Race and Racial Domination According to Desmond and Emyrbayer
Matthew Desmond and Mustafa Emirbayer provided their definition of “race”, which is now widely used by scholars. According to their approach, “race is a symbolic category, based on phenotype or ancestry and constructed according to specific social and historical contexts, that is misrecognized as a natural category” (Wilder, 2015, p.47).
Racism is divided into four major types: internalized, interpersonal, structural, and institutional. The first category comprises an individual’s beliefs towards different races, impacted by the culture. Interpersonal type implies relations between individuals in the process of their interaction. Structural racism is prejudicial treatment among institutions and societies. Institutional type occurs within organizations, including discriminatory policies at schools or workplaces.
A famous writer James Baldwin stated that the USA has no legal code for black people (Kaufman, 2020). According to his opinion, which is proven today by many examples including the attitude of the authorities, people of color are treated as if they are worthless and not destined to achieve success.
Popular Fallacies Surrounding Racism and Racial Domination
Racism is considered to be widespread in the USA; however, many Americans misunderstand this notion. It leads to the development of five major fallacies, which are better to avoid (Fallacies about Racism, 2019). The first misbelief is individualistic, implying that racism is based on ideas and prejudices of a certain individual about representatives of other nations. The second conception is legalistic, meaning that accepting laws against racism does not guarantee the absence of racial discrimination in real practice.
The third fallacy is tokenistic, assuming that employing people of color means the end of racial problems as thousands of African-American people continue to experience deprivations. The fourth idea is ahistorical, considering the country’s history not important, leaving people with no opportunities for learning from such facts as legacies of slavery, racist propaganda, and others. The last fallacy is fixed, implying racism is not developing with time, although, the followers of this approach admit that in many aspects, such as racial violence, the situation becomes better.
The Role of Civil Society and Social Movements in Social Change. The Black Lives Matter Movement
Civil society and social movements have many opportunities for promoting changes, including defense of collective interests, impact on decision making, and fight against prejudice. These groups can give rise to alterations by forming organizations which represent interests of the community, and conducting research to attract attention to certain problems.
A bright example of a social movement is Black Lives Matter (BLM), which advocates for non-violent protests against cases of violence against black people. This movement appeared in July 2013 with the use of the hashtag “#BlackLivesMatter” on social media, having distinguished itself from the old establishment, claiming to be aimed at dialogue with political leaders.
Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor (2016), the author of the book From #Blacklivesmatter to Black Liberation argues that it is an efficient tool against police violence, with opportunities for a more serious impact on black liberation. With time, the significance of the movement has been rapidly changing. Thus, in 2018, the attitude to this organization was negative, while in 2019, it became popular.
Similarities and Differences of Modern Policies with the Fascism of 1930s and 40s
After the defeat of fascism, a new approach, which received the name of modern democratic populism, appeared. It became an attempt of combining the experience of the 1930s and 40s, following a democratic path with authoritarian methods of influence. These approaches are united by such factors as restriction of political rights and participation of citizens.
According to Enzo Traverso, “populism is a transversal category which displays the porous frontier that exists between the right and the extreme right” (Finchelstein, 2014, p. 474). However, there are differences between the classical form of fascism and the modern approach, as the first one is targeted at dictatorship, while the new attitude does not destroy democracy. Modern populism tends to restrict political rights, providing more opportunities for social inclusion.
Thus, this approach, deeply rooted in fascism, is a modern understanding of the politics with unstable ideas about leadership and the organization of the society, representing a combination of extreme nationalism and non-Marxist traditions.
Aaron Bastani’s Argument about Fully Automated Luxury Communism
In 2019, Aaron Bastani published a book Fully Automated Luxury Communism: A Manifesto, stating that widespread prosperity can be created with the help of technology. The author suggests this model is characterized by the absence of scarcity, as opposed to capitalism, based on the concept of deficit (Featherstone, 2020).
The writer pictures a world in which society guarantees its members a high status with the prospect of traveling, and time for friends, family, and hobbies. This approach is a technological utopia, where robots make all the work, and humans enjoy life. However, it is unclear if such a situation will result in further destruction of nature, or will give rise to its revival. In my opinion, the idea seems utopic and hardly possible to achieve, as the results are unpredictable. Moreover, the author creates many doubts by refusing to admit proven economic and historical facts, such as capitalism, which helped billions of people forget about poverty.
European and American Orientalism
Orientalism implies a tradition of portraying Islam and Arabs as corrupted against the West, regarded as rational and progressive. This approach was widespread in Europe during the post-colonial era, and in the 20th century, it was adopted by the USA. European and American scholars choose facts about the East from past experiences and display them to the public as relevant for their time. This process of selective borrowing continues even today with the only difference that Islam was replaced by Muslim societies, and the study of its classical texts became focused on the social science research agenda instead (Nyang, et al., n.d.).
One of the brightest examples of Orientalism in modern Western society is the famous Disney movie Aladdin, which was strongly criticized for its wrong portrayal of the Arab world. The creators even had to make changes in the opening theme song, as it was considered to give a false idea of the East.
Jane Jacobs’s Views on the Importance of Neighborhood Preservation
Jane Jacobs was an American-Canadian journalist and activist who made a serious impact on urban studies. In her works, she argued that renewal did not take into consideration the real needs of citizens. Jacobs introduced the terms “social capital”, “mixed primary uses”, and “eyes on the street”, which were adopted in urban design, and other spheres (Jacobs, 1961). The author said that “Americans are poor at handling city neighborhoods”, preferring to create “self-contained areas reminiscent of “repetitious towns” (Mitchelle-Dix, 2015, para. 1).
She argued that city neighborhoods should be aligned with small-town life and groups of peoples living there, making the streets “a lively, spontaneous system of threads woven throughout the district” (Mitchelle-Dix, 2015, para. 2). It should also include other public places, such as parks or libraries. In addition, the writer stated that relationships are crucial for people, and they need opportunities for maintaining them inside and outside the neighborhood.
The Environmental Consequences of Urbanization According to William Rees and Mathis Wackernagel
The Ecological Footprint is an approach developed by William Rees and Mathis Wackernagel, representing a tool for tracking the population’s demands regarding the availability of ecological resources. The method suggests considering three important factors: a revelation of Earth’s ecological limits, estimation of risks of unlimited consumption, and facilitation of the natural resources preservation for people’s needs. According to the research, “no city or urban region can achieve sustainability on its own” (Rees & Wackernagel, 1996, p. 236).
The authors state that in big cities there is a great load, which leads to more intense use of the existing resources because the population becomes more urbanized. According to this view, such big cities as New York need to adopt policies, encouraging people to invest in promoting their local manufacturers and use their forests, lands, and fisheries. This approach would increase the independence of the region, which would allow coping with growing international demand and decrease in productivity of other areas.
The “Coloniality of Migration” and “Refugee Crisis”
The coloniality of migration addresses the connections between labor, capitalism, and racism. This notion implies that part of the people have privileges because of their citizenship, while migrants are banned. The beginning of the “refugee crisis” is traced back to the autumn of 2015 when nationalists blamed the German government “for allowing European societies to be “over-run” by Muslim refugees from “archaic” societies” (Rodriguez, 2018).
In the summer of 2015, the number of people coming to Europe became extremely high, and the media began discussing it, calling it a violation of the social order. The origin of this “refuge crisis” is associated with a specific attitude of European communities to racism. Its combination with migration marked the rise of new policies in many areas, including the United States. The situation was solved by the decision to provide job positions to all the migrants, whereas until the middle of the 20th century these countries recruited only white Europeans.
References
Fallacies about racism (2019). Rachel’s Musings. Web.
Featherstone, M. (2020). Review: Aaron Bastani, “Fully automated luxury communism: A manifesto”. Theory, Culture & Society. Web.
Finchelstein, F. (2014). Returning populism to history. Constellations, 21(4), 467-482. Web.
Jacobs, J. (1961). The death and life of great American cities. Random House
Kaufman, L. (2020). James Baldwin: The price of the ticket. 6 James Baldwin quotes about race. American Masters. Web.
Mitchelle-Dix, S. (2015). Jane Jacobs “The uses of city neighborhoods”. Samantha Mitchell-Dix. Web.
Nyang, S.S., Ahmad M. & Bukhari, Z.H. (n.d.). The state of Islamic studies in American Universities. The International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT). Web.
Rees, W. & Wackernagel, M. (1996). Urban ecological footprints: Why cities cannot be sustainable – and why they are a key to sustainability. Elsevier Science Inc., 223-248. Web.
Rodriguez, E.G. (2018). The coloniality of migration and the “refugee crisis”: On the asylum-migration nexus, the Transatlantic white European settler colonialism-migration and racial capitalism. Refuge, 34(1), 16-28.
Taylor, K.Y. (2016). From #Blacklivesmatter to black liberation. Haymarket Books.
Wilder, J. (2015). Color stories: black women and colorism in the 21st century. ABC-CLIO.