Analyzing Racial Inequality

and Racial Tension in America Today

1) --William Julius Wilson, The Truly Disadvantaged

def'n of problem: social isolation, economic devastation

--Doug Massey and Nancy Denton, American Apartheid

def'n of problem: de facto residential segregation and institutional racism

--Cornel West, Race Matters, and Keeping Faith

def'n of problem: racism in our everyday symbol systems and ruling ideologies

2a) Some basic historical statistics:

--percentage of black births out-of-wedlock: 1965: 25% 1980: 57%

--percentage of black families female-headed:

1965: 25% 1980: 43%

--12% of Americans are black, but half of those arrested for murder/manslaughter in 1984 were black, and 61% of those arrested for robbery

--percentage of black children living below the poverty line, 1983: 46%

2b) statistics for robert taylor homes, chicago: --population density: ~140,000/sq mile)

--median family income: less than $5500

--93% of families headed by single parent --100% black

--69% of the population minors

--47% unemployment

--80% receive AFDC money

--crime rate: ~20 times higher than citywide average

3) Liberal vs Conservative approaches:

liberals: --emphasized racial prejudice as problem

--blindly, shyly, and optimistically emphasized vibrancy of ghetto culture

conservatives: --weak family values, and creation of an indolent poor as the problems

--poor need to be off welfare and on their own

4) Wilson's factors affecting inner city poverty

--a) High and continuous in-migration through the 1960s

--created hostility of whites, underemployment of blacks

--b) Replacement of in-migration with young pop'n --> increased deviance

--c) Deindustrialization and removal of firms to the sunbelt: northern blue-collar workers adversely affected by a shift to a service economy

--d) Out-migration of middle-class blacks to the suburbs, leaving CONCENTRATED poverty and SOCIAL ISOLATION

Update: although the % of blacks living in concentrated poverty neighborhoods declined from 33% to 19% between 1990 and 2000, blacks still have the highest rates of c.p.

--e) Gov't policies of anti-discrimination and affirmative action: tended to help mostly the privileged minority, and increased white resentment.

These policies were procedurally equal but substantively unequal in their effect

5) Wilson's "hidden agenda:" "to improve the life chances of groups such as the ghetto underclass by emphasizing programs to which the more advantaged groups of all races can positively relate."

--The key remains economic growth: Vivian Henderson: “the economic future of blacks in the U.S. is bound up with that of the rest of the nation.” Welfare reform has not been the cause of changes in poverty rates.

6) --Doug Massey and Nancy Denton’s view of the problem: de facto residential segregation and institutional racism

7) --Cornel West’s def'n of problem: racism in our everyday symbol systems and ruling ideologies