SOCIAL THEORY & AFRICAN-AMER. EXPERIENCE.   Term Paper ID:26275 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Examines theories on social structure & reform (Rousseau, Mill, Marx) related to two books on racial inequities in U.S.... More...

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Paper Abstract: Examines theories on social structure & reform (Rousseau, Mill, Marx) related to two books on racial inequities in U.S. Paper Introduction: This research will examine how major social theorists cast light on the experience of African Americans as described in books on the status of race relations in the U.S., by Andrew Hacker and Stephen and Abigail Thernstrom, respectively. The research will set forth the context for application of social theory to the two books and then discuss how theories of social structure can be employed to illuminate or explain certain assumptions and attitudes that inform each book. It could be argued that there are as many definitions of social structure as there are commentators defining it, and the problem of definition and interpretation of observed conditions of human society (and of critique of such definition and interpretation) reaches back at least as far as Rousseau, who answers such earlier commentators as Aristotle and Hobbes (Rous Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. That isbecause, as Hacker explains (24 ff), there are advantages of being whiteand disadvantages of being black. The research will set forth the context forapplication of social theory to the two books and then discuss how theoriesof social structure can be employed to illuminate or explain certainassumptions and attitudes that inform each book. This explains what Hirschmancharacterizes as the failure of nerve in connection with the motivation tocontinue to produce more surplus. Hirschman, Albert O. These positions do not seem to bereconcilable. Donald A. The Communist Manifesto.Ed. Wealth, property, and the power implied by control over them are byand large concentrated in white-majority hands. Mill's views are a critique of the shape of society and advocatesocial reform. The Thernstroms argue that there is evidence that most blacks and mostwhites are committed to integration, not separatism and that the nation isafter all (or should be) indivisible. In general, Hacker takes the view that African Americans remainoppressed and marginalized by social norms in which white-majority culture,attitudes, and power are the standards against which nonwhites in generaland African Americans in particular are to be measured. (1955). (1997). Power ratios imply social problems. The Basic Political Writings.Trans. Wheeling, Ill.: Harlan Davidson. Thernstrom, Stephan, and Abigail Thernstrom. Thus blacks never get access to equal jobs or even accessto the opportunity to get access. Discourse on the Origin of Inequality.The Basic Political Writings. Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. Hirschman sees a needfor balancing voice, loyalty, and exit in public discourse but also saysthat "optimal" mixture of those elements is elusive (125 et passim). The concern with repairable lapsesamounts to a challenge to the idea that impersonal economic trends can beobserved and analyzed but not altered by the response of institutions orgroups upon which these trends act in negative ways. Mill, John Stuart. In fact, that is the power to which Mill refers.Uncritical acceptance of the found conditions of society developsauthority, so that even if there is an impulse toward social reform bymeans of legislation or transformed social custom, the high level ofcomfort that is associated with things as they are would tend to limit theability to reshape opinion toward reform -- still less toward revolutionalong the Marxist line. New York: Ballantine. Hackerargues that the evidence is on the side of pessimism and race hostilitybecause the divisions are real and more decisive than the progress that hasbeen made and because "no matter what happens [to white people], they cannever become 'black'" (Hacker 244). A key observation about the unequal employment positionof blacks is contained in Hacker's description of why the proportion ofblack representation among auto mechanics has declined in recent years: One answer is that he bulk of car-service work now takes place insuburbs or farther-flung locations, far from where most blacks live. The relevance of these various theories to the situation of AfricanAmericans as described by Hacker and the Thernstroms is that they can helpexplain why Hacker faults what he sees as the race-based structure ofsocial inequity and why the Thernstroms fault criticism of a society thathas in their view accomplished so much in the direction of race-basedequity. . Mere representation of African Americans at workplace or school does notguarantee achievement. Just as the proletariat cannot meet the industrial-capitalismstandard, so African Americans cannot meet the white standard. . . They describe the central strategy of Dr. King asshifting civil rights protest from "persuasion to provocation" (147),though under King the civil rights movement retained tactics associatedwith nonviolence. Conversely, if an African American fails at a job, the failure isconsidered not in individual but in group terms; the failure of one is thefailure of all. Disadvantages thus persist though many blacks have"surmounted the most daunting of obstacles" (Hacker 245). And yet if both they andwhites believe they are, it may well become true" (492). These organizations takeshape and function (or stop functioning) in ways that reflect a response byor to them in the context of unfolding events (voice), or because of theiror their constituents' failure to respond and so decline or disappear(exit). Change,whether in the shape of reform or of disruption, is perceived asthreatening, at least for those who have the benefit of access to surplusgood, or existing power relationships. The Thernstroms argue that increasing identity-group consciousness hasfostered the view among blacks that they are more disadvantaged thananybody and that they have not made social progress, even though AfricanAmericans are not really "a people apart . The two nations in the U.S. andthe illusion of power bestowed upon a group whose members seem to live inconstant fear that their hard-earned status is not quite real -- that theyremain the 'invisible' men and women they once so clearly were" (Thernstromand Thernstrom 498). It could be argued that there are as many definitions of socialstructure as there are commentators defining it, and the problem ofdefinition and interpretation of observed conditions of human society (andof critique of such definition and interpretation) reaches back at least asfar as Rousseau, who answers such earlier commentators as Aristotle andHobbes (Rousseau, Inequality 39, 41, 53, et passim). Samuel H. The problem is that not everyone has assets orsurplus, notably those in the underclass. Hirschman explains this in terms of theperceived benefits of regressive or slack periods, characterized by acertain apathy, which can "contribute to the stability and flexibility of apolitical system and provides for 'reserves' of political resources whichcan be thrown into the battle in crisis situations" (Hirschman 14). Board ofEducation. In the1859 essay On Liberty (The Communist Manifesto appeared in 1848), Millcites "an increasing inclination to stretch unduly the powers of societyover the individual, both by the force of opinion and even by that oflegislation" (Mill 18). The oppressed remain alienated not because, as Marx says,they are doomed forever to be the servants of capital but rather becausethey may be able to derive moral and material benefit out of perceiving thedominant culture as oppressive. (197 ). Meanwhile, housing is seen as the given even though it is the coreinequity. This ambivalence fosters preservation of the status quo. On one hand they have relativeinability to afford housing in certain neighborhoods. This analysis of racial alienation turns the Marxist view upside down. (1987). The status quo, which privilegeswhiteness because it makes white access the standard, is maintained. (1987). This tendency is balanced by "relentlesspretense" that all whites are enemies and racists: "It invites whites whoare nervous about their racial rectitude to remain supplicants . It positions the oppressed group as deriving benefit from the guilt of theoppressor group. Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses toDecline in Firms, Organizations, and States. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 141-227. Rather, they state a paradox in which competing statements,all of which may be true as far as they go, do not point toward resolutionany more than Rousseau=s statement that man is born free only to live inchains can be finally resolved. According to Mill, an exactcontemporary of Marx, the source of social and economic problems is to befound in aspects of societal pressure that have the force of law. On the other, theneighborhoods where they do live will not attract business and thereforewill not offer them employment. are unequalbecause, just as industrial capitalism asks of laborers without capital toraise themselves socially to the level of capital, the empowered whitenation asks of the disempowered black nation "patience and perseverancethat whites have never required of themselves" (Hacker 245). For example, although blacks, like whites, want "a fair chancefor steady employment at decent pay" (Hacker 11 ), the fact is that entireprofessions are de facto closed to blacks and entire professions are defacto reserved for blacks. . Hirschman's analysisfocuses on organizations that are functioning in a society where there is"surplus," or what Marx would call "surplus value," i.e., in industrializedsocieties rather than subsistence societies. On one hand, blacks and whites may attend de factosegregated schools, which is against the spirit of Brown v. There is no doubt that intellectual currents in Western philosophy andeconomics, notably the insights of Enlightenment thinkers such as Rousseau,influenced subsequent analysts. The social force of shared values should not be underestimated. Only the "civil rights lobby"persists in giving voice to the idea that racism has not changed at all:"pessimism has become the public voice of black America" (5 7). If Hacker's view of American racial society is consistent with Marx=stheory, the view of Thernstrom and Thernstrom is specifically opposed toit. Thereason this attitude is important is that the tendency is rather towardpreserving what is known and what one already has than toward sharing orrisking those assets. The social injustice thatthis implies can be interpreted in line with Rousseau's equation betweenthe very existence of private property and the very existence ofinequality. That explanation is meant to make more sense thana "voice" for positive programs of equity and reform. Blacks and whites, workingtogether, have conspired to rob black children of . He cites "man's fundamentallyambivalent attitude toward his ability to produce a surplus: he likessurplus but is fearful of paying its price." While unwilling to give up progress he hankers after the simple rigidconstraints on behavior that governed him when he, like all othercreatures, was totally absorbed by the need to satisfy his most basicdrives (Hirschman 9). A similar argument is developed byHirschman, who says (1) that "economists have paid little attention torepairable lapses of economic actors" (with "actors" referring toinstitutions, individuals, or groups). As society's power strengthens, individual powerdecreases. America in Blackand White: One Nation, Indivisible. Whether blacks challenge thestandard or retreat from it, they can be isolated from benefits attached toengagement with it. The analysis of property as the defining feature of society is also anexplanation of power relationships in society, which perforce entailsconditions of individual and group inequality. Condescending policies masquerading as racially sensitiveones that have made a bad situation worse. Blacks account for 1 .2% of the total Americanlabor force but 3 % of the unemployed force; 3 .7% of nurses' aides andorderlies but only 1.9% of dentists; 21.5% of janitors but 3.1% ofarchitects (116). Thisis consistent with Marx's view that the laborer is so oppressed by thestandard of industrial capitalism that he "sinks deeper and deeper belowthe conditions of existence of his own class" (Manifesto 22). In defining what heterms the social compact, Rousseau posits the ideal framework of a societyorganized according to his Social Contract. They then make the case that after King -- and in thelegislative and political climate of such phenomena as affirmative action,black power, opportunity advocacy, government-mandated antidiscrimination,urban decay and crime, and various "diversity" projects -- the combinationof minority-victim advocacy and ineffectual government programs aimed atimposing structures of equity have prevented African Americans fromreaching de facto social equity. Donald A. Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. Indianapolis: HackettPublishing, 25-81. Hiring blacks at the loading dock is not likely toput them on the management track within a company. Thernstrom and Thernstrom analyze a Nightline presented as a racialdialogue as a program that degenerated into blacks blaming whites andsociety for everything wrong with their lives (493ff). According to Hacker, institutional protocols affect racial experience. access to qualityeducation (Thernstrom and Thernstrom 384-5). New York: Simon andSchuster/Touchstone. That example andmany others in their book are in the background for what amounts to a callfor more loyalty and exit in civil rights discourse and less voice. . Whoever controls propertycontrols social benefits, and those who lack control are identified withsocial powerlessness. Shields. On Liberty. UpperSaddle River, N.J.: Prentice Hall. The Thernstrom analysis of black-white relations in America is thatthe transformation of black society and opportunity in the 2 th century hasbeen accomplished as a fact for all except those who have a vested interestin fostering alienation. What reaches public debate is busing or jobs or education, whichcan be seen as subsidiary issues. A similar problem arises in discussion ofpublic education. Evenmore important for the structure of society is the implication for societyif those shared values are out of line with social justice. If the sharedvalues of society tend to reinforce injustice, then social and legislatedreform will be difficult to accomplish. (1997). Cambridge: Harvard UP. Cress. There is evidence of direct connectionbetween Rousseau's declaration at the beginning of his Social Contract(141) that man is born free but everywhere is in chains, and thedeclaration at the end of the Manifesto that powerless workers of the worldmust unite because they have nothing to lose but their chains (Marx 46).Similarly, Rousseau's statement (Inequality 6 ) "The first person who,having enclosed a plot of land, took it into his head to say this is mineand found people simple enough to believe him, was the true founder ofcivil society," is undoubtedly the Enlightenment ancestor of theManifesto's call for abolition of private property as the fundamentaldelegitimation of civil society as it had evolved by 1848: You are horrified at our intending to do away with private property.But in your existing society, private property is already done away withfor nine-tenths of the population; its existence for the few is solely dueto its nonexistence in the hands of those nine-tenths" (Marx 26). However, Hirschman's real subject is not organizational behavior butsocial organization more generally. Acquiescence of public opinion in what could be calledreceived wisdom is not less powerful because it is not mandatedspecifically by law. Ed. Currin V. . On the Social Contract. Beer. References Hacker, Andrew. Theycite "black anger, white surrender" as the tendency of white liberals toabsorb and accept the accusation, in effect making an what Hirschman wouldcall an "exit" from the debate. Mill sees this power ratio as pernicious because it "is not oneof the evils which tend spontaneously to disappear, but, on the contrary,to grow more and more formidable" (Mill 18). So areal obstacle to workforce equity stems from the difficulties blacks havein finding housing in areas where jobs open up (Hacker 117). Hirschman says that once a preference for"voice" is established, it may be difficult to extricate advocacy from thatmode even though "management" or society "is working hard to make itselfless vulnerable to it" (125). On the other hand, blacks may be an alienated minority atmainly white schools to which they are bused because they do not adapt towhite-minority culture and protocols, or more exactly do not acquiesce inthe value system of the dominant culture, which is assumed to be what Millwould call the "infallible" standard (22). Trans. In Inequality, Rousseau makesa case against a social contract embedded with fundamental inequalities ofexperience within a given society. Hacker says that"affirmative action promotions are temporary expedients that may lapse onceblack representation becomes evident in all sectors of the system@ (Hacker127). ---. Minority-group dissent against the idea that social equity has beenachieved gives what Hirschman would call "voice" to social reform, just ascautioning against the persistence of protest in the face of recognizableprogress and change can be seen as an argument for "loyalty" to theorganization (society) in which equity is evaluated. Meanwhile, those who do havesurplus can explain the absence (or so to speak "exit") of surplus amongthe disadvantaged as a perfectly natural structure of inequity that isbuilt in to the society. (1995). It might also besaid, however, that the Thernstroms are lending authority to the idea ofshared values, to which Mill refers, and complaining that blacks who havenot accepted those values should not expect the material benefits thatsharing those values confers. The socialconstruction is equivalent to Mills discussion of the force of sharedculture, which can be seen as a given, in making injustice seem the norm.It is also consistent with Rousseau's view that social institutions deependivisions and inequalities that are not so likely to be found in a state ofnature (Rousseau 58). In otherwords white-dominated society fosters class warfare in the form of socialalienation -- alienating itself from blacks and blacks from both whites andthemselves. In other words, the employment situation of blacks is connected totheir housing situation in two ways. . Cress. The Thernstroms cite a whole range of social problems that affect andoppress blacks disproportionately: crime, illegitimacy, racial resentment.Their analysis of education illustrates the more general argument. Two Nations: Black and White, Separate,Hostile, Unequal. This research will examine how major social theorists cast light onthe experience of African Americans as described in books on the status ofrace relations in the U.S., by Andrew Hacker and Stephen and AbigailThernstrom, respectively. Theyblame the persistence of the gap in public-school test scores betweenwhites and blacks on: Social disorder coupled with self-esteem strategies and Afrocentricfantasies that entail low academic standards and insufficient attention tocore subjects. The Thernstroms are arguing either that thisis what has happened to civil rights advocacy, even though the reality ofhard-core white racism is "largely a thing of the past" (499), or that itis time for what Hirschman elsewhere refers to as a "slack" period, inwhich dissent is perceived as more destructive than constructive. In Hacker=s view, the black-whitedivision comes about because the disadvantages of being black have beensocially constructed as givens (such as housing/integration) that neverreach discourse. If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.