The Structure of Racism in Color-Blind, “Post-Racial” America

Abstract

In this article, I describe the racial order of America in the post–Civil Rights era. First, I discuss what racism is all about and emphasize the centrality of conceiving the phenomenon in a structural way. Second, I argue that the “new racism,” or the set of mostly subtle, institutional, and seemingly nonracial mechanisms and practices that comprise the racial regime of “post-racial” America, has all but replaced the old Jim Crow order. Third, I describe the racial ideology of color-blind racism and its component parts (i.e., frames, style, and racial stories) and contend that, like the racial order, this new ideology is slippery and has a “beyond race” character. Fourth, I explain that the Obama moment is part of the new racism, color-blind period and justify my claim empirically. I conclude this essay pondering if people of color will wake up and realize that the new, more “civil” way of maintaining and justifying racial things is a more formidable way of maintaining racial domination.