on their corporate family trees. Such
revelations are hardly surprising in light of slaverys role in spurring the nations economic
development. America's "take-off" in the 19th century wasn't in spite of slavery; it was largely
thanks to it. And recent research in economic history goes further: It highlights the role that commodified
human beings played in the emergence of modern capitalism itself. The U.S. won its independence from
Britain just as it was becoming possible to imagine a liberal alternative to the mercantilist policies of the colonial era. Those best
situated to take advantage of these new opportunities -- those who would soon be called
"capitalists" -- rarely started from scratch, but instead drew on wealth generated earlier in the
robust Atlantic economy of slaves, sugar and tobacco. Fathers who made their fortunes outfitting ships for

distant voyages begat sons who built factories, chartered banks, incorporated canal and railroad enterprises, invested in government
securities, and speculated in new financial instruments. This recognizably modern capitalist economy was no

less reliant on slavery than the mercantilist economy of the preceding century. Rather, it offered a

wider range of opportunities to profit from the remote labor of slaves, especially as cotton emerged as the indispensable commodity
of the age of industry. In the North, where slavery had been abolished and cotton failed to grow, the

enterprising might transform slave-grown cotton into clothing; market other manufactured
goods, such as hoes and hats, to plantation owners; or invest in securities tied to next year's crop
prices in places such as Liverpool and Le Havre. This network linked Mississippi planters and Massachusetts
manufacturers to the era's great financial firms: the Barings, Browns and Rothschilds. A major financial crisis in 1837
revealed the interdependence of cotton planters, manufacturers and investors, and their
collective dependence on the labor of slaves. Leveraged cotton -- pledged but not yet picked -led overseers to whip their slaves to pick more, and prodded auctioneers to liquidate slave
families to cover the debts of the overextended. The plantation didn't just produce the
commodities that fueled the broader economy, it also generated innovative business practices
that would come to typify modern management . As some of the most heavily capitalized enterprises in
antebellum America, plantations offered early examples of time-motion studies and regimentation through clocks and bells. Seeking
ever-greater efficiencies in cotton picking, slaveholders reorganized their fields, regimented the workday, and implemented a system
of vertical reporting that made overseers into managers answerable to those above for the labor of those below. The perverse

reality of a capitalized labor force led to new accounting methods that incorporated (human)
property depreciation in the bottom line as slaves aged, as well as new actuarial techniques to
indemnify slaveholders from loss or damage to the men and women they owned. Property rights
in human beings also created a lengthy set of judicial opinions that would influence the broader
sanctity of private property in U.S. law. So important was slavery to the American economy that
on the eve of the Civil War, many commentators predicted that the North would kill "its golden
goose." That prediction didn't come to pass, and as a result, slavery's importance to American
economic development has been obscured. But as scholars delve deeper into corporate archives
and think more critically about coerced labor and capitalism -- perhaps informed by the current
scale of human trafficking -- the importance of slavery to American economic history will
become inescapable.

Race was the precondition that enabled capitalism slaves were the
capital that made capitalism possible and the relationship is reverse
causal
Ott 4/9 (Julia, Assistant professor in the history of capitalism and the co-director of the
Robert L. Heilbroner Center for Capitalism Studies at the New School for Social Research and
the Eugene Lang College at the New School, Slaves: the capital that made capitalism,
http://www.publicseminar.org/2014/04/slavery-the-capital-that-madecapitalism/#.U7oQto1dVKY, 4/9/14, acc. 7/6/14, arh)
Racialized chattel slaves were the capital that made capitalism. While most theories of
capitalism set slavery apart, as something utterly distinct, because under slavery, workers do not
labor for a wage, new historical research reveals that for centuries, a single economic system
encompassed both the plantation and the factory. At the dawn of the industrial age
commentators like Rev. Thomas Malthus could not envision that capital an asset that is used
but not consumed in the production of goods and services could compound and diversify its
forms, increasing productivity and engendering economic growth. Yet, ironically, when Malthus
penned his Essay on the Principle of Population in 1798, the economies of Western Europe
already had crawled their way out of the so-called Malthusian trap. The New World yielded
vast quantities of drug foods like tobacco, tea, coffee, chocolate, and sugar for world markets.
Europeans worked a little bit harder to satiate their hunger for these drug foods. The luxurycommodities of the seventeenth century became integrated into the new middle-class rituals like
tea-drinking in the eighteenth century. By the nineteenth century, these commodities became a
caloric and stimulative necessity for the denizens of the dark satanic mills. The New World
yielded food for proletarians and fiber for factories at reasonable (even falling) prices. The
industrious revolution that began in the sixteenth century set the stage for the Industrial
Revolution of the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. But the demand-side tells only part
of the story. A new form of capital, racialized chattel slaves, proved essential for the industrious

revolution and for the industrial one that followed. The systematic application of African
slaves in staple export crop production began in the sixteenth century, with sugar in Brazil. The
African slave trade populated the plantations of the Caribbean, landing on the shores of the
Chesapeake at the end of the seventeenth century. African slaves held the legal status of chattel:
moveable, alienable property. When owners hold living creatures as chattel, they gain additional
property rights: the ownership of the offspring of any chattel, and the ownership of their
offspring, and so on and so forth. Chattel becomes self-augmenting capital. While slavery
existed in human societies since prehistoric times, chattel status had never been applied so
thoroughly to human beings as it would be to Africans and African-Americans beginning in the
sixteenth century. But this was not done easily, especially in those New World regions where
African slaves survived, worked alongside European indentured servants and landless free
men and women, and bore offspring as they did in Britains mainland colonies in North
America. In the seventeenth century, African slaves and European indentured servants worked
together to build what Ira Berlin characterizes as a society with slaves along the Chesapeake
Bay. These Africans were slaves, but before the end of the seventeenth century, these Africans
were not chattel, not fully. Planters and overseers didnt use them that differently than their
indentured servants. Slaves and servants alike were subject to routine corporeal punishment.
Slaves occupied the furthest point along a continuum of unequal and coercive labor relations.
(Also, see here and here.) Even so, 20% of the Africans brought into the Chesapeake before 1675
became free, and some of those freed even received the head-right a plot of land promised
to European indentures. Some of those free Africans would command white indentures and own
African slaves. To the British inhabitants of the Chesapeake, Africans looked different. They
sounded different. They acted different. But that was true of the Irish, as well. Africans were
pagans, but the kind of people who wound up indentured in the Chesapeake werent exactly
model Christians. European and African laborers worked, fornicated, fought, wept, birthed, ate,
died, drank, danced, traded with one another, and with the indigenous population. Neither laws
nor customs set them apart. And this would become a problem. By the 1670s, large landowners
some local planters, some absentees began to consolidate plantations. This pushed the
head-rights out to the least-productive lands on the frontier. In 1676, poor whites joined forces
with those of African descent under the leadership of Nathaniel Bacon. They torched
Jamestown, the colonys capital. It took British troops several years to bring the Chesapeake
under control. Ultimately, planter elites thwarted class conflict by writing laws and by modeling
and encouraging social practices that persuaded those with white skin to imagine that
tremendous social significance inherent difference and inferiority lay underneath black
skin. (Also, see here and here.) New laws regulated social relations sex, marriage, sociability,
trade, assembly, religion between the races that those very laws, in fact, helped to create.
The law of chattel applied to African and African-descended slaves to the fullest extent on
eighteenth century plantations. Under racialized chattel slavery, master-enslavers possessed the
right to torture and maim, the right to kill, the right to rape, the right to alienate, and the right to
own offspring specifically, the offspring of the female slave. The exploitation of enslaved
womens reproductive labor became a prerogative that masters shared with other white men.
Any offspring resulting from rape increased the masters stock of capital.

Racial inferiority led to slavery

Greene 3 independent writer, researcher, and historian. With degrees in history and historic preservation, she also works as
an architectural historian who documents and writes about historic buildings and landscapes. (Meg, Did slavery cause racism?,
2003,
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&ved=0CCcQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.stratford.or
g%2Fuploaded%2Ffaculty%2Fjjordan%2Fviewpoint_essays%2Fdid_slavery_cause_racism_viewpoint_essay.doc&ei=LPe3UCpAorP0AXnwoD4Dg&usg=AFQjCNFtuyaqtMDgz_dDGhy00TUfFc7wvA&sig2=s7Av7kATnB4j1SUkV7isNg //SRSL)

No. Slavery followed from racism and reinforced existing perceptions of blacks' racial
inferiority. Racism both preexisted and survived slavery. Slavery bred racism. No people can systematically
enslave another people of a different "race" for several hundred years without developing some
Viewpoint:

form of racial animosity and prejudice. Yet, racism also preceded slavery and survived it. Various and

subtle influences had already conditioned Europeans to take a negative view of blacks long before they thought of enslaving them. In his classic study of racial stereotypes, White Over Black: American Attitudes

Winthrop D. Jordan identified three distinct but related prejudices that

conditioned English perceptions of Africans. First, the English noticed that Africans were black.
Jordan, however, shows that this judgment was mistaken inasmuch as it simplified a more complex reality. Not all Africans had black skin. For the English, though,
"blackness became so generally associated with Africa," Jordan wrote, "that every African seemed a black
man." The English were quick to attach an unwarranted pejorative significance to black skin. Blackness signified filth, immorality, sin, and evil. Whiteness, by contrast, represented cleanliness, goodness,
Toward the Negro, 1550-1812 (1968),

virtue, and purity. As Jordan pointed out, before the sixteenth century, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, "black" meant "deeply stained with dirt; soiled, dirty, foul. . . . Having dark and deadly purposes,
malignant; pertaining to or involving death, deadly; baneful, disastrous, sinister. . . . Foul, iniquitous, atrocious, horrible, wicked. . . . Indicating disgrace, censure, liability to punishment, etc." Despite some

Second, the English thought the

Africans were "uncivilized." Africans dressed, lived, fought, spoke, and even ate differently from the English. In any comparison with English ways, Africans were found wanting.
Difference constituted inferiority. The second "fact" worthy of note about Africans after the color of their skin was that they were not English. Deviation
from English norms and standards implied barbarism. Although they knew better, the English depicted
Africans as savages, beasts, and cannibals. In making such comparisons, Jordan declared, "Englishmen unwittingly
demonstrated how powerfully the African's different culture--for Englishmen, his 'savagery'-operated to make Negroes seem to Englishmen a radically different kind of men." Few writers
applied this racial ideology as thoroughly as did Edward Long, or less hesitantly drew out its
implications. In The History of Jamaica; or, General Survey of the Ancient and Modern State of the Island. . . . (1774) Long popularized the notion that
blacks were a separate species fit only for slavery. Instead of degrading human nature, Long
maintained that the theory of black racial inferiority confirmed belief in a rational, creative,
fecund, and perfect God. What better testimony to the omnipotence of God, Long asked, than a beautifully complete and coherent chain of being, a "series and progression from a
marked inconsistencies, medieval Christian thinkers also linked blackness to the same general set of associations and characteristics.

lump of dirt to a perfect man?" Long failed to explain why one link in this continuum ought to be so loathsome, but he made no effort to conceal his disgust for the "bestial fleece," the "tumid nostrils," and the
"fetid smell" that he thought characterized all blacks to a greater or lesser degree. Long also concluded that blacks possessed no rational faculty or moral sense. Incapable of thought and virtue, they thus desired
no more than food, drink, sex, and leisure and would pursue these amusements without restraint unless disciplined and coerced. Africans had made no progress for two thousand years, he asserted. They
remained, in Long's estimation, "a brutish, ignorant, idle, crafty, treacherous, bloody, thievish, mistrustful, and superstitious people." Apes, Long conjectured, could be trained to "perform a variety of menial
domestic services" and the "mechanic arts" as well as any black. African bestiality was nowhere more transparent, in Long's view, than in the possibility of sexual relations between apes and black women. Apes
coveted black women, Long wrote, "from a natural impulse of desire, such as inclines one animal towards another of the same species, or which had a conformity in the organs of generation." With blacks, Long
observed, sex was "libidinous and shameless." Since both blacks and apes shared the "lasciviousness of disposition," Long did not think that "an orang-outang husband would be any dishonour to an Hottentot
female." There was, indeed, Long asserted, every reason to believe that black women regularly admitted such animals to their embraces. Such a union, he reported, had occurred in England itself. Thus, he wrote,
"how freely may it not operate in the more genial soil of Afric [sic], that parent of every thing that is monstrous in nature, where . . . the passions rage without controul; and the retired wilderness presents
opportunity to gratify them without fear of detection!" Third, the English condemned the Africans as unchristian. This "defective religious condition" was part of a much larger problem once the English
discovered that the world was abounding with "heathen" peoples. The Africans' "primitive" religions offered one more indication of their failure to approximate English norms; it was another symptom of their
blackness and their barbarism. For an Englishman of the sixteenth century, Jordan asserted, Christianity was interwoven into his conception of his own nationality, and he was therefore inclined to regard the
Negroes' lack of true religion as part of theirs. Being a Christian was not merely a matter of subscribing to certain doctrines; it was a quality inherent in oneself and in one's society. It was interconnected with all
the other attributes of normal and proper men: as one of the earliest English accounts distinguished Negroes from Englishmen, they were 'a people of beastly living, without a God, lawe, religion, or common
wealth. . . .' In an important sense, then, heathenism was for Englishmen one inherent characteristic of savage men. To be Christian, according to the English, was to be civilized. Yet, the English did not attribute
such deficiencies to blacks alone. They also regarded the Irish as wild, subhuman, uncivilized, dangerous brutes. In English eyes, the Irish were "more uncivill, more uncleanly, more barbarous and more brutish in
their customs and demeanures [demeanor], then in any other part of the world that is known." As Nicholas P. Canny has demonstrated in "The Ideology of English Colonization: From Ireland to America" (1983),
the Indians were the New World equivalent of the "wilde Irish." Poor whites fared little better, for the "giddy multitude" seemed to pose an additional threat to social order. The English fit Africans into these
established stereotypes in a way that enabled them to make sense of peoples so apparently different that one might expect to find them on another planet. Africans and Europeans were "bound to one another
without mingling," wrote French writer Alexis de Tocqueville in Democracy in America (1835). It "is equally difficult for them to separate completely or to unite. . . . The Negro transmits to his descendants at birth
the external mark of his ignominy. The law can abolish servitude, but only God can obliterate its traces. . . . You can make the Negro free, but you cannot prevent him facing the European as a stranger." For
Tocqueville, the unavoidable and irrevocable certainty of black skin remained, forever intruding itself upon the European consciousness. Most Englishmen and Europeans, and later the majority of white

The reality
upon which race purports to rest, the natural and permanent inequality of human beings, is
utterly false. Biologically, there is only one race: the human race. The most striking attributes of racial appearance--color of skin, texture of hair, shape of nose, eyes, lips, and ears--can all be
Americans, assumed that race is a fixed and observable physical reality. It is not. Race, instead, is an idea, an ideological construct, a historical phenomenon, not a biological fact.

gradually transformed or radically altered by repeated instances of miscegenation (race mixing). Although not a biological fact, race is nonetheless real, for it embodies in thought actual social relations.
Paradoxically, the reality of race lies in appearances and the meanings that human beings attach to them. What Europeans once defined as racial differences between themselves and Africans reveals less about

This racial ideology existed prior to the

enslavement of Africans and did not emerge as a consequence of slavery. Yet, it was not without
consequences. As Tocqueville reflected: From the moment when Europeans took their slaves from a race
different from their own, which many of them considered inferior to the other human races, and
assimilation with whom they all regarded with horror, they assumed that slavery would be
eternal, for there is no intermediate state that can be durable between the excessive inequality
created by slavery and the complete equality which is the natural result of independence. The Europeans
who Africans were than it does about who Europeans thought that they were at a particular moment in history.

have vaguely sensed this truth but have not admitted it. In everything concerning the Negroes, either interest or pride or pity has dictated their behavior. Tocqueville accurately predicted that racial animosity
would intensify with the abolition of slavery. Perhaps more remarkable, the modification or removal of the racial characteristics that had so absorbed the European imagination did nothing to eradicate slavery or
even to alter the status of individual slaves. The variations in skin color that emerged as the result of miscegenation, blacks' acquisition of learning and culture, and the conversion of slaves to Christianity did not
effect emancipation. Race was an important element in New World slavery, but it proved not to be essential.

Ideology
Civil society is built on a grammar of anti-black violence class
struggle is formed between the antagonisms of race
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Associate Professor at UC Irvines Department of Drama and
African American Studies, BA in government and philosophy from Dartmouth College, MA in Fine Arts from
Columbia University, PhD in Rhetoric and Film Studies from UC Berkeley
, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms, 2010, Pg. 1-7, **WE DO NOT ENDORSE
ABLEIST LANGUAGE, CHANGES MARKED WITH STRIKE THROUGH**, arh)
Leaving aside for the moment their state of mind, it would seem that the structure, that is to say the rebar, or better
still the grammar of their demandsand, by extension, the grammar of their sufferingwas indeed

an ethical grammar. Perhaps their grammars are the only ethical grammars
available to modern politics and modernity writ large, for they draw our attention
not to the way in which space and time are used and abused by enfranchised and
violently powerful interests, but to the violence that underwrites the modern worlds capacity to think,

act, and exist spatially and temporally. The violence that robbed her of her body and him of his land provided the
stage upon which other violent and consensual dramas could be enacted. Thus, they would have to be crazy, crazy
enough to call not merely the actions of the world to account but to call the world itself to account, and to account for
them no less! The woman at Columbia was not demanding to be a participant in an unethical network of distribution:
she was not demanding a place within capital, a piece of the pie (the demand for her sofa notwithstanding). Rather,
she was articulating a triangulation between, on the one hand, the loss of her body, the very dereliction of her
corporeal integrity, what Hortense Spillers charts as the transition from being a being to becoming a being for the
captor (206), the drama of value (the stage upon which surplus value is extracted from labor power through
commodity production and sale); and on the other, the corporeal integrity that, once ripped from her body, fortified
and extended the corporeal integrity of everyone else on the street. She gave birth to the commodity and to the
Human, yet she had neither subjectivity nor a sofa to show for it. In her eyes, the worldand not its myriad
discriminatory practices, but the world itselfwas unethical. And yet, the world passes by her without the slightest
inclination to stop and disabuse her of her claim. Instead, it calls her crazy. And to what does the world attribute the
Native American mans insanity? Hes crazy if he thinks hes getting any money out of us? Surely, that doesnt make
him crazy. Rather it is simply an indication that he does not have a big enough gun.
What are we to make of a world that responds to the most lucid enunciation of ethics with violence? What

are the foundational questions of the ethico-political? Why are these questions so
scandalous that they are rarely posed politically, intellectually, and cinematically
unless they are posed obliquely and unconsciously, as if by accident? Return Turtle Island to the Savage. Repair the
demolished subjectivity of the Slave. Two simple sentences, thirteen simple words, and the structure of U.S. (and
perhaps global) antagonisms would be dismantled. An ethical modernity would no longer sound like an oxymoron.
From there we could busy ourselves with important conflicts that have been promoted to the level of antagonisms:
class struggle, gender conflict, immigrants rights.

When pared down to thirteen words and two sentences, one cannot but wonder
why questions that go to the heart of the ethico-political, questions of political
ontology, are so unspeakable in intellectual meditations, political broadsides, and
even socially and politically engaged feature films. Clearly they can be spoken, even a child could speak
those lines, so they would pose no problem for a scholar, an activist, or a filmmaker. And yet, what is also clearif the
filmographies of socially and politically engaged directors, the archive of progressive scholars, and the plethora of
Left-wing broadsides are anything to go byis that what can so easily be spoken is now (five hundred years and two
hundred fifty million Settlers/Masters on) so ubiquitously unspoken that these two simple sentences, these thirteen
words not only render their speaker crazy but become themselves impossible to imagine. Soon it will be forty years
since radical politics, Left-leaning scholarship, and socially engaged feature films

began to speak the unspeakable.ii In the 1960s and early 1970s the questions asked
by radical politics and scholarship were not Should the U.S. be overthrown? or
even Would it be overthrown? but rather when and howand, for some, what
would come in its wake. Those steadfast in their conviction that there remained a
discernable quantum of ethics in the U.S. writ large (and here I am speaking of everyone from
Martin Luther King, Jr., prior to his 1968 shift, to the Tom Hayden wing of SDS, to the Julian Bond and Marion Barry
faction of SNCC, to Bobbie Kennedy Democrats) were accountable, in their rhetorical machinations, to the
paradigmatic zeitgeist of the Black Panthers, the American Indian Movement, and the Weather

Underground. Radicals and progressives could deride, reject, or chastise armed

struggle mercilessly and cavalierly with respect to tactics and the possibility of
success, but they could not dismiss revolution-as-ethic because they could not
make a convincing caseby way of a paradigmatic analysisthat the U.S. was an
ethical formation and still hope to maintain credibility as radicals and
progressives. Even Bobby Kennedy (a U.S. attorney general and presidential candidate) mused that the law and

its enforcers had no ethical standing in the presence of Blacks.iii One could (and many did) acknowledge Americas
strength and power. This seldom, however, rose to the level of an ethical assessment, but rather remained an
assessment of the so-called balance of forces. The political discourse of Blacks, and to a lesser extent
Indians, circulated too widely to credibly wed the U.S. and ethics. The raw force of
COINTELPRO put an end to this trajectory toward a possible hegemony of ethical accountability. Consequently, the
power of Blackness and Redness to pose the questionand the power to pose the question is the greatest power of
allretreated as did White radicals and progressives who retired from struggle. The questions echo lies buried in
the graves of young Black Panthers, AIM Warriors, and Black Liberation Army soldiers, or in prison cells where so
many of them have been rotting (some in solitary confinement) for ten, twenty, thirty years, and at the gates of the
academy where the crazies shout at passers-by. Gone are not only the young and vibrant voices that affected a
seismic shift on the political landscape, but also the intellectual protocols of inquiry, and with them a spate of feature
films that became authorized, if not by an unabashed revolutionary polemic, then certainly by a revolutionary
zeitgeist. Is it still possible for a dream of unfettered ethics, a dream of the Settlement and the Slave estatesiv
destruction, to manifest itself at the ethical core of cinematic discourse, when this dream is no longer a constituent
element of political discourse in the streets nor of intellectual discourse in the academy? The answer is no in the
sense that, as history has shown, what cannot be articulated as political discourse in the streets is doubly foreclosed
upon in screenplays and in scholarly prose; but yes in the sense that in even the most taciturn historical moments
such as ours, the grammar of Black and Red suffering breaks in on this foreclosure, albeit like the somatic compliance
of hysterical symptomsit registers in both cinema and scholarship as symptoms of awareness of the structural
antagonisms. Between 1967 and 1980, we could think cinematically and intellectually of Blackness and Redness as
having the coherence of full-blown discourses. But from 1980 to the present, Blackness and Redness manifests only in
the rebar of cinematic and intellectual (political) discourse, that is, as unspoken grammars. This grammar can be
discerned in the cinematic strategies (lighting, camera angles, image composition, and acoustic strategies/design),
even when the script labors for the spectator to imagine social turmoil through the rubric of conflict (that is, a rubric
of problems that can be posed and conceptually solved) as opposed to the rubric of antagonism (an irreconcilable
struggle between entities, or positionalities, the resolution of which is not dialectical but entails

the obliteration of one of the positions). In other words, even when films narrate a
story in which Blacks or Indians are beleaguered with problems that the script
insists are conceptually coherent (usually having to do with poverty or the absence
of family values), the non-narrative, or cinematic, strategies of the film often disrupt this coherence by

posing the irreconcilable questions of Red and Black political ontologyor non-ontology. The grammar of
antagonism breaks in on the mendacity of conflict. Semiotics and linguistics teach us that when we speak, our
grammar goes unspoken. Our grammar is assumed. It is the structure through which the labor of speech is possible.v
Likewise, the grammar of political ethicsthe grammar of assumptions regarding the
ontology of sufferingwhich underwrite Film Theory and political discourse (in this book, discourse
elaborated in direct relation to radical action), and which underwrite cinematic speech (in this book, Red, White, and
Black films from the mid-1960s to the present) is also unspoken. This notwithstanding, film theory, political
discourse, and cinema assume an ontological grammar, a structure of suffering. And the structure of

suffering which film theory, political discourse, and cinema assume crowds out
other structures of suffering, regardless of the sentiment of the film or the spirit of
unity mobilized by the political discourse in question. To put a finer point on it,
structures of ontological suffering stand in antagonistic, rather then conflictual,
relation to one another (despite the fact that antagonists themselves may not be
aware of the ontological positionality from which they speak). Though this is perhaps the
most controversial and out-of-step claim of this book, it is, nonetheless, the foundation of the close reading of feature
films and political theory that follows. The difficulty of a writing a book which seeks to uncover Red, Back, and White
socially engaged feature films as aesthetic accompaniments to grammars of suffering, predicated on the subject
positions of the Savage and the Slave is that todays intellectual protocols are not informed by Fanons insistence
that ontologyonce it is finally admitted as leaving existence by the waysidedoes
not permit us to understand the being of the black man [sic] (Black Skin, White Masks 110).
In sharp contrast to the late 60s and early 70s, we now live in a political, academic, and cinematic milieu which

stresses diversity, unity, civic participation, hybridity, access, and contribution. The radical fringe of
political discourse amounts to little more than a passionate dream of civic reform and social stability. The distance
between the protester and the police has narrowed considerably. The effect of this upon the academy

is that intellectual protocols tend to privilege two of the three domains of

subjectivity, namely preconscious interests (as evidenced in the work of social
science around political unity, social attitudes, civic participation, and
diversity,) and unconscious identification (as evidenced in the humanities
postmodern regimes of diversity, hybridity, and relative [rather than
master] narratives). Since the 1980s, intellectual protocols aligned with
structural positionality (except in the work of die-hard Marxists) have been kicked
to the curb. That is to say, it is hardly fashionable anymore to think the vagaries of power through the generic

positions within a structure of power relationssuch as man/woman, worker/boss. Instead, the academys ensembles
of questions are fixated on specific and unique experience of the myriad identities that make up those structural
positions. This would fine if the work led us back to a critique of the paradigm; but

most of it does not. Again, the upshot of this is that the intellectual protocols now
in play, and the composite effect of cinematic and political discourse since the
1980s, tend to hide rather than make explicit the grammar of suffering which

underwrites the US and its foundational antagonisms. This state of affairs exacerbatesor,
more precisely, mystifies and veilsthe ontological death of the Slave and the Savage because (as in the 1950s)
cinematic, political, and intellectual discourse of the current milieu resists being sanctioned and authorized by the
irreconcilable demands of Indigenism and Blacknessacademic enquiry is thus no more effective
in pursuing a revolutionary critique than the legislative antics of the loyal
opposition. This is how Left-leaning scholars help civil society recuperate and
maintain stability. But this stability is a state of emergency for Indians and Blacks.

Racism is the root cause of slavery ideological hierarchies and

Social Darwinism
UNESCO 1
(United Nations Educational, Social, and Cultural Organization, Slavery and Racism,
http://www.unesco.org/bpi/eng/unescopress/2001/01-91e.shtml, acc. 7/4/14, arh)
Durban (South Africa), September 4 (No.2001-91) - The transatlantic slave trade saw the
greatest deportation in history. From the mid 15th century to the closing decades of the 19th
century tens of millions of Africans were brutally wrenched from their villages and transported
to the plantations and mines of the Americas and West Indies. The impact of this
unprecedented movement is still burdening the descendants of these stolen
people, and the continent that was their home. UNESCO is organizing a panel debate on
The Slave Route: Slavery and Racism at the World Conference against Racism and Xenophobia
in Durban (South Africa). The debate will examine the causes and consequences of the African
slave trade along with its ideological and legal foundations. It will also explore the links between
racism and slavery. Slavery is a universal phenomenon. The ancient Greeks first
institutionalised it, and countries and civilisations everywhere and throughout
history have practised it. Nonetheless, the transatlantic trade is unique in history.
Over four centuries it developed into a major industry that, in the 18th century, fuelled the world
economy. No-one really knows how many men, women and children left Africa in
the holds of slave ships, but historians agree that it changed the continents
demography. In the boom decade from 1783, with record prices being fetched for
black gold, French ports alone despatched more than 1,100 slave ships to the
coasts of Africa. According to French historian Jean-Michel Deveau, between 10 and 15
million Africans were deported in the 18th and 19th centuries. Before that we dont know. And
for every slave who made it to the New World, several others died on the way. The death rate on

the ships was 15 to 18%, says Deveau, but many were killed during attacks on their villages or
while they were being marched to the coast. In some places, women about to be captured killed
their own children. The racial nature of this triangular trade between Africa,
Europe and the Americas also sets it apart. The trade was supported by a racist
ideology that saw white people as being the most perfectly developed and blacks
as being at the bottom of the ladder. This was reinforced by the French Code Noir (Black
Code). Published as an edict by Louis XIV in March 1685, its 60-odd articles regulated the way
black slaves lived and died in French possessions in the West Indies and Indian Ocean. In 1724,
the same legislation was extended to cover the American territory of Louisiana.
The code clearly defines slaves a moveable property, people unfit to possess or
contract in their own right. Although racism against blacks was not born with the
transatlantic trade, it was legitimized by it and remains one of its most tragic
legacies.

AT: Cap Root Cause

Enslavement
Capitalism may have been the initial reason why slaves were
captured, but racism serves as the grounds for how they were
enslaved
Maller No date (post 2011) (Katherine, William Macauly University,
http://macaulay.cuny.edu/eportfolios/kmaller/writing/academic/capitalism-slavery-and-thebirth-of-racism/, Post 2011, acc. 7/6/14, arh)
The results of this system become clear in The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah
Equiano, in which Equiano, among other hardships experienced as a slave, describes the Middle
Passage between African and America. The absolutely pestilential (Equiano, 424) conditions
in which the African slaves were kept were certainly inhumane, but the cruelty of the white
sailors exacerbated the misery. The slaves were not well fed, and when they sought their own
means of sustenance, they suffered some very severe floggings. (Equiano, 425) Given the
myth that slavery was always racialized , one would assume that this cruelty was the
product of the white sailors hatred of these black slaves. However, Equiano also describes an
incident in which the white sailors flogged [one of their own] unmercifully. (Equiano, 425)
This removes race as the motivation for cruelty. The inhumane treatment of slaves confirms
that slaves were viewed as commodities instead of people. The equally inhumane
treatment of a white sailor would then confirm that the sailors, too, were
commodities in the capitalist system that they served . They, along with the slaves they
shipped, were the laboring subjects of the Atlantic economy, (Linebaugh and Rediker, 111) the
slaves that were essential to the rise of capitalism. (Linebaugh and Rediker, 28)

False History
Their approach to antebellum slavery is reliant upon a false history
slavery was not founded upon racial antagonism but rather economic
exploitation
Alexander 10 (Michelle, associate professor of law, Ohio State University, Kirwan Institute
for the Study of Race and Ethnicity, former director of ACLUs Racial Justice Project, J.D.,
Stanford Law School, The new Jim Crow: Mass Incaceration in the Age of Colorblindness, The
New Press 2010, pg 23-25, wcp)
The concept of race is a relatively recent development. Only in the past few centuries,
owing largely to European imperialism, have the world's people been classified
along racial lines.4 Here, in America, the idea of race emerged as a means of reconciling
chattel slaveryas well as the extermination of American Indianswith the ideals of freedom
preached by whites in the new colonies. In the early colonial period, when settlements
remained relatively small, indentured servitude was the dominant means of securing cheap
labor. Under this system, whites and blacks struggled to survive against a common
enemy, what historian Lerone Bennett Jr. describes as "the big planter apparatus and a social
system that legalized terror against black and white bondsmen."5 Initially, blacks brought to
this country were not all enslaved; many were treated as indentured servants. As plantation
farming expanded, particularly tobacco and cotton farming, demand increased greatly for both
labor and land. 222he demand for land was met by invading and conquering larger and larger
swaths of territory. American Indians became a growing impediment to white European
"progress," and during this period, the images of American Indians promoted in books,
newspapers, and magazines became increasingly negative. As sociologists Keith Kilty and Eric
Swank have observed, eliminating "savages" is less of a moral problem than eliminating human
beings, and therefore American Indians came to be understood as a lesser raceuncivilized
savages thus providing a justification for the extermination of the native peoples.6 The
growing demand for labor on plantations was met through slavery. American Indians were
considered unsuitable as slaves, largely because native tribes were clearly in a position to fight
back. The fear of raids by Indian tribes led plantation owners to grasp for an alternative source
of free labor. European immigrants were also deemed poor candidates for slavery, not because
of their race, but rather because they were in short supply and enslavement would,
quite naturally, interfere with voluntary immigration to the new colonies.
Plantation owners thus viewed Africans, who were relatively powerless, as the ideal slaves. The
systematic enslavement of Africans, and the rearing of their children under bondage, emerged
with all deliberate speedquickened by events such as Bacon's Rebellion. Nathaniel
Bacon was a white property owner in Jamestown, Virginia, who managed to unite slaves,
indentured servants, and poor whites in a revolutionary effort to overthrow the planter elite.
Although slaves clearly occupied the lowest position in the social hierarchy and suffered the
most under the plantation system, the condition of indentured whites was barely better, and the
majority of free whites lived in extreme poverty. As explained by historian Edmund Morgan, in
colonies like Virginia, the planter elite, with huge land grants, occupied a vastly superior
position to workers of all colors.7 Southern colonies did not hesitate to invent ways to extend
the terms of servitude, and the planter class accumulated uncultivated lands to restrict the
options of free workers. The simmering resentment against the planter class created conditions
that were ripe for revolt. Varying accounts of Bacon's rebellion abound, but the basic facts are
these: Bacon developed plans in 1675 to seize Native American lands in order to acquire more
property for himself and others and nullify the threat of Indian raids. When the planter elite in
Virginia refused to provide militia support for his scheme, Bacon retaliated, leading an attack
on the elite, their homes, and their property. He openly condemned the rich for their

oppression of the poor and inspired an alliance of white and black bond laborers,
as well as slaves, who demanded an end to their servitude. The attempted revolution
was ended by force and false promises of amnesty. A number of the people who participated in
the revolt were hanged. The events in Jamestown were alarming to the planter elite, who were
deeply fearful of the multiracial alliance of bond workers and slaves. Word of Bacon's Rebellion
spread far and wide, and several more uprisings of a similar type followed. In an effort to
protect their superior status and economic position, the planters shifted their
strategy for maintaining dominance. They abandoned their heavy reliance on
indentured servants in favor of the importation of more black slaves. Instead of
importing English-speaking slaves from the West Indies, who were more likely to be familiar
with European language and culture, many more1 slaves were shipped directly from Africa.
These slaves would be far easier to control and far less likely to form alliances with poor whites.
Fearful that such measures might not be sufficient to protect their interests, the planter class
took an additional precautionary step, a step that would later come to be known as a "racial
bribe." Deliberately and strategically, the planter class extended special privileges to poor whites
in an effort to drive a wedge between them and black slaves. White settlers were allowed
greater access to Native American lands, white servants were allowed to police slaves through
slave patrols and militias, and barriers were created so that free labor would not be placed in
competition with slave labor. These measures effectively eliminated the risk of future alliances
between black slaves and poor whites. Poor whites suddenly had a direct, personal stake in the
223xistence of a race-based system of slavery. Their own plight had not improved by much, but
at least they were not slaves. Once the planter elite split the labor force, poor whites
responded to the logic of their situation and sought ways to expand their racially
privileged position.8

Anti-blackness is an incorrect understanding of slavery sole focus

on racial violence crowds out focus on the material conditions that
created the brutality prevents collective organization
Reed 13 (Adolph, Django Unchained, or, The Help: How Cultural Politics Is Worse Than
No Politics at All, and Why, Nonsite Issue #9, February 25th,
http://nonsite.org/feature/django-unchained-or-the-help-how-cultural-politics-is-worse-thanno-politics-at-all-and-why, thx Gtown AM, wcp)
On reflection, its possible to see that Django Unchained and The Help are basically different
versions of the same movie. Both dissolve political economy and social relations into
individual quests and interpersonal transactions and thus effectively sanitize, respectively,
slavery and Jim Crow by dehistoricizing them. The problem is not so much that each film
invents cartoonish fictions; its that the point of the cartoons is to take the place of the actual
relations of exploitation that anchored the regime it depicts. In The Help the buffoonishly
bigoted housewife, Hilly, obsessively pushes a pet bill that would require employers of black
domestic servants to provide separate, Jim Crow toilets for them; in Django Unchained the
sensibility of 1970s blaxploitation imagines comfort girls and Mandingo fighters as
representative slave job descriptions. Its as if Jim Crow had nothing to do with cheap labor and
slavery had nothing to do with making slave owners rich. And the point here is not just that they
get the past wrongits that the particular way they get it wrong enables them to get the present
just as wrong and so their politics are as misbegotten as their history. Thus, for example, its
only the dehistoricization that makes each films entirely neoliberal (they could have been
scripted by Oprah) happy ending possible. The Help ends with Skeeter and the black lead, the
maid Aibileen, embarking joyfully on the new, excitingly uncharted paths their bookan
account of the master-servant relationship told from the perspective of the servantshas
opened for them. But dehistoricization makes it possible not to notice the great distance
between those paths and their likely trajectories. For Skeeter the book from which the film takes

its name opens a career in the fast track of the journalism and publishing industry. Aibileens
new path was forced upon her because the book got her fired from her intrinsically precarious
job, more at-whim than at-will, in one of the few areas of employment available to working-class
black women in the segregationist Souththe precise likelihood that had made her and other
maids initially reluctant to warm to Skeeters project. Yet Aibileen smiles and strides ever more
confidently as she walks home because she has found and articulated her voice. The implication
is that having been fired, rather than portending deeper poverty and economic insecurity, was a
moment of liberation; Aibileen, armed with the confidence and self-knowledge conferred by
knowing her voice, was now free to venture out into a world of unlimited opportunity and
promise. This, of course, is pure neoliberal bullshit, of the same variety that permits the odious
Michelle Rhee to assert with a straight face that teachers defined-benefit pensions deny them
choice and thereby undermine the quality of public education. But who knows? Perhaps
Skeeter brought with her from the 2000s an NGO to arrange microcredit that would enable
Aibileen to start up a culturally authentic pie-making venture or a day spa for harried and
stressed domestic servants. In the Jackson, Mississippi of 1963, no such options would exist for
Aibileen. Instead, she most likely would be blackballed and unable to find a comparable menial
job and forced to toil under even more undesirable conditions. Django Unchained ends with the
hero and his lady fair riding happily off into the sunset after he has vanquished evil slave owners
and their henchmen and henchwomen. Django and Broomhildawhose name is spelled like
that of the 1970s comic strip character, not the figure in Norse mythology, presumably a
pointless Tarantino inside jokeare free. However, their freedom was not won by his prodigious
bloodletting; it was obtained within the legal framework that accepted and regulated property
rights in slaves. Each had been purchased and manumitted by the German bounty hunter who,
as others have noted, is the only character in the film to condemn slavery as an institution.
Django is no insurrectionist. His singular focus from beginning to end is on reclaiming his wife
from her slave master. Presumably, we are to understand this solipsism as indicative of the
depth and intensity of his love, probably also as homage to the borderline sociopathic style of
the spaghetti western/blaxploitation hero. Regardless, Djangos quest is entirely individualist;
he never intends to challenge slavery and never does. Indeed, for the purpose of buttressing the
credibility of their ruse, he even countermands his bounty hunter partners attempt to save
through purchase, of coursea recalcitrant Mandingo fighter from being ripped apart by dogs.
He is essentially indifferent to the handful of slaves who are freed as incidental byproducts of his
actions. The happy ending is that he and Broomhilda ride off together and free in a slavocracy
that is not a whit less secure at the moment of celebratory resolution than it was when Django
set out on his mission of retrieval and revenge. In both films the bogus happy endings are
possible only because they characterize their respective regimes of racial hierarchy in the
superficial terms of interpersonal transactions. In The Help segregationisms evil was smallminded bigotry and lack of sensitivity; it was more like bad manners than oppression. In
Tarantinos vision, slaverys definitive injustice was its gratuitous and sadistic
brutalization and sexualized degradation. Malevolent, ludicrously arrogant whites owned
slaves most conspicuously to degrade and torture them. Apart from serving a formal dinner in a
plantation houseand Tarantino, the Chance the Gardener of American filmmakers (and Best
Original Screenplay? Really?) seems to draw his images of plantation life from Birth of a Nation
and Gone With the Wind, as well as old Warner Brothers cartoonsand the Mandingo fighters
and comfort girls, Tarantinos slaves do no actual work at all; theyre present only to be
brutalized. In fact, the cavalier sadism with which owners and traders treat them belies the fact
that slaves were, first and foremost, capital investments. Its not for nothing that New Orleans
has a monument to the estimated 20,000-30,000 antebellum Irish immigrants who died
constructing the New Basin Canal; slave labor was too valuable for such lethal work. The Help
trivializes Jim Crow by reducing it to its most superficial features and irrational extremes. The
master-servant nexus was, and is, a labor relation. And the problem of labor relations particular

to the segregationist regime wasnt employers bigoted lack of respect or failure to hear the
voices of the domestic servants, or even benighted refusal to recognize their equal humanity. It
was that the labor relation was structured within and sustained by a political and institutional
order that severely impinged on, when it didnt altogether deny, black citizens avenues for
pursuit of grievances and standing before the law. The crucial lynchpin of that order was neither
myopia nor malevolence; it was suppression of black citizens capacities for direct participation
in civic and political life, with racial disfranchisement and the constant threat of terror intrinsic
to substantive denial of equal protection and due process before the law as its principal
mechanisms. And the point of the regime wasnt racial hatred or enforced disregard; its roots lay
in the much more prosaic concern of dominant elites to maintain their political and economic
hegemony by suppressing potential opposition and in the linked ideal of maintaining access to a
labor force with no options but to accept employment on whatever terms employers offered.
(Those who liked The Help or found it moving should watch The Long Walk Home, a 1990 film
set in Montgomery, Alabama, around the bus boycott. I suspect thats the film you thought you
were watching when you saw The Help.) Django Unchained trivializes slavery by reducing it to
its most barbaric and lurid excesses. Slavery also was fundamentally a labor relation. It was a
form of forced labor regulatedsystematized, enforced and sustainedthrough a political and
institutional order that specified it as a civil relationship granting owners absolute control over
the life, liberty, and fortunes of others defined as eligible for enslavement, including most of all
control of the conditions of their labor and appropriation of its product. Historian Kenneth M.
Stampp quotes a slaveholders succinct explanation: For what purpose does the master
hold the servant? asked an ante-bellum Southerner. Is it not that by his labor, he,
the master, may accumulate wealth?1 That absolute control permitted horrible,
unthinkable brutality, to be sure, but perpetrating such brutality was neither the
point of slavery nor its essential injustice. The master-slave relationship could, and did,
exist without brutality, and certainly without sadism and sexual degradation. In Tarantinos
depiction, however, it is not clear that slavery shorn of its extremes of brutality would be
objectionable. It does not diminish the historical injustice and horror of slavery to note that it
was not the product of sui generis, transcendent Evil but a terminus on a continuum of bound
labor that was more norm than exception in the Anglo-American world until well into the
eighteenth century, if not later. As legal historian Robert Steinfeld points out, it is not so much
slavery, but the emergence of the notion of free laboras the absolute control of a worker over
her personthat is the historical anomaly that needs to be explained.2 Django Unchained
sanitizes the essential injustice of slavery by not problematizing it and by focusing instead on the
extremes of brutality and degradation it permitted, to the extent of making some of them up,
just as does The Help regarding Jim Crow. The Help could not imagine a more honest and
complex view of segregationist Mississippi partly because it uses the period ultimately as a prop
for human interest clich, and Django Unchaineds absurdly ahistorical view of plantation
slavery is only backdrop for the merger of spaghetti western and blaxploitation hero movie.
Neither film is really about the period in which it is set. Film critic Manohla Dargis, reflecting a
decade ago on what she saw as a growing Hollywood penchant for period films, observed that
such films are typically stripped of politics and historical factand instead will find meaning in
appealing to seemingly timeless ideals and stirring scenes of love, valor and compassion and
that the Hollywood professionals who embrace accuracy most enthusiastically nowadays are
costume designers.3 That observation applies to both these films, although in Django concern
with historically accurate representation of material culture applies only to the costumes and
props of the 1970s film genres Tarantino wants to recall. To make sense of how Django
Unchained has received so much warmer a reception among black and leftoid commentators
than did The Help, it is useful to recall Margaret Thatchers 1981 dictum that economics are the
method: the object is to change the soul.4 Simply put, she and her element have won. Few
observersamong opponents and boosters alikehave noted how deeply and thoroughly both

films are embedded in the practical ontology of neoliberalism, the complex of unarticulated
assumptions and unexamined first premises that provide its common sense, its lifeworld.
Objection to The Help has been largely of the shooting fish in a barrel variety: complaints about
the films paternalistic treatment of the maids, which generally have boiled down to an objection
that the master-servant relation is thematized at all, as well as the standard, predictable litany of
anti-racist charges about whites speaking for blacks, the films inattentiveness to the fact that at
that time in Mississippi black people were busily engaged in liberating themselves, etc. An
illustration of this tendency that conveniently refers to several other variants of it is Akiba
Solomon, Why Im Just Saying No to The Help and Its Historical Whitewash in Color Lines,
August 10, 2011, available at:
http://colorlines.com/archives/2011/08/why_im_just_saying_no_to_the_help.html.
Defenses of Django Unchained pivot on claims about the social significance of the narrative of a
black hero. One node of this argument emphasizes the need to validate a history of autonomous
black agency and resistance as a politico-existential desideratum. It accommodates a view that
stresses the importance of recognition of rebellious or militant individuals and revolts in black
American history. Another centers on a notion that exposure to fictional black heroes can
inculcate the sense of personal efficacy necessary to overcome the psychological effects of
inequality and to facilitate upward mobility and may undermine some whites negative
stereotypes about black people. In either register assignment of social or political importance to
depictions of black heroes rests on presumptions about the nexus of mass cultural
representation, social commentary, and racial justice that are more significant politically than
the controversy about the film itself. In both versions, this argument casts political and
economic problems in psychological terms. Injustice appears as a matter of disrespect and
denial of due recognition, and the remedies proposedwhich are all about images projected and
the distribution of jobs associated with their projectionlook a lot like self-esteem engineering.
Moreover, nothing could indicate more strikingly the extent of neoliberal ideological hegemony
than the idea that the mass culture industry and its representational practices constitute a
meaningful terrain for struggle to advance egalitarian interests. It is possible to entertain that
view seriously only by ignoring the fact that the production and consumption of mass culture is
thoroughly embedded in capitalist material and ideological imperatives. That, incidentally, is
why I prefer the usage mass culture to describe this industry and its products and processes,
although I recognize that it may seem archaic to some readers. The mass culture v. popular
culture debate dates at least from the 1950s and has continued with occasional crescendos ever
since.5 For two decades or more, instructively in line with the retreat of possibilities for
concerted left political action outside the academy, the popular culture side of that debate has
been dominant, along with its view that the products of this precinct of mass consumption
capitalism are somehow capable of transcending or subverting their material identity as
commodities, if not avoiding that identity altogether. Despite the dogged commitment of several
generations of American Studies and cultural studies graduate students who want to valorize
watching television and immersion in hip-hop or other specialty market niches centered on
youth recreation and the most ephemeral fads as both intellectually avant-garde and politically
resistive, it should be time to admit that that earnest disposition is intellectually shallow and
an ersatz politics. The idea of popular culture posits a spurious autonomy and organicism that
actually affirm mass industrial processes by effacing them, especially in the putatively rebel,
fringe, or underground market niches that depend on the fiction of the authentic to announce
the birth of new product cycles. The power of the hero is a cathartic trope that connects mainly
with the sensibility of adolescent boysof whatever nominal age. Tarantino has allowed as
much, responding to black critics complaints about the violence and copious use of nigger by
proclaiming Even for the films biggest detractors, I think their children will grow up and love
this movie. I think it could become a rite of passage for young black males.6 This response
stems no doubt from Tarantinos arrogance and opportunism, and some critics have denounced

it as no better than racially presumptuous. But he is hardly alone in defending the film with an
assertion that it gives black youth heroes, is generically inspirational or both. Similarly, in a
January 9, 2012 interview on the Daily Show, George Lucas adduced this line to promote his
even more execrable race-oriented live-action cartoon, Red Tails, which, incidentally, trivializes
segregation in the military by reducing it to a matter of bad or outmoded attitudes. The ironic
effect is significant understatement of both the obstacles the Tuskegee airmen faced and their
actual accomplishments by rendering them as backdrop for a blackface, slapped-together
remake of Top Gun. (Norman Jewisons 1984 film, A Soldiers Story, adapted from Charles
Fullers A Soldiers Play, is a much more sensitive and thought-provoking rumination on the
complexities of race and racism in the Jim Crow U.S. Armyan army mobilized, as my father, a
veteran of the Normandy invasion, never tired of remarking sardonically, to fight the racist
Nazis.) Lucas characterized his film as patriotic, even jingoistic and was explicit that he
wanted to create a film that would feature real heroes and would be inspirational for teenage
boys. Much as Django Unchaineds defenders compare it on those terms favorably to Lincoln,
Lucas hyped Red Tails as being a genuine hero story unlike Glory, where you have a lot of white
officers running those guys into cannon fodder. Of course, the film industry is sharply tilted
toward the youth market, as Lucas and Tarantino are acutely aware. But Lucas, unlike
Tarantino, was not being defensive in asserting his desire to inspire the young; he offered it
more as a boast. As he has said often, hed wanted for years to make a film about the Tuskegee
airmen, and he reports that he always intended telling their story as a feel-good, crossover
inspirational tale. Telling it that way also fits in principle (though in this instance not in practice,
as Red Tails bombed at the box office) with the commercial imperatives of increasingly degraded
mass entertainment. Dargis observed that the ahistoricism of the recent period films is
influenced by market imperatives in a global film industry. The more a film is tied to historically
specific contexts, the more difficult it is to sell elsewhere. That logic selects for special effectsdriven products as well as standardized, decontextualized and simplisticuniversalstory
lines, preferably set in fantasy worlds of the filmmakers design. As Dargis notes, these films find
their meaning in shopworn clichs puffed up as timeless verities, including uplifting and
inspirational messages for youth. But something else underlies the stress on inspiration in the
black-interest films, which shows up in critical discussion of them as well. All these filmsThe
Help, Red Tails, Django Unchained, even Lincoln and Glorymake a claim to public attention
based partly on their social significance beyond entertainment or art, and they do so because
they engage with significant moments in the history of the nexus of race and politics in the
United States. There would not be so much discussion and debate and no Golden Globe, NAACP
Image, or Academy Award nominations for The Help, Red Tails, or Django Unchained if those
films werent defined partly by thematizing that nexus of race and politics in some way. The
pretensions to social significance that fit these films into their particular market niche dont
conflict with the mass-market film industrys imperative of infantilization because those
pretensions are only part of the show; they are little more than empty bromides, product
differentiation in the patter of seemingly timeless ideals which the mass entertainment
industry constantly recycles. (Andrew OHehir observes as much about Django Unchained,
which he describes as a three-hour trailer for a movie that never happens.7) That comes
through in the defense of these films, in the face of evidence of their failings, that, after all, they
are just entertainment. Their substantive content is ideological; it is their contribution to the
naturalization of neoliberalisms ontology as they propagandize its universalization across
spatial, temporal, and social contexts. Purportedly in the interest of popular education cum
entertainment, Django Unchained and The Help, and Red Tails for that matter, read the
sensibilities of the present into the past by divesting the latter of its specific historicity. They
reinforce the sense of the past as generic old-timey times distinguishable from the present by
superficial inadequaciesoutmoded fashion, technology, commodities and ideassince
overcome. In The Help Hillys obsession with her pet project marks segregations petty

apartheid as irrational in part because of the expense rigorously enforcing it would require; the
breadwinning husbands express their frustration with it as financially impractical. Hilly is a
mean-spirited, narrow-minded person whose rigid and tone-deaf commitment to segregationist
consistency not only reflects her limitations of character but also is economically unsound, a fact
that further defines her, and the cartoon version of Jim Crow she represents, as irrational. The
deeper message of these films, insofar as they deny the integrity of the past, is that there is no
thinkable alternative to the ideological order under which we live. This message is reproduced
throughout the mass entertainment industry; it shapes the normative reality even of the fantasy
worlds that masquerade as escapism. Even among those who laud the supposedly cathartic
effects of Djangos insurgent violence as reflecting a greater truth of abolition than passage of
the Thirteenth Amendment, few commentators notice that he and Broomhilda attained their
freedom through a market transaction.8 This reflects an ideological hegemony in which students
all too commonly wonder why planters would deny slaves or sharecroppers education because
education would have made them more productive as workers. And, tellingly, in a glowing
rumination in the Daily Kos, Ryan Brooke inadvertently thrusts mass cultures destruction of
historicity into bold relief by declaiming on the segregated society presented in Django
Unchained and babbling onwith the absurdly ill-informed and pontifical self-righteousness
that the blogosphere enablesabout our need to take responsibility for preserving racial
divides if we are to put segregation in the past and fully fulfill Dr. Kings dream.9 Its all an
indistinguishable mush of bad stuff about racial injustice in the old-timey days. Decoupled from
its moorings in a historically specific political economy, slavery becomes at bottom a problem of
race relations, and, as historian Michael R. West argues forcefully, race relations emerged
as and has remained a discourse that substitutes etiquette for equality.10 This is the
context in which we should take account of what inspiring the young means as a justification
for those films. In part, the claim to inspire is a simple platitude, more filler than substance. It
is, as Ive already noted, both an excuse for films that are cartoons made for an infantilized,
generic market and an assertion of a claim to a particular niche within that market. More
insidiously, though, the ease with which inspiration of youth rolls out in this context resonates
with three related and disturbing themes: 1) underclass ideologys narrativesnow all
Americans common sensethat link poverty and inequality most crucially to (racialized)
cultural inadequacy and psychological damage; 2) the belief that racial inequality stems from
prejudice, bad ideas and ignorance, and 3) the cognate of both: the neoliberal rendering of social
justice as equality of opportunity, with an aspiration of creating competitive individual
minority agents who might stand a better fighting chance in the neoliberal rat race rather than a
positive alternative vision of a society that eliminates the need to fight constantly against
disruptive market whims in the first place.11 This politics seeps through in the chatter about
Django Unchained in particular. Erin Aubry Kaplan, in the Los Angeles Times article in which
Tarantino asserts his appeal to youth, remarks that the most disturbing detail [about slavery] is
the emotional violence and degradation directed at blacks that effectively keeps them at the
bottom of the social order, a place they still occupy today. Writing on the Institute of the Black
World blog, one Dr. Kwa David Whitaker, a 1960s-style cultural nationalist, declaims on
Djangos testament to the sources of degradation and unending servitude [that] has rendered
[black Americans] almost incapable of making sound evaluations of our current situations or the
kind of steps we must take to improve our condition.12 In its blindness to political economy,
this notion of black cultural or psychological damage as either a legacy of slavery or of more
indirect recent origine.g., urban migration, crack epidemic, matriarchy, babies making
babiescomports well with the reduction of slavery and Jim Crow to interpersonal dynamics
and bad attitudes. It substitutes a politics of recognition and a patter of racial uplift for politics
and underwrites a conflation of political action and therapy. With respect to the nexus of race
and inequality, this discourse supports victim-blaming programs of personal rehabilitation and
self-esteem engineeringinspirationas easily as it does multiculturalist respect for difference,

which, by the way, also feeds back to self-esteem engineering and inspiration as nodes within a
larger political economy of race relations. Either way, this is a discourse that displaces a politics
challenging social structures that reproduce inequality with concern for the feelings and
characteristics of individuals and of categories of population statistics reified as singular groups
that are equivalent to individuals. This discourse has made it possible (again, but more
sanctimoniously this time) to characterize destruction of low-income housing as an uplift
strategy for poor people; curtailment of access to public education as choice; being cut adrift
from essential social wage protections as empowerment; and individual material success as
socially important role modeling. Neoliberalisms triumph is affirmed with unselfconscious
clarity in the ostensibly leftist defenses of Django Unchained that center on the theme of slaves
having liberated themselves. Trotskyists, would-be anarchists, and psychobabbling identitarians
have their respective sectarian garnishes: Trotskyists see everywhere the bugbear of
bureaucratism and mystify self-activity; anarchists similarly fetishize direct action and
voluntarism and oppose large-scale public institutions on principle, and identitarians
romanticize essentialist notions of organic, folkish authenticity under constant threat from
institutions. However, all are indistinguishable from the nominally libertarian right in their
disdain for government and institutionally based political action, which their common
reflex is to disparage as inauthentic or corrupt.

Their use of a false history prevents the development of accurate

accounts of oppression renders their strategy useless
Wilki 12 (Assistant Professor of Cultural and Digital Studies U Wisconsin-La Crosse,
Capitalisms Posthuman Empire, The Red Critique Vol. 14, Fall/Winter, thx Gtown AM, wcp)
Despite their differences, what each film relies on in re-writing the contradictions of race and
class as an epistemological confrontation between human and animal is what Derrida theorizes
as "the gaze of the absolute other" (11); that is, the "gaze of the animal" which "offers to my sight
the abyssal limit of the human: the inhuman or the ahuman" (12). For example, during his time
on the farm Lurie begins to work at the local rescue shelter/veterinary hospital and, as part of
his transition to an "ethical" posthumanist, helps to euthanize the dogs and take them to the
incinerator. Most significantly in this context, since it ultimately reflects the "realization" that
Lurie undergoes over the course of the film, the attack on Lucy and him occurs after he has just
told a story about the "ignobility" of a male dog that was beaten until he hated his own desire. As
part of the attack the young men shoot Lucy's dogs, which is meant to signal a sharp contrast to
Lurie's adopting of an "ethical" approach at the veterinary clinic. What he ultimately comes to
see is that recasting his identity in the new post-Apartheid landscape will mean, in his words,
being "humiliated like a dog." This, however, is meant to indicate not simply a personal
humiliation, but, by the end of the film, an inversion of his previous egoist "self" and, through
identification with animals perspective, the full recognition of the epistemological conditions
which produce otherness. When, at the conclusion of the film, Lurie leaves his car at the top of
the mountain and walks down to Lucy's farm for tea, giving up on his silent protest at the "deal"
that Lucy has made with Petrus to become her "wife" in exchange for protection from future
attacks, the viewer has been positioned to see him as no longer able to act on his desires and
thus having been reduced to being "a dog." In this way, we are meant to see the deep connection
that Lurie makes between humans and animals. He sees that to be other, whether human or
animal, means being "humiliated" by those in power. Of course, the image of the white professor
who is powerless in the face of the black farmers completely inverts the reality of social relations
in South Africa, in which unemployment is listed as anywhere from 31% to 42%, falling largely
on the black population (Zeiling and Ceruti). But this, I argue, is the point. Posthumanism is an
ideology which separates culture from reality and, instead, posits that regardless of the
economic, social reality is always driven by divisions which violently classify those whose desires
place them outside the "normal" bounds of society. In District 9 the relationship between race

and class is represented through the relay of science fiction. In the film, we learn that the
extraterrestrials literally emerge from nowhere, as their ship suddenly appeared without
warning in the sky over Johannesburg. It is only when the humans cut into the ship and find the
aliens living in deplorable conditions with no seeming purpose that "first contact" is made.
While later in the film we learn that MNU is one of the world's leading arms manufacturers and
their interest in managing the situation is obtaining the alien's weapon technology, there is no
reason given for the initial segregation of the aliens into townships except their "animal-like"
difference. In other words, like the post-historical conclusion of Disgrace, District 9 turns the
modern history of exploitation and oppression into an ahistorical fear of the other driven by the
instrumental desire to "capture" all life in reductive classifications. Similar to Lurie's taking up
of the dog's perspective, it is through Wikus' adopting of the "prawns'" perspective that we learn
that it is "bad" to "capture" or "impose" upon life conditions which are alien to its existencejust
as Derrida and Agamben suggestbutalso like Agamben and Derridanot where these terms
come from. Wikus' decision at the film's conclusion to sacrifice his own life to make sure that
Christopher Johnson and his son escape is thus meant to signify the posthumanist realization
that social change hinges on the individual decision of how one approaches the other. There is
no broad social movement, no social collectivity, only the ethical acts of one for the other, one in
debt to the other. Thus, Wikus (and the viewer) end the film with the hope that the future will be
different, simply through the act of individual ethics. This is the limit of the posthumanist theory
of "difference." Insofar as it defines otherness, oppression, and exploitation as the effect of an
instrumental logic of classification which is endemic to all social relations, it denies that there is
any history to the ways in which people live. Instead, transformative theory becomes an "ethical"
praxis that, in the words of Agamben, "must face a problem and a particular situation each and
every time" (What is An Apparatus? 9). In this way, it becomes impossible to suggest that
exploitation and oppression are inherent to capitalism or would be any different under any
alternative mode of production. In fact, Hardt and Negri argue precisely this when they declare
that "Socialism and capitalismare both regimes of property that exclude the common" (ix).
The consequence is that posthumanism effectively naturalizes capitalism by denying what Marx
calls "species-being"the basis of human freedom in the collectivity of laborand replacing it
instead with what Agamben calls "special being" or that which "without resembling any
otherrepresents all others" (Profanations 59). When Agamben proclaims that, "To be special
[far specie] can mean to surprise and astonish (in a negative sense) by not fitting into
established rules, but the notion that individuals constitute a species and belong together in a
homogeneous class tends to be reassuring" (59) he replicates the bourgeois theory of difference
which, as Marx writes, is based upon "an individual separated from the community, withdrawn
into himself, wholly preoccupied with his private interest and acting in accordance with his
private caprice" such that "far from being considered, in the rights of man, as a species-being; on
the contrary, species-life itselfsocietyappears as a system which is external to the individual
and as a limitation of his original independence" (On the Jewish Question 43). In other words,
the very nature of the division of labor under capitalism causes workers to blame ahistorical
notions of "society" and "government" for the contradictions which reside in the economic and,
in turn, seek refuge in the "freedom" of individuality which bourgeois society promises. In this
way, when Agamben writes that "The transformation of the species into a principle of identity
and classification is the original sin of our culture, its most implacable apparatus [dispositivo]"
(60), he reproduces the sense with which people respond to capitalist exploitation by blaming
the very idea of "society," rather than the society of exploitation. By taking the question of
identity and difference out of the social, Agamben turns exploitation into an existential crisis
which can only be resolved by the ethical recognition of difference on its own terms, leaving the
contradictions of society intact. This is how the posthumanist theories of identity return to the
same structures of representation they claim to oppose because their opposition does not move
beyond the economic structures of capitalism. Both the Hegelian theory of "recognition" and the

posthuman theory of "singularity" are ultimately theories of the isolated individual, which is an
ideological fiction arising alongside capitalism (a la "Robinson Crusoe") as a result of the
economic shift toward wage-labor. They consequently substitute for more radical theories of
freedom from the market the freedom of the individual in the market, as if rigid structures of
social interpretations and not the system of wage-labor were holding the individual back. If we
are to truly see the world differently, not just as isolated individuals, but as a
united community which uses new technologies for freeing people from the
drudgery of wage labor and its corresponding ideologies of racism, sexism,
homophobia, and other forms of oppression, what is necessary is a social
transformation that ends the exploitation of labor upon which capitalism is based.
Pluralizing identities doesnt challenge the logic of exploitation, but actually expands it since
private property establishes individual responsibility as the very basis of one's "natural"
existence by stripping people of any means of survival outside of wage-labor. Thus, retreating
into individualism is merely the ideological mask which is placed over the subsumption of all life
under the profit motive. However, as Marx writes, regardless of appearances, "the individual is
the social being. His life, even if it may not appear in the direct form of a communal life carried
out together with others is an expression and confirmation of social life" (86). Although
posthumanism turns the alienation of the worker under capitalism into the very pre-condition of
all culture, I argue that it is only by freeing labor from the restrictions of capitalist exploitation
that, we can, as Marx writes, end racial oppression and find a "genuine resolution of the conflict
between man and nature and between man and manthe true resolution of the strife between
existence and essence, between objectification and self-confirmation, between freedom and
necessity, between the individual and the species" (84).

Ignorance
Framing racism in terms of economic structures is inadequate
ignores oppression outside of the workplace

West 93 [Abanes Cornel West, University Professor at Princeton University, M.A. and Ph.D in Philosophy, Princeton
University, graduated Magna Cum Laude in philosophy from Harvard, Prophetic Fragments, Towards a Socialist Theory of Racism
p. 97-?, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 1993, http://books.google.com/books?id=2bw-drt5sigC&source=gbs_navlinks_s]

basic conceptions of racism in the Marxist tradition. The first subsumes racism under the
general rubric of working-class exploitation. This viewpoint tends to ignore forms of racism not
determined by the workplace. At the turn of the century, this position was put forward by many leading figures in the Socialist party, particularly Eugene
There are four

Debs. Debs believed that white racism against peoples of color was solely a "divide-and-conquer strategy" of the ruling class and that any attention to its operations "apart from
the general labor problem" would constitute racism in reverse. My aim is not to castigate the Socialist party or insinuate that Debs was a racist. The Socialist party had some

any analysis that confines itself to oppression in the

workplace overlooks racism's operation in other spheres of life. For the Socialist party, this yielded a "color-blind" strategy
for resisting racism in which all workers were viewed simply as workers with no specific identity or problems. Complex racist practices within and
outside the workplace were reduced to mere strategies of the ruling class. The second conception
of racism in the Marxist tradition acknowledges the specific operation of racism within the workplace (for
example, job discrimination and structural inequality of wages) but remains silent about these
operations outside the workplace. This viewpoint holds that peoples of color are subjected both to general workingclass exploitation and to a specific "super-exploitation" resulting from less access to jobs and lower wages. On the practical plane, this
perspective accented a more intense struggle against racism than did Debs' viewpoint, and yet it still limited this struggle to the
workplace. The third conception of racism in the Marxist tradition, the so-called "Black Nation thesis", has been the most
influential among black Marxists. It claims that the operation of racism is best understood as a result of general and specific
working-class exploitation and national oppression. This viewpoint holds that Afro-Americans constitute, or once constituted, an
distinguished black members, and Debs had a long history of fighting racism. But

oppressed nation in the Black Belt South and an oppressed national minority in the rest of American society. There are numerous versions of the Black Nation Thesis. Its
classical form was put forth by the American Communist party in 1928, was then modified in the 1930 resolution and codified in Harry Haywood's Negro Liberation (1948).
Some small Leninist organizations still subscribe to the thesis, and its most recent reformulation appeared in James Forman's Self-Determination and the African-American
People (1981). All of these variants adhere to Stalin's definition of a nation set forth in his Marxism and the National Question (1913) which states that "a nation is a historically
constituted, stable community of people formed on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life and psychological make-up manifested in a common culture."
Despite its brevity and crudity, this formulation incorporates a crucial cultural dimension overlooked by the other two Marxist accounts of racism. Furthermore, linking racist
practices to struggles between dominating and dominated nations (or peoples) has been seen as relevant to the plight of Native Americans, Chicanos, and Puerto Ricans who
were disinherited and decimated by white colonial settlers. Such models of "internal colonialism" have important implications for organizing strategies because they give
particular attention to critical linguistic and cultural forms of oppression. They remind us that much of the American West consists of lands taken from Native Americans and
from Mexico. Since the Garveyite movement of the 1920s, which was the first mass movement among Afro-Americans, the black left has been forced to take seriously the cultural

black nationalism rendered most black Marxists "proto-Gramscians" in at least the limited sense that
did
inspire many impressive struggles against racism by the predominantly white left, particularly in the 1930s,
its ahistorical racial definition of a nation, its purely statistical determination of national
boundaries (the South was a black nation because of its then black majority population), and its illusory conception of a distinct
black national economy ultimately rendered it an inadequate analysis. The fourth conception of
racism in the Marxist tradition claims that racist practices result not only from general and specific workingclass exploitation but also from xenophobic attitudes that are not strictly reducible to class
exploitation. From this perspective, racist attitudes have a life and logic of their own, dependent
upon psychological factors and cultural practices. This viewpoint was motivated primarily by opposition to the predominant role of the
dimension of the black freedom struggle. Marcus Garvey's

they took cultural concerns more seriously than many other Marxists. But this concern with cultural life was limited by the Black Nation Thesis itself. Although the theory

Black Nation Thesis on the American and Afro-American left. Its most prominent exponents were W. E. B. DuBois and Oliver Cox. This brief examination of past Marxist views

Marxist theory is indispensable yet ultimately inadequate for grasping the

complexity of racism as a historical phenomenon. Marxism is indispensable because it highlights
the relation of racist practices to the capitalist mode of production and recognizes the crucial
role racism plays within the capitalist economy. Yet Marxism is inadequate because it fails to
probe other spheres of American society where racism plays an integral role especially the
psychological and cultural spheres. Furthermore, Marxist views tend to assume that racism has its
roots in the rise of modern capitalism. Yet, it can easily be shown that although racist practices
were shaped and appropriated by modern capitalism, racism itself predates capitalism. Its roots lie in the
leads to one conclusion.

earlier encounters between the civilizations of Europe, Africa, Asia, and Latin America, encounters that occurred long before the rise of modern capitalism.

Intensification
Racism intensifies the effects of capitalismcontrols the root cause
Andersen and Collins 92 M.A., Ph. D., University of Massachusetts, Amherst; B.A., Georgia
State University, Atlanta AND MA Harvard, Graduate school of education and phD brandeis
university, sociology (Margaret L. and Patricia Hill, Race, Class, and Gender: An Anthology,
6th edition, chapter 15// SRSL)

I met Frank and Suzanne Conway during the late-afternoon rush hour at a restaurant in Los Angeles. Recently laid off from a
communications marketing firm and now taking courses to become certified to teach elementary school, Frank arrived after picking
up their daughter, Logan, from day care. Suzanne arrived from her job as an operations supervisor for a money management
company. The Conways loved their home in the diverse urban neighborhood ofJefferson Park, near the University of Southern
California, but were gravely concerned about sending Logan to weak public schools. They talked to me at length over coffee about
this community-school dilemma, their high educa- tional hopes, and their future plans. The Conways' story and their solution to
their dilemma turned out to be more common than anticipated. Because they receive generous help from their families, they are
considering moving to a suburban community with highly regarded schools. Home prices there start at four times those where they
live now, and Logan would grow up and go to school in a far more homogenous community-family wealth makes these decisions
logical and desirable for some families. Of course, as with the nearly one in three American families without financial assets, many of
the family interviews did not brim over with opti- mistic choices and options but rather turned on how lack of family wealth severely
restricts community, housing, and schooling opportunities. Like the Conways, Alice and Bob Bryant work at professional jobs and
earn a middle- class income, but they do not have access to family wealth-they are asset- poor. Living in the working-class
Dorchester section of Boston, they are frustrated about their inability to afford to move to a neighborhood with better schools. Doing
the best they can, they are highly aware that their son. Mathew, attends only "halfway decent schools" and is not getting the "besteducation." The Bryants' hopes for Mathew are no different from the Conways for Logan. What is different is their capacity to follow
through on their hope and deliver opportunities. The Conways are white and the Bryants are black. Because their incomes,
professional status, and educations are nearly identical. conventional wisdom suggests that race should be at most a minor factor in
op- portunities available to these two families, but we will see tangible connections between family assets and

race. Differing family asset capacity, which has more to do with race than with merits or
accomplishments, most likely will translate into different worlds for Mathew and Logan.
Demonstrating the unique and diverse social circumstances that blacks and whites face is the
best way to understand racial differences in wealth hold- ing. The ideas I develop ... also push the sociology of
wealth in another im- portant direction, namely, an exploration of how the uses of wealth perpetu- ate
inequality. Together, wealth accumulation and utilization highlight the ways in which the
opportunity structure contributes to massive racial wealth inequality that worsens racial
inequality. My argument is grounded in three big ideas. First, I argue that family inheritance and continuing
racial discrimination in crucial areas like home- ownership are reversing gains earned in schools
and on jobs and making racial inequality worse. Family inheritance is more encompassing than money passed at

death, because for young adults it often includes paying for college, substantial down-payment assistance in buying a first home, and
other continuing parental financial assistance. Consequently, it is virtually impossible for people of color to earn

their way to equal wealth through wages. No matter how much blacks earn, they cannot preserve
their occupa- tional status for their children; 'they cannot outearn the wealth gap. Many believe that

African Americans do not do as well as whites, other minorities, or immigrants because they spend too much money rather than save
and in- vest in the future. They are unable to defer gratification, do not sacrifice for the future, and consume excessively. We will see
how the facts speak other- wise. Second, these inheritances frequently amount to what I call transfor- mative

assets. This involves the capacity of unearned, inherited wealth to lift a family economically and
socially beyond where their own achievements, jobs, and earnings would place them. These
head-start assets set up different starting lines, establish different rules for success, fix different
rewards for accomplishments, and ultimately perpetuate inequality. Third, the way fam- ilies use
head-start assets to transform their own lives-within current struc- tures that reward them for
doing so- has racial and class consequences for the homes they buy, the communities they live
in, and the quality of schools their children attend. The same set of processes typically advantages whites while

disadvantaging African Americans. My family interviews point to crit- ical mechanisms of denial that insulate whites from privilege.
Homeownership is one of the bedrocks of the American Dream, and I explore homeownership as a prime way of delving into these
big ideas. We are a nation of homeowners. In 2002 the homeownership rate was 68 percent, a historic high. Homeownership

is by far the single most important way families accumulate wealth. Homeownership also is the way

families gain access to the nicest communities, the best public services, and, most important for my argument, quality education.

Homeownership is the most critical pathway for transformative assets; hence examining
homeownership also keeps our eyes on contemporary discrimination in mortgage markets, the

cost of home loans, residential segregation, and the way families accumulate wealth through
home appreciation, all of which systematically disadvantage blacks. Homeownership appears critical to

success in other areas of life as well, from how well a child does in school to better marital stability to positive civic participation to
de- creased domestic violence.1 How young families acquire homes is one of the most tangible ways that

the historical legacy of race plays out in the present generation and projects well into future.
Understanding how young families can afford to buy homes and how this contributes greatly to
the racial wealth gap brings us back full circle to the importance of family legacies. These big ideas

help us understand one of the most important issues facing America as we start the twenty-first century. African Americans were
frozen out of the mainstream of American life over the first half of the last century, but since 1954 the civil rights movement has won
many battles against racial injustice, and America has reached a broad national consensus in favor of a more tolerant, more inclusive
society. Yet we live with a great para- dox: Why is racial inequality increasing in this new era? To fully
appreciate the decisions American families like the Conways and Bryants face, we need to understand the extent, causes, and
consequences ofthe vast increase in inequality that has taken place since the early 1970s. Inequality has increased

during both Democratic and Republican administrations. Those at the top of the income
distribution have increased their share the most. In fact, the slice of the income pie received by the top 1 percent of

families is nearly twice as large as it was 30 years ago, and their share now is about as large as the share of the bottom 40 percent.
This is not news. In Nickel and Dimed, liberal critic Barbara Ehrenreich tells her story of working at low-skill jobs in America's
booming service sector, jobs like waitressing, cleaning houses, and retail sales. These are the fastest-growing jobs in America, and
they highlighc our current work-to-welfare reform strategy. Ehrenreich's experiences illus- trate how hard it is to get by in America
on poverty wages. More than anything else, perhaps, Ehrenreich's personal experiences demonstrate that in toda} America more
than hard work is necessary for economic success. I talked to many families who live these lives for real, and we will see how rising
inequal- ity makes assets even more critical for success. In Wealth and Democracy, conservative strategist Kevin Phillips argues that
current laissez-faire policies are pretenses to further enrich wealthy an powerful families. Rather than philosophical principles,
conservative polici of tax cuts for the wealthy, gutting the inheritance tax, and less business reg- ulation favor wealth and property at
the expense of middle-class success. T he Bush administration's gradual phase-out of the estate tax privileges unearned. inherited
wealth over opportunity, hard work, and accomplishment. Presi- dent Bush's 2003 tax stimulus package carved 39 percent of the
benefits for the wealthiest 1 percent. I will broaden the discussion of rising inequality by bringing family wealth back into the picture.
Phillips concludes his book with a dire warning: "Either democracy must be renewed, with politics brough back to life, or wealth is
likely to cement a new and less democratic regime- plutocracy by some other name. An ideology that equated personal gain with
benefits to society accompa- nied the great economic boom of the last part of the twentieth century. Even though inequality

increased in the past 20 years, despite loud words and littl action, policies such as affordable
housing and equitable school funding tha challenged that mindset simply had no chance of
getting off the ground. Iron- ically, historically low unemployment rates went hand-in-hand with
rising inequality in an America where hard work no longer means economic success. Success includes
harder work, less family time, and probably more stress. T he average middle-income, two-parent family now works the equivalent
of 1 more weeks than it did in 1979 due to longer hours, second jobs, and workin::- spouses.2 The years of economic stagnation
subsequent to the boom pro- duced a dramatic increase in the number of working poor, and working homeless families are a
growing concern.3 Since late 2001, in a period marke by a declining stock market and rising unemployment, an abundance of da has
provided strong evidence that lpwer-income households are under severe economic stress: Personal bankruptcies, automobile
repossessions, mortgage foreclosures, and other indicators of bad debt all reached records in 2002.~ What is the role ofwealth and
inheritance in rising inequality? The batJ:- boom generation, which grew up during a long period of economic prosper- ity right after
World War II, is in the midst of benefiting from the greates inheritance of wealth in history. One reliable source estimates that paren
will bequeath $9 trillion to their adult children between 1990 and 2030.: Given this fact, it is no wonder that an already ineffective
estate tax (due to tax planning, family trusts, and loopholes), which takes 50 percent of estates worth more than $1 million, came
under such ferocious political attack during the second Clinton administration and has been effectively repealed by the Bush
administration. This wealth inheritance will exacerbate already rising inequality. Economists Robert Avery and Michael Rendall
presented a benchmark statistical study in 1993 showing that most inherited wealth will be pocketed by only a few. 6 According to
the study, one-third of the money will go to 1 percent of the baby boomers, who will receive about $1.6 million apiece. Another third,
rep- resenting an average bequest of $336,000, will go to the next 9 percent. The final slice, divided by the remaining 90 percent of
the generation, will run about $40,000 apiece. We will see how this baby boomer inheritance not only fuels inequality but also
intensifies racial inequality. Few people now talk about the profound effects-economic, social, and political-of that widening gap. We
can argue for the privilege of passing along more unearned inequality, or we can take a stand for fairness and equality. THE
CONTEXT OF RACIAL INEQUALITY Writing at the beginning of the twentieth century, historian W.E.B. Du Bois

emphatically declared that the problem of the century was the problem of the color line. Writing
again at midcentury, Du Bois reviewed what African Americans had accomplished in education, civil
rights, voting rights, occupa- tion, income, housing, literature and arts, and science. African
Americans had made progress, he noted, although it was unequal, incomplete, and accompanied by wide gaps and temporary retreats. At about the same time that Du Bois was penning his assessment in a
black newspaper, the Pittsburgh Courier, the Nobel economist Gunnar Myrdal published the widely read An American Dilemma.

This influential and lengthy study documented the living conditions for African Americans
during the first half of the century, reveal- ing to many for the first time the impact of systematic
discrimination in the United States. These two giants helped to define racial inequality in terms

of equal opportunity and discrimination and to place these issues at the heart of a nation's
concern. The twisted, politically narrow, and bureaucratically un- fortunate notion of "affirmative action" substituted for equal

opportunity by century's end, and affirmative action continues to frame our hopes and dis- trust regarding race. Even though the
struggle for equal opportunity is far from completed, the single-minded and narrow focus on affirmative action forces compromises
with our past, obscures our present understanding of racial inequality, and restricts policy in the future. Du Bois and Myrdal
correctly identified a color line of opportunity and discrimination at the core of the twentieth-century racial equality agenda in the
United States. The agenda in the twenty-first century must go further to include the challenge of

closing the wealth gap, which currently is 10 cents on the dollar, if we are to make real progress
toward racial equality and democ- racy. Understanding the racial wealth gap is the key to
understanding how racial inequality is passed along from generation to generation. The enigma of

racial inequality is still a festering public and private con- versation in American society. After the country's dismantling of the most
oppressive racist policies and practices of its past, many have come to believe that the United States has moved beyond race and that
our most pressing racial concerns should center now on race-neutrality and color-blindness. Proclaim- ing the success of the civil
rights agenda and the dawning of a postracial age in America, books by Shelby Steele, Abigail and Stephan Thernstrom, and oth- ers
influenced not only the academic debates but elite and popular opinion as well.7 Indeed, a review of the record shows impressive
gains, most particularly in the areas oflaw, education, jobs, and earnings. Even though progress is real, this new political sensibility
about racial progress and equality incorporates illusions that mask an enduring and robust racial hierarchy and continue to hinder
efforts to achieve our ideals of democracy and justice. . In fact, we can consider seriously the declining economic significance of
race because the measures we have traditionally used to gauge racial inequal- ity focus almost exclusively on salaries. The blackwhite earnings gap nar- rowed considerably throughout the 1960s and 1970s. The earnings gap has remained relatively stable since
then, with inequality rising again in the 1980s and closing once more during tight labor markets in the 1990s.8 The average black
family earned 55 cents for every dollar earned by the average white family in 1989; by 2000 it reached an all-time high of 64 cents
on the dollar.9 For black men working full-time, the gains are more impressive, as their wages reached 67 percent of those of fully
employed white men, up from 62 percent in 1980 and only 50 percent in 1960.10 How much the racial wage gap has closed, why it
has closed, and what it means are the subjects of aca- demic and political debate. One study, for example, argues that the racial
wage gap is really 23 percent higher than the official figures because incarcer- ation rates hide low wages and joblessness among
blacks.11 At comparable in- comes, more African American family members work to earn the same money as white families.
Working longer hours and more weeks per year means that middle-income black families worked the equivalent of 12 more weeks
than white families to earn the same money in 2000. The tremendous growth of the black middle class often is cited as a triumphant sign of progress toward racial equality. Indeed, the raw numbers appear to justify celebration: In 1960 a little more than
three-quarters of a million black men and women were employed in middle-class occupations; by 1980 the number increased to
nearly three and a third million; and nearly seven million African Americans worked in middle-class jobs in 1995.13 T his impressive
growth in achieving upward mobility, however, does not tell the whole story, as some argue that stagnating economic conditions and
blacks' lower-middle-class occupational profile have stalled the march into the mid- dle class since the mid-1970s. The real story of
the meaning of race in modern America, however, must include a serious consideration of how one generation passes advantage and
disadvantage to the next-how individuals' starting points are determined. While ending the old ways of outright exclusion,
subjugation, segregation, custom, discrimination, racist ideology, and violence, our nation continues to reproduce racial inequality,
racial hierarchy, and social injustice that is very real and formidable for those who experience it. In law, in public policy, in custom,
in education, in jobs, in health, indeed, in achievements, one could argue that America is more equal today than at any time in our
past. Analysts and advocates scour the annual release of official government statistics on income

to detect the latest trends in racial inequality. Traditional measures of economic well-being and inequality, such as
income, education, and jobs, show authentic and impressive progress toward racial equality from the mid-1960s through the early
1980s and stagnation since.15 This is not to suggest by any stretch of the imagination that we have seen

the dawning of the age of racial parity in the United States, because, indeed, wide racial gaps and
discrimination persist in all of these domains. Employment dis- crimination, educational discrimination,
environmental discrimination, and discriminatory immigration, taxation, health, welfare, and transportation poli- cies continue.16

Despite the passage of major civil rights reforms, most whites and blacks continue to live in
highly segregated communities. To achieve per- fectly integrated communities, two-thirds of
either all black or all white resi- dents would have to move across racial boundaries. The same
indicators show too that progress toward racial equality has halted since the early 1980s. Vast wealth differences and
hence enormous disparities in opportunities remain be- tween equally achieving and
meritorious white and black families. Progress made since the early 1960s has stalled short of equality. Familiar for Du
Bois and Myrdal is the dilemma that, despite narrowed gaps in so many important areas, new generations of whites and blacks still
start with vastly different sets of options and opportunities. An asset perspective examines a modern element of

the American dilemma: Similar achievements by people of similar abilities do not yield
comparable results.

Capitalism is just a magnifier for the effects of racismracism is the

root cause of the discrimination
Andersen and Collins 92 M.A., Ph. D., University of Massachusetts, Amherst; B.A.,
Georgia State University, Atlanta AND MA Harvard, Graduate school of education and phD

brandeis university, sociology (Margaret L. and Patricia Hill, Race, Class, and Gender: An
Anthology, 6th edition, chapter 15// SRSL)
Much of the research and media attention on African Americans is on the black poor. Welfare
debates, discussions of crime and safety, urban policy initiatives, and even the cultural uproar
over things like rap music are fo- cused on the situation of poor African Americans. With more than
one in four African Americans living below the official poverty line (versus approx- imately one in nine whites), this
is a reasonable and warranted bias. But rarely do we hear the stories of the other three-fourths, or the
majority of African Americans, who may be the office secretary, the company's com- puter technician, a project manager down the hall, or the person who .teaches our children.
The growth of the black middle class has been hailed as one of the major triumphs of the civil
rights movement, but if we have so little information on who makes up this group and what their
lives are like, how can we be so sure that triumphant progress is the full story? The opti- mistic assumption of
the 1970s and 1980s was that upwardly mobile African Americans were quietly integrating formerly all-white occupations, busi- nesses, neighborhoods, and social clubs. Black
middle- and working-class families were moving out of all-black urban neighborhoods and into the sub- urbs. With these suppositions, the black middle class dropped from
under the scientific lens and off the policy agenda, even though basic evidence suggests that the public celebration of black middle-class ascendance has perhaps been too hasty.

, that a more appropriate socioeconomic label for members of the black middle class
is "lower middle class." The one black doc- tor who lives in an exclusive white suburb and the few African American lawyers who work at a large firm are not
We know, for example

representative of the black middle class overall (but neither are their experiences identical to those of their white colleagues). And although most white Americans are also not
doctors or lawyers, the lopsided distribution of occupations for whites does favor such professional and managerial jobs, whereas the black middle class is clustered in the sales

African Americans have lower earnings. Yet the inequalities

run even deeper than just income. Compound and exponentiate the current differences over a history of slavery and Jim Crow, and the nearly
fourteenfold wealth advan- tage that whites enjoy over African Americans-regardless ofincome, educa- tion, or occupation-needs little explanation. We also know
that the black middle class faces housing segregation to the same extent as the black poor.
African Americans are more segregated from whites than any other racial or ethnic group. In fact,
the black middle class likely faces the most blatant racial discrimination, in that many in its
ranks can actually afford to pay for housing in predominantly white areas. Real estate agents and apartment
and clerical fields. Because one's occupation affects one's income,

managers can easily turn away poor African Americans by simply quoting prohibitive home costs or high rents. It takes more purpo- sive creativity, however, to consistently
steer middle-class blacks into already established African American neighborhoods by such tactics as disingenu- ously asserting that an apartment has just been rented when the
prospective renters who show up at the property manager's door are, to his or her sur- prise, black. Racial segregation means that racial inequalities in employment, education,

. Predominantly white neighborhoods benefit from the historically

determined and contemporarily sustained edge that whites enjoy. Finally, we know that middle-class African Americans do
income, and wealth are inscribed in space

not perform as well as whites on standardized tests (in school or in employment); are more likely to be incarcerated for drug offenses; are less likely to marry, and more likely to
have a child without being married; and are less likely to be work- ing. Liberals bumble when addressing these realities because, unlike housing segregation or job
discrimination, of which middle-class African Americans are the clear victims, earning low grades in school or getting pregnant with- out a husband can easily be attributed to
the bad behaviors of blacks them- selves. For middle-class blacks, who ostensibly do not face the daily disad- vantages of poverty, it is even more difficult to explain why they do
not measure up to whites. To resolve this quandary it is essential to continuously refer back to the ways in which the black middle class is not equal to the white middle class....
The lives of the families in Groveland* provide some answers to these questions. Groveland's approximately ninety square blocks contain a popula- tion of just under twelve
thousand residents, over 95 percent of whom are African American. The 1990 median annual family income in the neighbor- hood is nearly $40,000, while the comparable
figure for Chicago as a whole is just over $30,000. More than 70 percent of Groveland families own their own homes. By income and occupational criteria, as well as the
American dream of homeownership, Groveland qualifies as a "middle-class neighborhood." Yet this sterile description does not at all capture the neighborhood's di- versity,
which is critical to correctly portraying the neighborhood context of the black middle class. Groveland's unemployment rate is 12 percent, which is higher than the citywide rate,
but lower than the percentage of unemployed residents in the neighborhoods that border Groveland. Twelve percent of Groveland's families are poor, which again makes it a bit
more advantaged than the surrounding areas, but worse off than most of Chicago's predomi- nantly white neighborhoods. The geography of Groveland is typical of black middleclass areas, which often sit as a kind of buffer between core black poverty areas and whites. Contrary to popular discussion, the black middle class has not out-migrated to
unnamed neighborhoods outside of the black community. Instead, they are an overlooked population still rooted in the contemporary "Black Belts" of cities across the country.
Some of the ques- tions about why middle-class blacks are not at parity with middle-class whites can be answered once this fact is recognized. ... By the end of my research
tenure in Groveland, I had seen three groups .of eighrh-graders graduate to high school, high school kids go on to college and college graduates start their careers. I also heard
too many stories and read too many obituaries of the teenagers who were jailed or killed along the way. The son of a police detective in jail for murder. The grandson of a teacher
shot while visiting his girlfriend's house. The daughter of a park supervisor living with a drug dealer who would later be killed at a fast-food restaurant. These events were
jarring, and all-too-frequent, discontinuities in the daily routine of Groveland residents. Why were some Groveland youth following a path to success, while others had concocted
a recipe for certain failure? After all, these are not the stories of poor youth caught in a trap of absent opportunities, low aspirations, and harsh environments. Instead Groveland
is a neighborhood of single-family homes, old stately churches tree-lined streets, active political and civic organizations, and concerned par- ents trying to maintain a middleclass way of life. These black middle-class families are a hidden population in this country's urban fabric. The evening news hour in every major American city is filled with reports of urban crime and violence. Newspapers fill in the_gaps of the more sensational tragedies about which the television could provide only a few sound bites. Rounding out
the flow ofurban Armageddon stories are the gos- sip and hearsay passed informally between neighbors, church friends, and drinking buddies. For many middle-class white
Americans, the incidents they hear about in distant and troubled inner cities provide a constant symbolic threat, but an infrequent reality. For the families who live on the corner
of the crime scene-overwhelmingly black or Latino, and poor-daily life is organized to avoid victimization. In the middle of these two geographically and socially distant groups
lives the black middle class. African American social workers and teachers, secretaries and nurses, en- trepreneurs and government bureaucrats are in many ways the buffer
between the black poor and the white middle class. When neighborhoods are chang- ing, white middle-class families may find themselves living near low-income black families,

More than thirty years after the civil

rights movement, racial segregation remains a reality in most American cities. Middle-income
black families fill the residential gap between the neigh- borhoods that house middle-class
whites and the neighborhoods where poor African Americans live. Unlike most whites, middle-class black families must
but one group is inevitably displaced. The neighborhood be- comes, once again, racially homogeneous.

contend with the crime, dilapidated housing, and social disorder in the dete- riorating poor neighborhoods that continue to grow in their direction. Resi- dents attempt to fortify
their neighborhoods against this encroachment, and limit their travel and associations to other middle-class neighborhoods in the city and suburbs. Yet even with these efforts,
residents of black middle-class neighborhoods share schools, grocery stores, hospitals, nightclubs, and parks with their poorer neighbors, ensuring frequent interaction within
and outside the neighborhood. The in-between position of the black middle class sets up certain cross- roads for its youth. This peculiar limbo begins to explain the disparate
out- comes of otherwise similar young people in Groveland. The right and wrong paths are in easy reach of neighborhood youth. Working adults are models of success. Some
parents even work two jobs; while still others combine work and school to increase their chances of on-the-job promotions. All of the pos- itive knowledge, networking, and rolemodel benefits that accrue to working parents are operative for many families in Groveland. But at the same time the rebellious nature of adolescence inevitably makes the
wrong path a strong temptation, and there is no shortage of showy drug dealers and cocky gang members who make dabbling in deviance look fun. Youth walk a fine line between preparing for success and youthful delinquent experimentation, the consequences ofwhich can be especially serious for blackyouth.... ...

The black middle

class is connected to the black poor through friend- ship and kinship ties, as well as
geographically. Policies that hurt the black poor will ultimately negatively affect the black
middle class. At the same time, the black middle class sits at the doorstep of middle-class privilege. Contin- ued affirmative action, access to higher education, a plan

to create real family- wage jobs, and the alleviation of residential segregation should be at the fore- front of policy initiatives to support the gains already made by the black
middle class.... "Middle class" is a notoriously elusive category based on a combination of socioeconomic factors (mostly income, occupation, and education) and normative
judgments (ranging from where people live, to what churches or clubs they belong to, to whether they plant flowers in their gardens). Among African Americans, where there has
historically been less income and occupa- tional diversity, the question of middle-class position becomes even more murky.... Conversations with Groveland residents ...
underscore the fluid and complex nature of class categories among African Americans. Although most Groveland residents settle on a label somewhere between "lower middle
class" and "middle class" to describe their own class position, the intermedi- ate descriptors are plentiful. Some classification schemes focus on inequality. One resident resolved
that there are the "rich," and everyone else falls into the categories of "poor, poorer, and poorest." Other words, like ghetto, bourgie (the, shortened version of bourgeois), and
uppity are normative terms that Grovelandites use to describe the intersection of standard socioeconomic measures and normative judgments of lifestyles and attitudes. Still
other peo- ple talk about class in geographic terms, delineating a hierarchy of places rather than of incomes or occupations.... . . . Despite continuing social and political ties, the
reality of class schisms cannot be ignored. In The Declining Significance ofRace (1978), William Julius Wilson argued that the African American community was splitting in two,
with middle-class blacks improving their position relative to whites, and poor blacks becoming ever more marginalized. Civil rights legislation, especially affirmative action,
worked well for African Americans poised to take advan- tage of educational and employment opportunities. The unsolved problem was what to do about African Americans in
poverty. They were doing poorly not primarily because they were black, Wilson argued, but because they were unskilled and because the structure of the labor market had
changed around them. Grounded in the conviction that social structure influences the nature of race relations, Wilson saw the growth in high-wage employment and the rise of
political liberalism as fueling the diminution of race as a factor in the stratification process. The life chances of blacks were becoming more dependent on their class position.
African Americans with a college education were positioned to take advantage of jobs in a service-producing economy- jobs in trade and finance, public management, and social
services. And be- cause of affirmative action legislation, firms were motivated to hire these qualified blacks. At the same time, the situation for the black poor was stagnating, if
no- deteriorating. Black unemployment began to rise in the 1950s. There was no much difference in the unemployment rate for blacks and whites in 1930, bu- by the mid-1950s
the ratio of black to white unemployment reached 2 to~ (Farley 1985). These changes, Wilson and others argued, were the result o- shifts in the mode of production. The number
of well-paying manufactur- ing jobs in the central city had declined as a result of both technologica.; changes and relocation. These changes permanently relegated unskilled
bla~ to low-wage, nienial, and dead-end jobs, or pushed theni out of the workforce altogether. Wilson's contribution was to direct attention to changes in the nature of
production that disadvantaged unskilled blacks. His prognosis for the black niiddle class was relatively optiniistic, a position for which he was criticized by other African
American scholars. Wilson's critics rushed to prove hini wrong and show that members of the new black middle class con- tinued to face obstacles because of their race (Pinkney
1984; Willie 1979; Washington 1979, 1980; see Morris 1996 for a review). .. . To be sure, the obstacles faced by poor blacks in a changing economy and the persistence of black
poverty more generally are intolerable facts that merit considerable research and government resources. However, the re- search pendulum swung to the extreme, virtually

The declining interest in the status of nonpoor blacks was

premature. The African American community was in a short time transformed from a
population almost uniform in its poverty to one with a nascent niiddle class- this as recently as
the 1950s. But racial disparities in occupation, income, and intergenerational mobility were not eradicated by the few years of progress. The brief period of growth
ignoring the majority of African Americans who are not poor. ... ..

spawned a kind of dismissive optimism, but the economic and social purse strings were once again pulled tight, stalling the advances made by some African Americans. The
continuing inequalities be- tween middle-class whites and African Americans attest to the persistence of racism and discrimination, albeit in quite different forms than in the
Jim Crow era (Bobo, Kluegel, and Smith 1997).. .. The same stages that characterize the socioeconomic past and present of African Americans-overwhelming disadvantage,
followed by progress and optimism, followed by stagnation and retrenchment-are mirrored in the spatial history (the where) of the black niiddle class.... While some black
families have integrated white neighborhoods as many commentators had predicted, the black middle class overall remains as segregated from whites as the black poor (Farley
1991). This means that the search for better neighborhoods has taken place within a segregated housing market. As a result, black middle-class neighborhoods are often located
next to predominantly black areas with much higher poverty rates. Blacks of all socioeconomic statuses tend to be confined to a limited geographic space, which is formally
designated by the discriminatory practices of banks, insur- ance companies, and urban planners, and synibolically identified by the for- mation of cultural and social
institutions.... .. . Historic and contemporary black residential patterns suggest the fol- lowing. African Americans have long attempted to translate socioeconomic success into
residential mobility, making them similar to other ethnic groups (Massey and Denton 1985). They desire to purchase better homes, safer neighborhoods, higher quality schools,

Out-migration has been a constant process. The black middle class

has always attempted to leave poor neighborhoods, but has never been able to get very far. However,
when the relative size of the black middle class grew, the size of its residential enclaves grew as
well. The increase in the number ofblack middle-classpersons has led to growth in the size ofblack middle-class enclaves, which in turn increases the spatial distance
and more amenities with their in- creased earnings.

between poor and middle-class African Americans. This greater physical separation within a segregated black com- munity accounts for the popular belief that black middleclass out-migration is a recent and alarming trend. . . . The problems confronting middle-class African Americans are not solved by simply moving away from a low-income
black family and next door to a middle-class white family. The fact that a neighborhood's racial makeup is frequently a proxy for the things that really count-quality of schools,
se- curity, appreciation of property values, political clout, and availability of de- sirable amenities-attests to the ways in which larger processes of discrimi- nation penalize blacks

Racial inequalities perpetuate the higher poverty rate among blacks and ensure
that segregated black communities will bear nearly the full burden of such inequality. The ar- gument for
at the neighborhood level.

residential integration is not to allow the black middle class to eas- ily abandon black neighborhoods. Instead, more strict desegregation laws would also open the door for lowincome blacks to move to predominantly white neighborhoods, where jobs and resources are unfairly clustered. Yet we need not wait for whites to accept blacks into their

Aggressive measures must be taken to improve the

socioeconomic conditions of African Americans where they are, by highlighting where the black middle class lives, it becomes apparent
neighborhoods, and think ofintegration as the panacea for current problems.

that concentrated urban poverty has repercussions not only for poor African Americans, but for middle-class blacks as well, while a majority of middle-class whites move farther

. A comprehensive an- tipoverty agenda would have positive benefits for African
Americans as a group, and therefore for the residential environs of the black middle classalthough it leaves unchallenged the desire of many blacks and even more whites to live with
others of the same race.
into the hinterlands

No correlation
Cap does not rely on racism they have nothing to do with each other.
Capitalists and African Americans can and do live peacefully together
Capitalism No Date Does capitalism cause racism? http://capitalism.org/racism/does-capitalism-cause-racism/
(MG)

A common complaint about capitalism is that all the capitalist sees is money. Given that this is
true, observe that anyone who only cares about money, doesnt care about the color of the
person where their money comes from. Capitalism is a system of individual rights it is a
necessary political condition to the banishment of racism, where it results in the violation of
individual rights. The only protection a man needs from racism is the protection of his rights
specifically protection from the initiation of force, whether it be a knife held at ones throat by a Black Panther, or
the noose held by a member of the KKK. Observe the great American melting pot where the warring
tribes of Europe who were busy killing each other in their homeland, were able to live relatively
peacefully together. What principle was the cause of this? Politically, the principle of individual
rights the foundation of capitalism. This principle of individualism is gradually being eroded
as the racists of today are advocating that people be rewarded political privileges, based on ones
race, i.e., so called affirmative action the affirmation of racist policies. Under capitalism,
such evil racist policies carried out by the power of government would be outlawed. Under
capitalism, the only form of judgment is the method of individualism judging each man as an
individual, i.e., by the content of ones character, and not the color of his skin (ancestry) as racists
like Jesse Jackson clamor for.

AT: Prejudice + Power

Their understanding of racism is based on a simplistic understanding
of power violence occurs regardless of power structures
Townhead 13 (Daniel Townhead interdisciplinary Human Studies at Bradford, The Hidden Struggle, Dysophia:
Anarchist Debates on Privilege, vol. 4 (November 2013), pp. 43 // JJ)
Regarding the second point, there are several different

arguments used to justify this kind of

assertion. One you may come across is that racism is impossible without 'power' supporting
it, and as 'people of colour' have no power due to the structure of society and the
institutions that compose it a). holding all the power and b). systematically
privileging white people and un-privileging 'people of colour', it is impossible for
them to exercise racism. The problem with this is that power is not just held by the
institutions of society; every human being holds potential power, which can be
exercised towards other human beings in various ways including love, aid, direct violence,

manipulation, creativity, etc. To take the negative example, one human being can kill another independently of a power structure,
because they possess physical power either in the form of weaponry or being bigger, stronger or more skilled than the other. If you
think this example is too individualised,

a group of humans can also exercise said physical power

over other humans for various reasons and motivations that again are not directly
tied to any white-privileging power structure or discourse, including practical competitive
reasons, cultural conflict, or ideological motivations that they have developed themselves.

Alt Fails

Zero-Sum
Capitalism is not the only problem--tradesoff with talking about race,
sexism, etc.
Dominick 11 (Brian, FuturEconomy, Down with (Occupy) Materialism, Up with Diversity and Holism, December 20
2011, http://futureconomy.com/tag/racism/ //SRSL)

local Occupy groups have encountered allegations of internal racism and sexism.
When people who are marginalized or sidelined in the outside world feel that happening inside
movement groups, they tend to get upset. I dont really have trouble seeing why that makes sense, but a lot of people do, so Id like to explain as briefly as possible one main reason for it.
Activists hopefully understand that racism, sexism/heterosexism, and ageism in movement
circles are rooted in their institutionalized counterparts in the rest of society. But what keeps them from effectively
preventing or even addressing these problems reemergence in and between activist groups? I believe the problem is that many leftist intellectuals
insist oppressions such as sexism and racism are secondary to classism: the exploitation,
alienation, and subjugation of labor. The Occupy movement is fertile ground for this ignorance,
and Im glad that its being challenged in many quarters. Slavoj ieks recent column really brought this home for me. In his commentary, popleft darling iek falsely identifies the Occupy phenomenon as a monist movement about
economics alone. But hes not that far off, actually; he may be more right than wrong. iek is positively giddy that, in his perception, the Left seems to be
abandoning its attachment to struggles against racism and sexism, finally getting back to the
real work of fighting capitalism. In a kind of Hegelian triad*, the western left has come full
circle: after abandoning the so-called class struggle essentialism for the plurality of anti-racist,
feminist, and other struggles, capitalism is now clearly re-emerging as the name of the problem.
Its barely secret that numerous

Yes, the was italicized in the original. I think he really believes all other problems are not just subordinate to and exacerbated by exploitative economic relations, but that racism, sexism, and other struggles are

identity
politics, that murky expanse in which the special interests of people of color, women, queers,
and sometimes even young folks are taken into account, or even raised to the same level of
concern as workers grievances against capital. Those who believe economics is the central (or only) battlefield of struggle usually admit some or all of these
groups are oppressed, but they add caveats. They say (1) people of color, women, queers, etc. are primarily oppressed as
workers; and (2) capitalism is the root cause of all oppression, so surmounting it will naturally
lead to universal liberation. Whats really going on here? How is it that someone with a supposedly sophisticated mind like ieks can believe
that capitalism is really the only problem (the problem)? Heres the deal: capitalism is reemerging as the name of the problem
because the OWS phenomenon started with a massive influx of people who are new to
radicalism and radical ideas. These folks first came together mainly around economic concerns, i.e., Wall Street vs Main Street, 1% vs. 99%, etc. Then shifty
Marxian ideologues swooped in to coopt Occupy Wall Street, along with its various
manifestations and energy. The truth is, they did a pretty poor job of this, I gather largely
because OWS and its offshoots were steadfastly anti-authoritarian. Still, as a social phenomenon that lacks the sophistication
strictly rooted in capitalism. Hes not alone. Many hardcore Marxists, and even reformed Marxists as most style themselves these days, have long lamented the Lefts foray into

developed through generations of struggle and learned analysis, Occupy is highly susceptible to oversimplified ideologies and sectarianism. Craven Marxist hacks apparently cannot help but try to take advantage
of this, even through the pages of mainstream newspapers. Make no mistake: materialist fixation (also known as economism or class struggle reductionism, as iek noted) in North American movements
means in practice writing off or at least subordinating major concerns of pretty much everyone outside the white, male so-called middle class (not to mention groups like young people, among whom
consciousness raising of oppression is barely active). This doesnt seem to matter to folks like iek, because they can draw the privileged into their camp with promises that the resulting vanguard will take care of
women and people of color (who are technically welcome, after all) after the revolution (guided by the remaining white men who stay in board). Theres nothing like an immature movement to make people with
immature analysis feel righteous. And theres nothing like a lack of real organizing experience to let someone believe exclusive ideologies wont have exclusive effects on participation. At last, theres nothing like

Even if you buy into a theory that poses a primacy

of economics over cultural, interpersonal, and other social dynamics, consider the implications
of organizing around class issues to the general exclusion of anti-racism, anti-sexism, antiageism, and so forth. This is what some incarnations of the Occupy phenomenon have tended
toward; women and people of color (too many links to list) especially are taking notice. And theyre not just
being a straight white male to enable one to decide that racism and sexism are secondary to classism.

charging that the Wall Street-oriented focus doesnt include their particular interests; theyre noting that traditional race, sex, and age-based hierarchies are appearing within Occupy groups. To truly transform
society, a social movement will need to be radical (seek out and strike at the roots of problems), and its approach to the array of oppressions will need to be holistic. To attract the kind of diverse participation that
makes a movement worth really standing behind, it will need to be at least pluralistic in this crucial regard. Sidelining or subordinating the major, legitimate concerns of people from marginalized communities and
identities all but guarantees a movement dominated by people with backgrounds and privileges in tune with the top 20% that really owns and runs society, if not the 1%. And even though Occupy might be under
the impression that the 99% are one big happy monolith, reality begs to differ. Failing to acknowledge this reality is essentially terminal for any radical social movement in the US, Canada, or Western Europe. The
good news is, there are elements inside most Occupy manifestations that Ive heard of including straight white males who are willing to challenge failures of inclusiveness. There are folks effectively making

Occupy may well be headed in the right direction, not least because its
failure to empower an official leadership has not allowed the narrowly, materially focused
among them to heed typical calls of lets just move on from matters of race, gender, and so
forth. That said, the failure to have accountable leadership has enabled unofficial hierarchies to
develop, and this militates in the wrong direction, almost no matter their character. If youre participating in an
the case for holistic or at least pluralistic approaches.

Occupy general assembly or working group and feel like calls for inclusiveness and diverse objectives are bogging down the process, I urge you to rethink. There is power in movement and organizational diversity,

and there is something to the idea that addressing oppressions other than hierarchy and classism is critical to the endeavor of radical social transformation. * (I wouldnt worry too much if the meaning of
Hegelian triad doesnt jump out at you; its pretty clear with references of this nature that you arent ieks intended audience. Theres no use for that phrase except as a wink to those steeped in the teachings of
the pre-Marxian philosopher Hegel. Hes just talking to the academics and bookworms; he doesnt mind if the rest miss his message. If you havent read Hegel, maybe you dont really matter to iek.)

A focus on economic justice ridiculously precludes important racial

and gender identitiesits an identity that a cisgender white male can
partake in without reflexive thought
Ross 2k [Marlon B. Ross, University of Michigan, Professor of English Language and Literature & African and African
American Studies, New Literary History, Vol. 31, No. 4, Is There Life after Identity Politics? (Autumn, 2000), pp. 827-850,
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20057638] l.gong
Although in his contribution Eric Lott targets Professor Michaels's comments and his own recent feud with Timothy Brennan (who
unfortunately is not included in this volume) rather than Ken's argument, what Eric says about "left and liberal fundamentalists"
who "simply and somewhat penitently" urge us to "'go back to class'" could also be directed at Ken's conclusion. Ken writes,
"Crafting a political left that does not merely reflect existing racial divisions starts with the
relatively mundane

proposition that it is possible to make a persuasive appeal to the given interests

of working and unemployed women and men, regardless of race, in support of a program for
economic justice." On this one, I side with Eric, rather than Tim and Ken. Standing on the left depends on whose left side

we're talking about. My left might be your right and vice versa, because it depends on what direction we're facing, and what direction
depends on which identities we're assuming and affirming. Eric adds, "Even in less dismissive [than Tim's] accounts of new

social movements based not on class but on identities formed by histories of injustice, there is a
striking a priori sense of voluntarism about the investment in this cause or that movement or the
other issue--as though determining the most fundamental issue were a matter of the writer's
strength of feeling rather than a studied or analytical sense of the ever-unstable balance of forces
in a hegemonic bloc at a given moment." I agree, but I'll risk mangling what Eric says by putting it more crassly.
Touting class or "economic justice" as the fundamental stance for left identity is just another
way of telling everybody else to shut up so I can be heard above the fray. Because of the force of
"identity politics," a leftist white person would be leery of claiming to lead Blacks toward the promised
land, a leftist straight man leery of claiming to lead women or queers, but , for a number of complex
rationalizations, we in the middle class (where all of us writing here currently reside) still have few qualms
about volunteering to lead2, at least theoretically, the working class toward "economic justice." What Eric
calls here "left fundamental ism," I'd call, at the risk of sounding harsh, left paternalism. Of the big identity groups
articulated through "identity politics," economic class remains the only identity where a straight
white middle-class man can still feel comfortable claiming himself a leading political voice, and
thus he may sometimes overcompensate by screaming that this is the only identity that really
matters--which is the same as claiming that class is beyond identity. Partly this is because
Marxist theory and Marx himself (a bourgeois intellectual creating the theoretical practice for the work ers' revolution) stage
the model for working-class identity as a sort of trans-identification, a magical identity that is
transferable to those outside the group who commit themselves to it wholeheartedly enough. If we
look back, we realize even this magical quality is not special to a history of class struggle, as whites during
the New Negro movements of the early twentieth century felt that they were vanguard race leaders because they had putatively
imbibed some essential qualities of Negroness by cross-identifying with the folk and their culture.

Foundations
Freedom of class struggle is not freedom from anti-blackness the
alternative leaves the foundation for racist structures in place
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Associate Professor at UC Irvines Department of Drama and
African American Studies, BA in government and philosophy from Dartmouth College, MA in Fine Arts from
Columbia University PhD in Rhetoric and Film Studies from UC Berkeley Red, White & Black: Cinema and the
Structure of U.S. Antagonisms, 2010, Pg. 19-23, arh)

Again, what is important for us to glean from these historians is that the pre-Columbian
period, the Late Middle Ages, reveals no archive of debate on these three questions as
they might be related to that massive group of Black-skinned people south of the
Sahara. Eltis suggests that there was indeed massive debate which ultimately led to Britain
taking the lead in the abolition of slavery, but he reminds us that that debate did not have its
roots in the late Middle Ages, the post-Columbian period of the 1500s or the Virginia Colony
period of the 1600s. It was, he asserts, an outgrowth of the mid- to late-18th century
emancipatory thrustintra-Human disputes such as the French and American
Revolutionsthat swept through Europe. But Eltis does not take his analysis further than
this. Therefore, it is important that we not be swayed by his optimism about the Enlightenment
and its subsequent abolitionist discourses. It is highly conceivable that the discourse that
elaborates the justification for freeing the slave is not the product of the Human
being having suddenly and miraculously recognized the slave. Rather, as Saidiya
Hartman argues, emancipatory discourses present themselves to us as further
evidence of the Slaves fungibility: [T]he figurative capacities of blackness enable
white flights of fancy while increasing the likelihood of the captives
disappearance (Scenes22). First, the questions of Humanism were elaborated in
contradistinction to the human void, to the African-qua-chattel (the 1200s to the end of the 17th
century). Then, as the presence of Black chattel in the midst of exploited and unexploited Humans (workers and bosses, respectively) became a fact of the world,
exploited Humans (in the throes of class conflict with un-exploited Humans) seized the
image of the slave as an enabling vehicle that animated the evolving discourses of
their emancipation, just as un-exploited Humans had seized the flesh of the Slave
to increase their profits. Without this gratuitous violence, a violence that marks everyone
experientially until the late Middle Ages when it starts to mark the Black ontologically, the socalled great emancipatory discourses of modernitymarxism, feminism, postcolonialism, sexual
liberation, and the ecology movementpolitical discourses predicated on grammars of suffering
and whose constituent elements are exploitation and alienation, might not have developed.xi
Chattel slavery did not simply reterritorialize the ontology of the African. It also created the
Human out of culturally disparate entities from Europe to the East. I am not
suggesting that across the globe Humanism developed in the same way regardless
of region or culture; what I am saying is that the late Middle Ages gave rise to an
ontological categoryan ensemble of common existential concernswhich made
and continues to make possible both war and peace, conflict and resolution,
between the disparate members of the human race, east and west. Senator Thomas
Hart Benton intuited this notion of the existential commons when he wrote that though the
Yellow race and its culture had been torpid and stationary for thousands of years [Whites
and Asians] must talk together, and trade together, and marry together. Commerce is a great
civilizersocial intercourse as greatand marriage greater (The Congressional Globe. May 28,
1846). David Eltis points out that as late as the 17th century, [p]risoners taken in the course of
European military actioncould expect death if they were leaders, or banishment if they were
deemed followers, but never enslavementDetention followed by prisoner exchanges or

ransoming was common (1413). By the seventeenth century, enslavement of fellow Europeans
was beyond the limits (1423) of Humanisms existential commons, even in times of war. Slave
status was reserved for non-Christians. Even the latter group howeverhad some
prospect of release in exchange for Christians held by rulers of Algiers, Tunis, and
other Mediterranean Muslim powers (emphasis mine 1413). But though the practice
of enslaving the vanquished was beyond the limit of intra-West wars and only
practiced provisionally in East-West conflicts, the baseness of the option was not
debated when it came to the African. The race of Humanism (White, Asian, South
Asian, and Arab) could not have produced itself without the simultaneous
production of that walking destruction which became known as the Black . Put
another way, through chattel slavery the world gave birth and coherence to both its joys of
domesticity and to its struggles of political discontent; and with these joys and struggles, the
Human was born, but not before it murdered the Black, forging a symbiosis between the
political ontology of Humanity and the social death of Blacks. In his essay To Corroborate Our
Claims: Public Positioning and the Slavery Metaphor in Revolutionary America, Peter Dorsey
(in his concurrence with cultural historians F. Nwabueze Okoye and Patricia Bradley) suggests
that, in mid- to late-18th century America, Blackness was such a fungible commodity that it was
traded as freely between the exploited (workers who did not own slaves) as it was between the
unexploited (planters who did). This was due to the effective uses to which Whites
could put the Slave as both flesh and metaphor. For the Revolutionaries, slavery
represented a nightmare that white Americans were trying to avoid (359). Dorseys
claim is provocative, but not unsupported: he maintains that had Blacks-as-Slaves not been in
the White field of vision on a daily basis that it would have been virtually impossible for Whites
to transform themselves from colonial subjects into Revolutionaries: Especially prominent in
the rhetoric and reality of the [Revolutionary] era, the concepts of freedom and slavery
were applied to a wide variety of events and values and were constantly being
defined and redefined[E]arly understandings of American freedom were in
many ways dependent on the existence of chattel slavery[We should] see slavery
in revolutionary discourse, not merely as a hyperbolic rhetorical device but as a
crucial and fluid [fungible] concept that had a major impact on the way early
Americans thought about their political future The slavery metaphor destabilized
previously accepted categories of thought about politics, race, and the early republic. (355)
Though the idea of taxation without representation may have spoken concretely to the idiom
of power that marked the British/American relation as being structurally unethical, it did not
provide metaphors powerful and fungible enough for Whites to meditate and move on when
resisting the structure of their own subordination at the hands of unchecked political power
(354). The most salient feature of Dorseys findings is not his understanding of the way
Blackness, as a crucial and fungible conceptual possession of civil society, impacts
and destabilizes previously accepted categories of intra-White thought, but rather
his contribution to the evidence that, even when Blackness is deployed to stretch
the elasticity of civil society to the point of civil war, that expansion is never elastic
enough to embrace the very Black who catalyzed the expansion. In fact, Dorsey,
building on Patricia Bradleys historical research, asserts that just the opposite is true. The more
the political imagination of civil society is enabled by the fungibility of the slave metaphor, the
less legible the condition of the slave becomes: Focusing primarily on colonial
newspapersBradley finds that the slavery metaphor served to distance the patriot agenda
from the antislavery movement. If anything, Bradley states, widespread use of the metaphor
gave first evidence that the issue of real slavery was not to have a part in the revolutionary
messages (359). And David Eltis believes that this philosophical incongruity between the
image of the Slave and freedom for the Slave begins in Europe and pre-dates the American

Revolution by at least one hundred years: The [European] countries least likely to
enslave their own had the harshest and most sophisticated system of exploiting
enslaved non-Europeans. Overall, the English and Dutch conception of the role of the
individual in metropolitan society ensured the accelerated development of African chattel
slavery in the Americasbecause their own subjects could not become chattel slaves or even
convicts for life(1423) Furthermore, the circulation of Blackness as metaphor and image at the
most politically volatile and progressive moments in history (e.g. the French, English, and
American Revolutions), produces dreams of liberation which are more inessential to and more
parasitic on the Black, and more emphatic in their guarantee of Black suffering, than any dream
of human liberation in any era heretofore. Black slavery is foundational to modern
Humanisms ontics because freedom is the hub of Humanisms infinite
conceptual trajectories. But these trajectories only appear to be infinite. They are
finite in the sense that they are predicated on the idea of freedom from some
contingency that can be named, or at least conceptualized. The contingent rider
could be freedom from patriarchy, freedom from economic exploitation, freedom
from political tyranny (for example, taxation without representation), freedom from
heteronormativity, and so on. What I am suggesting is that first, political discourse recognizes
freedom as a structuring ontologic and then it works to disavow this recognition by imagining
freedom not through political ontologywhere it rightfully beganbut through political
experience (and practice); whereupon it immediately loses its ontological foundations. Why
would anyone do this? Why would anyone start off with, quite literally, an earthshattering ontologic and, in the process of meditating on it and acting through it,
reduce it to an earth reforming experience? Why do Humans take such pride in
self-adjustment, in diminishing, rather than intensifying, the project of liberation
(how did we get from 68 to the present)? Because, I contend, in allowing the notion of freedom
to attain the ethical purity of its ontological status, one would have to lose ones Human
coordinates and become Black. Which is to say one would have to die. For the Black, freedom is
an ontological, rather than experiential, question. There is no philosophically credible
way to attach an experiential, a contingent, rider onto the notion of freedom when
one considers the Blacksuch as freedom from gender or economic oppression,
the kind of contingent riders rightfully placed on the non-Black when thinking
freedom. Rather, the riders that one could place on Black freedom would be
hyperbolicthough no less trueand ultimately untenable: i.e., freedom from the
world, freedom from humanity, freedom from everyone (including ones Black self).
Given the reigning episteme, what are the chances of elaborating a comprehensive, much less
translatable and communicable, political project out of the necessity of freedom as an absolute?
Gratuitous freedom has never been a trajectory of Humanist thought, which is why the infinite
trajectories of freedom that emanate from Humanisms hub are anything but infinitefor they
have no line of flight leading to the Slave.

Class struggle doesnt reveal the foundations of violence against the

black body, identities of race will always permit violence to maintain
their humanity
Pak 12 PhD in literature from UC-San Diego
[Yumi, PhD in literature from UC-San Diego, Outside Relationality: Autobiographical
Deformations and the Literary Lineage of Afro-pessimism in 20th and 21st Century African
American Literature, 2012, acc. 7/15/14, arh]

Because the four authors I examine focus intensively on untangling and retangling the nexus of race, gender, and
sexuality in autobiographical narratives, this project originally relied most heavily on the frameworks provided by
queer theory and performance studies, as the structural organization and methodology behind both disciplines

offered the characteristic of being inter in between... intergenric [sic], interdisciplinary, intercultural and
therefore inherently unstable (What is Performance Studies Anyway? 360). My abstract ideation of the dissertation
was one which conceptualized the unloosening of the authors respective texts from the ways in which they have been
read in particular genres. Yet the investigative progression of my research redirected me to question the despondency
I found within Toomer, Himes, Baldwin and Jones novels, a despondency and sorrow that seemed to reach beyond
the individual and collective purportedly represented in these works. What does it mean, they seem to

speculate, to suffer beyond the individual, beyond the collective, and into the far
reaches of paradigmatic structure? What does it mean to exist beyond social oppression and veer

instead into what Frank B. Wilderson, III calls structural suffering (Red, White & Black 36)? Briefly, Wilderson
utilizes what he calls Frantz Fanons splitting of the hair[s] between social oppression and structural suffering; in
other words, Wilderson refutes the possibility of analogizing blackness with any other

positionality in the world. Others may be oppressed, indeed, may suffer

experientially, but only the black, the paradigmatic slave, suffers structurally.
Afro-pessimism, the theoretical means by which I attempt to answer this query, provides the integral
term and parameters with which I bind together queer theory, performance studies, and autobiography
studies in order to propose a re-examination of these authors and their texts. The structural suffering of
blackness seeps into all elements of American history, culture, and life, and thus I begin
my discussion with an analysis of Hortense Spillers concept of an American grammar in Mamas Baby, Papas
Maybe: An American Grammar Book. To theorize blackness is to begin with the slave ship,
a space that is in actuality no place.7 In discussing the transportation of human

in

cargo across the Middle Passage, Spillers writes that this physical theft of bodies
was a willful and violent (and unimaginable from this distance) severing of the captive body
from its motive will, its active desire (Spillers 67). She contends here that in this mass
gathering and transportation, what becomes illuminated is not only the complete and total
deracination of native from soil, but rather the evisceration of subjectivity from
blackness, the evacuation of will and desire from the body; in other words, we see that
even before the black body there is flesh, that zero degree of social conceptualization that does not
escape concealment under the brush of discourse, or the reflexes of iconography (67). Black flesh, which
arrives in the United States to be manipulated and utilized as slave bodies, is a
primary narrative with its seared, divided, ripped-apartness, riveted to the
ships hole, fallen, or escaped overboard (67). These markings lacerations, woundings,

fissures, tears, scars, openings, ruptures, lesions, rendings, punctures of the flesh are indicative of the sheer scale
of the structural violence amassed against blackness, and from this beginning Spillers culls an American grammar
that grounds itself in the rupture and a radically different kind of cultural continuation, a grammar that is the fabric
of blackness in the United States (67, 68). As Wilderson observes, Africans went into the ships and
came out as Blacks (Red, White & Black 38). In other words, in the same moment they are
(re)born as blacks, they are doomed to death as slaves. This rupture, I argue, is evident in the
definitions of slavery set forth by Orlando Patterson in his seminal volume, Slavery and Social Death: natal alienation,
general dishonor and openness to gratuitous violence. The captive body, which is constructed with torn flesh, is laid
bare to any and all, and it is critical to note here that Patterson, in line with Afro-pessimists, does not align slavery
with labor. The slave can and did work, but what defines him/her as such is that as a dishonored and violated
object, the masters whims for him/her to work, or not work, can be carried out without ramifications. Rather, the
slaves powerlessness is heightened to the greatest possible capacity, wherein s/he is marked by social death and the
permanent, violent domination of their selves (Patterson 13). Spillers radically different kind of cultural
continuation finds an articulation of the object status of blackness in the United States, one which impugns the
separation of slave and black. As Jared Sexton and Huey Copeland inquire, [h]ow might it feel to be... a scandal
to ontology, an outrage to every marker of the human? What, in the final analysis, does it mean to suffer? (Sexton
and Copeland 53). Blackness functions as a scandal to ontology because, as Wilderson states, black

suffering forms the ethical backbone of civil society. He writes, [c]hattel slavery
did not simply reterritorialize the ontology of the African. It also created the
Human out of cultural disparate identities from Europe to the East... Put another
way, through chattel slavery the world gave birth and coherence to both its joys of
domesticity and to its struggles of political discontent, and with these joys and
struggles, the Human was born, but not before it murdered the Black, forging a
symbiosis between the political ontology of Humanity and the social death of

Blacks. (Red, White & Black 20 21) Again, the African is made black, and in this murder both

ontological and physical, humanity gains its coherence. It is not my intention (nor of other Afro-pessimists) to argue
that violence has only ever been committed against black individuals and communities in the United States, or in the
world, but rather that the structural suffering that defines blackness, the violence enacted against blackness to
maintain its positioning outside of civil society, that demarcates the black as slave, has no horizontal equivalent and,
indeed, provides the logical ethos of existence for all othered subjectivities; by this I mean that all other subjects (and
I use this word quite intentionally) retain a body and not the zero degree of flesh. As Sexton writes, we might say of
the colonized: you may lose your motherland, but you will not lose your mother (Hartman 2007) (The Curtain of
the Sky 14). This is precisely why Sexton offers the succinct definition of Afro-pessimism as a political ontology
dividing the Slave from the world of the Human in a constitutive way (The Social Life of Social Death 23).
Furthermore, Afro-pessimists contest the idea that the modern world is one wherein the price of labor determines the
price of being equally for all people. In this capitalistic reading of the world, we summon blacks back into civil society
by utilizing Marxism to assume a subaltern structured by capital, not by white supremacy (Gramscis Black Marx
1). While it is undeniable, of course, that black bodies and labor were used to aid in

the economic growth of the United States, we return again to the point that what
defines enslavement is accumulation and fungibility, alongside natal alienation,
general dishonor, and openness to gratuitous violence; the slave, then, is not
constituted as part of the class struggle.8 While it is true that labor power is exploited and that the

worker is alienated in it, it is also true that workers labor on the commodity, they are not the commodity itself is,
their labor power is (Red, White & Black 50). The slave is, then, invisible within this matrix, and, to a more
detrimental effect, invisible within the ontology of lived subjects entirely. The slave cannot be defined as loss as can
the postcolonial subject, the woman, or the immigrant but can only be configured as lack, as there is no potential for
synthesis within a rubric of antagonism. Wilderson sets up the phrase rubric of antagonism in opposition to rubric
of conflict to clarify the positionality of blacks outside relationality. The former is an irreconcilable

struggle between entities, or positions, the resolution of which is not dialectical

but entails the obliteration of one of the positions , whereas the latter is a rubric of problems
that can be posed and conceptually solved (Red, White & Black 5). He continues, [i]f a Black is the very
antithesis of a Human subject... then his or her paradigmatic exile is not simply a
function of repressive practices on the part of institutions (9). Integrating Hegel and Marx,
and returning to Spillers, Wilderson argues that within this grammar of suffering, the slave is not
a laborer but what he calls anti- Human, against which Humanity establishes,
maintains, and renews its coherence, its corporeal integrity (11). In contrast to
imagining the black other in opposition to whiteness, Wilderson and other Afropessimists theorize blackness as being absent in the dialectic, as anti-Human.

Identity Politics

Good

Voice
Even if imperfect, identity politics is the only and most effective
means for minority groups to gain a voice
Ross 2k [Marlon B. Ross, University of Michigan, Professor of English Language and Literature & African and African
American Studies, New Literary History, Vol. 31, No. 4, Is There Life after Identity Politics? (Autumn, 2000), pp. 827-850,
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20057638] l.gong
On the one hand, individuals sometimes identify as a group in order to struggle for a share of power

against others with whom they disagree and to whom they are subordinated. Black women, for
instance, vote in a higher percentage and more consistently than any other identity group for the
Democratic Party. They do not do so in order merely to assert a different perspective as an identity group; they do so
instead because they understand how their interests, as a collective group, place them in peril if they
do otherwise. Their group identity is the most effective means for them to take

sides in an ongoing argument in which others constantly attempt to distort

and diminish their share of political, economic, and social resources. If they

do not see how their collective interests pivot on asserting their collective identity, then they shall
not be able to see the argument before them, much less the ideology operating to buttress that argument.
Their collective identity clarifies which side of the argument they have to be on in order to have a
political voice. On the other hand, sometimes groups exploit a rational disagreement, creating oversimplified bilateral sides in
order to em power themselves as a group by subordinating others as a group. Every time politicians attack "welfare mothers," they
manufacture a bilateral argument of us against them, sometimes a very rationalist one, just to enhance their own political power
within the status quo. The interplay between opinion and identity is neither either/or nor both/and but all at once. Rational

arguments can be used to mask ideology, and contrarily they can be used to bring it to light, just
as the appeal to identity can be exploited to reveal a true difference of opinion or exploited to fabricate a rational
disagreement in order to win the upper hand in a competition among groups. Finally, limiting ideology to a rational
disagreement of opinion seems to cover over the naked reality of what it means to take sides in
any argument not purely defined by rationality, which no argument can be. Such words as "side" and
"stance," exploited by Professor Michaels because they are inescapable in our deliberative discourses, again

remind us that "left" and "right" are oblique references to the human body, and I would suggest, as such, they are also references not
to just individual stray bodies, but to collectivities of bodies comprising the body politic. People take stancesthey take sides

because they stand somewhere, and where they always stand in taking a side is in some identity-formation,
assumed or affirmed, normalized or marginalized, politic or politicized, covered or exposed by
the supposed reasonableness of the side they choose to take. If politics were a forum among equals, like the relative
equality of colleagues at some academic conference, the attractiveness of Professor Michaels's argument would be undeniable.
Politics, however, is a struggle exactly because inequality exists among individuals constituted as groups.7 Ideology is not

just
the content or substance that thought takes in politics, defined as the struggle for power; it is
moreover the form (including point of view) and direction (including point of view) that thought takes as it
structures and is structured by politics. Contrary to Professor Michaels's assertions, therefore, point of view is
not extrinsic to an argument; instead it is an intrinsic facet of an argument as it helps to shape that argument's
form, direction, and content. Although it is much more than this, "identity politics" is, to some extent, about what
point of view is available to (and is occupied by) those engaged in a struggle for power, and about how
that power will be exercised. It is a matter not just of what is being said, but also who is saying it about whom, and
directed toward whose individual and collective benefit and/or detriment.

Movements
We must act within identity politics as the only effective method to coalesce
against oppression

Ross 2k [Marlon B. Ross, University of Michigan, Professor of English Language and Literature & African and African
American Studies, New Literary History, Vol. 31, No. 4, Is There Life after Identity Politics? (Autumn, 2000), pp. 827-850,
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20057638] l.gong

Another reason we may be restless inside identity theory is because, according to the institutional expectations
of academe, we hunger for a new, attention-grabbing paradigm to market at the moment that the sexiness of a new
method seems to wear off. Anti-identity advocates can smell that moment approaching and are eager to capitalize
on it to demote race, gender, and sexuality and the identity groups that these categories supposedly represent. This sort of academic
restlessness is a bit underhanded, given that we have been studying solely the intellectual identity of Aristotle for nigh 2400 years, and
yet there is no movement to clamp down on those who take pleasure in the study of Aristotelian physics, metaphysics, posterior analytics, ethics, and
poetics, even though these have ceased to provide a living paradigm for modernity. This

kind of academic restlessness can also

take place within such an identity discipline like feminism or queer studies. As Wiegman suggests, certain
feminists are anxious to return to a universal woman because they have grown tired of others' "identity politics." Otherwise instructive
queer theorists like Freeman in her contribution here or Lauren Berlant10 strive to make family or church automatic
signifiers of unqueer conservatism blocking the progress of queer theory and politics . This has
the effect of dismissing a strong tendency among Black lesbians, gays, and bisexuals to identify
with church and family as sites of transformation, actual and potential, central to their sexual identity as
Blacks and to their racial identity as men-loving men and women-loving women. Such
restlessness within an identity discipline frequently tends also to assume that stigma, marginality, and typing
mobilized as key terms in Palumbo-Liu's contributionmust dominate the study of the representation of
intersecting identities, such that it becomes impossible to understand, for instance, the pleasures of identification that enable Black sexual
minorities to find in the Black church and the Black family, not only in particular cases but also as institutions, magnets for progressive "identity

Instead of assuming that

something is astray with anyone who identifies with these "reproductive"
institutions, we need to investigate and theorize the economies of pleasure
operating in such familial and familiar identity attractions. If we abandon the
politics," rather than a common enemy that can unite queers across race, class, and gender.

study of identity "inside" academe in the clamor for a new paradigm, "out there" identity politics and pleasures will
continue and probably intensify. The more self-consciously pleased and disturbed that we
become in our affirmed and enforced identities, the more restless we become "inside" them. Even
intensified self-consciousness, however, does not seem to get us closer to the dance of identification as we experience it pleasurably and disturbingly
"inside" and "across" our bodies' persons, individually and collectively considered. Our recourse to more externalized structureslike the sides of an
argument or the solidity of economic classespromises some reprieve, but we grow no less restless "outside" our personal and collective selves, as
though individuals and their dis/affectionate affiliations are emptied of their identity, mere meanings and patterns bereft of that inner motivating
vitality. As "identity

politics" is not dead, is in fact thriving, so I'd suggest we get on with making its theory and practice thrive in our
Nealon's examination of "affect" as
queer reception history is a good instance of this.11 By insisting on pleasure as a face/t of
identification, I realize that I risk others' diminishing the political struggle at stake in the
disciplining of identity forms. I would not sacrifice one to the other. If identity is always political,
the economies of pleasure at work in identification also cannot escape the play for power, in shared or
monopolistic versions. In fact, it is the activity of pleasure on and across subjects of identity that makes
identity such a forceful vehicle for oppressive politics, and likewise this pleasure functions in
collective assaults against oppression. The pleasures of thinking that one belongs to a superior white race must be reckoned as
intellectual institutions, accompanied by less nervousness and as much pleasure as possible .

the
pleasure in identifying against dominance cannot be delimited by acts of
domination. Belonging to a group formed through others' domination and one's own
interfused with the obligations, confusions, fears, and privileges afforded by such a sweep ing, compelling identity. Fortunately for us,

subordination paradoxically affords its own peculiar pleasures aimed at upsetting the norms of
power. These are the potentially liberating pleasures of identification that the domineering
cannot rescind, however much they may practice to outlaw or outpace them. Of identity's politics and pleasures there is

no end, and as for the "identity politics" besetting us at the present time, we are only now
beginning to learn the rudimentary steps of the dance.

Pre-Req to Cap
Direct confrontation with issues of race is a precondition to
movements against capitalism.
Taylor 11 (Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, on the editorial board of the International Socialist Review
and a doctoral student in African American Studies at Northwestern University; Race, class and
Marxism, SocialistWorker.org, http://socialistworker.org/2011/01/04/race-class-and-marxism
.nt)
Marxists believe that the potential for that kind of unity is dependent on battles and struggles
against racism today. Without a commitment by revolutionary organizations in the here and
now to the fight against racism, working-class unity will never be achieved and the revolutionary
potential of the working class will never be realized. Yet despite all the evidence of this
commitment to fighting racism over many decades, Marxism has been maligned as, at best,
"blind" to combating racism and, at worst, "incapable" of it. For example, in an article published
last summer, popular commentator and self-described "anti-racist" Tim Wise summarized the
critique of "left activists" that he later defines as Marxists. He writes: [L]eft activists often
marginalize people of color by operating from a framework of extreme class reductionism, which
holds that the "real" issue is class, not race, that "the only color that matters is green," and that
issues like racism are mere "identity politics," which should take a backseat to promoting classbased universalism and programs to help working people. This reductionism, by ignoring the
way that even middle class and affluent people of color face racism and color-based
discrimination (and by presuming that low-income folks of color and low-income whites are
equally oppressed, despite a wealth of evidence to the contrary) reinforces white denial,
privileges white perspectivism and dismisses the lived reality of people of color. Even more, as
we'll see, it ignores perhaps the most important political lesson regarding the interplay of race
and class: namely, that the biggest reason why there is so little working-class consciousness and
unity in the Untied States (and thus, why class-based programs to uplift all in need are so much
weaker here than in the rest of the industrialized world), is precisely because of racism and the
way that white racism has been deliberately inculcated among white working folks. Only by
confronting that directly (rather than sidestepping it as class reductionists seek to do) can we
ever hope to build cross-racial, class based coalitions. In other words, for the policies favored by
the class reductionist to work--be they social democrats or Marxists--or even to come into being,
racism and white supremacy must be challenged directly.

Inevitable
Identity politics are inevitablewe necessarily impute some form of
an identity on every person we meet
Ross 2k [Marlon B. Ross, University of Michigan, Professor of English Language and Literature & African and African
American Studies, New Literary History, Vol. 31, No. 4, Is There Life after Identity Politics? (Autumn, 2000), pp. 827-850,
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20057638] l.gong
And why shouldn't they be? I am told that I'm the "spittin' image" (a colloquial corruption of "spit and image") of

my
father. I often see the spittin' image of my "blood relatives" in Blacks whom I encounter far from home. I see
the spittin' image of movie stars in ordinary people on the street. Walking around London, I see the
spittin' image of members of the royal family everywhere. Whether resulting from a trick of the
mind's eye or from actual meta/physical resonances forced upon the mind by the eye, I cannot deny the
constant recurrence of such facial echoes as a commonplace deja vu. And upon such facial echoes
rest the mountains of racial and other identity ideologies, the weight of which "identity politics"
seeks to lift. Our fate is not that presence is always already beyond our metaphysical grasp, as
Jacques Derrida would have it, but instead that we can handle only the physics of presences , even when
caught within that gap between the personal encounter and the person's absence? the gap that we variously call
touching, seeing, knowing, imaging, or reading. Those contributors I have not met in person,
therefore, must necessarily possess face/ts of identitymetonymic facesmore or less see able,
knowable, imaginable, readable to me. This is because, given the lack of such "evidence" supposedly
offered by the actual person's face, in the effort to reckon what they are saying and why, I necessarily must
impute some kind of identity to who they are and why they say what they're saying. All of these

contributors I have met in print, as we like to say, and the more print that I've read by them, the more cohesivethe less inchoateis
my sense of an identity for them.3 My identification of them is not merely a projection, although we cannot
disallow a degree of this, but more aptly, it is a

matter of a dialectic between what they project to me and

what I take from that projection. All of this is to assert that the most basic act of "seeing" or
"knowing" or "imaging" or "reading" is itself a kind of face-off that we now call "identity
politics," but that was no doubt called by other names before. And this is so not merely because we live in a
moment in which what we call "identity politics" is rife, or is anticipated as waning because too fluent. When
we cannot deal with persons face to face, we always deal with face/ts, the disembodied parts that
connect them to larger abstract, but no less material and actual, categories readily available to us.
When we do meet someone face to face, we still deal only with face/ts, with bodied parts that we
can classify according to what makes sense to us from our own limited identity experiences.
Identities are not like the faces in facets; they are face/ts. When we therefore talk about the
politics of identityno matter how much more sophisticated we try to make it soundwe are
really talking about the politics of our face/ts.

Where there is identity, there is the struggle for power

Ross 2k [Marlon B. Ross, University of Michigan, Professor of English Language and Literature & African and African
American Studies, New Literary History, Vol. 31, No. 4, Is There Life after Identity Politics? (Autumn, 2000), pp. 827-850,
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20057638] l.gong
On the surface, where we like to think that faces exist (note the "face" lurking in "surface"), this equation

of

"identity politics" with face/ts may sound pretty innocuous. And in a sense it is. It certainly does not sound scandalous
enough to compel the question, "Is there life after identity politics?" My point is that before "identity politics," however
we date the emergence of that, there was identity, and wherever there is identity, there is a
struggle over power of some sort. In our farfetched prehistory, this may have meant my clan against yours, your tribe

against someone else's, or their kinfolk against one another. It may have meant a seemingly simple division of social roles between
menfolk and women folk, whereby the pressure of utilitythe need for divisions of laborinexplicably enables one group to assume
priority over the other.4 The face/t nature of identityour tendency to observe real (in other words,

essential) categories in the surfaces of uniquely materialized facesconstantly reminds us that

we judge others' facets by their sur/faces, even when we've never encountered them in person. This fact (of history,

not "science") understandably creates a great deal of frustration and anxiety, intellectual and otherwise, in the essays of this volume.

After all, centuries of chattel slavery, sexual bondage, ethnic exclusion, colonial theft, warfare,
economic exploitation, internment, apartheid, lynching, rape, and downright genocide have
revolved around fixing faces into categories based on face/ts of identity. Given thatthanks to
"identity politics"we now, most of us, acknowledge these horrific practices as historical facts, it
is easy to forget that the feat of making them horrible facts of history is a hard-won and fragile
victory based as much in the face/ts of identity as in these genocidal practices themselves. Given
these horrifying facts of history, it is also too easy to forget to what extent we can and do find pleasure in
our group identifications, even in, or perhaps especially in, those identities historically burdened
by the divisive politics of identity. In other words, it makes a difference that there was a politics of
identity before the "identity politics" that we supposedly are about to lose forever. At the risk of splitting hairs, I want
to suggest that it is absolutely necessary to distinguish between this longer human history of the
politics of identity and the current episode of "identity politics" at issue among these contributors. If, for a
moment, we accept the notion that "identity politics" is a brief episode, a particular object quickly fading from the sight-lines of
amorphous faces, even if we accept this particular narrative of identity, then we are still faced with (yes that metonymy face again) a
politics for identity before this particular episode of "identity politics." It is a monstrous mistake to think that the

politics of identity is something that happened only recently and is on the decline just because
we have a name, "identity politics," for a local, putatively short lived phenomenona phenomenon that in actuality
arises out of a long, uncharted human history in which "identity" has always been the heart of "politics," if not
self-consciously politicized in now familiar ways. If the politics of identity has been with us since
at least the beginnings of recorded human history, then I must ask again, why the urge to
prophesy the death of "identity politics"?

Alternative

Alt Solves

Racism
Criticizing the Black-white framework allows us to find an effective
strategy for vanquishing the evil of racism
Andersen and Collins 92 M.A., Ph. D., University of Massachusetts, Amherst; B.A.,
Georgia State University, Atlanta AND MA Harvard, Graduate school of education and phD
brandeis university, sociology (Margaret L. and Patricia Hill, Race, Class, and Gender: An
Anthology, 6th edition, chapter 15// SRSL)
The racial and ethnic landscape has changed too much in recent years to view it with the same eyes as before. We are looking at a multi-dimensional reality in which race,
ethnicity, nationality, culture and immigrant status come to- gether with breathtakingly new
results. W e are also seeing global changes that have a massive impact on our domestic situation,
especially the economy and labor force. For a group of Korean restaurant entrepreneurs to hire Mexican cooks to prepare Chinese dishes for mainly African-American
customers, as happened in Houston, Texas, has ceased to be unusual. The ever-changing demographic landscape compels those
struggling against racism and for a transformed, non-capitalist society to resolve several
strategic questions. Among them: doesn't the exclusively Black-white frame- work discourage the
perception of common interests among people of color and thus sustain White Supremacy? Doesn't the
view that only African Americans face serious institutionalized racism isolate them from potential allies? Doesn't the Black-white model encourage
people of color to spend toop much energy understanding our lives in relation to whiteness,
obsessing about what white society will think and do? That tendency is inevitable in some ways:
the locus of power over our lives has long been white (although big shifts have recently taken place in the color of capital, as we see in Japan,
Singapore and elsewhere). The oppressed have always survived by becoming experts on the oppressor's ways.
But that can become a prison of sorts, a trap of compulsive vigilance. Let us liberate ourselves, then,
from the tunnel vision of whiteness and behold the many colors around us! Let us summon the courage to
reject outdated ideas and stretch our imaginations into the next century. For a Latina to urge recognizing a variety of racist
models is not, and should not be, yet another round in the Oppression Olympics. We don't need more competition among different social
groups for the gold medal of "Most Oppressed." We don't need more comparisons of suffering
between women and Blacks, the disabled and the gay, Latino teenagers and white seniors, or
whatever. Pursuing some hierarchy of oppression leads us down dead-end streets
where we will never find the linkage between different oppressions and how to
overcome them. To criticize the exclusively Black-white framework , then, is not some
resentful demand by other people of color for equal sympa- thy, equal funding,
equal clout, equal .patronage or other questionable crumbs . Above all, it is not a devious
way of minimizing the centrality of the African-American experience in any analysis of racism.
The goal in re-examining the Black-white framework is to find an effec- tive strategy for
vanquishing an evil that has expanded rather than dimin- ished. Racism has expanded partly as
a result of the worldwide economic recession that followed the end of the post-war boom in the
early 1970s, with the resulting capitalist restructuring and changes in the international divi- sion
of labor. Those developments generated feelings of insecurity and a search for scapegoats. In the United States racism has also escalated
as whites increasingly fear becoming a weakened, minority population in the next cen- tury. The stage is set for decades of ever more vicious divide-and-conquer tactics. What has been the
response from people of color to this ugly White Supremacist agenda? Instead of uniting, based
on common experience and needs, we have often closed our doors in a defensive, isolationist
mode, each community on its own. A fire of fear and distrust begins to crackle, threaten- ing to
consume us all. Building solidarity among people of color is more necessary than ever -but the
exclusively Black-white definition of racism makes such solidarity more difficult
than ever . We urgently need twenty-first-century thinking that will move us be- yond the Black-white framework without negating its historical role in the construction of U.S. racism. We
need a better understanding of how racism developed both similarly and differently for various
peoples, according to whether they experienced genocide, enslavement, colonization or some

other Structure of oppression. At stake is the building of a united anti-racist force strong enough to resist
White Supremacist strategies of divide-and-conquer and move forward toward social justice for
all. ... ... African Americans have reason to be uneasy about where they, as a people, will find themselves politically, economically and socially with the rapid numerical growth of other folk of color. The issue is
not just possible job loss, a real question that does need to be faced honestly. There is also a feeling that after centuries of fighting for
simple recognition as human beings, Blacks will be shoved to the back of history again (like the back of the
bus). Whether these fears are real or not, uneasiness exists and can lead to resentment when there's
talk about a new model of race relations. So let me repeat: in speaking here of the need to move beyond
the bipolar concept, the goal is to clear the way for stronger unity against White Supremacy.
The goal is to identify our commonalities of experience and needs so we can build
alliances . The commonalities begin with history, which reveals that again and again peoples of
color have had one experience in common: European colo- nization and/or neo-colonialism with its accompanying exploitation. This is true for
all indigenous peoples, including Hawaiians. It is true for all Latino peoples, who were invaded and ruled by Spain or Portugal. It is true for peo- ple in Africa, Asia and the Pacific
Islands, where European powers became the colonizers. People of color were victimized by colonialism not only externally but
also through internalized racism-the "colonized mentality." Flowing from this shared history are our contemporary commonalities. On the

poverty scale, African Americans and Native Americans have always been at the bottom, with Latinos nearby. In 1995 the U.S. Census found that Latinos have the highest poverty rate, 24 percent. Segregation may
have been legally abolished in the 1960s, but now the United States is rapidly moving toward resegregation as a result of whites moving to the suburbs. This leaves people of color-especially Blacks and Latinoswith inner cities that lack an adequate tax base and thus have inadequate schools. Not surprisingly, Blacks and Latinos finish college at a far lower rate than whites. In other words, the victims of U.S. social ills

With
greater solidarity, justice for people of color could be won. And an even bigger prize would be
possible: a U.S. society that advances beyond "equality," beyond granting people of color a
respect equal to that given to Euro-Americans. Too often "equality" leaves whites still at the
center, still embodying the Americanness by which others are judged, still defining the national
character.... ... Innumerable statistics, reports and daily incidents should make it impossible to exclude Latinos and other non-Black populations of color when racism is discussed, but they don't. Police
come in more than one color. Doesn't that indicate the need for new, inclusive models for fighting racism? Doesn't that speak to the absolutely urgent need for alliances among peoples of color?

killings, hate crimes oy ra individuals and murders with impunity by border officials should mak impossible, but they don't. With chilling regularity, ranch owners com migrant workers, usually Mexican, to repay
the cost of smuggling them i;:; the United States by laboring the rest of their lives for free. The 45 La..:- and Thai garment workers locked up in an El Monte, California, facto . working 18 hours a day seven days a
week for $299 a month, can also be co::::- sidered slaves (and one must ask why it took three years for the Immigra and Naturalization Service to act on its own reports about this horror) Francisco Examiner,
August 8, 1995). Abusive treatment of migrant work~- can be found all over the United States. In Jackson Hole, Wyoming, for e:i- ample, police and federal agents rounded up 150 Latino workers in 19W, inked

These experiences cannot be

attributed to xenophobia, cultural prejudi-- or some other, less repellent term than racism. Take the
numbers on their arms and hauled them off to jail in patrol cars and horse trailer full of manure (Los Angeles Times, September 6, 1997).

case of two sm Latino children in San Francisco who were found in 1997 covered from heac to toe with flour. They explained they had hoped to make their skin white enough for school. There is no way to
understand their action except as the result of fear in the racist climate that accompanied passage of Proposition 187, which denies schooling to the children of undocumented immigrants. Another example:
Mexican and Chicana women working at a Nabisco plant in Oxnard, California, were not allowed to take bathroom breaks from the . assembly line and were told to wear diapers instead. Can we really imagine
white workers being treated that way? (The Nabisco women did file a suit and won, in 1997.) No "model minority" myth protects Asians and Asian Americans from hate crimes, police brutality, immigrant-bashing,
stereotyping and everyday racist prejudice. Scapegoating can even take their lives, as happened with the murder ofVincent Chin in Detroit some years ago.... WHY THE BLACK-WHITE MODEL? A bipolar model
of racism has never been really accurate for the United States. Early in this nation's history. Benjamin Franklin perceived a tri-racial society based on skin color-"the lovely white" (Franklin's words), the Black, and
the "tawny," as Ron Takaki tells us in Ir~n Cages. But this concept changed as cap- ital's need for labor intensified in the new nation and came to focus on African slave labor. The "tawny" were decimated or
forcibly exiled to distant areas; Mexicans were not yet available to be the main labor force. As enslaved Africans became the crucial labor force for the primitive accumulation of capital, they also served as the
foundation for the very idea of whiteness-based on the concept of blackness as inferior. Three other reasons for the Black-white framework seem obvious: num- bers, geography and history. African Americans
have long been the largest population of color in the United States; only recently has this begun to change. Also, African Americans have long been found in sizable numbers in most parts of the United States,
including major cities, which has not been true of Latinos until recent times. Historically, the Black-white relationship has been entrenched in the nation's collective memory for some 300 years- whereas it is only
150 years since the United States seized half of Mexico and incorporated those lands and their peoples. Slavery and the struggle to end it formed a central theme in this country's only civil war-a prolonged,
momentous conflict. Above all, enslaved Africans in the United States and African Americans have created an unmatched heritage ofmassive, persistent, dramatic and infinitely courageous resistance, with
individual leaders of worldwide note. We also find sociological and psychological explanations ofthe Black-white model's persistence. From the days ofJefferson onward, Native Americans, Mexicans and later the
Asian/Pacific Islanders did not seem as much a threat to racial purity or as capable of arousing white sexual anxieties as did Blacks. A major reason for this must have been Anglo ambiguity about who could be
called white. Most of the Mexican ranchero elite in California had welcomed the U.S. takeover, and Mexicans were partly European-therefore "semi-civilized"; this allowed Anglos to see them as white, unlike
lower-class Mexicans. For years Mexicans were legally white, and even today we hear the ambiguous U.S. Census term "Non-Hispanic Whites." Like Latinos, Asian Americans have also been officially counted as
white in some historical periods. They have been defined as "colored" in others, with "Chinese" being yet another category. Like Mexicans, they were often seen as not really white but not quite Black either. Such
ambiguity tended to put Asian Americans along with Latinos outside the prevailing framework of racism. Blacks, on the other hand, were not defined as white, could rarely become upper-class and maintained an
almost constant rebelliousness. Contemporary Black rebellion has been urban: right in the Man's face, scary. Mexicans, by contrast, have lived primarily in rural areas until a few decades ago and "have no MauMau image,'' as one Black friend said, even when protesting injustice energetically. Only the nineteenth-century resistance heroes labeled "bandits" stirred white fear, and that was along the border, a limited area.
Latino stereotypes are mostly silly: snoozing next to a cactus, eating greasy food, always being late and disorganized, rolling big Carmen Miranda eyes, shrug- ging with self-deprecation "me no speek good
eengleesh." In other words, not serious. This view may be altered today by stereotypes of the gangbanger, criminal or dirty immigrant, but the prevailing image of Latinos remains that of a debased white, at best. ...
Among other important reasons for the exclusively Black-white model, sheer ignorance leaps to mind. The oppression and exploitation of Latinos (like Asians) have historical roots unknown to most Americans.
People who learn at least a little about Black slavery remain totally ignorant about how the United States seized half ofMexico or how it has colonized Puerto Rico... One other important reason for the bipolar
model of racism is the sm born self-centeredness of U.S. political culture. It has meant that the nati~- lacks any global vision other than relations of domination. In particular. me United States refuses to see itself
as one among some 20 countries in a hem:- sphere whose dominant languages are Spanish and Portuguese, not Engli-:~ It has only a big yawn of contempt or at best indifference for the people languages and
issues of Latin America. It arrogantly took for itself alone the name of half the western hemisphere, America, as was its "Manifest Destiny." of course. So Mexico may be nice for a vacation and lots of Yankees like
tacos, b- the political image of Latin America combines incompetence with absurdir: fat corrupt dictators with endless siestas. Similar attitudes extend to Latinos within the United States. My parents, both
Spanish teachers, endure decades ofbeing told that students were better offlearning French or German. The mass media complain that "people can't relate to Hispanics (or Asians .- It takes mysterious masked
rebels, a beautiful young murdered singer or sal outselling ketchup for the Anglo world to take notice of Latinos. If there weren't a mushrooming, billion-dollar "Hispanic" market to be wooed, the Anglo world
might still not know we exist. No wonder that racial paradigm sees orily two poles. The exclusively Black-white framework is also sustained by the "mode minority" myth, because it distances Asian Americans
from other victims o; racism. Portraying Asian Americans as people who work hard, study hard. obey the established order and therefore prosper, the myth in effect admon- ishes Blacks and Latinos: "See, anyone
can make it in this society if you try hard enough. The poverty and prejudice you face are all your fault." The "model" label has been a wedge separating Asian Americans from others of color by denying their
commonalities. It creates a sort of racia! bourgeoisie, which White Supremacy uses to keep Asian Americans from joining forces with the poor, the homeless and criminalized youth. People then see Asian
Americans as a special class of yuppie: young, single, college- educated, on the white-collar track-and they like to shop for fun. Here is a dandy minority group, ready to be used against others. The stereotype of
Asian Americans as whiz kids is also enraging because it hides so many harsh truths about the impoverishment, oppression and racist treatment they experience. Some do come from middle- or upper-class
families in Asia, some do attain middle-class or higher status in the U.S., and their community must deal with the reality of class privilege where it exists. But the hidden truths include the poverty of many
Asian/Pacific Islander groups, especially women, who often work under intolerable conditions, as in the sweatshops.... Yet another cause of the persistent Black-white conception of racism is dual- ism, the
philosophy that sees all life as consisting of two irreducible elements. Those elements are usually oppositional, like good and evil, mind and body, civilized and savage. Dualism allowed the invaders, colonizers and
enslavers of today's United States to rationalize their actions by stratifying supposed opposites along race, color or gender lines. So mind is European, male and ra- tional; body is colored, female and emotional.
Dozens of other such pairs can be found, with their clear implications of superior-inferior. In the arena of race, this society's dualism has long maintained that if a person is not totally white (whatever that can
mean biologically), he or she must be considered Black.... Racism evolves; our models must also evolve. Today's challenge is to move beyond the Black-white dualism that has served as the foundation of White

. In taking up this challenge, we have to proceed with both boldness and infinite care.
Talking race in these United States is an intellectual minefield; for every observation, one can
find three contradic- tions and four necessary qualifications from five different racial groups.
Making your way through that complexity, you have to think: keep your eyes on the prize.
Supremacy

Critical race theorists are also committed to social justice on a larger

scalerace, gender, class, sexual orientation, disability and other
forms of oppression
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 8, pgs 133-135, 2009//SRSL)

While Marxists would disagree with certain assertions, for example racism is
permanent and central, I have broad agreement with the suggestions for
classroom practice of Daniel and Tara Yosso (2005, pp. 70-72). Their brief is higher
education, but it is my view that these suggestions apply equally to
elementary/primary/junior and secondary/high schools. Solorzano and Yasso (p. 70) argue that 'race'
and racism should be discussed in the class- room, that racism intersects with
other forms of oppression, and that racism is not a black/white binary (p. 70). They go
on to stress that CRT in the classroom must challenge the dom- inant ideology of
'objectivity, meritocracy, color-blindness, race neutral- ity, and equal opportunity'
(ibid.). Critical Race Theorists, they argue, are committed to social justice and
liberation with respect to 'race', gender and class

(p. 71). To this, I would wish to

add sexual

orientation and disability and other forms of oppression . I am, ofcourse, in full agreement with their wish to
eliminate poverty and empower underrepresented groups (ibid.), and with their acknowledgment that educational institutions 'operate in contradictory ways, with their poten-

To their argument that the

experiential knowledge of people of color is 'legitimate, appropriate, and critical to
understanding, analyzing, and teaching about racial subordination' (ibid.), I would want to
incorporate, as argued in chapter 3 ofthis volume, Leonardo's (2004) call to integrate this focus on subjectivity with
Marxist objectivism. I would further wish to insist that the voice and experiential
knowledge of those racialized on non-color-coded grounds (see chapter 2 ofthis volume) is also
legitimate, appropriate and critical, as is indeed the experience and voice ofthe
exploited and oppressed non-racialized white working class pupils/students (and I use
tial to oppress and marginalize coexisting with their potential to emancipate and empower' (ibid.).

'working class' in its sociological sense here). Finally, Solorzano and Yosso (2007, p. 70) claim that CRT 'challenges ahistoricism' and is transdisciplinary With respect to

not all CRT analyses incorporate this challenge. As

far as a transdiciplinary knowledge base is concerned, I would fully endorse the
need to utilize various curriculum subject areas to understand and undermine
racism and other inequalities. Indeed, I have attempted just this in Cole (2009b) (see chapter 4, note 14 of this volume). I would also agree
with Marvin Lynn (2007, p. 131), in his discussion of 'Critical Race Theory and its Links to Education' that
there is a need 'to look analytically at the failure of the educational system ... to
properly edu- cate the majority of culturally and racially subordinated students',
and to examine 'racial sorting' where schools put pupils/students of color in lower
tracks (streams), are over-represented in 'special' schools and pushed out of certain
schools (ibid.). But again, I would want to stress that certain pupils/ students who are racialized in non-color-coded ways may be on the receiv- ing end of similar
'ahistoricism', I have suggested in chapter 5 ofthis volume that

processes, and that non-racialized white working class (again in the sociological sense) pupils/students also get 'sorted' in ways that are to their detriment (Lynn also refers to
this, but only in passing (ibid.)). I would further agree with Lawn (ibid.) when he refers to 'the systematic annihilation ofBlack and Brown students' through the whole education
sys- tem (ibid.), although I would use the phrase 'structural and systematic' and would include the other constituencies I refer to immediately above. Lynn concludes his

claim that CRT in education 'seeks to

identify, analyze, and transform those structural, cultural, and interpersonal
aspects of education that maintain the subordination of Students of Color', and, in
addition, that it 'asks such questions as: what roles do schools themselves, school
processes, and school structures play in helping to maintain racial, ethnic and
gender subordination' (Solorzano and Yosso, 2000, p. 40, cited in Lynn, 2007, p. 131). Finally Lynn suggests, also following Solorzano an Yosso, 2000
that 'CRT can be utilized as a point from which to begin the dialogue about the
possibilities for schools to engage in the transformation of society' (Lynn, 2007, p. 131). The
discussion of'CRT and Education' by citing Solorzano and Yosso's (2000, p. 42)

transformation of society is of course the guiding principle of Marxism, but whereas, for Marxists, transforma- tion entails a social revolution and transition to socialism, Critical
Race Theorists in general, like poststructuralists and postmodernists in toto (see Cole, 2008d, Chapter 5), lack a clear vision of a transformed society or, indeed, a transformed
world. Marx was suspicious ofphilosophers (and I am sure would be equally suspicious of Critical Race Theorists) who had 'inter- preted the world in many ways', whereas for
him, the point was 'to change it' ([1845] [1976], p. 123). I return to a discussion ofthis limitation ofCRT in the Conclusion to this volume. For a discussion of Marxist ideas about
socialist transformation, and a consideration of twenty-first century social- ism, see chapter 7 of this volume. Lynn (2007, pp. 137) concludes his analysis in typical CRT fashion
by stressing the existence ofwhite supremacy 'in the United States and in the world'. With respect to the notion of 'white supremacy' per se as a useful descriptor ofeveryday

As far as claims for its ubiquitous presence are

concerned, I have also argued that 'white supremacy' is a most valid historical
descriptor for certain societies but not an informative current one, and also that
world racism takes a number offorms which are not related to skin color.
racism I have critiqued this in chapter 2 and elsewhere in this volume.

At: Stop talking

Openness to criticism is critical to progressive social movements
Hutchinson 4 (Darren, Critical Race Histories: In and Out, University of Florida Levin
College of Law,
http://scholarship.law.ufl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1405&context=facultypub, pp. 118788, acc. 7/8/14, arh)
Cultural critic bell hooks has observed that progressive social movements mature in response to
critical inquiry from within their ranks. Hooks notes that "any progressive political movement
grows and matures only to the degree that it passionately welcomes and encourages, in both
theory and practice, diversity of opinion, new ideas, critical exchange, and dissent., 72 This
assertion certainly holds true in the context of CRT, as its evolution has depended largely upon
very vigorous internal criticism. Although Critical Race Theorists have not always passionately
welcomed such critiques,73 the relative openness of CRT has allowed for substantial innovation
of its intellectual agenda. Internal critics have also challenged Critical Race Theorists, and their
arguments have shaped the direction of critical race analysis as well-if only by generating
rebuttals to these very critiques. This Part discusses the influence of internal and external
critiques upon critical race analysis and then responds directly to some important critiques with
which Critical Race Theorists have not yet exhaustively engaged.

AT: Afropes
Racism isnt permanent an effective resistance requires the
commitment of all peoples
Camp 13 (Jordan, Johns Hopkins University, Black Radicalism, Marxism, and Collective
Memory: An Interview with Robin D. G. Kelley, pp. 216-218, acc. 7/7/14, arh)
Second, that even the most ardent racists are not fixed in their ideology . People can
be transformed in the struggle. Racism is definitely a fetter to mul- tiracial organizing, but
Hammer and Hoe shows how people built a movement across the color line in the most racist
place of all. Anyone watching footage of Bull Connor in Ingram Park in 1963 could not believe
that thirty years before that there had been an interracial group of five thousand people in
Birmingham standing on the street demanding relief, jobs, and an end to police brutality. Third,
that class politics are alive and well. But any class politics that pre- tend that race and also
gender get in the way of class organizing miss the point altogether. You can actually build
white support for antiracism, male support for antisexism, and black support for
white working-class justice.

People can and do cross the boundaries that historians and scholars impose on people. The levels of empathy that

many of the people in Hammer and Hoe showedthe fact that people were willing to be beaten or die for othersis an extremely important lesson. We spend so much time
theorizing race, class, and gender and wondering whether or not you can get people of a particular identity to move, but we dont even ask the question Can you get Steve to risk
his life for Hosea Hudson? It is not that Steve is supporting Hosea Hudson because he is black and male; Steve is supporting Hosea Hudson because he is part of a movement

. Collective struggle is the only answer to solving all of our problems, and
your problem is mine. Camp: Hammer and Hoes excavation of interracial class militancy has been less well noted. A story that stood out for me was about
that says, solidarity is the only answer

Clyde Johnson, a white Communist whom you describe as an able and militant labor leader sensitive to the needs of black workers and someone who was a key figure in the
Share Croppers Union (SCU). Can you talk about these race and class dynamics? Kelley: This is a huge question. To be a white Communist in Alabama was an incredible act of

what it meant to be a white comrade depended on

where you were and what choices you made. Clyde was unique in that he chose to work primarily, almost exclusively with African
bravery, but in all honesty not quite as brave as being a black Communist. Still,

Americans. He took over the Share Croppers Union and worked in the Piedmont and black belt counties with large black majorities. On the other hand, there were white
Communists in the upcountry counties who really only organized white farmers, many of whom came out of the Klan. Many of these folks did not deal directly with black
comrades, but those who did faced culture shock. They not only had to listen to working-class black folks, they also had to take criticism and even direction from them. Of
course, in the long history of the United States, this isnt unprecedented. During Reconstruction there were similar circumstances. In the 1880s and 1890s when interracial

Of course, the race and class dynamics mean

nothing outside the sexual and gender dynamics. This is why the state made much more of white
womens involvement in a movement full of assertive black men. Women like Jane Speed and Mary Leonard and other
movements were still alive in the South, there were a few black leaders in mixed company.

white women were either treated as potential victims of rape or dismissed as prostitutes for their mere proximity to black men. Recall that the largest civil rights struggles
involving the Party at the time had to do with the defense of black men falsely accused of raping white women. Even the rural areas had their own racial-sexual dynamics
notably, sharecropper wives often negotiated the end-of-the-year settlements. Landlords would send their wives presumably to negotiate with black male sharecroppers, who in
turn could not contradict them without calling a white woman a liar! Camp: How did Antonio Gramscis work inform your methodological approach to analyzing politics and
culture in Hammer and Hoe? Kelley: My sister, Makani Themba, and I had been reading Gramsci since about 19811982. Specifically, the Prison Notebooks distinguishes
between organic intellectuals and traditional intellectuals, and elaborates the idea of cultural hegemony, which is that the state cant rule by force alone, but has to generate an

This common sense defined what was considered natural: of course black
people earn less money, of course the depression means you are going to be out of work,
there is nothing you can do, this is the way life is, and quit complaining. This common sense of the
ideology of common sense.1

dominant culture was challenged by the counterhegemonic culture that the Communist Party created through the Young Pioneers, the Young Communist League, and

They provided information about struggles that were outside Alabama and
across the Atlantic and Pacific world, which opened up a sense of possibility. That possibility is
precisely what put a crack in cultural hegemony.
newspapers like the Southern Worker.

CRT K/2 Education

CRT is critical for an educational system that supports multiple
backgrounds and is key to taking down the standards of evaluation set
by the white, middle-class society
Yosso & Solrzano 5 (Tara J. Yosso & Daniel G. Solrzano, Ph.D., University of
California, Education, Ph.D., is the director of UC/ACCORD and a professor of social science
and comparative education in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at the
University of California, 2005, Conceptualizing a Critical Race Theory in Sociology,
http://dl2af5jf3e.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.882004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF8&rfr_id=info:sid/summon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:book&rft.g
enre=book%20item&rft.title=Blackwell+Companions+to+Sociology%3A+The+Blackwell+Com
panion+to+Social+Inequalities&rft.atitle=Conceptualizing+a+Critical+Race+Theory+in+Sociol
ogy&rft.date=2005-0101&rft.pub=Blackwell+Publishers&rft.isbn=9780631231547&rft.externalDocID=10262924.)//k
y
Challenging Racism, Revealing Cultural Wealth Because we have described CRT as an analytical
framework with at least five main tenets, it is helpful to think about these tenets as a guiding
lens that can inform our research in communities of color. Specifically, CRT can be utilized as a
primary lens to address research questions, teaching approaches, and our policy
recommendations regarding social inequality. Indeed, CRT is grounded in the experiences and
knowledge of communities of color. Such a theory unapologetically centers the research lens on
race and racisms intersections with other forms of subordination. As we look through a CRT
lens, we critique deficit theorizing and data that may be limited by its omission of the voices of
people of color. We assert that CRT helps researchers, teachers, and policy makers see the
cultural wealth (as opposed to deficits) in marginalized communities. Yet CRT also insists that
we take the responsibility to build reciprocity in to our research, teaching, and policy so that we
do not attempt to disrespectfully mine these culturally wealthy communities. Deficitinformed
research often sees deprivation in communities of color. Utilizing CRT as an analytical lens
helps us approach research with a critical eye to identify, analyze, and challenge distorted
notions of people of color as we build on the cultural wealth already present in these
communities. Culture influences how society is organized, how the curriculum is developed, and
how pedagogy and policy are implemented. In sociology, the concept of culture for students of
color has taken on many divergent meanings. Some research has equated culture with race and
ethnicity, while other work clearly has viewed culture through a much broader lens of
characteristics and forms of social histories and identities. We view the culture of students of
color as a set of characteristics that are neither fixed nor static. Culture refers to behaviors and
values that are learned, shared, and exhibited by a group of people. Culture is also evidenced in
material and nonmaterial productions of a people. For example, with students of color, culture
is frequently represented symbolically through language and can encompass conceptualizing a
critical race theory in sociology 127 identities around immigration status, gender, phenotype,
sexuality, and region, as well as race and ethnicity. The cultures of students of color can nurture
and empower them (Delgado Bernal 2002). Focusing on research with Latina/o families, Luis C.
Moll, Cathy Amanti, Deborah Neff, and Norma Gonzalez (1992), Carlos Vlez-Ibez and James
Greenberg (1992), and Irma Olmedo (1997) assert that culture can form and draw from
communal funds of knowledge (Gonzalez et al. 1995; Gonzalez and Moll 2002). Likewise,
Douglas Foley notes research revealing the virtues and solidarity in African American
community and family traditions as well as the deeply spiritual values passed from generation
to generation in most African American communities (1997: 123). Our description of cultural

wealth begins with a critique of the ways sociologists Bourdieu and Passerons work (1977) has
been used to discuss social and racial inequity. In education, Bourdieus work has often been
called upon to explain why students of color do not succeed at the same rate as Whites.
According to Bourdieu, cultural capital refers to an accumulation of cultural knowledge, skills,
and abilities possessed and inherited by privileged groups in society. Bourdieu asserts that
cultural capital (i.e., education, language), social capital (i.e., social networks, connections), and
economic capital (i.e., money and other material possessions) can be acquired two ways, from
ones family and/or through formal schooling. The dominant groups within society are able to
maintain power because access is limited to acquiring and learning strategies to use these forms
of capital for social mobility (Bourdieu and Passeron 1977). Therefore, while Bourdieus work
sought to provide a structural critique of social and cultural reproduction, his theory of cultural
capital has been used to assert that some communities are culturally wealthy while others are
culturally poor. This interpretation of Bourdieu exposes White, middle-class culture as the
standard by which all others are judged. We argue that cultural capital is not just inherited or
possessed by the middle class, but rather it refers to an accumulation of specific forms of
knowledge, skills, and abilities that are valued by privileged groups in society. For example,
middle- or upper-class students may have access to a computer at home and, therefore, can
learn numerous computer-related vocabulary and technological skills before arriving at school.
These students have acquired cultural capital because computer-related vocabulary and
technological skills are valued in the school setting. On the other hand, a working-class
Chicana/o student whose mother works in the garment industry may bring a different
vocabulary, perhaps in two languages (English and Spanish) to school, along with techniques of
conducting errands on the city bus and translating gas and electric bills for her/his mother (see
Faulstich Orellana 2003). This cultural knowledge is very valuable to the student and her/his
family, but not necessarily considered to carry any capital in the school context. This leads us to
ask: Are there forms of cultural capital that marginalized groups bring to the table that
traditional cultural capital theory does not recognize or value? CRT shifts the center of our focus
from White, middle-class culture to the cultures of communities of color. In doing so, we also
draw on the work of sociologists Melvin Oliver and Thomas Shapiro (1995) to better understand
how cultural capital is actually only one form of many different aspects that might be considered
valuable. They proposed a model to explain how the narrowing of the income or 128 tara j. yosso
and daniel g. solrzano earnings gap between people of color and Whites is a misleading way to
examine inequality. They argue that ones income over a typical fiscal year focuses on a single
form of capital and that the income gap between Blacks and Whites is narrowing over time. On
the other hand, they examine separately the concept of wealth and define it as the total extent of
an individuals accumulated assets and resources (i.e., ownership of stocks, money in bank, real
estate, business ownership, and so on). They then argue that while the income of Blacks may
indeed be climbing and the Black/White income gap narrowing, their overall wealth, compared
to Whites, is declining and the gap is diverging. Thus, traditional Bourdieuian cultural capital
theory has parallel comparisons to Oliver and Shapiros (1995) description of income in that it
places value on a very narrow range of assets and characteristics. This narrow view of cultural
capital, as defined by White, middle-class values, is more limited than wealth ones
accumulated assets and resources. We propose that cultural wealth encompasses accumulated
assets and resources found in communities of color (see Villalpando and Solrzano in press).
Cultural wealth includes various forms of capital such as aspirational, navigational, social,
linguistic, familial, and resistance capital (see Auerbach 2001; Delgado Bernal 2001; Solrzano
and Delgado Bernal 2001; Stanton-Salazar 2001; Faulstich Orellana 2003; Villalpando and
Solrzano in press). Deficit scholars such as E. D. Hirsch (1988, 1996) bemoan the lack of
cultural capital, or what he terms cultural literacy, in low-income communities of color. As
previously discussed, research utilizing a deficit analytical lens places value judgments on
communities that often do not have access to White, middle- or upperclass resources. In

contrast, a CRT lens allows us to focus on and learn from the cultural wealth of communities of
color. CRT identifies individual indicators of capital that have rarely been acknowledged and
used as assets in examining the cultural and social characteristics of communities of color.
Cultural wealth is found in the histories and lives of communities of color and has gone
unrecognized and/or unacknowledged. CRT centers the research, pedagogy, and policy lens on
communities of color and calls into question White middle-class communities as the standard
by which all others are judged. CRT therefore can begin to recognize multiple forms of cultural
wealth within communities of color. Figure 6.2 demonstrates that community cultural wealth is
an array of cultural knowledge, skills, abilities, and contacts possessed by socially marginalized
groups that often go unrecognized. Communities of color nurture cultural wealth through at
least six forms of capital: (1) Aspirational (i.e., dreams for the future, see Auerbach 2001); (2)
Familial (i.e., pedagogies of the home, see Delgado Bernal 2001); (3) Social (i.e., networks, see
Stanton-Salazar 2001); (4) Navigational (i.e., maneuverability, see Auerbach 2001); (5)
Resistant (i.e., oppositional behaviors, see Solrzano and Delgado Bernal 2001); and (6)
Linguistic (i.e., language style and content, see Faulstich Orellana 2003).8 Aspirational capital
draws on the work of Patricia Gndara (1982, 1995) and others who have shown that
Chicanas/os experience the lowest educational outcomes compared to every other group in the
USA, but maintain consistently high aspirations for their childrens future (Delgado-Gaitan
1992, 1994; Solrzano 1992; Auerbach 2001). These stories nurture a culture of possibility as
they represent the creation of a history that would break the links between parents current
occupaconceptualizing a critical race theory in sociology 129 tional status and their childrens
future academic attainment (Gndara 1995: 55). Aspirational capital is evidenced in those who
allow themselves, and their children, to dream of possibilities beyond their present
circumstances despite the presence of real and perceived barriers and, often, without the
resources or other objective means to attain those goals. Social capital is directly connected to
navigational capital because it addresses the peer and other social networks developed to assist
in the movement through social institutions, such as schools (Stanton-Salazar 2001). Scholars
note that, historically, people of color have utilized their social capital to maneuver through the
system, but they often turned around and gave the information and resources gained through
the navigation process back to their social networks. Mutualistas or mutual aid societies are an
example of how, historically, immigrants to the USA and, indeed, African Americans, even while
enslaved, created and maintained social networks (Gmez-Quiones 1973, 1994; Gutman 1976;
Snchez 1993; Stevenson 1996). In her book Teaching to Transgress, bell hooks notes that this
tradition was the motto of the National Colored Womens Association, lifting as we climb
(1994). Social capital can be understood as networks of people and community resources that
help one navigate through societys institutions. Familial capital connects with a commitment to
community well-being and expands the concept of family to include a broader understanding of
kinship. Acknowledging the racialized, classed, and heterosexualized inferences that comprise
traditional understandings of family, familial capital is nurtured by our extended family. It
may include immediate family (living or long passed on) as well as aunts, uncles, grandparents,
and friends we might consider part of our family. From these kinship ties, we learn the
importance of emotional, moral, educational, and occupational consciousness in maintaining a
healthy connection to ones community and its resources. Familial capital includes funds of
knowledge (Moll et al. 1992; Vlez-Ibez and Greenberg 1992) and pedagogies of the home
(Delgado Bernal 2002), as well as the emotional, moral, educational, and occupational
consciousness learned from our kin (Elenes et al. 2001; Lopez 2003). Navigational capital refers
to the ability to maneuver through social institutions not created with communities of color in
mind. Strategies to navigate through racially hostile university campuses draw on the concept of
academic invulnerability, or students ability to sustain high levels of achievement, despite the
presence of stressful events and conditions that place them at risk of doing poorly at school and,
ultimately, dropping out of school (Alva 1991: 19). Scholars have examined individual, family,

and community factors that support Mexican American students academic invulnerability
their successful navigation through the educational system (Alva 1995; Arrellano and Padilla
1996). In addition, resilience has been recognized as a set of inner resources, social
competencies, and cultural strategies that permit individuals to not only survive, recover, or
even thrive after stressful events, but also to draw from the experience to enhance subsequent
functioning (Stanton- Salazar and Spina 2000: 229; see also Yosso 2003). This reflects the
process of developing critical navigational skills (Solrzano and Villalpando 1998). We assert
that academic invulnerability and resilience do not take place in a social vacuum, but are
influenced by ones social location (Zavella 1991). Navigational capital, then, refers to a set of
social-psychological skills that assist individuals and groups to maneuver through structures of
inequality. This acknowledges individual agency within institutional constraints, but it also
connects to social networks that facilitate community navigation through places and spaces
including schools, the job market, and the health care and judicial systems (P. Williams 1997).
Resistant capital acknowledges the work of Tracy Robinson and Janie Ward (1991) in examining
a group of African American mothers who were consciously raising their daughters as
resisters. Through verbal and nonverbal lessons, these Black mothers taught their daughters
to assert themselves as intelligent, beautiful, strong, and worthy of respect to resist the barrage
of societal messages devaluing Blackness and belittling Black women (Ward 1996). Similarly,
Sofia Villenas and Melissa Moreno (2001) discuss the contradictions Latina mothers face as they
try to teach their daughters to valerse por si misma (value themselves and be self-reliant) within
structures of inequality such as racism, capitalism, and patriarchy. In analyzing students efforts
to transform unequal conditions in urban schools, Daniel Solrzano and Dolores Delgado Bernal
(2001) reveal various forms of Chicana/o student resistance and the continuity of this resistance
as demonstrated by the 1968 East Los Angeles high school blowouts and the 1993 UCLA hunger
strike for Chicana/o Studies. Solrzano and Delgado Bernal (2001) show that resistance may
include different forms of oppositional behavior, such as self-defeating or conformist strategies
that feed back into the system of subordination. However, when informed by a Freirean critical
consciousness (1970), or recognition of the strucconceptualizing a critical race theory in
sociology 131 tural nature of oppression, and the motivation to work toward social and racial
justice, resistance takes on a transformative form (see Solrzano and Yosso 2002c). Therefore,
resistant capital refers to the willingness to challenge inequalities (Giroux 1983). Transformative
resistant capital can be evidenced in those who recognize structures of racism and are motivated
to transform such oppressive structures (Pizarro 1998; Villenas and Deyhle 1999). Linguistic
capital learns from over 35 years of research on bilingual education that emphasizes the value of
supporting fluency in more than one language and the connections between racialized cultural
history and language (Cummins 1986; Anzalda 1987; Garca and Baker 1995; Macedo and
Bartolom 1999). Linguistic capital reflects the idea that students of color arrive at school with
multiple strengths, including language and communication skills. In addition, just as there are
different vocal registers we each draw on to whisper, whistle, or sing, linguistic capital
acknowledges that youth of color must often develop and draw on various language registers, or
styles, to communicate with different audiences. For example, Marjorie Faulstich Orellana
examines bilingual children who are often called upon to translate for their parents or other
adults and finds that these youth gain multiple social tools of vocabulary, audience awareness,
cross-cultural awareness, realworld literacy skills, math skills, metalinguistic awareness,
teaching and tutoring skills, civic and familial responsibility, [and] social maturity (2003: 6).
Linguistic capital refers to these intellectual and social tools attained through communication
experiences in more than one language and/or style. As demonstrated by this discussion of
cultural wealth, CRT listens to and observes people of color from the perspective that these
individuals, families, and communities are places with multiple strengths. Recognizing the
knowledge students of color bring with them from their homes and communities into the
classroom can also be facilitated through the tools of multiple disciplines. In addition, CRT

challenges scholars to strategically utilize interdisciplinary methods to present research findings

in unconventional and creative ways. Such research would listen to and learn from those whose
knowledges traditionally are excluded from and silenced by academic research. A CRT approach
to sociology, then, involves a commitment to conduct research, teach, and develop social policy
with a larger purpose of working toward social and racial justice.
By engaging in counter narratives, we can begin to see the roots of racism in education and allow
the people of color to produce pedagogical case studies, which empower them to shatter white,
male, and class privilege
Yosso & Solrzano 5 (Tara J. Yosso & Daniel G. Solrzano, Ph.D., University of
California, Education, Ph.D., is the director of UC/ACCORD and a professor of social science
and comparative education in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at the
University of California, 2005, Conceptualizing a Critical Race Theory in Sociology,
http://dl2af5jf3e.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.882004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF8&rfr_id=info:sid/summon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:book&rft.g
enre=book%20item&rft.title=Blackwell+Companions+to+Sociology%3A+The+Blackwell+Com
panion+to+Social+Inequalities&rft.atitle=Conceptualizing+a+Critical+Race+Theory+in+Sociol
ogy&rft.date=2005-0101&rft.pub=Blackwell+Publishers&rft.isbn=9780631231547&rft.externalDocID=10262924.)//k
y
One of the methods of CRT that help analyze the role of race and racism through the experiences
of people of color is a technique with a long tradition in the social sciences, humanities, ethnic
studies, womens studies, and the law storytelling. Richard Delgado (1989) uses a practice
called counter-storytelling. Delgado argues that counter-storytelling is both a method of telling
the story of those experiences that have not been told (i.e., those on the margins of society) and a
tool for analyzing and challenging the stories of those in power and whose story is a natural part
of the dominant discourse the majoritarian story.4 CRT can challenge deficit majoritarian
approaches to sociology through counter-storytelling, oral traditions, historiographies, corridos,
poetry, films, actos, and humor. CRT asks: Whose stories are privileged in academic discourse,
mass media, and social policy contexts and whose stories are distorted and silenced? US history
reveals that White upper/middle-class stories are privileged and treated as normative while the
stories of people of color are marginalized (Gutirrez-Jones 2001). We further ask: What are the
experiences and responses of those whose stories are often distorted, silenced, and
marginalized? In documenting the voices of people of color, CRT in sociology works to tell their
stories. Although CRT scholarship arguably serves counter-narrative functions in general, some
scholars seek to be more explicit in presenting their research through the genre of storytelling.
There are at least three types of such counter-stories evidenced in the CRT literature:
autobiographical stories (Espinoza 1990; Williams 1991; Montoya 1994), biographical stories
(Lawrence and Matsuda 1997; Fernndez 2002), and multimethod/composite stories (Bell 1987,
1992, 1996; Delgado 1995a,b, 1996, 1999, 2003; Solrzano and Yosso 2000, 2001, 2002a,b;
Solrzano and Delgado Bernal 2001; Delgado Bernal and Villalpando 2002). Critical race
counter-stories can serve several pedagogical functions: (1) they can build community among
those at the margins of society; (2) they can challenge the perceived wisdom of those at societys
center; (3) they can open new windows into the reality of those at the margins by showing the
possibilities beyond the ones they live and by showing that they are not alone in their position;
(4) they can teach others that by combining elements from both the story and the current
reality, one can construct another world that is richer than either the story or the reality alone;
and (5) they can provide a context to understand and transform established belief systems
(Delgado 1989; Lawson 1995). Storytelling has a rich and continuing tradition in the African
American (Berkeley Art Center 1982; Bell 1987, 1992, 1996; Lawrence 1992), Chicana/o
(Paredes 1977; Delgado 1989, 1995b, 1996; Olivas 1990), Native American (Deloria 1969;

Williams, R. 1997), and Asian American (Wakatsuki Houston and Houston 1973; Hong Kingston
1976) communities. For our purposes here, we focus on multimethod/composite stories.
Composite counter-narratives draw on multiple forms of data to recount the racialized,
sexualized, classed experiences of people of color. Barney Glaser and Anselm Strauss assert,
The generation of theory requires that the analyst take apart the story within his [/her] data
(1967: 108). Our counter-stories add to the storytelling tradition and address racism in higher
education through composite characters that embody 124 tara j. yosso and daniel g. solrzano
the patterns and themes evidenced in social science data. Our approach to the critical race
counter-story method borrows from the works of Anselm Strauss and Juliet Corbin and Dolores
Delgado Bernal. Strauss and Corbin utilize a concept called theoretical sensitivity and refer to it
as a personal quality of the researcher . . . the attribute of having insight, the ability to give
meaning to data, the capacity to understand, and capability to separate the pertinent from that
which isnt (1990: 412). Delgado Bernals (1998) notion of cultural intuition adds to Strauss
and Corbins notion of theoretical sensitivity in that it extends ones personal experience to
include collective experience and community memory, and points to the importance of
participants engaging in the analysis of data (1990: 5634). Using Strauss and Corbins
theoretical sensitivity and Delgado Bernals cultural intuition, we create counter-stories from:
(1) the data gathered from the research process itself, (2) the existing literature on the topic(s),
(3) our own professional experiences, (4) our own personal experiences, and (5) our collective
experiences and community memory. For example, in the following counter-story excerpt, our
first form of data came from primary sources, namely focus-group interviews conducted with
undergraduate and law students of color at three major universities, in conjunction with the
University of Michigan Affirmative Action case (see Solrzano et al. 2000; Allen and Solrzano
2001; Solrzano and Yosso 2002b). We searched and sifted through these data for examples of
the concepts we were seeking to illuminate, such as experiences with and responses to racism
and sexism (Glaser and Strauss 1967). Drawing on the experiences of undergraduate and
graduate African American, Native American, and Latina/o, Chicana/o students, we sought to
examine race, racism, White privilege, and the racial tipping-point phenomenon. We also
wanted to demonstrate how affirmative action had been weakened from its original intent. The
policy was initially developed to serve as a means to remedy racial discrimination and, thereby,
integrate true racial diversity (pluralism) into higher education. Next, we looked to other sources
for secondary data analysis related to these concepts in the social sciences, humanities, and legal
literature. For this particular counter-story, we used the social science data to analyze the legal
documents leading up to and including the law school case at the University of Michigan (e.g.,
opinions and dissents in the 1978 Bakke vs. University of California, the 1954 Brown vs. Board
of Education, and the 1947 Mendez vs. Westminster cases). In sifting through this literature, we
began to draw connections between our previous readings on desegregation and racial tracking
and the relevant focus-group interview data (Oakes 1985; Valencia 2003). Finally, we added our
own professional and personal experiences related to the concepts and ideas. Here, we not only
shared our own stories and reflections, but we also drew upon the multiple voices of family,
friends, colleagues, and acquaintances. Once these various sources of data had been compiled,
examined, and analyzed, we created composite characters to help tell the counter-story. We
attempted to get the characters to engage in a real and critical dialogue about our findings from
the interviews, literature, and experiences. In the tradition of Freire (1973), this dialogue
emerged between the characters much like our own discussions emerged through sharing,
listening, challenging, and reflecting. We share below an excerpt of this counter-story that
engages Claudia,5 a Chicana civil rights attorney and professor at a California university, in a
dialogue with the conceptualizing a critical race theory in sociology 125 late Justice Thurgood
Marshall and a community activist from the spirit-world, Ms. Ruby Puentes.6 These three
characters are attending a session of the University of Michigan Law School affirmative action
trial in January 2001.7 We ask the reader to approach the counter-story as a pedagogical case

study, listen for the storys points and reflect on how these points compare with her/his own
version of reality (however conceived). We bring the reader into this story already underway in a
federal courthouse in Detroit, Michigan as our three characters engage in dialogue about the
continuities of racism in US history: Justice Marshall interjected, History repeats itself,
Claudia. Remember Michael Olivas (1990) comments on Derrick Bells (1995) Space Traders
chronicle? He talks about how the USA has welcomed and rejected Mexicans and Asians
according to socio-political convenience. And this is like Bells (1987) interest-convergence
theory, because civil rights legislation has only been implemented to the extent that Whites
have benefited. Again I am reminded that affirmative action as a social policy of limited goals
and timetables only lasted for 10 years, from 1968 to 1978. In the 1954 Brown case, individual
states took the courts mandate to desegregate with all deliberate speed and focused on the
word deliberate rather than speed, to slow down and hinder racial integration of the public
schools. In contrast, as soon as Bakke (1978) was ruled on, many colleges and universities
couldnt move fast enough in their rush to dismantle the limited set aside affirmative action
programs they had in place. Whites had become nervous. They felt threatened. Bakke ended that
10-year stint of set-aside affirmative action programs, even though we had barely begun to see
some results from those goals and timetables. Despite the fact that in California limited
racebased affirmative action ended in 1997 (with passage of Proposition 209), Whites still
perceive students of color enrolling at universities to be less-qualified. The legal debate hasnt
even begun about the set-asides that are available to Whites, just because they are White. The
courts should be discussing the unequal educational playing field leading up to university
admissions processes. They should also discuss why White students are given disproportionate
access to AP/honors classes, and an overall comprehensive college preparatory curriculum. And
it would also be important for the courts to note that White students benefit from the tradition
of family legacy admissions. . . . Ms. Puentes added, But instead of those discussions, we will
most likely hear more misinterpretations of Dr. Kings dream, because ignoring the realities of
racism and pretending that we live in a color-blind society converges with the interests of those
who benefit from racism. The elimination of White privilege begins by educating and
empowering people of color. I nodded my head in agreement as I continued jotting down notes.
I began to think about ways to articulate Justice Marshall and Ms. Puentes comments for my
own opening remarks in the California case. I smiled at the thought that we made a really great
team. I felt humbled to have such prophetic colleagues. (see Solrzano and Yosso 2002b)
Margaret Montoya writes, Stories by and about Outsiders resist the subordinating messages of
the dominant culture by challenging stereotypes and presenting and representing people of
color as complex and heterogeneous (2002: 244). Our work attempts to tell such Outsider
stories (Hill Collins 1986). This counter-story excerpt demonstrates how we create dialogue that
critically illuminates concepts, ideas, and experiences, while incorporating the tenets of CRT.
We hear Justice Marshall describing that race matters because the legacy of racism is a
contemporary reality that shapes US society. We also listen to Ms. Puentes concerns that 126
tara j. yosso and daniel g. solrzano discourse about racism has not gone far enough. In
addition, we reflect along with Claudia as she is trying to digest this critical race analysis that
challenges more traditional discussions of affirmative action. Clara Lomas explains that this
tradition of listening to and recounting testimonios (life experiences) of subordinated groups is
a genre of action. She asserts that: a story does something to the storyteller; it does something
to the listeners/readers, the spectators: It has the capacity to transform them . . . In making
sense of the text as a whole the reader is forced to go outside the text itself and examine the real
world in relation to the text. (2003: 23) Lomas describes storytelling as having the capacity to
transform all those who engage the text (e.g., visual, print, verbal). In format and content, our
counter-stories attempt to build on the transformative capacity of narratives. By offering a
radically different vision for communities of color, critical race counter-stories can shatter the
naturalness of White, male, and class privilege.

Performance Fails
The ontology of the black body is inherently shaped by slavery
through grammar and ghosts, making every performance occur in a
fog
Wilderson 9 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, 2009, GRAMMAR & GHOSTS: THE PERFORMATIVE LIMITS OF
AFRICAN FREEDOM,
http://journals.cambridge.org.proxy.lib.umich.edu/action/displayFulltext?type=1&fid=5476116
&jid=TSY&volumeId=50&issueId=01&aid=5476108&bodyId=&membershipNumber=&society
ETOCSession=.) //ky
This easy, largely intuitive articulation of performance and emancipation was also manifest in
the declarations of performers themselves. On several occasions, artists declared that they
wanted to be known simply as artists and not as Africans or black artists. As with any demand
that is charged with high emotion, this one was not always made with rhetorical scaffolding and
extended explanationin part, because such statements were often made during Q & A sessions
or in the buzz between sessions. As a critical theorist, it would be easy for me to deconstruct
these cries and demonstrate their dependency on outdated notions of a unitary self. Freud and
Marx, to name but two, have long ago compelled us to come to grips with the partitioned
nature of our existence. And Lacan pushed the prospects of self-knowing beyond hope of
retrieval with his assertion that the wall of language guarantees our capacity for relationality
while simultaneously severing us from the Real. There is no self to be known; hence, there is no
artist whose status is free of the taint of race and place. But if we think of this demand not as a
wish to disavow relationality, but as a wish to be imbued with relationality, then something else
emerges. Freud, Marx, and Lacans subjects dont suffer from the violence of enslavement,
which is an explicit interdiction against relationality; they suffer from having imbibed the
mystifications of the ruling class (Marx), the ego (Freud), or the Imaginary (Lacan). There was
something in the force of the performance artists cry just to be artists that resonated with the
force that first turned subjects into cargo. Lest we think that this force is merely the grammar
and ghosts of blacks in the New World, that somehow Africans of the twentieth and twentyfirst century have an altogether different rebar of ontology, we should note Achille Mbembes
argument that, once Hegel (as a placeholder for all the punishing discourse of the Maafa, or
African Holocaust) renders Africa territorium nullius, the land of motionless substance and of
the blinding, joyful, and tragic disorder of creation, even the African who was not captured was
a slave in relation to the rest of the world, his or her freedom from chains and distance from the
Middle Passage notwithstanding.3 Though this free African may know him/herself through
coherent cultural accoutrements unavailable to the black American or black Caribbean, s/he is
positioned, paradigmatically, as someone unable to attain[ ] to immanent differentiation or to
the clarity of self-knowledge.4 S/he is recast as an object in a world of subjects. Even the status
of free blacks, Saidiya Hartman argues, is shaped and compromised by . . . slavery.5 Here, the
prohibition against attaining differentiation or self-knowledge rests, in the first ontological
instance, with a structural violence that removes black people from the world. The cry to be
known and appreciated as an artist and not as an African or black artist operates on several
levels, but the most profound recognizes (if only intuitively or unconsciously) the damage of
being marked as such, not in the sense of a compromised artistic status, but a compromised
existential status. The cry is not the effect of a neurotic complex that refuses to live in a
deconstructive relation to the ego; it is a narrative strategy hoping to slip the noose of a life
shaped and compromised by slavery. No other gathering of artists and critics is overdetermined
by this dilemma. No slavery, no diaspora. No diaspora, no conference. Such gatherings are
always haunted by a shared sense that violence and captivity are the grammar and ghosts of our

every gesture. This is where performance meets ontology. But all too often, such meetings take
place not on a well-lit stage, but in a fog.

Current discussions of race are destabilized as a result of capitalism,

racism still exists and results in exploitation, oppression, and
ignorance
Yosso & Solrzano 5 (Tara J. Yosso & Daniel G. Solrzano, Ph.D., University of
California, Education, Ph.D., is the director of UC/ACCORD and a professor of social science
and comparative education in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at the
University of California, 2005, Conceptualizing a Critical Race Theory in Sociology,
http://dl2af5jf3e.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.882004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF8&rfr_id=info:sid/summon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:book&rft.g
enre=book%20item&rft.title=Blackwell+Companions+to+Sociology%3A+The+Blackwell+Com
panion+to+Social+Inequalities&rft.atitle=Conceptualizing+a+Critical+Race+Theory+in+Sociol
ogy&rft.date=2005-0101&rft.pub=Blackwell+Publishers&rft.isbn=9780631231547&rft.externalDocID=10262924.)//k
y
Discussion of race and racism in the social sciences has a long tradition. W. E. B. DuBoiss often
quoted line from The Souls of Black Folk: the problem of the twentieth century is the problem
of the color-line (1989 [1903]: 29) takes the discussion of race and racism back to at least the
turn of the nineteenth century. Indeed, a century after this great American social scientist
predicted that racism would continue to emerge as one of this countrys key social problems,
researchers, practitioners, and students are still searching for the necessary tools to effectively
analyze and challenge the impact of race and racism in US society. Discussions about race and
racism have been either pushed to the margins or effectively destabilized. While those on the
political right attempt to dismiss the permanence of racism and strategically move the discourse
toward a colorblind society, some liberal and even leftleaning scholars criticize work that
addresses issues of race, stating that it is merely a social construction and a byproduct of
capitalism. In this context, we argue that we must discuss race because racism continues to have
very real consequences on US society at both the institutional (macro) and the individual
(micro) levels. Eurocentric versions of US history reveal race to be a socially constructed
category, created to differentiate racial groups and to show the superiority or dominance of one
race over another (Omi and Winant 1994; Banks 1995). Race can be viewed as an objective
phenomenon until human beings provide the social meaning. The social meaning applied to
race is based upon and justified by an ideology of racial superiority and White privilege. That
ideology is called racism and Audre Lorde defines racism as the belief in the inherent
superiority of one race over all others and thereby the right to dominance (1992: 496). Manning
Marable defines racism as a system of ignorance, exploitation, and power used to oppress
African-Americans, Latinos, Asians, Pacific Americans, American Indians, and other people on
the basis of ethnicity, culture, mannerisms, and color (1992: 5). Marables definition of racism
is important because it shifts the discussion of race and racism from a Black/White discourse to
one that includes multiple faces, voices, and experiences. Embedded in the Lorde and Marable
definitions of racism are at least three important points: (1) one group deems itself superior to
all others, (2) the group that is superior has the power to carry out the racist behavior, and (3)
racism benefits the superior group while it negatively impacts the subordinate racial/ethnic
groups. These two definitions take the position that racism is about institutional power and
people of color in the United States have never possessed this form of power. Beverly Tatum
further reminds us: Despite the current rhetoric about affirmative action and reverse racism,
every social indicator, from salary to life expectancy, reveals the advantages of being White
(1997: 8). Harlon Dalton has argued that it is important for Whites to conceive of themselves as

members of a race and to recognize the advantages that attach to simply having white skin
(1995: 6). Andrew Hacker has raised the question: Can we place a price on being White in the
United States? (see 1992: 312). The racial/ethnic advantages and privileges of being White in
the USA can be an important part of the discussion and analysis in the sociology classroom (see
Hacker 1992; Allen 1993; Scheurich 1993a,b; Sleeter 1993, 1994; Dalton 1995; Halewood 1995;
Bonilla-Silva 2001). John Calmore (1997) asserts that what is noticeably missing from the
discussion of race is a substantive discussion of racism. We agree that a conversation about race
without talking about racism and White privilege decontextualizes those places where race and
racism enter our lives in macro and micro ways (Lawrence 1987; Davis 1989). The field of
sociology has consistently been at the forefront of work asking critical questions about race,
racism, and social inequality. Our goals for this chapter are to provide readers with insight into
how we came to utilize critical race theory (CRT) as an analytical framework, and to encourage
sociological research on race and inequality to more explicitly draw on this powerful analytical
lens. We agree with Derrick Bell, who has asserted, it is time to get real about race and the
persistence of racism in America (1992: 5).

Race is key to every aspect of society, but is incompatible with other

forms of critical studies
Yosso & Solrzano 5 (Tara J. Yosso & Daniel G. Solrzano, Ph.D., University of
California, Education, Ph.D., is the director of UC/ACCORD and a professor of social science
and comparative education in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at the
University of California, 2005, Conceptualizing a Critical Race Theory in Sociology,
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enre=book%20item&rft.title=Blackwell+Companions+to+Sociology%3A+The+Blackwell+Com
panion+to+Social+Inequalities&rft.atitle=Conceptualizing+a+Critical+Race+Theory+in+Sociol
ogy&rft.date=2005-0101&rft.pub=Blackwell+Publishers&rft.isbn=9780631231547&rft.externalDocID=10262924.)//k
y
Although social science has traditionally confirmed the salience of race in US society, many
critical race theorists are going beyond the view that race is a dichotomy based on social
construction or biological factors (Bell 1992; Delgado and Stefancic 1995). They recognize that
race is central to peoples lives and are likewise placing race at the center of their work (Dalton
1987). These scholars are not utilizing race as a variable that can be controlled, but instead are
focusing on the real impact that racism has had and continues to have within American society.
CRT draws from and extends a broad literature base, often termed critical theory, in law,
sociology, history, ethnic studies, and womens studies (Delgado and Stefancic 1995). In
paraphrasing Brian Fay (1987: 4), William Tierney has defined critical theory as an attempt to
understand the oppressive aspects of society in order to generate societal and individual
transformation (1993: 4). Kimberl Crenshaw (2002) explains that in the late 1980s, various
legal scholars felt limited by work that separated critical theory from conversations about race
and racism. Alongside other Outsider scholars (Hill Collins 1986), Crenshaw was looking for
both a critical space in which race was foregrounded and a race space where critical themes were
central (Crenshaw 2002: 19). Mari Matsuda defined the CRT space as: conceptualizing a critical
race theory in sociology 119 the work of progressive legal scholars of color who are attempting to
develop a jurisprudence that accounts for the role of racism in American law and that works
toward the elimination of racism as part of a larger goal of eliminating all forms of
subordination. (1991: 1331) Figure 6.1 outlines CRTs family tree through our own lenses of
experience. In prior work we described a genealogy of CRT that links the themes and patterns of
legal scholarship with the social science literature that seems to have informed CRT scholars

(Solrzano and Yosso 2001). Here, we take a more personalized approach that reflects our own
intellectual history that led us to CRT and beyond. In its post-1987 form, CRT emerged from
criticisms of the Critical Legal Studies (CLS) movement. One of the criticisms was the inability
of the CLS scholars to incorporate race and racism into their analysis. Indeed, these same
critiques of critical studies had been taking place in Ethnic Studies and Women Studies
Departments. These Departments were struggling to define and incorporate cultural nationalist
paradigms, internal colonial models, Marxist and neo-Marxist, and feminist frameworks into
their race- and gender-based intellectual and community work. Critical race theorists began to
pull away from CLS because the critical legal framework restricted their ability to analyze racial
injustice (Delgado 1988; Crenshaw et al. 1995; Delgado and Stefancic 2001; Crenshaw 2002).
Initially, because CRT focused on civil rights legislation in terms of Black vs. White, other
groups have since expanded the CRT family tree to incorporate their racialized experiences, as
women, as Latinas/os, as Native Americans, and as Asian Americans. For example, LatCrit,
TribalCrit, and AsianCrit are natural outgrowths of CRT, evidencing Chicana/o, Latina/o, Native
American, and Asian American communities ongoing search for a framework that addresses
racism and its accompanying oppressions beyond the Black/White binary (Ikemoto 1992; Chang
1993, 1998; Chon 1995; Delgado 1997; Williams, R. 1997; Brayboy 2001, 2002). color have also
challenged CRT to address feminist critiques of racism and classism through FemCrit theory
(Caldwell 1995; Wing 1997, 2000). In addition, White scholars have expanded CRT with
WhiteCrit, by looking behind the mirror to expose White privilege and challenge racism
(Delgado and Stefancic 1997). Our work in CRT is informed by the scholarship of Latina/o
Critical Race (LatCrit) theory. LatCrit theory extends critical race discussions to address the
layers of racialized subordination that comprise Chicana/o, Latina/o experiences (Arriola 1997,
1998; Stefancic 1998). LatCrit scholars assert that racism, sexism, and classism are experienced
amidst other layers of subordination based on immigration status, sexuality, culture, language,
phenotype, accent, and surname. Alongside these scholars, we argue that the Black/White
binary is a paradigm of understanding US race relations in terms of the African American and
White experience (Valdes 1997, 1998). The use of the word binary describes the twodimensional limit that is placed on discussions about race and racism. Like the work of Marable
(1992), we argue that racism in the United States intersects with other forms of subordination
described above (Crenshaw 1989, 1991; Montoya 1994; Espinoza and Harris 1998; Johnson
1999). We recognize that African Americans have experienced a unique history of racism and
other forms of subordination in this country, yet we also acknowledge that other people of color
have their own histories that likewise have been shaped by the intersecting forms of
subordination. By offering a two-dimensional discourse, the Black/White binary limits our
understanding of the multiple ways in which African Americans, Native Americans,
Asian/Pacific Islanders, Chicanas/os, and Latinas/os experience, respond to, and resist these
forms of oppression. Indeed, racism and its intersections with other forms of subordination
shape the experiences of people of color very differently than Whites (Bell 1986, 1998; Baca Zinn
1989; Essed 1991). Overall, the popular discourse in the USA, as well as the academic discourse,
continues to be limited by the Black/White binary. We hope that a CRT in sociology will aid
those whose efforts continue to expand this dialogue to recognize the ways in which our
struggles for social justice are limited by discourses that omit and thereby silence the multiple
experiences of people of color (Ellison 1990). While we are informed by CRT and its genealogical
branches, we continue to draw on our interdisciplinary training and theoretical models whose
popularity may have waned since the 1960s and 1970s, but whose commitment to speaking
truth to power continues to speak to contemporary social realities. Informed by scholars who
continue to expand the literature and scope of discussions on race and racism, we have
developed a working definition of CRT in education, adapted originally from the LatCrit Primer
(1999) and that we adapt here for the field of sociology: Critical race theory (CRT) is a
framework that can be used to theorize and examine the ways in which race and racism

implicitly and explicitly impact on the social structures, practices, and discourses that affect
people of color. Important to this critical framework is a challenge to the dominant ideology,
which supports deficit notions about communities of color while assuming neutrality and
objectivity. Utilizing the experiences of people of color, a CRT in sociology also theorizes and
examines that place where racism intersects with other forms of subordination such as sexism,
classism, nativism, monolingualism, and heterosexism. CRT in sociology is conceived as a social
justice project that attempts to link theory with practice, scholarship with teachconceptualizing
a critical race theory in sociology 121 ing, and the academy with the community. CRT
acknowledges that social institutions operate in contradictory ways with their potential to
oppress and marginalize coexisting with their potential to emancipate and empower. CRT in
sociology is transdisciplinary and draws on many other schools of progressive scholarship. From
this working definition, at least five themes of CRT inform our work as social scientists in the
field of education:3 (1) The intercentricity of race and racism; (2) the challenge to dominant
ideology; (3) the commitment to social justice; (4) the centrality of experiential knowledge; and
(5) the utilization of interdisciplinary approaches. These five tenets provide a guide to
developing a CRT in sociology.

Wilderson

Cap Turns

Settler Ontology
Marxist Revolutions represent the ontology of the Settler, continuing
Indian Land Dispossession and leads to auto-genocide and the
prevention of stewardship
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
Land In delineating Savage ontology through the element of land, indigenous scholars
emphasize that a relationship (a) to the land in general and (b) to the land which any given tribe
inhabited at the time of contact, is a relationship constituent of ontology. Most writers are also
quick to draw a distinction between their relationship to the land and that of the Settler. In so
doing, land becomes a pivotal element in a semiotics of Savage loss and Settler gain: We are all
land-based peoplewho are attuned to the rhythms of our homelands in a way that assumes
both protection of, and an intimate belonging to, our ancestral places [But we are] surrounded
by other, more powerful nations thatwant our land and resources[This is an] ongoing
colonial relationship. (Trask 132-133) Savage sovereignty qua land is distinguished from
Settlerism in the way in which it imagines dominion and use. Indigenous dominion is
characterized by the idea of stewardship rather than the idea of ownership: Indigenous
philosophies are premised on the belief that the earth was created by a power
external to human beings, who have a responsibility to act as stewards ; since
humans had no hand in making the earth, they have 237 Red, White, & Black: Cinema and the
Structure of U.S. Antagonisms no right to possess it or dispose of it as they see fitpossession
of land by man is unnatural and unjust. The stewardship principle, reflecting a spiritual
connection with land established by the Creator, gives human beings special responsibilities
within the areas they occupy as indigenous peoples, linking them in a natural way to their
territories. (Alfred 60-61) Stewardship impacts upon use in that the landwhat Western
metaphysics refers to as natureis viewed as source rather than resource. This not only
gestures to the unethical spiritual and political character of the capitalist profit motive but also
posits the idea of resource development and industrialization as paradigms of dominion and
use which are irreconcilable with indigenisms paradigm of dominion and use. It not only marks
a conflict between indigenism and the heinous and exploitive desires of capitalism, but also
between indigenism and the emancipatory and revolutionary desires of a Marxist proletarian
dictatorship. Ward Churchill illustrates the split between Indians and Marxists regarding
conclusions to be drawn from analyses of what is wrong with the capitalist process; with a
vision of an alternative societythe redistribution of proceeds accruing from a systematic rape
of the earth is, at best, an irrelevancy forIndians (Marxism and Native Americans 185).
Throughout the meta-commentaries of Savage ontology the point is made that Native people
share and watch over the land in concert with other creatures that inhabit it. Settlerisms
structural imposition on the indigenous system of relationality (one in which all inhabitants of
the land are the Indians relations) is tantamount to the dismantling of indigenous
subjectivity. This dismantling of subjectivity, Church and others point out, cannot be
repaired by a Marxist revolution (found, for example, in Negri 238 Red, White, & Black:
Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms and Hardts idea of time redeemed or the
commons restored); for such a revolution reinstates neither stewardship nor
animate/inanimate kinship relations back to the paradigm of dominion and
use .lxii The Settlers ontological degradation in the form of capitalism, and his/her

emancipation in the form of communism, portends the beginning and the continuation,
respectively, of Indian land dispossessiona dispossession far more profound than material
larceny: Abandonment of their land base is not an option for Native Americans, either in fact or
in theory. The result would simply be auto-genocide (Churchill, Marxism and Native
Americans 193).

Indigenism
Marxism erases original experience and is a threat to native
sovereignty
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
Deloria, Churchill, and others insist upon the incompatibility of both Marxist and
psychoanalytic utopianism as projects of emancipation for Native people. Churchill goes so far
as to say that Marxism [constitutes] as great a threat to native sovereignty and selfdetermination as capitalism (Since Predator Came 6). In addition, there seems to be a radical
disarticulation between the Settlers and the Savages topographies of the soul: the secular
mediations and processes through which a psychoanalyst punctuates (Lacan) the analysands
empty speech, and thereby guides the analysand to a non-egoic relationship with his/her
contemporaries (the attainment of full speech), are apparently 242 Red, White, & Black: Cinema
and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms dumbstruck when confronted by the mediations and
processes through which the medicine man/woman heals the tribal member and thereby reharmonizes him/her with the universe and all its relations. Vine Deloria links this besetting
hobble of psychoanalysiss healing power to the bankrupt ethics of Christianity: [T]he original
[Christian] perception of reality becomes transformed over a period of time into philosophies
and theologies which purport to give a logical and analytical explanation of ultimate reality [i.e.,
Freudian psychoanalysis]. These explanations, of course, have eliminated the human emotions
and intuitive insights of the original experience and in their place have substituted a systematic
rendering of human knowledge concerning the natural world. (The Metaphysics of Modern
Existence 151) Here, Deloria glosses Leslie Silkos assertion that Europeans are spiritual
orphans. The ancestors had called Europeans the orphan people and had noted that as with
orphans taken in by selfish and coldhearted people, few Europeans had remained whole. They
failed to recognize the earth as their mother (Silko The Almanac of the Dead 258). The
disturbing result of this abandonment is the European

Marxism encourages an unethical logic that is based on the

supremacy of the human, destroying indigenism
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
Sterling and Angelita advance across the novel bearing their grammar of suffering and that
grammar of sufferings incompatibility with the Settlers grammar of suffering. Sterling is
banished from his reservation because he facilitated the access of a Hollywood film crew to a
sacred site, though the very same elders who banished him also allowed United States
corporate mining interests onto the reservation to mine uranium and, consequently,
contaminate the minds and bodies of the inhabitants. The people and places Sterling meets
during his wandering exile, as well as his internal monologues, catalyzed by his reminiscences,
give Silko the opportunity for extensive reflection regarding the spiritual impact of Laguna
Pueblo myth and lore on a colonized people; and on the intraindigenous tensions that arise
when cracks and fissures occur in the credibility of those charged with safekeeping these
traditions and those charged with continuing them. Angelitas struggle for her own credibility
within the Army of Justice and Redistribution and among the indigenous peoples of southern
Mexico provides Silko with the opportunity to critique Marxism through an indigenous lens and
thereby show how its secular excesses (e.g. industrialization) are isomorphic with the religious

excesses of Christianity. Silkos argumentby way of Angelitas struggles with Bartolomeo and
her 319 Red, White, & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms dialogues with her
people and the eldersis that, at a certain level of abstraction, both the emancipatory logic of
Marxism and the conservative logic of Christianity are unethical when confronted with the
emancipatory logic of indigenism because they are built upon the supremacy of a monolithic
entity: either the Human being (Marxism) or the one God (Christianity).

Inequality
The Settler forms an unequal relationship with the savage, where the
settler wreaks havoc on the savage and attempts to wipe it out
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
Granted, the Savage relation to the Settler by way of libidinal economys structure of exchange
is far from isomorphic, at the level of content, with what Fanon calls existence.xxi For
example, there is indeed important and resounding dissonance between the Indians
spiritual/divine imagining of the subject in libidinal economy and the Settler/Masters secular,
or psychoanalytic, or even religious imaginings (see Deloria, 1973: 217 and 1979: ix-xiii, 14-18,
86-101, and 118-120). But these differences do not cancel each other out. That is, they are not
differences with an antagonistic structure, but differences with a conflictual structure; because
articulation, rather than a void, makes the differences legible. In other words, Savage capacity
is not obliterated by these differences. In fact, its interlocutory life is often fortified and
extended by such differences. The modern or post-modern subject alienated within language, on
one hand, and the Great Spirit devotee, or child of Mother Earth, on the other hand, may in fact
be elaborated by different cosmologies (Deloria, 1973: 75-89), predicated on what Deloria has
noted as conflictual visions, but Lacans analysand (meaning a subjective capacity for full or
empty speech) does not require the Indian as its parasitic host, despite the fact that the Indian
was forcibly removed to clear a space for the analysts office. This is because alienation is
essential to both the Savage and the Settlers way of imagining structural positionality; to the
way Native American meta-commentaries think ontology. Thus, the analysands essential
capacity for alienation from being (alienation that takes place in language) is not parasitic on the
Savages capacity to be alienated from the spirit world or the land (which for Indians are
cosmologically inseparable). Whereas historically, the secular imperialism which made
psychoanalytic imaginings possible wreaked havoc on the Savage at the level of Fanonian
existence, that contact did not wipe out his/her 63 Red, White, & Black: Cinema and the
Structure of U.S. Antagonisms libidinal capacityor Native metaphysics. This is true not in
some empirical sense, for as a Black I have no access to the Indians spirit world. I am also
barred from subjectivity in even the most revolutionary schemata of White secularism (Lacanian
psychoanalysis and Negris Marxism). Rather, it is true because the most profound and
unflinching metacommentators on the Savage and libidinal economy (although Indians would
probably substitute spirit world for libidinal economy and replace the subject with the
soul) and the most unflinching meta-commentators on the Settler and libidinal economy say it
is true. Having communed around their shared capacity for subjective alienation since the dawn
of modernity (what Indians call contact), they formed a community of interpretation. Even as
the Settler began to wipe the Indian out, s/he was building an interpretive community with the
Savage the likes of which the Master was not building with the Slave. In the 1530s, the
Thomist ecclesiastics of the School of Salamanca agreed that Indians possessed subjective
dominion in a way that slaves did not. Judy maintains that this claim was made possible on the
basis of ethnographic evidence which Cortes and others had returned from the New World to
Spain with. For the Thomists and the Spanish explorers: Indians are humans and not
animalsthey possessed a certain rational order in their affairsCortess ethnographic
datadescribed a culture with extensive evidence of rationality and civility: a material culture
capable of constructing cities of stone, urbanization (society based on the polis), sophisticated
and hierarchical social organization, commerce, juridical institutions, and above all highly
ritualized religious practice 64 Red, White, & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms Forfeiture of the natural right of dominium, then, would require that the Indian

was truly irrational and so in violation of the law of nature. In the face of overwhelming evidence
of the Indians rationality and civility, even the two most frequently cited acts of abomination
held against Indians, cannibalismand sacrificewere viewedas no more than singular
temporary aberrations of reason and so not evidence of true irrationality, which made them
insufficient grounds for denying the Indians possession of dominium. (Judy 80-81)

The black subjects positionality is ignored, being placed in total subjectivity

Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, 25 Aug 2010, Gramscis Black Marx: Whither the Slave in Civil Society?,
http://www.tandfonline.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/pdf/10.1080/1350463032000101579.)
//ky
Thus, the KhoiSans status within Discourse was not the status of an opponent or an
interlocutor, but was the status of an unspeakable scandal. His/her position within the
Discourse was one of disarticulation, for he/she did little or nothing to fortify and extend the
interlocutory life of the Discourse. Just as the KhoiSan presented the Discourse of the Cape with
an anthropological scandal, so the black subject in the United States, the slave, presents both
marxism and American social movement practice with a historical scandal. Every group
provides American discourse with acceptable categories for the record (a play of signifiers,
points of articulation) except black Americans. How is black incoherence in the face of the
Historical Axis germane to the black experience as a phenomenon without analog? A sample
list of codes mapped out by an American subjects Historical Axis Downloaded by
[141.213.236.110] at 11:41 04 July 2014 236 Frank Wilderson, III include the following. (1)
Rights or Entitlements: here even Native Americans provide categories for the record when one
thinks of how the Iroquois constitution, for example, becomes the American constitution. (2)
Sovereignty: whether that state be one the subject left behind, or one, once again as in the case
of American Indians, which was taken by force and dint of broken treaties. White supremacy has
made good use of the Indian subjects positionality: a positionality which fortifies and extends
the interlocutory life of America as a coherent (albeit genocidal) idea, because treaties are forms
of articulation, discussions brokered between two groups presumed to possess the same kind of
historical currency: sovereignty. The code of sovereignty can have both a past and future history,
if youll excuse the oxymoron, when one considers that there are 150 Native American tribes
with applications in at the B.I.A. for federal recognition, that they might qualify for funds
harvested from land stolen from them.5 In other words, the curse of being able to generate
categories for the record manifests itself in Indians ability to be named by white supremacy
that they might receive a small cash advance on funds (land) which white people stole from
them. (3) Immigration: another code which maps the subject onto the American Historical Axis
narratives of arrival based on collective volition and premeditated desire. Chicano/a subject
positions can fortify and extend the interlocutory life of America as an idea because racial
conflict can be articulated across the various contestations over the legitimacy of arrival,
immigration, or of sovereignty, i.e., the Mexican-American War. In this way, whites and
Chicano/as both generate data for this category. Slavery is the great leveller of the black
subjects positionality. The black American subject does not generate historical categories of
Entitlement, Sovereignty, and/or Immigration for the record. We are off the record. To the data
generating demands of the historical axis we present a virtual blank, much like the KhoiSans
virtual blank presented to the data generating demands of the anthropological axis. The work of
Hortense Spillers on black female sexuality corroborates these findings. Spillers conclusions
regarding the black female subject and the discourse of sexuality are in tandem with ours
regarding the black ungendered subject and the question of hegemony and, in addition, unveil
the ontological elements which black women and men share: a scandal in the face of New World
hegemony. [T]he black female [is] the veritable nemesis of degree and difference [emphasis
mine]. Having encountered what they understand as chaos, the empowered need not name

further, since chaos is sufficient naming within itself. I am not addressing the black female in
her historical apprenticeship as inferior being, but, rather, the paradox of non-being [emphasis
mine]. Under the sign of this particular historical order, black female and black male are
absolutely equal. (Spillers, 1984 p. 77) In the socio-political order of the New World the black
body is a captive body marked and branded from one generation to the next. A body on which
any hint or suggestion of a dimension of ethics, of relatedness between human personality and
its anatomical features, between one human Downloaded by [141.213.236.110] at 11:41 04 July
2014 Gramscis Black Marx: Whither the Slave in Civil Society? 237 personality and another,
between human personality and cultural institutions [is lost]. To that extent, the procedures
adopted for the captive flesh demarcate a total objectification, as the entire captive community
becomes a living laboratory. (emphasis mine, p. 68) The gratuitous violence begun in slavery,
hand in hand with the absence of data for the New World Historical Axis (Rights/Entitlement,
Sovereignty, Immigration) as a result of slavery, position black subjects in excess of Gramscis
fundamental categories, i.e. labour, exploitation, historical self-awareness; for these processes of
subjectification are assumed by those with a semiotics of analogy already in hand the currency
of exchange through which a dimensionof relatedness between one human personality and
another, between human personality and cultural institutions can be established. Thus, the
black subject imposes a radical incoherence upon the assumptive logic of Gramscian discourse.
S/he implies a scandal: total objectification in contradistinction to human possibility, however
slim, as in the case of working class hegemony, that human possibility appears. It is this scandal
which places black subjectivity in a structurally impossible position, outside of the natural
articulations of hegemony; but it also places hegemony in a structurally impossible position
because our presence works back upon the grammar of hegemony and threatens it with
incoherence. If every subject even the most massacred subjects, Indians are required to
have analogues within the nations structuring narrative, and one very large significant subject,
the subject upon which the nations drama of value is built, is a subject whose experience is
without analogue then, by that subjects very presence all other analogues are destabilised. Lest
we think of the black body as captive only until the mid-nineteenth century, Spillers reminds us
that the marking and branding, the total objectification are as much a part of the present as they
were of the past. Even though the captive flesh/body has been liberated, and no one need
pretend that even the quotation marks do not matter, dominant symbolic activity, the ruling
episteme that releases the dynamics of naming and valuation, remains grounded in the
originating metaphors of captivity and mutilation so that it is as if neither time nor history, nor
historiography and its topics, shows movement, as the human subject is murdered over and
over again by the passions of a bloodless and anonymous archaism, showing itself in endless
disguise. (1987, p. 68) Herein, the concept of civil war takes on a comprehensive and structural,
as opposed to merely eventful, connotation.

Social movements fail and lead to slavery, exploitation, and terror

Wilderson 3 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, 2003, The Prison Slave as Hegemony's (Silent) Scandal,
http://www.jstor.org.proxy.lib.umich.edu/stable/29768181?seq=6.) //ky
Any serious musing on the question of antagonistic identity formation ? a formation, the mass
mobilization of which can precipitate a crisis in the institu tions and assumptive logic that
undergird the United State of America ? must come to grips with the contradictions between the
political demands of radical social movements, such as the large prison abolition movement,
which seeks to abolish the prison-industrial complex, and the ideological structure that under?
writes its political desire. I contend that the positionality of Black subjectivity is at the heart of
those contradictions and that this unspoken desire is bound up with the political limitations of
several naturalized and uncritically accepted categories that have their genesis mainly in the
works of Antonio Gramsci, namely, work or labor, the wage, exploitation, hegemony, and civil

society. I wish to theorize the symptoms of rage and resignation I hear in the words of George
Jackson, when he boils reform down to a single word, "fascism," or in Assata's brief declaration,
"i hated it," as well as in the Manichean delirium of Fanon, Martinot, and Sexton. Today, the
failure of radical social movements to embrace symptoms of all three gestures is tantamount to
the reproduction of an anti-Black politics that nonethe? less represents itself as being in the
service of the emancipation of the Black prison slave. By examining the strategy and structure of
the Black subject's absence in, and incommensurability with, the key categories of Gramscian
theory, we come face to face with three unsettling consequences: (1) The Black American subject
imposes a radical incoherence upon the assumptive logic of Gramscian discourse and on today's
coalition politics. In other words, s/he implies a scandal. (2) The Black subject reveals the
inability of social movements grounded in Gramscian discourse to think of white supremacy
(rather than capitalism) as the base and thereby calls into question their claim to elaborate a
comprehensive and decisive antagonism. Stated another way, Gramscian discourse and coalition
politics are indeed able to imagine the subject that transforms itself into a mass of antagonistic
identity formations, formations that can precipitate a crisis in wage slavery, exploitation, and
hegemony, but they are asleep at the wheel when asked to provide enabling antagonisms toward
unwaged slavery, despotism, and terror. (3) We begin to see how Marxism suffers from a kind of
conceptual anxiety. There is a desire for socialism on the other side of crisis, a society that does
away not with the category of worker, but with the imposition workers suffer under the
approach of variable capital. In other words, the mark of its conceptual anxiety is in its desire to
democratize work and thus help to keep in place and insure the coherence of Reformation and
Enlightenment foundational values of productivity and progress. This scenario crowds out other
postrevolutionary possibilities, i.e., idleness. The scandal, with which the Black subject position
"threatens" Gramscian and coalition discourse, is manifest in the Black subject's
incommensurability with, or disarticulation of, Gramscian categories: work, progress,
production, exploita? tion, hegemony, and historical self-awareness. Through what strategies
does the Black subject destabilize ? emerge as the unthought, and thus the scandal of? historical
materialism? How does the Black subject function within the "American desiring machine"
differently than the quintessential Gramscian subaltern, the worker?

Capitalism Cant Solve

Slavery
The multitude fails to bring revolutionary change and instead
reinforces the slave estates foundation
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
In Monsters Ball, living time is redeemed from prison time by the power of love, the liberal
humanist event, rendered aesthetically through the character arc: the Southern racists refusal
of hate and his self-abandonment to the amorous embrace of the Other. Also enabled by the
power of the amorous, Michael Hardts living time is redeemed from prison time through the
event of revolutionary love, ontologically rendered through the continuous movement of
constituent power (Prison Time 78) manifest in Hardts prescription to embrace and
transpose Jean Genets project of saintliness. In Empire Negri and Hardt ground this notion
of a common, constituent power in their belief that the post-industrial abstract and
transcendental evolution of private property coincides with the re-composition of the
proletariat into a global, more radical and profound commonality than has ever been
experienced in the history of capitalism (Empire 303). They call this re-composed, radical and
profound commonality, which has been elaborated in the last twenty to thirty years of capitalist
exploitation and alienation, the multitude. 362 Red, White, & Black: Cinema and the Structure
of U.S. Antagonisms Just as Empire in the spectacle of its force continually determines systemic
recompositions, so too new figures of resistance are composed through the sequences of the
events of struggle. This is another fundamental characteristic of the existence of the multitude
today, within Empire and against Empire. New figures of struggle and new subjectivities are
produced in the conjuncture of events, in the universal nomadism [here Negri and Hardt are
referring to the exponential rise in near-refugee status of so many Third World people during
globalization], in the general mixture and miscegenation of individuals and populations, and in
the technological metamorphoses of the imperial biopolitical machine [The multitude]
express, nourish, and develop positively their own constituent projects; they work toward the
liberation of living labor, creating constellations of powerful singularitiesThe multitude is the
real productive force of our social world, whereas Empire is a mere apparatus of capture that
lives only off the vitality of the multitudeas Marx would say, a vampire regime of accumulated
dead labor that survives only by sucking off the blood of the living. (Empire 61-62) And on the
terrain of Empire (a terrain on which private property is more and more abstract and
transcendental, a terrain of communicative and interactive production) a new notion of [the]
commons will have to emerge (Empire 303) from the constituent projects of the multitude,
their liberation of living labor (61). According Negri and Hardt, a new species of political
activist has been born of the multitude, paradoxical in its idealism in that its: 363 Red,
White, & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms realistic course of action today is
to demand what is seemingly impossible, that is, something new. [The constituent projects of
the multitude] do not provide a practical blueprint for how to solve problems, and we should not
expect that of them. They seek rather to transform the public agenda by creating political desires
for a better futureOne of the most remarkable characteristics of these movements is their
diversity: trade unionists together with ecologist together with priests and Communists. These
movements evoke the opennesstoward new kinds of exchange and new ideas (Hardt, The
New Faces in Genoa Want a Different Future. New York Times. Wednesday, July 25, 2001.)
The emergence of a new notion of the commons, a transformed political agenda by way of the
creation of political desires or a better future, is Negri and Hardts dream for the
transformation of capitalist cartography: the redemption of prison space. It goes hand in hand
with Hardts specific dream for new common names (303) by way of Genets saintly project for

the redemption of prison timehis simple affirmation [that] we still do not know what bodies
can do (73). For Hardt, Genets divinity lies in his: revealing our common power to constitute
reality, to constitute being. The power of creation, the power to cause our own existence, is
divine If we recognize what is common to [the prisoners] body and our own, if we discover the
way [the prisoners] body agrees with our own and how our bodies together compose a new body
[the multitude re-composed from the worker], we can ourselves cause that joyful encounter to
return [hence the emancipatory event]. (Prison Time 73) 364 Red, White, & Black: Cinema
and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms For both Forsters individual and Hardts multitude
both subsumed by prison timethe event or encounter in which time is re-deemed is
inextricably bound in the subjects capacity to be transformed, socially (Forster) and
ontologically (Hardt), by abandoning subjectivity to what in the words of Genet is one long
mating, burdened and complicated by a heavy, strange, erotic ceremonial (The Thiefs
Journal, 10) (74). And love is the driving force in this constitution [of a new body, the
multitude]. The organization of joyful encounters is the increase in our power, our power to act
and power to exist This eternal return to the joyful encounter is a constitution of being, not in
the sense that it fixes an immobile identity (far from it), but rather in that it defines a
movement, a becoming, a trajectory of encounters, always open and unforeseeable, continuously
susceptible to the intervention of the new events. The return of the joyful encounter is the first
thread from which we will weave an alternative constituent time. (73-74) Lest the structural
correlation between Hanks susceptibility to the intervention of the new events (his liaison
with Leticia) and that same susceptibility of the multitude, found in Hardt and Negris work, be
read as an agreement between Monsters Ball and Marxism at the level of the social, we should
bear in mind Hardt and Negris contrariness when confronted with the politics of individuated
liberation. Outside of a materialist, collective, and dynamic conception of time it is impossible
to conceive of revolution (Negri, Macchina tempo. Milan: Feltrinelli: 1982: 253) (70); which is
to say, the social effect of Forsters amorous interracial dream cannot have a structural impact
on Hank Grotowski in his capacity as a member of the multitude. Thus, for Hardt, Monsters 365
Red, White, & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms Balls social politics would
be weak at best, reactionary at worst. I would agree with Hardt, but it is my task here to add that
the structural impact of Hardt and Negris amorous dream shakes not one pillar on the slave
estate and in fact strengthens, along with Forsters dream, the slave estates foundation.
Monsters Ball does, however, pose the question of redemption both in terms of Hanks
individuated amorous event, his liaison with Leticia, and in terms of Hardts constituent
(collective) revolutionary event, the problems posed by both the image of civil societys
organizers of hegemony trapped behind the glass of the death chambers witness room and by
the gathering of guards suffering on death row. What is essential, however, is that the power to
pose the question is dependent and parasitic on Black presence, while simultaneously, the Black
is barred from the questions raised. From the organizers of hegemony locked behind the glass of
the witness room, we then cut back to Lawrence, the guards, and the preparatory rituals. The
opening shot here is cropped in such a way that an asephalic, or headless, White guard appears.
He is helping the condemned on with his diaper. Like the high angle shot toward the beginning
of this montage, the asephalic subjectivity of the prison guard positions him in such a way that
he shares, with Lawrence Musgrove, not the fate of physical death, but the fate of social death. It
is as if they are positioned, both White guard and Black inmate, by a fatal way of being alive
(Marriott 15). The execution sequence, through a swift succession of compilation shots (shots
spliced together to give a quick impression of the place where the rituals of shaving and
diapering take place) cross-cuts Leticia and Tyrell at home and Lawrence, Hank, and Sonny and
the sketching Lawrence has drawn; then back and forth among the sacred 366 Red, White, &
Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms shearing, the witness room, the hallway,
the incarceration of civil societys assemblage, and the electric chair itself. It moves us through
the death walk during which Sonny vomits, doubles over, and so takes himself out of the

proceedings; all the way to the execution itself and the final cut which brings us back to the
Musgrove residence where Leticia is now alone, brushing her teeth (the image of her face split in
two between a normal medicine cabinet mirror and a magnifying mirror that extends out from
the wall). On the face of it, the argument of the sequence appears to be in tandem with the
ontological assumptive logic that I have suggested, shared by both the aesthetic gestures of
White cinema and meta-commentaries on proletarian ontology. In other words, Monsters Ball,
through the intentionality of its screenplay, seeks agreement with the assumptive logic of Negri,
Hardt, film theory, and the plethora of critical attention the film received in local newspapers
and magazines; its narrative suggests that, though the experience of suffering varies from person
to person (some folks get executed while others grow morose at the thought of execution), the
grammar of suffering is universal because a carceral modality now permeates the commons. As
Michael Hardt would have it: My life too is structured through disciplinary regimes. I live
prison time in our free society, exiled from living (Prison Time 67).

Violence results from the power relationship of the master and the
slave, which Marxism ignores and instead exile the slave from the
drama of value
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
My thesis with respect to the structure of U.S. antagonisms posits violence as an idiom of power
which marks the triangulated relationality of Modernity (Red, White, and Black) as the broad
institutional effect of the Western Hemisphere and most pernicious expression of that
institutionality, the United States of America. My claim, building on the explanatory power of
the Afro-Pessimists, is that violence is at the heart of this idiom of power. Violence determines
the essential contours of Settler/Savage and Master/Slave relations. This notion of violence as
a positioning matrix weakens the heretofore consensual post-structuralist notions of film
studies, feminism, and Negri and Hardts post-industrial Marxism, all of which assume symbolic
negotiation (discourse) to be the essence of the matrix that positions subjects. The thesis seeks
to mark film studies, feminism, psychoanalysis, and Marxism as White, and to de-essentialize
the suffering which animates them, humiliating them in the face of the Slave and that part of the
Savage positioned, ontologically, by genocide as opposed to sovereignty. 328 Red, White, &
Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms In the preceding chapters there has been
little discussion of violent events (save a brief discussion of genocide endured by Native
Americans and ways in which the carceral continuum of Black life morphs and shape-shifts
through legislation). This is because the violence that is constitutive of the idiom of power that
positions one U.S. antagonist as Settler/Master, another as Slave, and still another as Savage
should not be reduced to its spectacle. It is not an event but rather a matrix of elaboration upon
which temporal and spatial capacity is possible for the Settler/Master; is both possible and
impossible for the Savage; and is absolutely derelict for the Slave. One can no more show the
matrix of violence that positions the Slave than one can show psychoanalysiss matrix of
language, the large object A, the Symbolic Order that castrates the infans and brings (positions)
him/her into subjectivity, that is, into a world of contemporaries. At the time of this writing,
even the most radical and overtly political gestures in film studies have as yet to engage Hardt
and Negris theories of political economy and its recomposed subject, the multitude. But this
shortcoming is one which plays out Master-to-Master, Settler-to-Settler: it is an intra-human
discussion inessential to the Slaves ethical dilemmas catalyzed by accumulation and fungibility.
(The Slave, however, is often brought into the discussion not in an effort to advance the analysis
but rather in an effort to avoid embarrassment.) Still engaging either the assumptive logic of
Foucauldian disciplinary regimes (i.e., Kalpana Seshadri-Crooks, Patrice Petro) or Gramscian
hegemony (i.e., Stuart Hall, Mary Ann Doane, Stephen Heath, and early Kaja Silverman), film

studies has either a minimalist agenda as regards the cinemas socially transformative potential
(that is, it is animated by notions of hybridity and change within 329 Red, White, & Black:
Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms the interstices of civil society), or it is hopeful for
a realignment of cinematic practice whose counter-hegemonic elements qualify as cultural
accompaniment for major social and political change. All this is to say that film studies has yet
to become underwritten by an ensemble of Negrian questions as regards the status of the
spectator and the cinematic diegesis in a world where now (even) Whites are positioned more
and more by what appears to Hardt and Negri as gratuitous violence and less and less by what
had appeared to Gramsci and Foucault as contingent violence. But as poles apart as Negrian
Marxism and film studies may be, what binds Negri and Hardts unflinching paradigmatic
analysis to the most unflinching interpretive film theory is a largely unspoken and
unsubstantiated notion that all sentient beings (euphemistically referred to as humansor
bona fide subjects) possess the capacity to contest value in some kind of dramain other words,
faith in the notion that all people have the capacity for history and anthropology, the power to
transform time and space. The drama of value, then, is underwritten by the inspiration of the
personal pronoun we. It is this inspiration that my efforts throughout this book have
attempted to deconstruct and humiliate. The inspiration of we, to use a term from film theory,
is a form of suture. It papers over any contemplation of violence as a structuring matrixand
weds us to the notion of violence as a contingent event. And the inspiration of we also
performs a suture between fields of study and political motivations as seemingly far apart as
Negrian Marxism and Gramscian/Lacanian film studies; sutures them together by way of two
basic assumptions: (1) that all people have bodies and (2) that all people contest dramas of
value. Thus, Marxism and film theory operate like police actions: they police 330 Red, White, &
Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms our ability to contemplate how the Slave is
not a lesser valued entity on a pole of higher valued entities but is instead exiled from the drama
of value. Acknowledgments of this exile are to be found, not in White meta-commentary and not
in White film theory but, oddly enough, in White films themselves. Monsters Ball is a film that
attempts to share the inspiration of Marxism and White film theorys we but finds itself
divided on the matter. It cannot be inspired by the assumptive we of its screenplay, that is, its
most conscious narrative strategies, because at key moments its images and soundtrack act
contrapuntally to the screenplay. The next three chapters are predicated on a claim that whereas
the screenplay labors ideologically in support of a notion that exploitation and alienation (the
Humans grammar of suffering) explain the essential antagonism of the paradigm, strategies of
cinematic form (as well as the irruption of contextual elements into the films production labor
ideologically in support of a notion that accumulation and fungibility (the Slaves grammar of
suffering) explain the essential antagonism of the paradigm (and, through this explanation,
render exploitation and alienation the touchstones of a conflict).

Sovereignty
Marxism is a threat to native sovereignty, making it incompatible with
emancipation for the native people
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
The notion of triumvirate articulation (connections, transfers, and displacements) is borrowed
from Peter Miller and Nikolas Roses article On Therapeutic Authority: Psychoanalytical
Expertise Under Advanced Liberalism. Miller and Rose reject the 241 Red, White, & Black:
Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms trend in scholarly writing about psychoanalysis
that attempts to explain the discourse by locating its origins in general social and cultural
transformations. Their strategy of analysis differs from dominant trends in scholarship in that
they are concern[ed] with therapeutics as a form of authority. This means that their analysis
focuses on the rhetorical strategies through which the discourse of psychoanalysis (in an
historical milieu of advanced liberalism) becomes authoritative. Their analysis is not animated
by the question why therapeutics but by the question how therapeutics (31). Similarly, we
have asked ourselves how, rhetorically, the Settler/Masters grammar of exploitation and
alienation functions: in what way is this grammar authoritative in discourses as disparate as
feminism, Marxism, and Western aesthetics? lxv We asked ourselves why there is no
articulation between the Slaves grammar of suffering and the Settler/Masters grammar of
suffering: what prevents them from being simultaneously authoritative? Now, we find ourselves
faced with sovereignty as a modality of the Savages grammar of suffering, with the network
through which its authority functions, and with the possibility or impossibility of its articulation
with the Settler and/or the Slave. Deloria, Churchill, and others insist upon the incompatibility
of both Marxist and psychoanalytic utopianism as projects of emancipation for Native people.
Churchill goes so far as to say that Marxism [constitutes] as great a threat to native sovereignty
and self-determination as capitalism (Since Predator Came 6). In addition, there seems to be a
radical disarticulation between the Settlers and the Savages topographies of the soul: the
secular mediations and processes through which a psychoanalyst punctuates (Lacan) the
analysands empty speech, and thereby guides the analysand to a non-egoic relationship with
his/her contemporaries (the attainment of full speech), are apparently 242 Red, White, & Black:
Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms dumbstruck when confronted by the mediations
and processes through which the medicine man/woman heals the tribal member and thereby reharmonizes him/her with the universe and all its relations. Vine Deloria links this besetting
hobble of psychoanalysiss healing power to the bankrupt ethics of Christianity: [T]he original
[Christian] perception of reality becomes transformed over a period of time into philosophies
and theologies which purport to give a logical and analytical explanation of ultimate reality [i.e.,
Freudian psychoanalysis]. These explanations, of course, have eliminated the human emotions
and intuitive insights of the original experience and in their place have substituted a systematic
rendering of human knowledge concerning the natural world. (The Metaphysics of Modern
Existence 151)

Exclusion
Ontological meditations do not explore the concept of the red and
black bodies as a product of genocide and portrays them as a threat to
civil society
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
My argument in Part III is that sovereignty, as one modality of the Savage grammar of
suffering, articulates quite well with the two modalities of the Settler/Masters grammar of
suffering, exploitation and alienation. The second thrust of my argument is this: whereas the
genocidal modality of the Savage grammar of suffering articulates quite well within the two
modalities of the Slaves grammar of suffering, accumulation and fungibility, Native American
film, political texts, and ontological meditations are not predisposed to recognize, much less
pursue, this articulation. To put a finer point on it, one could safely say: 200 Red, White, &
Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms 1. Savage ontological meditations are
animated by the network of connections, transfers, and displacements between the constituent
registers of indigenous sovereignty (governance, land stewardship, kinship structure, custom,
language, and cosmology) and the constituent registers of Settler/Master meditations (Marxism,
environmentalism, and psychoanalysis); but these ontological meditations do not explore the
being of the Indian as a product of genocide (except in the work of a handful of metacommentators on ontology such as Ward Churchill and, to a lesser extent, Leslie Silko). And
these meditations are certainly not explorations of a network of connections, transfers, and
displacements between Red ontological death and Black ontological death. 2. The small corpus
of socially engaged films directed by Native Americans privilege an ensemble of questions
animated by sovereign loss. However, the libidinal economy of cinema is so powerful that the
ensemble of questions catalyzed by genocide as a grammar of suffering often force their way into
the discourse of these films with a vengeance that exceeds their meekor downright omitted
appearance in the scripts; scripts which, nonetheless, tend to exert their authority by policing
the cinematic exploration of genocide with the sovereign power of the narrative. Heretofore,
little has been written which comments on the disinclination of Savage ontological
meditations to explore the network of connections, transfers, and displacements between Red
death and Black death. This section will end with an analysis of this disinclination and its
alarming consequences for Savage cinema. Most alarming 201 Red, White, & Black: Cinema
and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms is the fact that nearly half of the seven or eight feature
films directed by Native Americans within the past thirty years, Follow Me Home (1996), Sioux
City (1994), The Business of Fancydancing (2002) and Skins (2002), are not content to balance
the pathos of their ethical dilemmas solely on the back of White supremacy. In other words, in
these films the aesthetic argument as regards the history (and continuation) of Native extinction
rests as much upon the iconography and symbolism of Blackness as it does upon the
iconography and symbolism of White supremacy. When I say as much I do not mean to imply a
quantitative one for one pilgrims progress in which Indian films envision Native encounters
with Black people as being historically, or even empirically, the source of their extinction
cinema is seldom called to such a rational and conscious account. By as much I mean the
following: there are moments in these films in which the spectator is being persuaded that the
suffering of Indian-ness is untenable, cannot be justified, and should not be endured. None
would argue with the political and economic reasoning of such claims. But the libidinal
reasoning of these claims, manifest in some of the most emotionally charged scenes, relies
upon Settler civil societys longstanding commonplace and quotidian phobias as regards the
image- and acoustic-based iconography of Blackness as an unspecified and undisputed threat:

for example, the quotidian depravity of Black rap music (Skins), the figure the cold and
aggressive Black woman (The Business of Fancydancing), the loud and impossible Black male
task-master (Sioux City)lvii, and the vestmentary and kinesic codes of mise en scne commonly
accrued to Black youth-qua-criminal (Skins). The Black in both Savage and Settler cinema is
commonly imagined as a threat to sovereignty and civil society, respectively. Furthermore, it is
the imaginative labor around this threat in common which secures 202 Red, White, & Black:
Cinema and the Structure of U.S. Antagonisms coherence for the grammar of Savage
sovereignty. The argument being made here for the first time in either film studies, Native
American studies, Black studies, or, for that matter, comparative ethnic studies, will proceed by
examining not only what a benchmark film like Chris Eyres Skins yields symptomatically but by
way of an extensive examination of Native American ontological commentaries. In short,
whereas the coherence of Native American cinema may not reproduce the White supremacy of
Settler/Master cinema, its grammar of suffering, and the way that grammar labors
cinematically, is dependent on what I will call Savage Negrophobiaa Native American brand
of anxiety as regards the Slave, which is foundational not only to the emerging filmography of
Savage cinema but also to the more substantial and established archive of Native American
political common sense and meta-commentaries on Savage ontology.

The native does not care about class struggle, as it brings the Black to its heels,
ignoring the modality of Savage
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
When Angelita, the indigenous colonel in the Army of Justice and Redistribution, struggles to
explain to Comrade Bartolomeo, a White Marxist, why Indians couldnt care less about
international Marxism; all they wanted was to retake their land from the white man, or when
Sterling reminisces on his lifelong banishment from Laguna Pueblo by the elders (an intraSavage conflict), Silko is not compelled to discipline the dream world of the fiction by
reminding us that it is not about race but rather about poverty and oppression. Curiously
enough, these encounters evince what can only be described as a philosophical about-face:
Angelita is deployed by Silko against Marxisms ethical dilemmas that writer and character
might demonstrate how puny and inadequate the question of class is to indigenous dilemmas of
land restoration. And while Sterling is sent into the fictional world by Silko for a variety of
complex reasons central to the sovereign dilemma of cultural restoration, one thing is certain:
he is not deployed across seven hundred pages to convince the reader that it is all about class.
Why then, must the Black be brought to heel? Almanac of the Dead is not content to simply
ignore that modality of the Savage which is most analogous to the Slave; nor is it content to
merely displace the dilemma of the object status of the Slave onto the ethical dilemma of class.
In addition to these two strategies of erasure, Silko is determined to make the Black over in the
image of indigenism. This is a gratuitous gesture that even Skins does not attempt.

Civil Society
Ideologies such as Marxism fail to explain the social relationships of
the Black
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
My argument with the passage above has little to do with the content of Barretts claims.
Certainly, value is both the masking of social relations as well as the masking of its own circuit
of displacement, substitution, and signification. But theories (i.e., Marxism, feminism, and film
theory) which unpack the hypostasized form which value takes, as it masks both its differential
and social relations, experience the humiliation of their explanatory power when confronted
with the Black. For the Black has no social relation(s) to be either masked or unmaskednot,
that is, in a structural sense. Social relations depend on various pretenses to the contrary;
therefore, what gets masked is the matrix of violence that makes Black relationality an
oxymoron. To relate, socially, one must enter a social dramas mise-en-scne with spatial and
temporal coherencein other words, with human capacity. The Slave is not so much the
antithesis of human capacity (that might imply a dialectic potential in the Slaves encounter with
the world) as s/he is the absence of human capacity. 333 Red, White, & Black: Cinema and the
Structure of U.S. Antagonisms Having recapped the general project, we can begin to closely
examine Settler/Master cinema, a cinema elaborated by an ensemble of questions that arise out
of an explanatory rubric predicated on exploitation and alienation; a cinema in which the
protagonist(s) who shoulders a films ethical dilemmas is an exploited and alienated Human.
The apex of Humanness is Whiteness (Dyer). Therefore, socially engaged cinema of which the
director is White and whose standard bearer of ethical dilemmas is also White will be the focal
point of our investigation. Enter Monsters Ball

Ideology
Marxism fails to incorporate the slave into its philosophy
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, March 19, 2010, Red, White & Black: Cinema and the Structure of U.S.
Antagonisms)//ky
What is the it beyond representation that Whiteness murders? In other words, what
evidence do we have that the violence that positions the Slave, is structurally different then the
violence inflicted upon the Worker, the Woman, the Spectator, and the Post-Colonial? Again, as
was demonstrated in Part I, the murdered it is capacity par excellence, spatial and temporal
capacity. Marxism, Film Theory, and the political 419 Red, White, & Black: Cinema and the
Structure of U.S. Antagonisms common sense of socially engaged White cinema think human
capacity as Butler and Seshadri-Crooks do: as universal phenomena. But Blacks experience
human capacity as a homicidal phenomena. Fanon, Judy, Mbembe, Hartman, Marriott,
Patterson, and Spillers, have each, in their own way, shown us that the Black lost the coherence
of space and time in the hold of the Middle Passage. The philosophy of Butler, the film theory of
Silverman, Doane, and Seshadri-Crooks, the Marxism of Negri and Hardt, the social optimism
or pessimism of popular film reviews, and the auteurial intention of director Marc Forster, all
leave the Slave unthought. They take as given that the Black has access to dramas of value. But
each disparate entity in any drama of value must possess not only spatiality (for even a patch of
grass exists in space), but the power to labor on space: the cartographic capacity to make place
if only at the scale of the body. Each disparate entity in any drama of value must possess not
only temporality (for even a patch of grass begins-exists-and-is-no-more), but the power to labor
over time: the historiographic capacity to narrate eventsif only the event of sexuality. The
terrain of the body and the event of sexuality were murdered when the African became a
genealogical isolate (Patterson 5). Thus, the explanatory power of the theorists, filmmaker,
and film reviewers cited above, at its very best, is capable of thinking Blackness as identity or as
identification; conceding, however, as the more rigorous among them do, that black and white
do not say much about identity, though they do establish group and personal identifications of
the subjects involved (Seshadri-Crooks 133). But even this concession gets us nowhere. At best,
it is a red herring investing our attention in a semiotic impossibility: that of the Slave as
signifier. At worst, it puts the cart before the horse; which is to say that no Marxist theory of
social change and proletarian recomposition, 420 Red, White, & Black: Cinema and the
Structure of U.S. Antagonisms and no feminist theory of bodily resignification, have been able
(or cared) to demonstrate how, when, and where Lincoln freed the slaves. Yet, they remain, if
only by omission, steadfast in their conviction that slavery was abolished. At moments, however,
the sensory excess of cinema lets ordinary White film say what extraordinary White folks wont.

Marxism fails to recognize the white supremacist foundation,

preventing it from establishing a comprehensive antagonism
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, 25 Aug 2010, Gramscis Black Marx: Whither the Slave in Civil Society?,
http://www.tandfonline.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/pdf/10.1080/1350463032000101579.)
//ky
A Decisive Antagonism Any serious consideration of the question of antagonistic identity
formation a formation, the mass mobilisation of which can precipitate a crisis in the
institutions and assumptive logic which undergird the United States of America must come to
grips with the limitations of marxist discourse in the face of the black subject. This is because
the United States is constructed at the intersection of both a capitalist and white supremacist
matrix. And the privileged subject of marxist discourse is a subaltern who is approached by

variable capital a wage. In other words, marxism assumes a subaltern structured by capital,
not by white supremacy. In this scenario, racism is read off the base, as it were, as being
derivative of political economy. This is not an adequate subalternity from which to think the
elaboration of antagonistic identity formation; not if we are truly committed to elaborating a
theory of crisis crisis at the crux of Americas institutional and discursive strategies. The
scandal with which the black subject position threatens Gramscian discourse is manifest in the
subjects ontological disarticulation of Gramscian categories: work, progress, production,
exploitation, hegemony, and historical self-awareness. By examining the strategy and structure
of the black subjects absence in Antonio Gramscis Prison Notebooks and by contemplating the
black subjects incommensurability with the key categories of Gramscian theory, we come face to
face with three unsettling consequences. Firstly, the black American subject imposes a radical
incoherence upon the assumptive logic of Gramscian discourse. In other words, s/he implies a
scandal. Secondly, the black subject reveals marxisms inability to think white supremacy as the
base and, in so doing, calls into question marxisms claim to elaborate a comprehensive, or in
the words of Antonio Gramsci, decisive antagonism. Stated another way: Gramscian marxism
is able to imagine the subject which transforms her/himself into a mass of antagonistic identity
formations, formations which can precipitate a crisis in wage slavery, exploitation, and/or
hegemony, but it is asleep at the wheel when asked to provide enabling antagonisms toward
unwaged slavery, despotism, and/or terror. 1350-4630 Print/1363-0296 On-line/03/020225-16
wnloaded by
[141.213.236.110] at 11:41 04 July 2014 226 Frank Wilderson, III Finally, we begin to see how
marxism suffers from a kind of conceptual anxiety: a desire for socialism on the other side of
crisis a society which does away not with the category of worker, but with the imposition
workers suffer under the approach of variable capital: in other words, the mark of its conceptual
anxiety is in its desire to democratise work and thus help keep in place, ensure the coherence of,
the Reformation and Enlightenment foundational values of productivity and progress. This is a
crowding-out scenario for other post-revolutionary possibilities, i.e. idleness. Why interrogate
Gramsci with the political predicament and desire of the black(ened) subject position in the
Western Hemisphere? Because the Prison Notebooks intentionality, and general reception, lay
claim to universal applicability. Neither Gramsci nor his spiritual progenitors in the form of
scholars or activists say that the Gramscian project sows the seeds of freedom for whites only.
Instead, they claim that deep within the organicity of the organic intellectual is the organic black
intellectual, the organic Chinese intellectual, the organic South American intellectual and so on;
that though there are historical and cultural variances, there is a structural consistency which
elaborates all organic intellectuals and undergirds all resistance. Through what strategies does
the black subject destabilise emerge as the unthought, and thus the scandal of historical
materialism? How does the black subject distort and expand marxist categories in ways that
create, in the words of Hortense Spillers, a distended organisational calculus? (Spillers 1996, p.
82). We could put the question another way: How does the black subject function within the
American desiring machine differently than the quintessential Gramscian subaltern, the
worker? Before going more deeply into how the black subject position destabilises or
disarticulates the categories foundational to the assumptive logic of marixsm, its important to
allow ourselves a digression that attempts to schematise the Gramscian project on its own
terms.

Current movements fail because they fail to recognize the key

component of the system social and physical death. This means the
perm fails and the alt is key
Heiner 3 (Brady Heiner, Ph.D., Philosophy, Stony Brook University, 2003, Commentary
Social Death and the Relationship Between Abolition and Reform,

http://search.proquest.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/docview/231923698/fulltext/3BF8A16132A14
B13PQ/1?accountid=14667.)//ky
No reformation of the current system will lead to this total transformation. Reformist
movements fail to recognize that social and physical death are essential to the functioning of the
present social system. Consequently, reformist movements refuse to acknowledge that
destructive actions are necessary in the struggle for liberation. We must concentrate on the
structures and institutions that we need to destroy just as much as we focus on the practices and
formations we must construct to be free. We must eliminate enforced social death entirely for us
to be able to constitute alternative social organizations that truly provide for democratic
freedom. In addition, we must hold this systemic transformation in mind as we engage in our
various local struggles. For, without this total vision - what Rodriguez calls an abolitionist
"political fantasy" - our local successes will be doomed to mere reform.

Anti-Blackness Pre-requisite to
Capitalism
Anti-Blackness is a pre-requisite to capital accumulation and the
system of capitalism and US hegemony
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, 25 Aug 2010, Gramscis Black Marx: Whither the Slave in Civil Society?,
http://www.tandfonline.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/pdf/10.1080/1350463032000101579.)
//ky
Civil Death in Civil Society Capital was kick-started by the rape of the African continent. This
phenomenon is central to neither Gramsci nor Marx. The theoretical importance of emphasising
this in the early twenty-first century is two-fold: first, the socio-political order of the New
World (Spillers, 1987, p. 67) was kick-started by approaching a particular body (a black body)
with direct relations of force, not by approaching a white body with variable capital. Thus, one
could say that slavery the accumulation of black bodies regardless of their utility as labourers
(Hartman; Downloaded by [141.213.236.110] at 11:41 04 July 2014 230 Frank Wilderson, III
Johnson) through an idiom of despotic power (Patterson) is closer to capitals primal desire
than is waged oppression the exploitation of unraced bodies (Marx, Lenin, Gramsci) that
labour through an idiom of rational/symbolic (the wage) power: A relation of terror as opposed
to a relation of hegemony.4 Secondly, today, late capital is imposing a renaissance of this
original desire, direct relations of force (the prison industrial complex), the despotism of the
unwaged relation: and this Renaissance of slavery has, once again, as its structuring image in
libidinal economy, and its primary target in political economy, the black body. The value of
reintroducing the unthought category of the slave, by way of noting the absence of the black
subject, lies in the black subjects potential for extending the demand placed on state/capital
formations because its re-introduction into the discourse expands the intensity of the
antagonism. In other words, the slave makes a demand, which is in excess of the demand made
by the worker. The worker demands that productivity be fair and democratic (Gramscis new
hegemony, Lenins dictatorship of the proletariat), the slave, on the other hand, demands that
production stop; stop without recourse to its ultimate democratisation. Work is not an organic
principle for the slave. The absence of black subjectivity from the crux of marxist discourse is
symptomatic of the discourses inability to cope with the possibility that the generative subject of
capitalism, the black body of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and the generative subject
that resolves late-capitals over-accumulation crisis, the black (incarcerated) body of the
twentieth and twenty-first centuries, do not reify the basic categories which structure marxist
conflict: the categories of work, production, exploitation, historical self-awareness and, above
all, hegemony. If, by way of the black subject, we consider the underlying grammar of the
question What does it mean to be free? that grammar being the question What does it mean to
suffer? then we come up against a grammar of suffering not only in excess of any semiotics of
exploitation, but a grammar of suffering beyond signification itself, a suffering that cannot be
spoken because the gratuitous terror of white supremacy is as much contingent upon the
irrationality of white fantasies and shared pleasures as it is upon a logic the logic of capital. It
extends beyond texualisation. When talking about this terror, Cornel West uses the term black
invisibility and namelessness to designate, at the level of ontology, what we are calling a scandal
at the level of discourse. He writes: [Americas] unrelenting assault on black humanity produced
the fundamental condition of black culture that of black invisibility and namelessness. On the
crucial existential level relating to black invisibility and namelessness, the first difficult

challenge and demanding discipline is to ward off madness and discredit suicide as a desirable
option. A central preoccupation of black culture is that of confronting candidly the ontological
wounds, psychic scars, and existential bruises of black people while fending off insanity and selfannihilation. This is why the ur-text of black culture is neither a word nor a book, not an
architec- Downloaded by [141.213.236.110] at 11:41 04 July 2014 Gramscis Black Marx: Whither
the Slave in Civil Society? 231 tural monument or a legal brief. Instead, it is a guttural cry and a
wrenching moan a cry not so much for help as for home, a moan less out of complaint than for
recognition. (1996, pp. 8081). Thus, the black subject position in America is an antagonism, a
demand that can not be satisfied through a transfer of ownership/organisation of existing
rubrics; whereas the Gramscian subject, the worker, represents a demand that can indeed be
satisfied by way of a successful War of Position, which brings about the end of exploitation. The
worker calls into question the legitimacy of productive practices, the slave calls into question the
legitimacy of productivity itself. From the positionality of the worker the question, What does it
mean to be free? is raised. But the question hides the process by which the discourse assumes a
hidden grammar which has already posed and answered the question, What does it mean to
suffer? And that grammar is organised around the categories of exploitation (unfair labour
relations or wage slavery). Thus, exploitation (wage slavery) is the only category of oppression
which concerns Gramsci: society, Western society, thrives on the exploitation of the Gramscian
subject. Full stop. Again, this is inadequate, because it would call white supremacy racism and
articulate it as a derivative phenomenon of the capitalist matrix, rather than incorporating white
supremacy as a matrix constituent to the base, if not the base itself. What I am saying is that the
insatiability of the slave demand upon existing structures means that it cannot find its
articulation within the modality of hegemony (influence, leadership, consent) the black body
cannot give its consent because generalised trust, the precondition for the solicitation of
consent, equals racialised whiteness (Barrett). Furthermore, as Patterson points out, slavery is
natal alienation by way of social death, which is to say that a slave has no symbolic currency or
material labour power to exchange: a slave does not enter into a transaction of value (however
asymmetrical) but is subsumed by direct relations of force, which is to say that a slave is an
articulation of a despotic irrationality whereas the worker is an articulation of a symbolic
rationality. White supremacys despotic irrationality is as foundational to American
institutionality as capitalisms symbolic rationality because, as West writes, it dictates the limits
of the operation of American democracy with black folk the indispensable sacrificial lamb
vital to its sustenance. Hence black subordination constitutes the necessary condition for the
flourishing of American democracy, the tragic prerequisite for America itself. This is, in part,
what Richard Wright meant when he noted, The Negro is Americas metaphor. (1996, p. 72)
And it is well known that a metaphor comes into being through a violence that kills, rather than
merely exploits, the object so that the concept might live. Wests interventions help us see how
marxism can only come to grips with Americas structuring rationality what it calls capitalism,
or political economy; but cannot come to grips with Americas structuring irrationality: the
libidinal economy of white supremacy, and its hyper-discursive violence that Downloaded by
[141.213.236.110] at 11:41 04 July 2014 232 Frank Wilderson, III kills the black subject so that
the concept, civil society, may live. In other words, from the incoherence of black death, America
generates the coherence of white life. This is important when considering the Gramscian
paradigm (and its progenitors in the world of US social movements today) which is so
dependent on the empirical status of hegemony and civil society: struggles over hegemony are
seldom, if ever, asignifying at some point they require coherence, they require categories for
the record which means they contain the seeds of anti-blackness.

In the War on Position, black bodies are accumulated and slaughtered

at will as a foundation for civil society
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, 25 Aug 2010, Gramscis Black Marx: Whither the Slave in Civil Society?,
http://www.tandfonline.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/pdf/10.1080/1350463032000101579.)
//ky
For the sake our scenario the impact of a successful War of Position on our hypothetical meat
packing plant let us not refer to the question as the negro question. Instead, let us call it the
cow question. Let us suppose that the superstructure has finally flowered, and that throughout
the various fronts where the power to pose the question held by the private initiatives and
associations elaborated by the industrialists, hegemony has now been called into question and a
war of position has been transposed into a war of manoeuver. The scandal with which the black
subject position threatens Gramscian discourse is manifest in the subjects ontological
disarticulation of Gramscian categories: work, progress, production, exploitation, hegemony,
and historical self-awareness. Gramscis notes on Americanism and Fordism demonstrate his
acumen in expressing how the drama of value is played out in civil society (i.e. the family) away
from the slaughter house, while being imbricated and foundational to the class exploitation
which workers experience within the slaughter house. But still we must ask, what about the
cows? The cows are not being exploited, they are being accumulated and, if need be, killed. The
desiring machine of capital and white supremacy manifest in society two dreams, imbricated
but, I would argue, distinct: the dream of worker exploitation and the dream of black
accumulation and death. Nowhere in Gramsci can one find sufficient reassurance that, once the
dream of worker exploitation has been smashed once the superstructure, civil society, has
flowered and the question of hegemony has been posed the dream of black accumulation and
death will be thrown into crisis as well. I submit that death of the black body is (a) foundational
to the life of American civil society (just as foundational as it is to the drama of value wage
slavery), and (b) foundational to the fantasy space of desires which underwrite the industrialists
hegemony and which underwrite the workers potential for, and realisation of, what Gramsci
calls good sense. Thus, a whole set of new and difficult, perhaps un-Gramscian, questions
emerge at the site of our meat packing plant in the throes of its War of Manoeuver. First, how
would the cows fare under a dictatorship of the proletariat? Would cows experience freedom at
the mere knowledge that theyre no longer being slaughtered in an economy of exchange
predicated on exploitation? In other words, would it feel more like freedom to be slaughtered by
a workers collective where there was no exploitation, where the working day was not a minute
longer than the time it took to reproduce workers needs and pleasures, as opposed to being
slaughtered in the exploitative context of that dreary old nine to five? Secondly, in the river of
common sense does the flotsam of good sense have a message in a bottle that reads Workers of
the World Become Vegetarians!? Finally, is it enough to just stop eating meat? In other words,
can the Gramscian worker simply give the cows their freedom, grant them emancipation, and
have it be meaningful to the cows? The cows need some answers before they raise a hoof for the
flowering of the superstructure. The cows bring us face to face with the limitations of a
Gramscian formulation of the question, what does it mean to be free? by revealing the
limitations of the ways in which it formulates the question, what does it mean to suffer? Because
exploitation (rather than accumulation and death) is at the heart of the Gramscian question,
what does it mean to suffer? and thus crowds out analysis of civil societys foundation of
despotic terror and white pleasure by way of the accumulation of black bodies the Gramscian
question also functions as a crowding out scenario of the black subject herself/himself, and is
indexical of a latent anti-blackness which black folks experience in the most sincere of social
movements. So, when Buttigieg tells us that: The struggle against the domination of the few over
the many, if it is be successful, must be rooted in a careful formulation of a counterhegemonic
conception of the social order, in the dissemination of such a conception, and in the formation of

counterhegemonic institutions which can only take place in civil society and actually require
an expansion of civil society. [emphasis mine] (1995, p. 31) a chill runs down our spine. For
this required expansion requires the intensification and proliferation of civil societys
constituent element: black accumulation and death.

Civil society and capitalism are founded on the accumulation and

death of the black body, where the black subject was never meant to
work, but instead sacrificed to kick start capital
Wilderson 10 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, 25 Aug 2010, Gramscis Black Marx: Whither the Slave in Civil Society?,
http://www.tandfonline.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/doi/pdf/10.1080/1350463032000101579.)
//ky
Civil society is the terrain where hegemony is produced, contested, mapped. And the invitation
to participate in hegemonys gestures of influence, leadership, and consent is not extended to
the black subject. We live in the world, but exist outside of civil society. This structurally
impossible position is a paradox Downloaded by [141.213.236.110] at 11:41 04 July 2014 238
Frank Wilderson, III because the black subject, the slave, is vital to civil societys political
economy: s/he kick-starts capital at its genesis and rescues it from its over-accumulation crisis
at its end black death is its condition of possibility. Civil societys subaltern, the worker, is
coded as waged, and wages are white. But marxism has no account of this phenomenal birth and
life-saving role played by the black subject: in Gramsci we have consistent silence. The black
body in the US is that constant reminder that not only can work not be reformed but it cannot be
transformed to accommodate all subjects: work is a white category. The fact that millions upon
millions of black people work misses the point. The point is we were never meant to be workers;
in other words, capital/white supremacys dream did not envision us as being incorporated or
incorporative. From the very beginning, we were meant to be accumulated and die. Work (i.e.
the French shipbuilding industry and bourgeois civil society which finally extended its
progressive hegemony to workers and peasants to topple the aristocracy) was what grew up all
around us 20 to 60 million seeds planted at the bottom of the Atlantic, 5 million seeds planted
in Dixie. Work sometimes registers as a historical component of blackness, but where whiteness
is concerned, work registers as a constituent element. And the black body must be processed
through a kind of civil death for this constituent element of whiteness to gain coherence. Today,
at the end of the twentieth century, we are still not meant to be workers. We are meant to be
warehoused and die. The U.S. carceral network killsmore blacks than any other ethnic
group[and] constitute[s] an outside in U.S. political life. In fact, our society displays waves of
concentric outside circles with increasing distances from bourgeois self-policing. The state
routinely polices the unassimilable in the hell of lockdown, deprivation tanks, control units, and
holes for political prisoners. (James, 1996, p. 34) Work (i.e. jobs for guards in the prison
industrial complex and the shot in the arm it gives to faltering white communities its positive
reterritorialisation of White Space and its simultaneous deterritorialisation of Black Space) is
what grows up around our dead bodies once again. The chief difference today, compared to
several hundred years ago, is that today our bodies are desired, accumulated, and warehoused
like the cows. Again, the chief constant to the dream is that, whereas desire for black labour
power is often a historical component to the institutionality of white supremacy, it is not a
constituent element. This paradox is not to be found at the crux of Gramscis intellectual
pessimism or his optimistic will. His concern is with subjects in a white(ned) enough subject
position that they are confronted by, or threatened with the removal of, a wage, be it monetary
or social. But black subjectivity itself disarticulates the Gramscian dream as a ubiquitous
emancipatory strategy, because Gramsci (like most US social movements) has no theory of, or
solidarity with, the slave. Whereas the positionality of the worker enables the reconfiguration of
civil society, the positionality of the slave exists as a destabilising force within civil society

because civil society gains its coherence, Downloaded by [141.213.236.110] at 11:41 04 July 2014
Gramscis Black Marx: Whither the Slave in Civil Society? 239 the very tabula raza upon which
workers and industrialists struggle for hegemony, through the violence of black erasure. From
the coherence of civil society the black subject beckons with the incoherence of civil war. Civil
war, then, becomes that unthought but never forgotten spectre waiting in the wings the
understudy of Gramscis hegemony.

Black subjectivity is based in the foundations of capitalism and is key

to the complete rejection of production itself
Wilderson 3 (Frank B. Wilderson III, Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, 2003, The Prison Slave as Hegemony's (Silent) Scandal,
http://www.jstor.org.proxy.lib.umich.edu/stable/29768181?seq=6.) //ky
Capital was kick-started by the rape of the African continent, a phenomenon that is central to
neither Gramsci nor Marx. According to Barrett (2002), some? thing about the Black body in
and of itself made it the repository of the violence that was the slave trade. It would have been
far easier and far more profitable to take the white underclass from along the riverbanks of
England and Western Europe than to travel all the way to Africa for slaves. The theoretical
importance of emphasizing this in the early 21st century is twofold. First, capital was kickstarted by approaching a particular body (a black body) with direct relations of force, not by
approaching a white body with variable capital. Thus, one could say that slavery is closer to
capital's primal desire than is exploitation. It is a relation of terror as opposed to a relation of
hegemony. Second, today, late capital is imposing a renaissance of this original desire, the direct
relation of force, the despotism of the unwaged relation. This renaissance of slavery, i.e., the
reconfiguration of the prison-industrial complex has, once again, as its structuring metaphor
and primary target the Black body. The value of reintroducing the unthought category of the
slave, by way of noting the absence of the Black subject, lies in the Black subject's potential for
extending the demand placed on state/capital formations because its reintroduc tion into the
discourse expands the intensity of the antagonism. In other words, the positionality of the slave
makes a demand that is in excess of the demand made by the positionality of the worker. The
worker demands that productivity be fair and democratic (Gramsci's new hegemony, Lenin's
dictatorship of the proletariat, in a word, socialism). In contrast, the slave demands that
production stop, without recourse to its ultimate democratization. Work is not an organic
principle for the slave. The absence of Black subjectivity from the crux of radical discourse is
symptomatic of the text's inability to cope with the possibility that the generative subject of
capitalism, the Black body of the 15th and 16th centuries, and the generative subject that
resolves late capital's over-accumulation crisis, the Black (incarcerated) body of the 20th and 21
st centuries, do not reify the basic categories that structure conflict within civil society; the
categories of work and exploitation. Thus, the Black subject position in America represents an
antagonism or demand that cannot be satisfied through a transfer of ownership/organization of
existing rubrics. In contrast, the Gramscian subject, the worker, represents a demand that can
indeed be satisfied by way of a successful war of position, which brings about the end of
exploitation. The worker calls into question the legitimacy of productive practices, while the
slave calls into question the legitimacy of productivity itself. Thus, the insatiability of the slave
demand upon existing structures means that it cannot find its articulation within the modality of
hegemony (influence, leadership, consent). The Black body cannot give its consent because
"generalized trust," the precondition for the solicitation of consent, "equals racialized whiteness"
(Barrett, 2002). Furthermore, as Orlando Patterson (1982) points out, slavery is natal alienation
by way of social death, which is to say, a slave has no symbolic currency or material labor power
to exchange. A slave does not enter into a transaction of value (however asymmetri? cal), but is
subsumed by direct relations of force. As such, a slave is an articulation of a despotic
irrationality, whereas the worker is an articulation of a symbolic rationality. A metaphor comes

into being through a violence that kills the thing such that the concept might live. Gramscian
discourse and coalition politics come to grips with America's structuring rationality ? what it
calls capitalism, or political economy ? but not with its structuring irrationality, the antiproduction of late capital, and the hyper-discursive violence that first kills the Black subject, so
that the concept may be born. In other words, from the incoherence of Black death, America
generates the coherence of white life. This is important when thinking the Gramscian paradigm
and their spiritual progenitors in the world of organizing in the U.S. today, with their
overvaluation of hegemony and civil society. Struggles over hegemony are seldom, if ever,
asignifying. At some point, they require coherence and categories for the record, meaning they
contain the seeds of anti Blackness. What does it mean to be positioned not as a positive term in
the struggle for anti capitalist hegemony, i.e., a worker, but to be positioned in excess of
hegemony, to be a catalyst that disarticulates the rubric of hegemony, to be a scandal to its
assumptive, foundational logic, to threaten civil society's discursive integrity? In White Writing,
J.M. Coetzee (1988) examines the literature of Europeans who encountered the South African
Khoisan in the Cape between the 16th and 18th centuries. The Europeans were faced with an
"anthropological scandal": a being without (recognizable) customs, religion, medicine, dietary
patterns, culinary habits, sexual mores, means of agriculture, and most significantly, without
character (because, according to the literature, they did not work). Other Africans, like the
Xhosa who were agriculturalists, provided European discourse with enough categories for the
record, so that, through various strategies of articulation, they could be known by textual
projects that accompanied the colonial project. But the Khoisan did not produce the necessary
categories for the record, the play of signifiers that would allow for a sustainable semiotics.

Alternatives
Only by completely taking down the prison-industrial complex can we
stop social death and lead to actual democracy
Heiner 3 (Brady Heiner, Ph.D., Philosophy, Stony Brook University, 2003, Commentary
Social Death and the Relationship Between Abolition and Reform,
http://search.proquest.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/docview/231923698/fulltext/3BF8A16132A14
B13PQ/1?accountid=14667.)//ky
IN MY BRIEF COMMENTS, I WISH TO FOCUS ON THE THEME OF DEATH THAT
APPEARS, explicitly or implicitly, in each presentation given at the "Prison Reform and
Abolition" panel. As Dylan Rodriguez put it, "death is the social truth of imprisonment.... [It is]
the political and organizational logic of the prison." "Death," in this discussion, has signified on
multiple registers. On one level, there is what Dylan Rodriguez, Geoff Ward, and Frank
Wilderson (at an earlier point) referred to as civic or social death - the disenfranchisement and
forced invisibility experienced by current and former prisoners. On another level, there is the
political "death" that Liz Appel discussed - the fact that the messages of many of the radical
imprisoned intellectuals who are "permitted" to escape this social death are, in turn, politically
neutralized by the individualist logic of exceptionalism. Then, of course, there is the physical
death inflicted by the racist mechanisms of capital punishment. The more seriously we take the
idea that death - not correction or rehabilitation - is the ultimate social truth of imprisonment,
the more radical our political organization against the prison-industrial complex will be. (By
radical, I do not mean violent, but rather powerful.)1 This death is administered inside and
outside the prison walls. As Henry Giroux illustrated, schools, particularly those in racialized
communities, are increasingly becoming sites that function to inure youth of color to their social
and political death. Similarly, penal intervention in these marginalized communities, as Ward
and Marable discuss, often strips those communities of their right to engage in the processes of
political decision-making. I would argue that many of us experience a kind of death when our
collective power to act is fragmented, abstracted, and controlled by the mechanisms of capitalist
command - a process that transforms our collective living labor into the dead labor that
produces profits for the capitalist class. Whether it is social death by incarceration, political
death by neutralization and disenfranchisement, productive death by exploitation, or physical
death by execution, capital and its state-form predicate the life of the wealthy, the white, and the
privileged on the death of the poor, the black and brown, and the impoverished. From this
perspective, all reformist politics are simply not radical enough. It is not simply that
incarceration is a superficial solution to complex social and economic inequalities. Many
recognize that fact and use it to fuel reformist agendas that reason, "if the causes of social and
economic inequality are more complex than the current criminal justice system acknowledges,
then let us restructure the criminal justice system in such a way that it accommodates those
social and economic complexities." However, these movements seek merely to perfect the
inherently oppressive logic of the capitalist state-form; I would argue, however, that the point is
to destroy it. To embrace a more radical and more properly abolitionist politics, we must
acknowledge that our life in the present society is determined by and founded upon the social
and physical death of the incarcerated. We mustrecognize that the wealth of the transnational
capitalist class is dependent upon the control of the living labor of the multitude. Thus, we must
refuse a system that sustains life through the infliction of death - a system that predicates the
freedom of the minority upon the unfreedom of the majority. In a discussion devoted to prison
reform and prison abolition, it is crucial that we explicitly address the differences between the
two. For instance, we cannot appropriately address the issue of abolitionism without

confronting its relationship to the state. Although prison reform and even death penalty
abolition are assimilable to liberal politics, prison abolition exists well outside the framework of
political liberalism. For example, Giroux stated, "the role of the state as a guardian of public
interests appears to be lost in [contemporary] society." Here we need to interrogate exactly who
and what constitutes the "public." Like many others, I would argue that the state has never
served as "a guardian of public interests," unless we interpret "public interests" as something
like "the interests of capital" or "the interests of the white ruling class." The element that
ultimately distinguishes a radical (abolitionist) agenda from a liberal (reformist) one resides in
the totality of its approach. The fundamental aim of a radical movement is total (systemic)
transformation. For that to be effected, positive, constructive measures must be continually
accompanied (and, in many cases, preceded) by negative, destructive ones. That is to say, an
abolitionist movement acknowledges that the prison-industrial complex (and the capitalist
state-form that sustains it) must be completely dismantled for democracy to be actualized. For,
as long as our lives in present society are determined by and founded upon the social and
physical death of the incarcerated, we are not truly free. No reformation of the current system
will lead to this total transformation. Reformist movements fail to recognize that social and
physical death are essential to the functioning of the present social system. Consequently,
reformist movements refuse to acknowledge that destructive actions are necessary in the
struggle for liberation. We must concentrate on the structures and institutions that we need to
destroy just as much as we focus on the practices and formations we must construct to be free.
We must eliminate enforced social death entirely for us to be able to constitute alternative social
organizations that truly provide for democratic freedom. In addition, we must hold this systemic
transformation in mind as we engage in our various local struggles. For, without this total vision
- what Rodriguez calls an abolitionist "political fantasy" - our local successes will be doomed to
mere reform. However, we must acknowledge that the line between reformist practices and
abolitionist practices is not a definitive one. For example, though the ultimate goal of an
abolitionist movement is the total negation of the capitalist state-form, this long-term objective
must not prevent us from engaging in a host of immediate struggles to secure the survival and
quality of life of those currently imprisoned. We must not allow our expansive vision to blind us
to the immediate struggles of those presently locked down by the system. A movement that fails
to engage in these types of struggles is at odds with the interests of those on the inside - those for
whom these immediate struggles are of utmost urgency.2 A properly radical/ abolitionist
movement must work incessantly to suture the divide (both actual and virtual) between the
inside and the outside of the prison, and, more generally, between the local and the global. In
this context, radical imprisoned intellectuals - through their lives, work, and resistance - urge us
to constitute a freedom that, as Rodriguez put it, "refuses to be defined against confinement,
incarceration, and immobilization." This freedom is not underpinned by the infliction of death,
but by the production of life. It is not constituted in a praxis of limitation, but in one of creation.

Impacts
Violence is a part of black constitution, it enables their nonbeing
Douglass and Wilderson 13 (Patrice Douglass, Frank B. Wilderson III, PhD in Culture
and Theory, University of California, Irvine,Ph.D. in Rhetoric/Film Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, Winter 2013, The violence of presence: metaphysics in a blackened world,
http://go.galegroup.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/ps/i.do?action=interpret&id=GALE%7CA363191
783&v=2.1&u=lom_umichanna&it=r&p=AONE&sw=w&authCount=1.)//ky
Over the past fifteen to twenty years, black philosophy has enhanced its explanatory power by
way of a deliberate engagement with critical theory. One of the most notable examples of this
turn is found in Lewis Gordon's extended readings of Frantz Fanon and Jean-Paul Sartre--the
dialogues Gordon has staged between Fanon's blackened psychoanalysis and Sartre's Marxist
existentialism. (1) We contend that black philosophy should continue to pursue this kind of
juxtaposition: an irreverent clash between ensembles of questions dedicated to the status of the
subject as a relational being and ensembles of questions dedicated to what are more often
thought of as general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with reality,
existence, reason, and mind; in the form, specifically, of a clash between questions concerning
the always already deracination of blackness and questions, for example, of metaphysics-rather
than pursue a line of inquiry that assumes a stable and coherent philosophical vantage point
from which a black metaphysics can be imagined. This is because, as we argue below, for blacks
no such vantage point exists. Such a project could stand the assumptive logic of philosophy on
its metaphysical and ethical head; just as a similarly blackened project has turned the
assumptive logic of critical theory (specifically, its starting point, which assumes subjectivity) on
its relational head. (2) A focus on violence should be at the center of this project because
violence not only makes thought possible, but it makes black metaphysical being and black
relationality impossible, while simultaneously giving rise to the philosophical contemplation of
metaphysics and the thick description of human relations. Without violence, critical theory and
pure philosophy would be impossible. Marx and others have intimated as much. But what is
often left unexamined is that this violence is peculiar in that, whereas some groups of people
might be the recipients of violence, after they have been constituted as people, violence is a
structural necessity to the constitution of blacks. Ideally, philosophers (studying metaphysics)
and critical theorists (studying the relational status of the subject) should not be able to labor
without contemplating the violence that enables black (non)being; but, in fact, the evasion of
blackness-qua-violence is what gives these disciplines their presumed coherence. This
unthought dynamic is a best case scenario, as will be seen below with a critique of Elaine
Scarry's The Body in Pain: The Making and Unmaking of the World. (3) A worst-case scenario
ensues when the critical theorist deploys anti-black violence in her/ his critique--and restricting
of subjectivities and genres, as will be seen with a critique of Jasbir K. Puar's Terrorist
Assemblages: Homo--nationalism in Queer Times. (4)

***Permutation***
Perm Intersectionality solves your criticism your author
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 152-153, 2009//SRSL)
David Gillborn (2008, p. 13) may be right when he asserts that 'the best crit- ical race theorists are

passionate about ... classism'. But while challenging the oppression of people that
is based on their social class (classism) is extremely important, and is championed
by Marxists, the fundamental point is to also challenge the exploitation of workers
at the point of production, for therein lies the economic relationship that sustains
and nurtures the capitalist sys- tem. While I am critical of CRT, I would like to reiterate that the purpose of this
book is to not to divide, but to unite. My intention has not been to question the ideological or
political integrity of Critical Race Theorists, but to open up comradely discussion
in the light ofthe entry ofCRT into British Academia. In chapter 5 of this volume, I discussed David
Gillborn's reluc- tance to engage in debate with Marxists. However, there seem to be some contradictions in his position, because he
has also argued that 'the best way ahead may simply be to make use of analytical tools as and when they seem most revealing'
(Gillborn, 2008, p. 38). This is followed up by the assertion that Marxists (presumably) will

not be amenable to this. He states: 'this will not satisfy people who seek to fetishize
a single concept or theory above all else' (ibid.) He then goes on to emphasize what he sees as central tenets
of CRT. He quotes Kimberle Crenshaw (1995, p. 377) as follows: Through an awareness of
intersectionality, we can better acknowledge and ground the differences among us
and negotiate the means by which these dif- ferences will find expression in
constructing group politics (cited in Gillborn, 2008, p. 38) To make matters even more confusing, Gillborn (ibid.)
then cites David Stovall (2006, p. 257) as stating that '[a]rguing across conference tables is useless', that our work must be done 'on
the frontline with communi- ties committed to change' and that 'neither race nor class exists as static phenomena'. For Marxists,
there is a need for both arguing across conference tables and working on the frontline with communities committed to change. Dare
I urge Gillborn, in a comradely way, to reconsider this reluctance to talk with Yiarxists, and, in so doing, perhaps address himself
to some of the strengths of Marxism? As noted in the Introduction to this volume, it was Max Weber who is credited as being the
first prominent sociologist to dispute Marx's arguments in a serious way. Since then, there have been many

other academics who have sought ways to challenge Marx and Marxism, Critical
Race Theorists, being among the most recent. There will no doubt be many others.
Marxists will continue to meet these challenges. Marxism is not, as some would have it, a moribund set

of beliefs and practice. On the contrary, as noted in chapter 5 of this volume, Jean-Paul Sartre (1960) has described Marxism as a
'living philosophy'. To Sartre's observation, Crystal Bartolovich (2002, p. 20) has added, Marxism is not 'simply a discourse nor a
body of (academic) knowl- edge' but a living project. As I have stressed, the Bolivarian Misiones are classic examples ofsocial
democracy rather than socialism. It is important to recognize that no one can foresee what direction the Bolivarian Revolution will
take. Like other revolutions, it may be defeated or it could be hijacked. However, the Bolivarian Revolution is firmly placed in the
dialectics of socialist struggle, and its full effect on Cuba, and the emerging struggles in other parts of South America and possibly
the rest of the world are yet to be seen. Whether or not the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela remains a capital- ist country, or
proves to be a concrete example of an attempt to nurture the living project of Marxism remains to be seen. It will certainly not be the
last such attempt. The struggle against capital and empire was important historically,

continues unabated in the present, and will be mounted against any empire of the
future. As Hugo Chavez put it in a speech to the United Nations (cited in Ali, 2008, p. 293): We reaffirm our infinite faith in

humankind. We are thirsty for peace and justice in order to survive as a species. Simon Bolivar, founding father of our country and
guide to our revolution swore to never allow his hands to be idle or his soul rest until he had broken the shackles which bound us to
the empire. Now is the time not to allow our hands to be idle or our souls to rest until

we save humanity.

Capitalist domination and racism are intertwined the two are

mutually dependent
Brown 14 (Pamela, columnist with Tidal Magazine, contributor to Acronym TV's Resistance
Report and an organizer with Peoples Investigation of Wall Street, Can We Have Capitalism
Without Racism? The Invisible Chains of Debt and the Catastrophic Loss of African American
Wealth, http://www.alternet.org/economy/can-we-have-capitalism-without-racism-invisiblechains-debt-and-catastrophic-loss-african?paging=off&current_page=1#bookmark, 1/4/14, acc.
7/13/14, arh)
Yet, when we talk about debt, mostly we talk about it as a thing as the kind of thing that hangs
from the body like a ball and chain or from our necks like an albatross. We talk a lot about how
debt makes us feel: atomized, isolated, alone. But, we dont often talk about how the neoliberal
construct of perpetual indebtedness to non-human financial entities has created a populace so
focused on debts owed to Wall Street that we have no collective memory of any other kinds of
debts. But, once we open Pandoras box to take a look at the intersections of debt and race, we
are forced to ask ourselves how it is that we have forgotten so much. Could it be that alongside
the rise of the neoliberal social order characterized by the isolation of the invisible chains of
debt, a parallel practice of colorblindness arose that produces the invisibility of race? And if
Malcolm X was correct that we cannot have capitalism without racism, we have to ask
ourselves whether racism has really declined with colorblindness, or whether colorblindness
might be neoliberalisms corollary. It has been under a gray monotone cloud that a predatory
debt system has been advanced, one that stripped African Americans of all economic gains
subsequent to Civil Rights, and that spread throughout the rest of the economy, impacting
generations to come. Theres plenty of evidence of racism in spite of all the talk about post-racial
America. Still, it comes as a big surprise that while we have been declaring race dead, structural
racism has clearly increased. In fact 50 years after Civil Rights, 150 years after the Emancipation
Proclamation, and during the first black presidency, white Americans currently hold at least 19
times the wealth of African-Americans (Kochhar 2010: 3). Put into perspective, in 1984 the ratio
was 12 to 1, dipping to 7 to 1 in 1995, jumping to an astonishing 19 to 1 in 2009, and is probably
even greater now. In practical terms this means that the average middle income black family has
less wealth than the average white family with earnings below the poverty line (Shapiro 2004:
7). According to a 2010 Brandeis University study, in the last 23 years, the racial wealth gap
increased by 75K from 20K to 95K (Shapiro 2010: 2). Even within the highest income African
Americans, wealth has fallen from 25K to 18K, whereas the wealth of whites in a similar class
surged to 240K (Shapiro 2010: 2). White families saw a dramatic growth of financial assets
excluding home value from 22K to 100K, while African Americans saw very little increase at all
(Shapiro 2010: 1). Because family wealth is the biggest predictor of personal wealth, and wealth
is used to pay for education, this gap assures racial inequality for at least the next generation.
Already 81% of African American students are graduating from college an average of 29K in the
hole (Johnson, 2012: 21). And already the average middle income African American worker
would have to spend an additional twelve weeks per year working to earn the same amount as a
white worker (Shapiro 2004: 7). As a result, between 1984 and 2007 African Americans actually
doubled their debt burden as measured by assets against liabilities. At the rate blacks have been
falling behind since the mid 90s, black and white median wealth will never ever reach parity,
and unless something is done, these paths will continue to diverge. Yet, 61% of white Americans
believe that blacks have already achieved equality, and an additional 22% believe that racial
equality will be reached soon (Richomme, 2012: 8). In other words , 83% of whites believe
that we are living in a post racial era. Only 17% of blacks believe that equality has
been reached . If we understand the neoliberal debt system as increasing inequality by
moving financial resources toward the top, this process would be visible if it were not for the
invisibility of race and the ideologies of colorblindness that accomplish that invisibility. Bonilla-

Silva proposes four central frameworks that colorblindness operates through: abstract
liberalism, naturalization, cultural racism and minimization of racism. Vaguely liberal ideals of
freedom manifest as the belief that opportunities should be equal, but not intentionally
expanded, tying right into the idea that things are just the way they are. The it is what it is
approach lends to beliefs that poverty is cultural, and if people changed their habits they would
advance. And, of course, this goes hand in hand with the idea that blacks do not experience
discrimination, a belief with which 83% of whites agree. According to Bonilla-Silva together
these frames form an impregnable yet elastic wall that barricades whites from the United States
racial reality (Bonilla-Silva, 2010: 47). These frames are drawn upon synergistically and
effortlessly such that it makes sense that inequalities exist, and that it also makes sense that
nothing proactive can or should be done about it. Part of the way that these beliefs work
effectively together is that they inhabit the invisible space that debt creates between us,
presenting us as if we are not only disconnected from each other but from time, and thus
history. As indebtedness to financial powers requires of us constant foresight, a constant seeking
of a future beyond debt, we lose sight of the past. Colorblindness serves the invisible debt
economy like a key in a lock. By rendering the debts that have created the structures of
inequality invisible, we reinforce the social dynamics of neoliberalisms formulation of debt. And
while the dominant belief is that the debts we owe are generic and disconnected from the past,
colorblind practices amount to a willful denial and lack of concern with the reality of worsening
racial inequality. Worse yet, by assuming that the playing field is truly even, colorblindness
tends toward blaming the victim. After all, if it were not simply inherent deficit, why else would
blacks be lagging so far behind? These ways of seeing manifest as increasing indebtedness and a
predatory debt based economy for all, as wealth-extracting products are first tested on and then
expanded out from black and other communities of color. When it comes to credit cards and real
estate, we can see how these frames led to a domino effect to the detriment of not only blacks,
but to white Americans as well. Beginning in the 1980s household debt began to rise
significantly, increasing every single year from 1982 to 2007 with total household debt hitting
13.9 trillion in 2008 (Ruben 2009:1). From 1989 to 2001 credit card debt literally tripled for the
average American family who experienced a 53% increase in debt load (Draut 2003: 9). And
since 2000 families began to increase debt at a pace four times faster than in the 1990s (Weller
2007: 54). But what is more shocking than this enormous increase is that lower income families
had a 184% increase in debt (Draut 2003: 21). While debt levels have increased fastest for
middle income families, low to moderate income families suffer more. As of 2004, 46% of very
low income families earning less than 10K per year spent more than 40% of their income to pay
off their debt (Ruben 2009: 9). Much of this increase in debt can be traced to the 1978
Marquette vs. First Omaha Service Corp Supreme Court case that had the practical effect of
ending laws prohibiting usury. By allowing states to regulate interest rates and credit card
issuers to set interest rates by the home state of their corporate operation, banks were able to
avoid state caps on interest rates. As a result, banks were able to market high interest,
high fee predatory credit products targeting lower and moderate income people
who could not obtain credit easily before. Since over 25% of African Americans
live below the poverty line, and since African Americans earn on average 62% of
white Americans, blacks were disproportionately impacted by these predatory
tactics. And because of the structural inequalities that have manifested as long term credit
famine in communities of color, these products were viewed as lifelines. But these predatory
products expanded rapidly. Credit card companies tested new ways to make greater profits
through strategies like resetting interest rates due to missed payments and charging exorbitant
late fees, and began to include these terms with less risky products.

Perm do both solvesfocus on both the class and race struggles is

necessary, they are intertwined throughout history and define each
other through the bouts of empirical oppression
WSF 3 (The Workers Solidarity Federation , Workers Solidarity :Magazine of the Workers Solidarity Federation
Racism and the Class struggle, 2003, http://struggle.ws/rbr/rbr4_racism.html //SRSL)

Racial oppression remains a defining feature of the modern capitalist world. It is manifest most spectacularly in violent attacks on
More important to the fate of these communities has been the systematic
and increasing discrimination by capitalist states, manifest in attacks on the rights of
immigrants, cuts in welfare services, and racist police and court systems. How can racism be defeated? An answer to this
question requires an examination of the forces which gave rise to, and continue to reproduce, racism. It also requires a careful analysis of which social forces benefit
from racial oppression. By racism is meant either an attitude denying the equality of all human
beings, or economic, political and social discrimination against racial groups. The roots of racism
Capitalism developed as a world system based on the exploitation of workers, slaves and
peasants - black, brown, yellow, and white. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the
young capitalist system centred mainly on western Europe and the Americas. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
Africa and Asia were brought increasingly into the ambit of capitalist power. In the Americas, vast plantation systems were set up. Based
on slavery, they were capitalist enterprises exporting agricultural goods. It was in the system of slavery that the genesis of
racism is to be found. In the words of Caribbean scholar, Eric Williams, "Slavery was not born of racism: rather, racism was the consequence of slavery" [1]. Initially, the slave plantations were not organised on
immigrants and minorities by fascist gangs.

racial lines. Although the first slaves in the Spanish possessions in the Americas were generally native Americans, slavery was restricted (at least officially) to those who did not convert to Christianity. The native
Americans were succeeded by poor Europeans. Many of these workers were only enslaved for a limited period, as indentured servants serving contracts of up to ten or more years. Others were convicts sentenced
for crimes such as stealing cloth, or prisoners of war from uprisings and the colonisation of areas such as Ireland and Scotland. However, there were also a substantial number of life-long European slaves, and
even amongst the indentured a substantial number had been kidnapped and sold into bondage.[2] Conditions on the "Middle Passage" (the trip across the Atlantic) for these indentured servants and slaves were,
in Williams' words, so bad that they should "banish any ideas that the horrors of the slave ship are to be in any way accounted for by the fact that the victims were Negroes"[3]. More than half the English
immigrants to the American colonies in the sixteenth century were indentured servants[4], and until the 1690s there were still far more unfree Europeans on the plantations of the American South than Black
slaves[5]. Racist ideas were developed in the context of the slave trade of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In this period, African people came to be the main source of slaves for the plantations. The
systems of social control established for American and European unfree labour was now applied to the Africans. The main reason for this shift to African slaves was that such slaves were obtained cheaply enough,
and in sufficient numbers, to meet the expanding needs of the plantation capitalists[6]. African ruling classes played a central role in the highly profitable slave trade: "The trade was ... an African trade until it
reached the coast. Only very rarely were Europeans directly involved in procuring slaves, and that largely in Angola" [7]. It in the seventeenth century that racist ideology began to be developed for the first time by
such groups as "British sugar planters in the Caribbean, and their mouthpieces in Britain" who fastened onto differences in physical appearance to develop the myth that Black people were sub-human and
deserved to be enslaved: "here is an ideology, a system of false ideas serving class interests"[8]. Racism was used to justify the capture and perpetual enslavement of millions of people for the purposes of

European servitude was justified as being

the lot of inferiors; Black slavery was justified through racism. Once developed, racist ideas came
to be used more broadly as a justification for oppression. Jewish people, for example, came to be oppressed as a racial minority rather than as a
capitalism. The enslavement of native Americans had been justified as being on the grounds of their heathen beliefs;

religious group. The beneficiaries of slavery were not Europeans in general, but the capitalist ruling classes of western Europe. African ruling classes also received substantial benefits. There were of course the
vast numbers of Europeans indentured or enslaved. There were also the sailors on the "Middle Passage" whose conditions, according to Williams, were themselves scarcely distinguishable from slavery. Finally,
there were vast numbers of "poor White" peasant farmers of the Americas (some of whom were former indentured servants) who were out-competed and driven to the margins by the giant slave plantations.[9]
The vast majority of Europeans never owned slaves: only 6 per cent of whites owned slaves in the American South in 1860.[10] There were also African-American and native American slave-owners. Race and
Empire Racism was thus born of the slavery of early capitalism. However, having been once created, subsequent developments in capitalism would sustain and rear this creature of the ruling class. The extension
of capitalist power over Africa and Asia took place largely from the seventeenth century onwards in the form of imperialism[11]. Initially, imperial conquest was often undertaken directly by large corporations such
as the British East India Company (in India) and the Dutch East India Company (in South Africa, among other places). Later capitalist governments took a direct hand, notably in the conquest of most of Africa
from the 1880s. Imperialism in this period was driven by the search for profits: initially, profits from control of trade; later by big corporations' need for cheap sources of labour and raw materials, and by the need
to find new markets to sell manufactured goods. Racist ideas were again pressed into service to justify the process of imperial conquest and rule. Imperial control was justified on the supposed grounds that
Africans and Asians (and for that matter other colonised peoples such as the Irish) were unable to govern or develop themselves, and needed to be ruled by external forces - namely the ruling classes of western
Europe and Japan[12]. Equal rights were not seen as even being possible in this world view. Empire did not benefit workers in the colonies, nor in the imperialist countries. The profits of empire accrued to the
capitalist class[13]. Meanwhile, the methods and forces of colonial repression were deployed against workers in the imperialist countries (most notably, the use of colonial troops to crush the Spanish Revolution),
whilst lives and material resources were wasted on imperial adventures. Today, multi-national companies cut jobs and wages by shifting to repressive Third World client regimes. Racism today Clearly, capitalism
gave birth to racism. Racism as an idea helped justify empire and slavery. Racism as a form of discrimination or oppression facilitated high levels of exploitation, and has thus been an important factor in the
development of capitalism. Today, both slavery and the formal empires have been overthrown - this has largely been the result of struggles by millions of workers, peasants and slaves against oppression. Slave
revolts are part of the history of class struggle against capitalism. Peasant and worker resistance to colonialism are equally so, although it must be noted that most anti-colonial struggles were prevented from

although these struggles

removed the formally racist structures of slavery and empire they have not buried racism.
Racism -as an idea and as a practice- continues to serve two key functions under capitalism. First, it
allows the capitalists to secure sources of cheap, unorganised, and highly exploitable labour. Key
reaching their necessary conclusion- socialist revolution- by the determination of local elites to reach a deal with capitalism and imperialism. However,

examples are immigrants and minorities. Subject to racist discrimination, they form a segment of the working class that has been described as "super-exploited", providing high levels of profit for capitalists. In

racism
allows the capitalist ruling class to divide and rule the exploited classes. Across the planet, billions of workers and peasants
times of capitalist crisis (such as today) these segments are most readily deprived of political and social rights, the first to fall in the overall assault on the working class that takes place. Secondly,

suffer the lashes of capitalism. Racism is used to foster divisions within the working class to help keep the ruling class in power. Praxedis Guerrero, a great Mexican anarchist, described the process as follows[14]:
"Racial prejudice and nationality, clearly managed by the capitalist and tyrants, prevent peoples living side by side in a fraternal manner... A river, a mountain, a line of small monuments suffice to maintain
foreigners and make enemies of two peoples, both living in mistrust and envy of one another because of the acts of past generations. Each nationality pretends to be above the other in some kind of way, and the
dominating classes, the keepers of education and the wealth of nations, feed the proletariat with the belief of stupid superiority and pride to make impossible the union of all nations who are separately fighting to
free themselves from Capital. If all the workers of the different ... nations had direct participation in all questions of social importance which affect one or more proletarian groups these questions would be
happily and promptly solved by the workers themselves." It happens between majority populations and super-exploited minorities, but also between the working classes of different countries. Workers are told to
blame and hate other workers- distinguished by culture, language, skin colour, or some other arbitrary feature- for their misery. A classic example is the scape-goating of immigrants and refugees for "taking away
jobs and housing". In this way, workers' anger is deflected onto other workers (with whom they have almost everything in common) rather than being directed against capitalists ( with whom workers have
nothing in common). An appearance of common interest is created between workers and bosses of a given race or nation. Who benefits? Racism does not benefit any workers. Even workers who are not
themselves directly oppressed by racism lose out from racism because it divides the working class. White American workers, for example, in no way benefit from the existence of an impoverished and oppressed
minority of African American workers who can be used to undercut wages, and working and living conditions. In addition, racist attitudes make it very difficult to unite workers against the capitalists to challenge
the overall distribution of wealth and power in society. Racism has been used again and again to break workers' struggles. The more the working class is divided, the worse its overall condition will be. This point,
which was repeatedly made by the classical anarchist movement[15], has been confirmed in a study by an American sociologist who set out to test the proposition that white workers gain from racism[16].
Comparing the situation of White and Black workers in all fifty US states, he found, firstly, that the less wage discrimination there was against Black workers, the better were the wages that White workers received.
Secondly, he found that the existence of a substantial nationally oppressed group of poor workers reduced the wages of White workers (but did not affect the earnings of middle and upper-class Whites very much).
Finally, he found that the more intense racial discrimination was, the more poverty there was for lower class Whites. Such facts fly in the face of political strategies which claim that majority population workers
receive material benefits from racism. The logic of this argument is that these privileges must be "renounced" before working class unity is possible. Such an argument assumes that capitalists would adopt a
strategy that systematically benefits the majority of workers, a most unlikely (and as we saw above, unsustainable) notion. In addition, this argument implies that the immediate political task is a redistribution of
wealth among workers as opposed to a class struggle against capitalism. That is to say, it calls on the majority of workers to fight on principle for worse conditions. Finally, this approach mixes up two very
different things: oppression and privilege. While it is obviously true that some workers do not directly experience racial oppression, it does not follow that they benefit from it. The two terms are distinct: while it is
oppressive to be subject to low wages, it is not a privilege to have a living wage. Why racist ideas are accepted None of the arguments made so far in this article deny the possibility that minorities of the working
class may receive temporary benefits from racial oppression in specific circumstances. A case in point would be the small white working class in South Africa between the 1920s and the 1980s, which received real
benefits from apartheid. But, as a general rule, racial oppression is fundamentally against the interests of the majority of workers of all colours. To recognise the primary role of capitalist ruling classes (aided by
their states) in promoting and benefiting from racial oppression is not to deny that many working class people often support racism. Racism is often very widespread. However, such support for racism is an

example of working class people acting against their own interests, rather than evidence that workers benefit from racism. However, if racism provides no benefits for workers, how can we explain such support for
the essentially irrational ideas of racism? The answer is that there are very real material forces in capitalist society which operate to foster support for these ideas. The first factor is capitalist control over ideas.
Capitalists do not simply rule by force, they also rule by promoting a capitalist world-view. Here we must consider, as Praxedis argued above, how "the dominating classes, the keepers of education and the wealth
of nations" "feed the proletariat with the belief of stupid superiority and pride": the role of the schools, the media, literature and so forth. The impact of this propaganda cannot be underestimated. The second
factor is the material conditions of the working class itself. Under capitalism, the working class suffers poverty, alienation and misery. In the same way that workers may take solace from religion, they may also
seek the imaginary compensation of supposed racial superiority, "the belief of stupid superiority and pride" (in Praxedis' words). In addition, working class people are locked in bitter competition for a limited
amount of jobs, housing and other resources. In this situation, they may blame other groups in the working class for their plight. Where the other groups are culturally or physically distinct in appearance, this
resentment and competition may be expressed in racist terms. Hence the view, for example, that 'they' are 'taking our jobs'. The Oppressed divided From the above, it is clear that racism is a product of
capitalism, and fundamentally against the interests of the working class and peasantry. Are capitalists from oppressed groups reliable allies in the struggle against racism? The short answer is, no, they are not.
The effects of racism are fundamentally mediated by class position. Taking the case of the United States: although national averages of White and Black incomes show a vast gulf between the two, when class is
taken into account the material inequalities between White and Black workers are shown to be quite limited; taken from another angle, the gap between the conditions of both sets of workers, on one side, and
those of the upper class, on the other, are yawning[17]. Michael Jackson may still face racism, but his wealth and power as a capitalist shields him from the worst effects of racism. Private schools, lawyers, high
incomes - all these factors cannot be ignored. Perhaps more importantly, the class interests of such elites tie them into supporting the capitalist system itself. Black police chiefs, mayors, and army officers are as
much defenders of capitalism as their White counterparts. Such strata will readily compromise with the powers-that-be if it will give them a chance to be 'in the racket and in the running'. Fighting racism It is
capitalism that continually generates the conditions for racist oppression and ideology. It follows that the struggle against racism can only be consistently carried out by the working class and peasantry: the only
forces capable of overthrowing the capitalist system. The overthrow of capitalism will in and of itself fundamentally undermine the social sources of racism. The overthrow of capitalism however, requires the
unification of the working class and peasantry internationally, across all lines of colour and nationality. In addition, the crushing of capitalism, and the establishment of libertarian socialism will allow the vast
resources currently chained to the needs of profiteering by a rich few to be placed under the control of the working and poor people of the whole globe. Under libertarian communism it will be possible to use these
resources to create social and economic equality for all, thus finally enabling the disfigurements of racial oppression to be scoured from the face of the earth. However, this article is in no way arguing that the fight
against racism must be deferred until after the revolution. Instead, it is arguing that on the one hand, only a united working class can defeat racism and capitalism; on the other, a united working class can only be
built on the basis of opposing all forms of oppression and prejudice, thereby winning the support of all sectors of the broad working class. Firstly, it is clear that racism can only be fought on a class basis. It is in
the interest of all workers to support the struggle against racism. Racism is a working class issue because it affects the conditions of all workers, because most people affected by racism are working class, and
because, as indicated above, it is the working class members of racially oppressed groups who are the most severely affected by racism. Working class unity is also in the interests of racially oppressed segments of
the working class, as alliances with the broader working class not only strengthen their own position, but also help lay the basis for the assault on capitalism. Without denying in the least the heroism, and, in some
cases, radicalising role played by minority movements, it is quite obvious that a minority of, say, 10 per cent of the population lacks the ability to overthrow the existing conditions on its own[18]. Such unity is
particularly vital in the workplace, where it is almost impossible for unions of minority workers to function. Secondly, working class unity can, however, clearly only be built on the basis of a resolute opposition to
all forms of racism. If other sections of the working class do not oppose racism, they create a situation in which nationalists can tie racially oppressed segments to Black and other minority capitalists in the futile
games of 'Buy Black' campaigns and voting blocs. Class-based and anarchist alternatives must present a viable alternative if they are to win support. Our tasks Anti-racist work should occupy a high priority in the
activities of all class struggle anarchists. This is important not simply because we always oppose all oppression, and because anarchists have long been opponents of racism. It is also because such work is an
essential to the vital task of unifying and conscientising the working class - a unity without which neither racism nor capitalism can be consigned to the history books. At a general level, we can approach these

by continual
propaganda against racism in our publications, workplaces, unions and communities. The workplace and the
tasks by active work in anti-racist struggles and campaigns, including work alongside non-anarchist forces (without, of course, surrendering our political independence), and

union are particularly important sites for activity: it is here that capitalism creates the greatest pressure for workers' unity across all barriers, and it is here that the workers' movement stands or falls on the basis of

We can approach these tasks by raising, on the one hand, demands

that apply equally to all workers (better wages, full union rights, opposition to social partnership
etc.), and by raising, on the other, demands which specifically address the needs of racially
oppressed segments of the working class (equal schooling, equal housing, no to colour bars in
industry etc.). Thus, we should fight for "Better Housing for All! No to Segregation!", to take one example. The target of such demands would, of course, be the bosses, although in no case
whatsoever should the tiniest concession be made to racial prejudices on the part of any workers. There is no contradiction between the class
its ability to address the needs of its whole constituency.

struggle and the struggle against racism. Neither can succeed without the other .

The perm is the only way to solvethe potential unity necessary to

fight cap is grounded in fighting race today, just focusing on cap cant
do the trick
Taylor 11 PhD Program in African American Studies, Northwestern University (Keeanga-Yamahtta, socialistworker.com,
Race, class and Marxism, January 4, 2011, http://socialistworker.org/2011/01/04/race-class-and-marxism //SRSL)

Capitalism is dependant on racism as both a source

of profiteering, but more importantly as a means to divide and rule. Racism is necessary to drive
a wedge between workers who otherwise have everything in common and every reason to ally
and organize together, but who are perpetually driven apart to the benefit of the ruling clas s. Thus,
any serious discussion about Black liberation has to take up not only a critique of
FOR REVOLUTIONARY Marxists, there is an inextricable link between racism and capitalism.

capitalism, but also a credible strategy for ending it. For Marxists, that strategy hinges on the
revolutionary potential of a unified, multiracial and multi-ethnic working-class upheaval against
capitalism. Marxists believe that the potential for that kind of unity is dependant on battles and
struggles against racism today. Without a commitment by revolutionary organizations in the here and now to the fight
against racism, working-class unity will never be achieved and the revolutionary potential of the working class will never be realized. Yet

despite all the evidence of this commitment to fighting racism over many decades, Marxism has been maligned as, at best, "blind" to combating racism and, at worst, "incapable" of it. For example, in an article
published last summer, popular commentator and self-described "anti-racist" Tim Wise summarized the critique of "left activists" that he later defines as Marxists. He writes: [L]eft activists often marginalize
people of color by operating from a framework of extreme class reductionism, which holds that the "real" issue is class, not race, that "the only color that matters is green," and that issues like racism are mere
"identity politics," which should take a backseat to promoting class-based universalism and programs to help working people. This reductionism, by ignoring the way that even middle class and affluent people of
color face racism and color-based discrimination (and by presuming that low-income folks of color and low-income whites are equally oppressed, despite a wealth of evidence to the contrary) reinforces white
denial, privileges white perspectivism and dismisses the lived reality of people of color. Even more, as we'll see, it ignores perhaps the most important political lesson regarding the interplay of race and class:
namely, that the biggest reason why there is so little working-class consciousness and unity in the Untied States (and thus, why class-based programs to uplift all in need are so much weaker here than in the rest of
the industrialized world), is precisely because of racism and the way that white racism has been deliberately inculcated among white working folks. Only by confronting that directly (rather than sidestepping it as
class reductionists seek to do) can we ever hope to build cross-racial, class based coalitions. In other words, for the policies favored by the class reductionist to work--be they social democrats or Marxists--or even

Marxists allegedly think

that class is more important than race; reducing struggles against racism to "mere identity
politics"; and requiring that struggles against racism should "take a back seat" to struggles over
economic issues. Wise also accuses so-called "left activists" of reinforcing "white denial" and
"dismiss[ing] the lived reality of people of color"--which, of course, presumes Left activists and
Marxists to all be white.
to come into being, racism and white supremacy must be challenged directly. Here, Wise accuses Marxism of: "extreme class reductionism," meaning that

Perm solves bestneither movement should be subsumed by the

other

West 93 [Abanes Cornel West, University Professor at Princeton University, M.A. and Ph.D in Philosophy, Princeton
University, graduated Magna Cum Laude in philosophy from Harvard, Prophetic Fragments, Towards a Socialist Theory of Racism
p. 97-?, Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 1993, http://books.google.com/books?id=2bw-drt5sigC&source=gbs_navlinks_s]
Socialism and Antiracism: Two Inseparable Yet Not Identical Goals It should be apparent that racist

practices directed against black, brown, yellow, and red people are an integral element of U. S. history,
including present day American culture and society. This means not simply that Americans have
inherited racist attitudes and prejudices, but, more importantly, that institutional forms of
racism are embedded in American society in both visible and invisible ways. These institutional forms

exist not only in remnants of de jure job, housing, and educational discrimination and political gerrymandering. They also manifest
themselves in a de facto labor market segmentation, produced by the exclusion of large numbers of peoples of color from the
socioeconomic mainstream. (This exclusion results from limited educational opportunities, devastated families, a disproportionate
presence in the prison population, and widespread police brutality.) It also should be evident that past Marxist

conceptions of racism have often prevented U. S. socialist movements from engaging in

antiracist activity in a serious and consistent manner. In addition, black suspicion of whitedominated political movements (no matter how progressive) as well as the distance between these
movements and the daily experiences of peoples of color have made it even more difficult to
fight racism effectively. Furthermore, the disproportionate white middle-class composition of contemporary democratic

socialist organizations creates cultural barriers to the participation by peoples of color. Yet this very participation is a vital
precondition for greater white sensitivity to antiracist struggle and to white acknowledgment of just how crucial antiracist struggle is
to the U. S. socialist movement. Progressive organizations often find themselves going around in a vicious circle. Even when they
have a great interest in antiracist struggle, they are unable to attract a critical mass of people of color because of their current
predominately white racial and cultural composition. These organizations are then stereotyped as lily white, and significant numbers
of people of color refuse to join. The only effective way the contemporary democratic socialist movement

can break out of this circle (and it is possible because the bulk of democratic socialists are among the least racist of
Americans) is to be sensitized to the critical importance of antiracist struggles. This "conscientization"

cannot take place either by reinforcing agonized white consciences by means of guilt, nor by presenting another grand theoretical
analysis with no practical implications. The former breeds psychological paralysis among white

progressives, which is unproductive for all of us; the latter yields important discussions but
often at the expense of concrete political engagement. Rather what is needed is more widespread
participation by predominantly white democratic socialist organizations in antiracist struggles

whether those struggles be for the political, economic, and cultural empowerment of Latinos, blacks, Asians, and Native Americans
or antiimperialist struggles against U.S. support for oppressive regimes in South Africa, Chile, the Philippines, and the occupied
West Bank. A major focus on antiracist coalition work will not only lead democratic socialists to act

upon their belief in genuine individuality and radical democracy for people around the world; it
also will put socialists in daily contact with peoples of color in common struggle. Bonds of trust
can be created only within concrete contexts of struggle. This interracial interaction guarantees neither love nor
friendship. Yet it can yield more understanding and the realization of two overlapping goals:
democratic socialism and antiracism. While engaging in antiracist struggles, democratic socialists can also enter into a
dialogue on the power relationships and misconceptions that often emerge in multiracial movements for social justice in a racist
society. Honest and trusting coalition work can help socialists unlearn Eurocentrism in a self-critical manner and can also demystify
the motivations of white progressives in the movement for social justice. We must frankly acknowledge that a

democratic socialist society will not necessarily eradicate racism. Yet a democratic socialist
society is the best hope for alleviating and minimizing racism, particularly institutional forms of
racism. This conclusion depends on a candid evaluation that guards against utopian self-deception. But it also
acknowledges the deep moral commitment on the part of democratic socialists of all races to the
dignity of all individuals and peoples, a commitment that impels us to fight for a more
libertarian and egalitarian society. Therefore concrete antiracist struggle is both an ethical
imperative and political necessity for democratic socialists. It is even more urgent as once again racist policies
and Third World intervention become more acceptable to many Americans. A more effective democratic socialist
movement engaged in antiracist and anti-imperialist struggle can help turn the tide. It depends on

how well we understand the past and present, how courageously we act, and how true we remain to our democratic socialist ideals of
freedom, equality, and democracy.

Permutation apply our methodology of questioning identity to issues

of classism.
The methodology perm is the combination of identity politics and
Marxism necessary to trigger a socialist revolution.
Rectenwald 13 (Michael, Editor at the North Star Magazine a magazine dedicated to
examining radical politics, from social democracy to anarchy Whats Wrong With Identity
Politics (and Intersectionality Theory)? A Response to Mark Fishers Exiting the Vampire
Castle (And Its Critics) http://www.thenorthstar.info/?p=11411 December 2, 2013 accessed
7/13/14 .nt)
Therefore, Marxists disgusted with identity politics should take the lessons of their
critique back to the heart of Marxism itself. They really should examine their own
house first. I refer here to the kind of policing of the category of working class
that marked the Old Left and that, with exceptions, continues to mark Marxist
politics at present. Are students working class? Are graduate teaching assistants
workers? Are academic Marxists workers or even real Marxists? Can a petit bourgeois
intellectual really understand the working class? These questions reflect the identity politics that
subsists in many Marxist milieus. The extirpation of such identity policing within
Marxism itself is much more important politically than the battle with the
identitarian left. As Ross Wolfe writes, It shouldnt matter who people supposedly are. All
that should matter is the kind of transformation they hope to effect in the world.

The perm solvesmixing Marxist race theory with the aff is the only
way to get results
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 37, 2009//SRSL)

When CRT was originally envisioned, it was to be an intersection of 'racial theory'

and activism against racism. However, a number of CRT theorists today are frustrated at
the turn CRT has made from activism to academic discourse, and this has led to a
reappraisal of the significance of social class. As we saw in chapter 1 of this volume, Delgado (2003) has
put forward a materialist critique of the discourse-focused trend of recent CRT
writings which focus more on text and symbol and less on the economic
determinants of Latino/a and black racial fortunes . Delgado's paper was the subject of a symposium in 2005, run by
The Michigan Journal of Race and Law, enti- tled, Going Back to Class: The Re-emergence ofClass in Critical Race Theory. Somewhat surprisingly, given Mills' published

Mills said he favored the combination ofMarxism

and CRT, which forms a kind of'racial capitalism.'15 He said he agreed with Delgado on the belief, central to
CRT, that class structure keeps racial hierarchy intact. The working class is divided
by 'race', Mills said, to the advantage of the upper class, which is mainly composed of
white elites (Hare, 2006), a position very familiar to Marxist analysts. At the same
symposium, Angela Harris said CRT is essential in exposing how interconnected
class, 'race' and sex can be: 'We need to pay attention to the intersections and
understand how complicated these issues are,' (cited in Hare 2006). As an
example, she referenced the affirmative action disputes in higher education. The oftencomments on Marxism above (see also Pateman and Mills, 2007),

cited argument that working-class whites are being rejected in favor of middle-class blacks and Latinos-who, the argu- ment goes have a better chance of acceptance regardless

'What CRT exposes is that class also needs to be

looked at in terms of access to wealth and the racializa- tion of class' (cited in ibid.). As for
the future of CRT, Delgado envisions a new movement of CRT theorists to
of 'race'-is looking at class based solely on income (cited in ibid.).

recombine discourse and political activism. 'I'm worried that the younger crop of
CRT theorists are enamored by the easy arm-chair task of writing about race the
word and not race in the world', Delgado concluded. 'A new movement is needed'. For Marxists, these are promising develop- ments and

point towards a possible alignment between CRT and Marxism. However, any future alignment would need to have at its core a structural analysis ofcapitalism and capitalist
social relations, combined with a critique thereof (I return to this in the Conclusion to this volume). I now turn to a consideration of racism and Marxism before relating racism
to the Marxist concept of racialization.

The permutation does existbest way to solve

Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 39-41, 2009//SRSL)

Contemporary racism, both in its ideological forms and material practices, might
best be thought of as a matrix of biological and cultural racism. I would argue that, in that
matrix, racism can be based on genetics (as in notions ofwhite people having higher IQs than black people: see Herrnstein & Murray, 199418; and
more recently Frank Ellis (Gair, 2006)19 or on culture it (as in contemporary manifestations of Islamophobia). Sometimes, however, it is not easily
identifiable as either (e.g., 'Britain for the British'), or is a com- bination of both. A good example of the latter is when Margaret
Thatcher, at the time of the Falklands/Malvinas war, referred to the people of that island as 'an island race'
whose 'way oflife is British' (Short and Carrington, 1996, p. 66). Here we have a conflation of notions of
'an island race' (like the British 'race' who, Mrs. Thatcher believes, built an empire and ruled a quarter of the world through its sterling qualities; (Thatcher, 1982, cited in Miles, 1993, p.
75)) and, in addition, a 'race', which is culturally, like 'us': 'their way oflife is British'.
There are also forms of racism which are quite unintentional, which
demonstrates that you do not have to be a racist (i.e., have allegiance to far-Right ideologies) to be racist, or to
be implicated in generating racism consequences. Thus when somebody starts a
sentence with the phrase 'I'm not racist but ... ', the undertone means that the next
utterance will always be racist. The use by some people in the United Kingdom, out ofignorance, of the term 'Pakistani' to refer to everyone whose mode of dress or
accent, for example, signifies that they might be ofAsian origin is another example of unintentional racism . The use ofthe nomenclature 'Paki', on
the other hand, I would suggest, is generally used in an intentionally racist way
because of the generally known negative connotations attached to the word in the
United Kingdom. Racism, as practices, can also be overt, as in racist name-calling
in schools, or it can be covert, as in racist mutterings in school corridors. For Miles (1989, p. 79),

racism relates to social collectivities identified as 'races' being 'attributed with negatively evaluated characteristics and/or represented as inducing negative consequences for any other'. Here I would also want to
inflate Miles' definition to include, following Smina Akhtar, 'seemingly positive attributes'. However, ascribing such attributes to an 'eth- nic group' will probably ultimately have racist implications, for example the
subtext of describing a particular group as having a strong culture might be that 'they are swamping our culture'. This form of racism is often directed at people of South Asian origin who are assumed to have
close-knit fami- lies and to be hard working, and therefore in a position to 'take over' our neighborhoods. 20 In addition, attributing something seemingly positive-'they are good at sport'-might have implications

People ofAfrican-Caribbean origin, in racist discourse, are thought

to have 'no culture' or a different culture, and to thus also pose a threat to 'us'. In
education this is something that facilitates the underachievement ofworking class
African-Caribbean boys who are thought to be (by some teachers) less academically able, and
'problems'. Stereotypes and stratifications of ethnic groups are invariably
problematic and, at least potentially, racist. Racism can be dominative (in the
form of direct and oppressive state pol- icy) as in the apartheid era in South Africa
or slavery in the United States, or it can be aversive, where people are segregated,
excluded or cold-shouldered on grounds of racism (Kovel, 1988), or where they are
routinely treated less favorably in day-to-day interactions. In certain situations, racism may well becoi:ne apparent given
that 'they are not good' at other things.

specific stimuli. For example, racism in the media, as in the above examples of anti-gypsy/Roma/Traveller racism and Islamophobia, can actually generate racism. Similarly, racist sentiments from a number of
peers who might be collectively present at a given moment can facilitate racist responses. Racist chants and other racist reactions at soccer matches are an obvious example. Elsewhere (Cole, 2008d, pp. 117-119),

I have advocated a definition of racism which includes cultural as well as biological

racism, intentional as well as unintentional racism; 'seemingly positive' attributes
with probably ulti- mately racist implications as well as obvious negative racism;
dominative racism (direct and oppressive) as opposed to aversive racism
(exclusion and cold-shouldering) (cf. Kovel, 1988) and overt as well as covert
racism. Finally, and crucially in the context of this chapter, racism can be noncolor-coded. All of these forms of racism can be individual or personal, and they
can be brought on, given certain stimuli. These various forms of racism can also
take institutional forms (see chapter 5 of this volume for a discussion of institutional racism), and there can, of course, be permutations among them. I would argue, therefore,
that, in order to encompass the multifaceted nature of contemporary racism, it is important to adopt a broad concept and defi- nition of racism, rather than a narrow one, based, as it was in the days of the British

Empire, or pre-civil rights United States, for example, on notions of overt biological inferiority, even though there may also have been implica- tions ofcultural inferiority. I believe that the above conception and
definition ofracism both theoretically and practically better depicts racism in contempo- rary Britain (and elsewhere) than CRT notions of 'white supremacy'. From a Marxist perspective, in order to understand

I now turn to the Marxist concept of

racialization which makes the connection between racism and capitalist modes of
production and thus is able to relate to these factors, namely the real material
contexts of struggle. While the extraction of surplus value defines the whole
capitalist process (see the appendix to chapter 8 of this volume), permutations ofthese factors vary greatly,
and combat racism, however, we must relate it to historical, economic and political factors.

and it is for this rea- son that the definition of racism has to be wide-ranging.

Modes of production and racialization are inherently linkedmeans

cap and race must be solved together in order to be successful
Cole 9 Research Professor in Education and Equality, Head of Research and Director of the Centre for Education for Social

Justice at Bishop Grosseteste University College Lincoln, UK (Mike, Critical Race Theory and Education A Marxist Response,
chapter 2, pgs 42-43, 2009//SRSL)

links between modes of production and racialization in the United Kingdom at length
elsewhere (e.g., Cole, 2004a, 2004b). For example, in Cole, 2004a, p. 39, noting that racialization is historically
and geographically specific, I argued that, in the British colonial era, implicit in the
rhetoric of imperialism was a racialized concept of 'nation'. British cap- italism
had to be to regenerated in the context of competition from other countries, and
amid fears that sparsely settled British colonies might be overrun by other
European 'races' (ibid.). As I put it, while the biologi- cal 'inferiority' ofBritain's imperial
subjects was perceived second-hand, the indigenous racism of the period was
anti-Irish and anti-Semitic (e.g., Kirk, 1985; Miles, 1982). From the 1880s, there was a sizeable immigration of destitute Jewish people from the
I have developed the

Russian pogroms, and this fuelled the pre- occupation of politicians and commentators about the health of the nation, the fear ofthe degeneration of'the race', and the
subsequent threat to impe- rial and economic hegemony (Holmes, 1979; Thane, 1982). Intentional and overt institutional racism was rampant in all the major institutions
ofsociety: in the Government, the TUC and, of course, at the heart of capitalism itself (Cole, 2004a, p. 40). Moreover, racialization ensured that the institutional- ized
racism promulgated by the ruling class filtered down to the school and became part of popular culture. This was also most marked in the actual curriculum (for an analysis, see
Cole and Blair, 2006, pp. 73-75; see also Cole, 1992b, pp. 71-80). As I argued (Cole, 2004a, pp. 42-43), the Empire came home to roost after World War 2. The demands of an
expanding post-war economy meant that Britain, like most other European countries, was faced with a major shortage oflabor (Castles and Kosack, 1985). The overwhelming
majority of migrants who came to Britain were from the Republic of Ireland, the Indian subcontinent and the Caribbean (Miles, 1989). Those industries where the demand for

Despite the
heterogeneous class structure of the migrating populations (see Heath and Ridge, 1983), migrant
workers came to occupy, overwhelmingly, the semi-skilled and unskilled positions
in the English labor market (Daniel, 1968: Smith, 1977). Furthermore, as I noted (Cole, 2004a, p. 42), they found
themselves disproportionately concentrated in certain types ofmanual work
characterized by a shortage oflabor, shift working, unsocial hours, low pay and an
unpleasant working environment (Smith, 1977). The conse- quences of this process ofracialization were clear. According to Miles (1982, p.
labor was greatest actively recruited Asian, black and other minor- ity ethnic workers in their home countries (Fryer, 1984; Ramdin, 1987).

165), these different racialized groups came to: occupy a structurally distinct position in the economic, political and ideolog- ical relations of British capitalism, but within the
boundary of the working class. They therefore constitute a fraction ofthe working class, one that can be identified as a racialised fraction . When the children of these migrant
workers entered the education system, there were different kinds of representation for different minority ethnic group students (Cole, 2004a, pp. 43-47). While black children
were seen as being disruptive and violent (corresponding to the previous racialization of their forebears in the African and Caribbean colonies), those ofAsian back- ground
(namely Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi) were both seen as an academic (and social) threat to white children (see Hiro, 1971), or religious 'aliens' whose 'specific needs' posed
a threat to the autonomy of schools (Blair, 1994)-a form ofcultural racism. Asian students were also presented in seemingly benign terms as passive and studious and not

This notion of the 'passive Asian'

student was juxtaposed against the 'aggressive' student of Caribbean origin and
became, as Sally Tomlinson (1984) declared, 'a stick to beat the West Indian pupil
with'. Racist inequali- ties in the current UK education system are discussed briefly in chapter 5 of this volume; see also Gillborn, 2008, Chapter 3 for a thorough
presenting a dis- ciplinary problem for teachers-a seemingly positive attribute (Cole, 2004a, p. 45).

discussion of these inequalities written from a CRT perspective.

***Misc***

Cap Link Disease

The Exploration for Cures of Diseases is a Mask for Pharmaceutical
Profits
Rath 03
(Dr. Rath After graduating from medical school he worked as a physician and researcher at the
University Clinic of Hamburg, Germany and the German Heart Center in Berlin. His research
focused on the causes of arteriosclerosis and cardiovascular disease. http://www4.dr-rathfoundation.org/THE_FOUNDATION/About_Dr_Matthias_Rath/why_book.html )

The purpose and driving force of the pharmaceutical industry is to increase sales
of pharmaceutical drugs for ongoing diseases and to find new diseases to market
existing drugs.By this very nature, the pharmaceutical industry has no interest in
curing diseases. The eradication of any disease inevitably destroys a multi-billion
dollar market of prescription drugs. Therefore, pharmaceutical drugs are primarily
developed to relieve symptoms, but not to cure.If eradication therapies for diseases are
discovered and developed, the industry has a basic interest to suppress, discredit and obstruct
these medical breakthroughs in order to make sure that diseases continue as the very basis for a
lucrative prescription drug market.The economic interest of the pharmaceutical
industry is the main reason why no medical breakthrough has been made for the
control of the most common diseases such as cardiovascular disease, high blood
pressure, heart failure, diabetes, cancer, and osteoporosis, and why these diseases
continue like epidemics on a worldwide scale.For the same economic reasons, the
pharmaceutical industry has now formed an international cartel by the code name "Codex
Alimentarius" with the aim to outlaw any health information in connection with vitamins and to
limit free access to natural therapies on a worldwide scale.At the same time, the pharmaceutical
companies withhold public information about the effects and risks of prescription drugs and
life-threatening side effects are omitted or openly denied. In order to assure the status quo
of this deceptive scheme, a legion of pharmaceutical lobbyists is employed to
influence legislation, control regulatory agencies (e.g., FDA), and manipulate
medical research and education. Expensive advertising campaigns and PR agencies are
used to deceive the public.Millions of people and patients around the world are
defrauded twice: A major portion of their income is used to finance the exploding
profits of the pharmaceutical industry. In return, they are offered a medicine that does
not even cure.

The Pharmaceutical Industry is the epitome of capitalism, Seeking

profits over the Safety of the Underprivileged
White 13
(Jackson White works for an organization called the Interhealth: Global Health group, that tries
to promote local health areas in small areas, he is an expert at health efforts in local tropical
communities)
Nowhere is the difference between corporate and public interests more pronounced
or more important than in the sphere of public health. As a universal concern, health
and healthcare has enormous potential for profit, and unsurprisingly the industry responsible
for developing and producing medicines is big business. Collectively known as the
pharmaceutical industry, it is set to rake in $1.1 trillion in world-wide revenue next

year.Unfortunately, profit does not parallel maximisation of health outcomes, and

we see a lopsided investment picture; those who are most desperate for medical
help, the worlds poor, are precisely those who cannot attract private investment
into solving their health problems because there are limited financial incentives to do
so.Mdecins Sans Frontires (MSF), the charity behind the Access campaign which aims to
provide and develop essential medicines for areas of need, notes that only 1% of drugs that
have come onto the market in the last 30 years have been developed for combating
tropical diseases and tuberculosis. This seems absurd when we consider the
enormous impact of these diseases: WHO estimates that the so-called neglected
tropical diseases impair the lives of 1 billion people, while tuberculosis kills
approximately 1.4 million and malaria 660,000 annually.There are attempts to correct
this imbalance in investment and innovation. Notably,OneWorld Health is a not-for-profit
pharmaceutical company founded in 2000 whose aims are the development of drugs for, and
the treatment of, malaria, kala-azar and diarrhoeal diseases, among others. It is currently
undergoing phase 2 trials for a novel anti-diarrhoeal drug. Whether OneWorld provides the
template for an effective solution remains to be seen, and its stability is questionable
considering it relies on donations from philanthropists Melinda and Bill Gates. It is no doubt a
step in the right direction. Another non-profit organisation working towards a similar goal is the
Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative, which has successfully delivered 2 antimalarial
treatments and a treatment against sleeping sickness, among others.The lack of private
investment into treatments for diseases of the developing world is not the only problem that
needs to be addressed. Equally pressing is the question of patents. While they are almost
certainly necessary for investment and innovation, we must question when, where
and for how long they are really necessary for.Currently, patents on novel drugs
last around 18 years, giving the developing pharmaceutical company a stifling
monopoly for an extended period of time. This has a stark impact on availability through
exorbitant pricing. In 2000, first-line antiretrovirals (ARVs) for the treatment of HIV cost
around $10,000 for the treatment of one person for one year. Understandably, organisations
such as MSF found great difficulty in treating the large numbers of HIV sufferers in areas of
great need such as sub-Saharan Africa. Since then the patent has run out, and prices plummeted
with the development of generic medicines; first-line treatment now costs around $100 per
person per year. This is a 99% decrease.It is an absurd reality of the capitalist world that
we have so many dying preventable deaths purely because the costs of treatment
are inflated by patent-produced monopolies. Pleasingly, these monopolies do not always
remain unchallenged. Last year in India the German pharmaceutical company Bayer was forced
to allow a compulsory license for its still under patent liver cancer treatment Nexavar, which is
estimated to bring the price of the drug from over $5500 per month per person down to $175.
This was allowed under the Indian Patents Act, which has a provision allowing a compulsory
license after three years of the grant on drugs that are not available at affordable prices. One
wonders whether this will serve as a warning against such excessive pricing in the
future.Another step forward was taken back in 2001, when the World Trade Organisation, of
which Australia is a member, released the Doha Declaration, announcing that a member
Government can declare a public health emergency and start manufacturing copies of a patented
drug, or take other steps to protect public health. We are not entirely impotent in the face of
health emergencies.Physician and humanitarian Paul Farmer believes that the way forward is to
treat health care as a human right, and making its delivery a prime concern rather than an
afterthought. Whether this compassionate view is welcome or even possible under our current
economic system is a matter up for debate.

Cap Link Satire

The affirmative's "satire" reinforces violent neoliberalismthe desire to maintain
a safe, cynical distance from ideology is a form of vaccinationit makes dominant
cultural messages more acceptable by diminishing the revolutionary potential of
dissent. The 1AC isn't a radical like Che Guevara, its a 29.99 Che Guevara T-shirt
Adam Corner is a research associate in psychology at Cardiff University. 11-21-13 http://aeon.co/magazine/livingtogether/how-advertising-turned-anti-consumerism-into-a-secret-weapon/
In 1796, the English physician Edward Jenner injected an eight-year-old

boy in Gloucestershire with

cowpox. Reasoning that absorbing a small amount of the virus would protect the child from a
full-strength attack of smallpox in the future, Jenners bold experiment founded the practice of
vaccination. Two hundred years later, the marketing industry has cottoned on to Jenners
insight: a little bit of a disease can be a very useful thing. If youre one of the more than 7 million
people who have watched the global fast-food chain Chipotles latest advertisement, youll have
experienced this sleight of hand for yourself. The animated short film accompanied by a smartphone game

depicts a haunting parody of corporate agribusiness: cartoon chickens inflated by robotic antibiotic arms, scarecrow workers
displaced by ruthless automata. Chipotles logo appears only at the very end of the three-minute trailer; it is otherwise branding-free.
The motivation for this big-budget expos? Were trying to educate people about where their food comes

from, Mark Crumpacker, chief marketing officer at Chipotle, told USA Today, but millennials are sceptical of brands that
perpetuate themselves. Never mind that Chipotle itself with more than 1,500 outlets across the US, and an
annual turnover of $278 million is hardly treading lightly on the worlds agricultural system.
The real story is that the company is using a dose of anti-Big Food sentiment to
inoculate the viewer against not buying any more of its burritos . Chipotle are very
happy to sell the idea that theyre on our side if it helps to keep the millennials happy. If its
advertising we dont like, then its advertising we wont get. In the UK, the telecommunications giant Orange creates cinema ads
which are spoof scenes from well-known feature films, doctoring the scripts to include gratuitous references to cell phones. One
popular instalment features the actor Jack Black recreating a scene from Gullivers Travels (2010), in which Gulliver is captured by
the tiny Lilliputians and lashed to the ground with ropes. As the product placements for Orange become increasingly blatant, Black
realises he has been tricked into acting in a cellphone ad, breaks character and begins a speech about how he wont be duped by
Orange. Dont let a mobile phone ruin your film runs the slogan. Its annoying, but they know this. And they

know that you know that they know. And ... well you get the gist. These ads want to be our friends to
empathise with us against the tyranny of the corporate world they inhabit. Just when we thought
wed cottoned on to subliminal advertising, personalised sidebars on web pages, advertorials and infomercials,
products started echoing our contempt for them. Shut up! we shout at the TV, and the TV gets behind the sofa

and shouts along with us. It seems almost quaint, now that popular culture is riddled with knowing, self-referential nods to itself, but
the aim of advertising used to be straightforward: to associate a product in a literal and direct way with positive images of a
desirable, aspirational life. How we chortle at those rosy-cheeked families that dominated commercials in the post-war era.

Nowadays, we adopt the slogans and imagery as ironic home decor wartime advertisements
for coffee adorn our kitchen walls; retro Brylcreem posters are pinned above the bathroom door .

But our reappropriation of artefacts from a previous era of consumerism sends a powerful message: we wouldnt be swayed by such
naked pitches today. The iconic VW 'Think small' campaign. The iconic VW 'Think small' campaign. Genre-subverting ads started to
emerge as early as 1959, when the Volkswagen Beetles US Think Small campaign began poking fun at the German cars size and
idiosyncratic design. In stark contrast to traditional US car adverts, whose brightly coloured depictions of gargantuan front ends left
the viewer in no doubt that bigger was better, the Beetle posters left most of the page blank, a tiny image of the car itself tucked away
in a corner. These designs spoke to a generation that was becoming aware of how the media and advertising industries worked. The
American journalist Vance Packard had blown the whistle on the tricks of the advertising trade in The Hidden Persuaders (1957),
and younger consumers increasingly saw themselves as savvy. Selling to this demographic required not overeager

direct pitches, but insouciant cool, laced with irony. Ads for sports drinks bemoan the
abundance of minutely differentiated sports drinks on the market, and beers yearn for the day
when a beer was just a beer In subsequent decades, self-aware adverts became the norm, and
advertising began to satirise the very concept of itself. In 1996, Sprite launched a successful

campaign with the slogan Image is nothing. Thirst is everything. Obey your thirst. In 2010, Kotex sent up the bizarre conventions of
1980s tampon adverts (happy, dancing women, jars of blue liquid being spilt) by flashing up the question Why are Tampon adverts
so ridiculous? before displaying its latest range of sanitary products. Companies try to convince you that they are part of your
family, says Tim Kasser, professor of psychology and an expert on consumer culture at Knox College in Illinois. They want to create

a sense of connection or even intimacy between the viewer and the advertiser. An

ad that says: Yes, I know you know

that Im an ad, and I know that you know that Im annoying you is a statement of empathy, and
thus a statement of connection. And as any salesperson will tell you, connection is key to the sales. This
technique of cultivating empathy through shared cynicism has taken off over the past
decade. Today, ads for sports drinks bemoan the abundance of minutely differentiated sports drinks on the market, and beers yearn
for the day when a beer was just a beer. The Swedish brewery Kopparberg has done more than any other company to promote the
idea that cider can come in many delicious fruity flavours, so if anyone is to blame for the difficulty in buying plain old apple cider, it
is Kopparberg. Yet their most recent invention is Naked apple cider. As the companys UK managing director Davin Nugent told
The Morning Advertiser: Innovation through fruit is not enough. The bigger picture is apple cider and were opening the back gate
into the category. The apple taste in cider has been lost and become bland were on to something exciting. Corporate

advertising is the ultimate shape-shifter; the perpetual tease. No sooner had the virulently anticapitalist Occupy Wall Street movement begun than the American rapper Jay Zs clothing label
created and marketed an Occupy All Streets spin-off T-shirt. But as citizen cynicism has
advanced, the space in which advertising can operate without tripping on its own rhetoric has
become ever more restricted, and ever more bizarre. Feeling jaded and cynical about samey scripts in ads? Commercials

such as 2012s Old Milwaukee Super Bowl spoof, in which Will Ferrells formulaic endorsement gets cut off mid-sentence, might still
speak to you. Getting a vicarious thrill from viral videos? Ads can mimic that excitement, with carefully coordinated campaigns to
capture the grassroots feel, such as the amateur footage of a man hacking the video screens in Times Square, New York, in fact
promoting the film Limitless (2011). Cynical about the lack of spontaneity in advertising messages? Real-time news-led marketing
can make even the most hackneyed of products seem cutting-edge although American Apparels attempt in October last year to
launch the #SandySale off the back of the worst Hurricane to hit New York in living memory was not the blast they had hoped for.

The ambiguous, semi-disguised adverts of today would appear to be the

commercials we deserve: self-cynical sales pitches for a jaded generation At the same
time, Magazine content, musical and theatrical entertainment and, in particular, online media are
often entirely integrated with the commercial messages that bankrolled them. This probably
wouldnt have been possible if advertisers had not made the strategic move from the blatant
salesmanship of yore to the subtler, more oblique arts of modern industry. As consumers cottoned on to
the tricks of the trade, ads have stayed one step ahead. There have, of course, been attempts to kick back. An entire lexicon
has flourished around the idea of subverting the advertising industry from acts of
brandalism, which distort or undermine corporate iconography, to culture jamming (satirical analyses of the business
world). Adbusters, the long-running Canadian magazine, has dedicated itself to exposing and challenging the the corporate world
generally, not just advertising. But a 2011 report for the Public Interest Research Centre about the

cultural impact of commercial messages argued that: The public debate about advertising such
as it exists has also been curiously unfocused and sporadic. Civil society organisations have
almost always used the products advertised as their point of departure attacking the
advertising of a harmful product like tobacco, or alcohol, for instance rather than developing a
deeper critical appraisal of advertising in the round. So what would a deeper look tell us? Perhaps it
is that the cynical distance inherent in knowing, self-immolating, empathetic
adverts not only perpetuates brands, but is at the foundation of advertising itself.
By factoring in dissent, the ad neutralises it in advance, like the stock market
inoculating itself against future shocks by including their likelihood in share
prices. The advertising industry anticipates and then absorbs its own opposition, like a
politician cracking jokes at his own expense to disarm a hostile media. And the industrys
seemingly endless capacity to perpetuate itself matters. Marketing is not simply a
mirror of our prevailing aspirations. It systematically promotes and presents a specific cluster of
values that undermine pro-social and pro-environmental attitudes and behaviour. In other words,
the more that were encouraged to obsess about the latest phone upgrade, the less likely we are
to concern ourselves with societys more pressing problems. Thats a reason to want to keep a careful tab on
advertisings elusive and ephemeral forms. Encouragingly, there is some evidence that young people are quietly developing their
own defence mechanisms the click-through rate for online advertising has plummeted from a heady 78 per cent for the worlds
first banner ad in 1994 to a meagre 0.05 per cent for Facebook ads in 2011. The Beetle adverts at the tail end of the 1950s picked up
on the growing media smarts of the post-war generation, and Sprites ironic critique of image-led branding could almost have been
lifted from the arguments of the 1990s anti-globalisation movement. The ambiguous, semi-disguised adverts of

today would then appear to be the commercials we deserve: self-cynical sales pitches for a jaded
generation. Instead of questioning the economic mechanisms that lead to the homogenisation of

town centres, we shop and drink coffee in commercial spaces disguised in the stylishly-frayed
aesthetics of the counter-culture. Satire has long been acknowledged as a paradoxical
crutch [ for a societys existing power structures: we laugh at political jibes, and
that same laughter displaces the desire for change. As such as Chipotle's which
express our concerns about the failings of globalisation in a safe space before packing them away
are surely an equivalent safety valve for any subversive rumblings. We all like to
think that were above the dark art of advertising; that we are immune to its persuasive powers.
But the reality is that, though we might have been immunised, it is not against ads: it is
against dissent.