Racial Conflict in Global Society


Book Description

Despite global shifts in world power, racial conflict remains one of the major problems of contemporary social life. This concise and engaging book demonstrates the interplay between identity, power and conflict in the creation, persistence and transformation of patterns of race and ethnic relations across the globe. Stone and Rizova employ a neo-Weberian comparative approach to explore how evolving systems of group conflict have been - and continue to be - impacted by changes in the world system, global capitalism, multinational corporations, and transnational alliances and institutions. The authors analyse critical debates about ‘post-racialism’, ‘exceptionalism’, ethnic warfare and diversity management in global organizations, drawing on cases from South Africa to Darfur, and from global migration to the Arab Spring uprisings. In conclusion, the search for effective strategies of conflict resolution and the quest for racial justice are evaluated from multiple perspectives. Racial Conflict in Global Society provides stimulating insights into the basic factors underlying racial conflict and consensus in the early decades of the twenty-first century. It is essential reading for scholars and students across the social and political sciences, management and international relations.




Understanding Prejudice, Racism, and Social Conflict


Book Description

`This book stands out for a number of reasons...the result is an authoritative, provocative and challenging collection, which will doubtless help to stimulate further debate in the field′ Susan Condor, Department of Psychology, Lancaster University `The authors are to be commended for assembling an unusually stimulating collection of chapters...the book is clearly distinguished by the breadth of its coverage and the theoretical insights it offers. It is a valuable addition to any collection on this topic′ Jack Dovidio, Department of Psychology, Colgate University `This is a comprehensive text that is extremely well written by top social psychologists, with all of the major theoretical perspectives represented. The editors should be commended for putting together this lively and engaging text′ Nyla Branscombe, Department of Psychology, University of Kansas A range of international events have recently focused attention on issues of prejudice, racism and social conflict: increasing tensions in former Eastern bloc countries, political conflict in Northern Ireland and the United States, as well as racial conflict in the Baltic States, Middle East, Africa, and Australasia. In light of these events, Understanding Prejudice, Racism and Social Conflict presents a timely and important update to the literature, and makes a fascinating textbook for all students who need to study the subject. A variety of theoretical and conceptual approaches are necessary to fully understand the themes of prejudice and racism. This textbook successfully presents these, uniquely, by examining how these themes manifest themselves at different levels - at the individual, interpersonal, intergroup and institutional levels. It aims to integrate the different approaches to understanding racism and prejudice and to suggest new ways to study these complex issues. This integrated, international focus should make it key reading for students in many countries. With contributions from world-leading figures, Understanding Prejudice, Racism and Social Conflict should prove to be an invaluable teaching resource, and an accessible volume for students in social psychology, as well as some neighbouring disciplines.




Understanding Racial and Ethnic Differences in Health in Late Life


Book Description

As the population of older Americans grows, it is becoming more racially and ethnically diverse. Differences in health by racial and ethnic status could be increasingly consequential for health policy and programs. Such differences are not simply a matter of education or ability to pay for health care. For instance, Asian Americans and Hispanics appear to be in better health, on a number of indicators, than White Americans, despite, on average, lower socioeconomic status. The reasons are complex, including possible roles for such factors as selective migration, risk behaviors, exposure to various stressors, patient attitudes, and geographic variation in health care. This volume, produced by a multidisciplinary panel, considers such possible explanations for racial and ethnic health differentials within an integrated framework. It provides a concise summary of available research and lays out a research agenda to address the many uncertainties in current knowledge. It recommends, for instance, looking at health differentials across the life course and deciphering the links between factors presumably producing differentials and biopsychosocial mechanisms that lead to impaired health.




Black Awakening in Capitalist America


Book Description

Black Awakening in Capitalist America is a classic study of the Black liberation movement of the 1960s. Examining Black Power and black capitalism, the student and radical movements, nationalists and integrationists, Allen argues that Black America, hemmed in by racism, constitutes an underdeveloped, domestic colony within the United States. Black Awakening in Capitalist America is essential reading to understand the origins and development of the contemporary black struggle for freedom.




Communities in Action


Book Description

In the United States, some populations suffer from far greater disparities in health than others. Those disparities are caused not only by fundamental differences in health status across segments of the population, but also because of inequities in factors that impact health status, so-called determinants of health. Only part of an individual's health status depends on his or her behavior and choice; community-wide problems like poverty, unemployment, poor education, inadequate housing, poor public transportation, interpersonal violence, and decaying neighborhoods also contribute to health inequities, as well as the historic and ongoing interplay of structures, policies, and norms that shape lives. When these factors are not optimal in a community, it does not mean they are intractable: such inequities can be mitigated by social policies that can shape health in powerful ways. Communities in Action: Pathways to Health Equity seeks to delineate the causes of and the solutions to health inequities in the United States. This report focuses on what communities can do to promote health equity, what actions are needed by the many and varied stakeholders that are part of communities or support them, as well as the root causes and structural barriers that need to be overcome.




Managing Ethnic Conflict in Africa


Book Description

In this book, Donald Rothchild analyzes the successes and failures of attempts at conflict resolution in different African countries and offers comprehensive ideas for successful mediation. The book demonstrates how negotiation and mediation can promote conflict resolution, along with a political environment that fosters development.




Why Race Still Matters


Book Description

'Why are you making this about race?' This question is repeated daily in public and in the media. Calling someone racist in these times of mounting white supremacy seems to be a worse insult than racism itself. In our supposedly post-racial society, surely it’s time to stop talking about race? This powerful refutation is a call to notice not just when and how race still matters but when, how and why it is said not to matter. Race critical scholar Alana Lentin argues that society is in urgent need of developing the skills of racial literacy, by jettisoning the idea that race is something and unveiling what race does as a key technology of modern rule, hidden in plain sight. Weaving together international examples, she eviscerates misconceptions such as reverse racism and the newfound acceptability of 'race realism', bursts the 'I’m not racist, but' justification, complicates the common criticisms of identity politics and warns against using concerns about antisemitism as a proxy for antiracism. Dominant voices in society suggest we are talking too much about race. Lentin shows why we actually need to talk about it more and how in doing so we can act to make it matter less.




World on Fire


Book Description

The reigning consensus holds that the combination of free markets and democracy would transform the third world and sweep away the ethnic hatred and religious zealotry associated with underdevelopment. In this revelatory investigation of the true impact of globalization, Yale Law School professor Amy Chua explains why many developing countries are in fact consumed by ethnic violence after adopting free market democracy. Chua shows how in non-Western countries around the globe, free markets have concentrated starkly disproportionate wealth in the hands of a resented ethnic minority. These “market-dominant minorities” – Chinese in Southeast Asia, Croatians in the former Yugoslavia, whites in Latin America and South Africa, Indians in East Africa, Lebanese in West Africa, Jews in post-communist Russia – become objects of violent hatred. At the same time, democracy empowers the impoverished majority, unleashing ethnic demagoguery, confiscation, and sometimes genocidal revenge. She also argues that the United States has become the world’s most visible market-dominant minority, a fact that helps explain the rising tide of anti-Americanism around the world. Chua is a friend of globalization, but she urges us to find ways to spread its benefits and curb its most destructive aspects.




Racism


Book Description

Are antisemitism and white supremacy manifestations of a general phenomenon? Why didn't racism appear in Europe before the fourteenth century, and why did it flourish as never before in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries? Why did the twentieth century see institutionalized racism in its most extreme forms? Why are egalitarian societies particularly susceptible to virulent racism? What do apartheid South Africa, Nazi Germany, and the American South under Jim Crow have in common? How did the Holocaust advance civil rights in the United States? With a rare blend of learning, economy, and cutting insight, George Fredrickson surveys the history of Western racism from its emergence in the late Middle Ages to the present. Beginning with the medieval antisemitism that put Jews beyond the pale of humanity, he traces the spread of racist thinking in the wake of European expansionism and the beginnings of the African slave trade. And he examines how the Enlightenment and nineteenth-century romantic nationalism created a new intellectual context for debates over slavery and Jewish emancipation. Fredrickson then makes the first sustained comparison between the color-coded racism of nineteenth-century America and the antisemitic racism that appeared in Germany around the same time. He finds similarity enough to justify the common label but also major differences in the nature and functions of the stereotypes invoked. The book concludes with a provocative account of the rise and decline of the twentieth century's overtly racist regimes--the Jim Crow South, Nazi Germany, and apartheid South Africa--in the context of world historical developments. This illuminating work is the first to treat racism across such a sweep of history and geography. It is distinguished not only by its original comparison of modern racism's two most significant varieties--white supremacy and antisemitism--but also by its eminent readability.




The Far Right Today


Book Description

The far right is back with a vengeance. After several decades at the political margins, far-right politics has again taken center stage. Three of the world’s largest democracies – Brazil, India, and the United States – now have a radical right leader, while far-right parties continue to increase their profile and support within Europe. In this timely book, leading global expert on political extremism Cas Mudde provides a concise overview of the fourth wave of postwar far-right politics, exploring its history, ideology, organization, causes, and consequences, as well as the responses available to civil society, party, and state actors to challenge its ideas and influence. What defines this current far-right renaissance, Mudde argues, is its mainstreaming and normalization within the contemporary political landscape. Challenging orthodox thinking on the relationship between conventional and far-right politics, Mudde offers a complex and insightful picture of one of the key political challenges of our time.