Politics and Social Change: The Demise of the African-American Ethnic Moment?
Georgia A. Persons
Georgia Institute of Technology
This essay is driven by two sets of interwoven and interrelated concerns regarding both the theory and practice of that which we call black politics. The first set of concerns is best characterized by what one might euphemistically call âthe malaise of black politics.â This euphemism refers to the fact that both the study and practice of black politics in America has reached a state of seeming inertia. There is very little which is new in terms of theory building or engaging analyses on the part of scholars. In analyzing the practice of black politics, scholars are increasingly inclined to speak disparagingly and despairingly of a politics without meaning or strategic logic. We see a persistence and preponderance of studies which describe and analyze the racially tinged dynamics of electoral contests in which blacks figure prominently as candidates or as major voting blocs. Most of these studies are directed toward answering questions about the changing or unchanging tendencies of whites to, with a few exceptions, offer only limited support for black candidates or only limited support for black issues and concerns.
Some studies of electoral dynamics specifically focus on deracialization strategies, defined as the eschewing of issues and tactics that are explicitly designed to mobilize black voter support beyond expressions of racial solidarity based on the symbolism of black candidates in favor of an issue set and campaign tactics designed to appeal to white voters by embracing issues that tend towards neutrality in racial impact and which can be projected as embracing the greater interests of all voters independent of race. Such studies follow the same line of inquiry as the general set referred to above. Careful analysis of deracialization cases always return to questions of the issue set on which such campaigns are mounted and the relevance of these campaigns in supporting a purposive politics of black advancement.
In the main, studies limited to explicating racial dynamics in electoral contests have long ceased to inform, particularly in terms of theory building, and only offer the negligible contribution which keenly observant laypersons might assert without the benefit of presumably sophisticated analysis: that in spite of three decades of exposure to large numbers of black candidates, and in spite of adjustments in issues and tactics on the part of black candidates, that is, the adoption of strategies of deracialization, white voters, in the main, do not vote for black candidates in large numbers when there is a choice of a white candidate to support. This singular finding holds whether the unit of analysis is a mayoral race, a contest for governor, a campaign for Congress, the state legislature, city council, or school board. In the main, black electoral successes are by far disproportionately attributable to solid black voter support.
A major dimension of the malaise of black politics is evidenced by the fact that analysts of black politics, especially black analysts, endlessly lament what they see as the lack of purpose in black politics in actual practice. At the core of the lament is a recognition and assertion that black politics has lost its zeal and purpose, and yet the black predicament persists as one of social inequality for all blacks, significant economic disparities for most blacks, and economically dire straits for a disproportionate number of blacks. The once promising momentum provided by a highly charged socio-political movement and the expectations of a responsive environment in major policy-making bodies of the national government have eroded into memory and history. Indeed, the current lament is reinforced and made more poignant by analyses of the high tide of black politics, that is, the civil rights movement and its successor movement, the electoral-based ânew black politics.â Such analyses are nearly consistent in suggesting that the legacies of this extended mobilization are significantly disappointing and very much wanting. The most recent and noted analysis of this type is that by Robert C. Smith in his latest book which bears the very provocative title of We Have No Leaders (Smith, 1996).
Yet despite this lament and the recognition of a decided and seemingly irreversible change in the nature, thrust, and direction of black politics, analysts of black politics generally have not responded with a conceptual framework which takes account of this change. Yet major questions are raised by this situation. How do we understand this state of affairs? What does this situation convey about the limits of social and political change, and how might the lessons of this situation inform the practice of black politics in the future?
A second major set of concerns which drive the thrust of this essay has to do with how to merge effectively an informative and engaging discussion of the African-American predicament of race in the United States with considerations of ethnicity in comparative perspective. Any analytical or expository exploration of race and ethnicity in comparative perspective encounters both awkwardness and significant difficulties when considering the U.S. context and the situation of blacks in America. There is an almost universal tendency to say and think âraceâ when considering the situation of blacks in the United States. This is reasonable given the omnibus, though bogus, category of race that has been applied to peoples around the world and the continuing legacies of slavery that significantly define the black predicament in the United States. In the international context, when examining or explaining intergroup conflict, which appears to be defined by differences of basic group identity, analysts and lay persons alike are inclined to label such conflicts as ethnic-based conflicts, frequently so even when such conflicts also parallel demarcations along lines of skin color, or what we call race. In the United States one rarely hears use of the concept of ethnicity anymore though the concept was liberally applied to conflicts in the late 1800s and around the turn of the century. In the current period one sees liberal use of the concept of âminority group conflictâ in reference to conflicts between blacks and other minorities, and use of the term racial conflict for conflicts between groups which are lumped together as blacks and whites. In the United States, the issue of race has, in the main, easily dwarfed issues of ethnicity for the past 100 years.
Yet from the perspective of scholarship and theory, important questions emerge in joint considerations of race and ethnicity. One compelling question that immediately arises is how does the situation of African Americans and the U.S. race problem fit within a comparative framework? How might the conceptual lens of ethnicity inform the African-American predicament? By predicament I refer to the persistent oppression of blacks as an identifiable group in American society and the persistent failure of varied strategic efforts to satisfactorily ameliorate or resolve that predicament. In terms of the practice of black politics, are there insights from the experiences and analyses of ethnicity as a social and political phenomenon which might inform the development of strategic considerations in the struggle for full social and political equality for African Americans?
The objectives of this essay are not to provide definitive answers to the questions raised to this point or other questions raised herein. Rather the objectives are more modest. A primary objective is to provoke reflection on the status and thrust of African-American politics by viewing them through the conceptual and analytical lens of ethnicity. Implicit, and sometimes explicit, in this discussion is the assertion that the conceptual framework of ethnicity elicits insightsâespecially those of a developmental perspectiveâ which are not provided by the traditional analytical framework of race. A second objective of this essay is to provoke scholarly and practical discourse about African-American politics from a fresh, and perhaps controversial, perspective which might in turn lead to consideration of some of the issues raised and implied herein in a more structured research agenda. A considerable portion of this essay is devoted to the scholarly explication of the concept of identity, a discussion which is likely to be quite familiar to comparativists but less familiar to scholars of American politics. The focus then shifts to a discussion of the ethnic experience in America as a means of rounding out an analytical canvas against which to contemplate the evolving status of blacks in the United States and the state of black politics. In a sense the essay ends where it begins, by raising questions about what the current state of practical politics and scholarly considerations in African-American politics portend for the future of black America. In this regard the essay is admittedly incomplete, a condition imposed in part by the very nature of the questions raised herein.
How might we begin an analysis that facilitates consideration of the racial situation in the United States through the conceptual lens of ethnicity? First, we must consider that within the context of a global or comparative scanning of intergroup conflicts, which can be characterized as ethnic conflict or ethno-racial conflict, the African-American situation is merely one of a large set of ethnic-based conflicts that have been played out in varying degrees of hostility and abject inhumanity across space and over the span of history, and which persist to the present time. Indeed such conflicts are a constant, over time and across space. Although the specific groups involved vary from place to place and time to time, the phenomenon of ethnic or ethno-racial conflict appears a constant of the global human condition. In other words, that which we call a problem of race in America is but a variant of global, ethno-political conflict.
A crystallization of the argument which is posited here as evolving theory and which provides the context for considering the remainder of this essay may be stated as follows: Is there in effect an identifiable and relatively brief period in the socio-political history of an oppressed ethnic group when the group is able to utilize its ethnic identity as a primary resource to achieve optimum mobilization, reap maximum possible benefits from the host political system, after which the group experiences a phased demobilization when both the strengths and benefits of ethnic identity wane and eventually disappear? In other words, is there an âethnic momentâ in the life of oppressed ethnic groups when the group experiences some indeterminate level of successful political and social mobilization and empowerment after which the significance of ethnic identity in determining the political behavior of the group wanes and the strength of and attachment to the ethnic bond dissipates? The obvious follow-up questions are: Have we experienced the apogee of the African-American ethnic moment in the United States and might we now be well into experiencing the demise of the African-American ethnic moment? If so, what are the implications of this kind of socio-political life-cycle for the theory and practice of black politics?
Understanding the Ethnic Phenomenon
At any point in time there exists numerous open conflicts around the world which are fueled by ethnic differences. Death tolls mount in numbers which stagger and numb the mind. Like a migrating viral strain, the phenomenon of ethnic conflict occurs in what are seemingly random patterns in different settings across space, and appear endlessly over the span of time. As Harold Isaacs so poignantly described it, âIshmael and Isaac clash and part in panic and retreat to their cavesâ (Isaacs, 1975: 3). From time to time analysts have calculated both the number of open ethnic conflicts and their accompanying death tolls. Some 7.5 million deaths have been attributed to ethnic conflicts between the end of World War II and 1968 in some two dozen conflicts (Isaacs, 1975: 3â4). More recently Ted Gurr identified some 233 groups worldwide who were, in 1990, experiencing either economic or political discrimination, or both, and who were potential candidates for open, warlike ethnic conflict or, who were already engaged in such conflicts. Other tallies have gone as high as 435 depending on the categorization scheme utilized and the time in which the tallies were taken (Gurr, 1993).
One might expect that a phenomenon of such universality and such serious consequences might be fully understood except that a review of the literature does not point to this conclusion. It is rather the case that the best scholarly explanations of the phenomenon of ethnicity are at once complementary, contradictory, and also confusing.
In regard to scholarship on ethnicity, analysts generally set forth two major explanations of its origins. The primordialist perspective views ethnicity as a basic group identity: âbasic in that fundamental human attributes are passed down from one generation to anotherâ (Isaacs, 1975). These âassumed givens of social existenceâ include blood and kinship connections, broadly shared ancestral ties, shared religion, language, historical experiences, common social mores, similar and distinguishing physical characteristics (Geertz, 1973; Isaacs, 1975).
According to this perspective, one is born into an identity which is not only significant but is frequently so intense as to appear immutable over time and across space. According to this view, ethnicity derives from a cultural interpretation of descent (Keyes, 1982) and though the strength of this bond varies widely from person to person and from society to society, these bonds are seen as emanating from an affinity that is more ânatural and even spiritualâ than other social bonds, such as social class, for example (Geertz, 1973; Stack, 1986). Ethnicity is seen as a basic individual and group identity which may wax and wane in intensity but yet remain as a persistent or permanent part of the individual attachment and group existence (Stack, 1986: 9).
The primordialist perspective embraces a strong socio-psychological dimension which bonds the individual to the group and which answers the profoundly fundamental question of âWho am I?â According to this view, ethnicity also serves as a basis for distinguishing the group at the level of âweâ and differentiating the group from âthe other.â It is this latter manifestation of the meaning and significance of ethnicity as identity which forms the basis of irrational appeals and fuels the oppressive and genocidal tendencies ever present in human history.
While the primordialist perspective acknowledges changes in the relative intensity of ethnic identity over time and across space and different circumstances, it is the rigidity of the primordialist perspective in its focus on the persistence of ethnic identity which forms the basis of major challenges by the structuralist or instrumentalist perspective. In brief, the structuralist/instrumentalist perspective holds that ethnic identity is socially constructed without the necessity or prerequisite of deep cultural ties, and derives from objective intergroup differences in the distribution of economic resources and political authority. From this perspective, ethnicity is situational and is greatly influenced and determined by social contexts in which rights, opportunities, and the distribution of other resources are determined differentially by the rules of the game...
