Reproducing Racism

Argues that racial inequality reproduces itself automatically over time because early unfair advantage for whites has paved the way for continuing advantage

This book is designed to change the way we think about racial inequality. Long after the passage of civil rights laws, blacks and Latinos possess barely a nickel of wealth for every dollar that whites have. Why have we made so little progress?

Legal scholar Daria Roithmayr provocatively argues that racial inequality lives on because white advantage functions as a powerful self-reinforcing monopoly, reproducing itself automatically from generation to generation even in the absence of intentional discrimination. Drawing on work in antitrust law and a range of other disciplines, Roithmayr brilliantly compares the dynamics of white advantage to the unfair tactics of giants like AT&T and Microsoft.

With penetrating insight, Roithmayr locates the engine of white monopoly in positive feedback loops that connect the dramatic disparity of Jim Crow to modern racial gaps in jobs, housing and education. Wealthy white neighborhoods fund public schools that then turn out wealthy white neighbors. Whites with lucrative jobs informally refer their friends, who refer their friends, and so on. Roithmayr concludes that racial inequality might now be locked in place, unless policymakers immediately take drastic steps to dismantle this oppressive system.

Autorentext

Daria Roithmayr

Inhalt

Acknowledgments Introduction 1. The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same Some (Incomplete and Unsatisfying) Explanations for Persistent Inequality 2. Cheating at the Starting Line How White Racial Cartels Gained an Early Unfair Advantage during Jim Crow 3. Racial Cartels in Action An In-Depth Look at Historical Racial Cartels in Housing and Politics 4. Oh Dad, Poor DadHow Whites' Early Unfair Advantage in Wealth Became Self-Reinforcing over Time 5. It's How You Play the Game How Whites Created Institutional Rules That Favored Them over Time 6. Not What You Know, but Who You Know How Social Networks Reproduce Early Advantage 7. Please Won't You Be My Neighbor?How Neighborhood Effects Reproduce Racial Segregation 8. Locked In How White Advantage May Now Have Become Hard-Wired into the System 9. Reframing Race How the Lock-In Model Helps Us to Think in New Ways about Racial Inequality 10. Unlocking Lock-In Some General Observations (and One or Two Suggestions) on Dismantling Lock-In Conclusion Notes Index About the Author