Trustees of Princeton University
Race-Making and the Nation-State
Author(s): Anthony W. Marx
Source: World Politics, Vol. 48, No. 2 (Jan., 1996), pp. 180-208
Published by: Cambridge University Press
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RACE-MAKING
AND THE
NATION-STATE
ByANTHONY W. MARX*
W.
E. B. Du
"the problem of the color line" as a cen
of this century, and indeed in the United
States and
Bois
tral concern
South Africa
described
the era has
seen the elaboration
and protest. These
experiences
Marxists
and modernization
were
and mobilization
have
of postslavery
segregation
the expectations
of
confounded
theorists
alike
archaic
residues
that
racial
identification
and would
merely
class conflict,
and rising
industrialization,
anything,
racial
and
reinforced
domination
conflict.1 Although
to
situations
be
the
that have
interconnected,
appear
course and
encoded
racial
practice,
produced
legally
If
disappear.
nationalism
have
these
shaped
processes
racial dis
identity,
and pro
voked conflict remain to be fully specified. The end of the century may
be a particularly
time for such an assessment.
opportune
and conflict must begin
Any analysis of racial ideology, domination,
the prior question
of why race becomes
is not suf
with
salient at all?it
race
to
certain
ficient
social factors polarize
relations, for this
argue that
race as a
assumes
racism and im
Thus,
category.
although
preexisting
ages of primordial
do seem to be pervasive where
peoples of
into contact,
this similarity does not account for
race has been constructed.
in which
is not
Race
difference
come
varying ancestry
the different
ways
we must
shift from describing
found, but "made" and used. Therefore,
race "as a tool of
to
it
"as
the
analysis"
considering
object of analysis."2
*
I am grateful for the comments
and suggestions provided by Karen Barkey, Douglas
Chalmers,
Carlos Hasenbalg,
Tom
Jennifer Hochschild,
Stephen Ellman, Eric Foner, Charles V. Hamilton,
Karis, Ira Katznelson, Mark Kesselman, David Laitin, Manning Marable, T. Dunbar Moodie, Mark
Orkin, Lloyd Rudolph,
Jack Snyder, Steven L. Solnick, Sidney Tarrow, Rupert Taylor, Charles Tilly,
Harrison White,
and the Identities workshop
of Columbias
Center for Social Sciences. Support has
States Institute of Peace, the Social Sciences Research Coun
generously been provided by the United
of the Institute for Latin American
and Iberian Studies at Co
cil, the Tinker Foundation
Fellowship
the Center
in Rio de Janeiro, and the Harry Frank
lumbia University,
Studies
for Afro-Asian
Foundation.
Guggenheim
1
See Robert Miles, Racism (London: Routledge,
Omi and Howard Winant,
Racial
1989); Michael
Formation
in the United States (New York: Routledge
and Kegan Paul, 1989); John Rex, Race Relations
in Sociological Theory (London: Routledge,
Power, Racism and Privilege
1970); William
Julius Wilson,
(New York: Free Press, 1973).
2
and the Question
of 'Race' in South Africa" (Manuscript,
Rupert Taylor, "Racial Terminology
1994).
WorldPolitics 48 (January 1996), 180-208
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RACE-MAKING
AND THE NATION-STATE
181
Why and how do social distinctions and conflict come to be projected
in terms of physical differences of color or purported race in the first
place? More
subjected
I propose
precisely,
to
why
race-specified
to examine
were
blacks
in particular
so
and
categorized
or
not?
domination,
conflict,
provoking
of official "race
the causes and consequences
means
of a comparative
of South Africa,
the
by,
analysis
cases
most
in
and
the
which
Euro
States,
Brazil,
prominent
and slave
of African
pean settlers dominated
indigenous
populations
In
each
of
these
social
and
economic
major
origin.3
regional powers,
making"
United
measures indicate significant and persistent disparities between black
and white that built on the legacy of slavery.But the different contexts
set them
apart and therefore
make
for a comparative
them useful
study
of the dynamics of official racial domination. Dutch, British, and Por
to
settlers brought
and traditions
tuguese
varying practices,
religions,
state
their colonies, making
economic
for
and
consolida
development
tion that followed divergent paths. Unlike
States
promised
rights
equal
in South Africa, the United
to which
in its Constitution,
Americans could and did appeal. Demographics
African
also differed: those of
are a
in the U.S.,
consti
minority
indigenous Africans
tute the
in South Africa,
and
of
those
African
and
majority
European
are
in number
in Brazil.
ancestry
roughly equal
was
in the early history
While
racial discrimination
of
pervasive
state
South Africa,
the United
States, and Brazil, postabolition
policies
encoded
racial orders. All
three cases faced extended
very different
"moments" of relative indeterminacy
and an unhappy
repertoire of pos
African
sible
descent
racial
configurations
in the aftermath
emerging state consolidation.
States
of
slavery,
In both South Africa
at the
time
of
and the United
the result?with
official racial ide
differences?was
significant
of
and only recent
and
conflict,
categories
ology, imposed
segregation
of legal discrimination.
In contrast,
Brazil
dismantling
postabolition
avoided legal distinctions based on race and instead projected an image
of "racial democracy."
continued
inequality,
Despite
Brazil
of early racism
the commonality
not
enact
did
anything
equivalent
and
to
or Jim Crow. These
outcomes
alternative
pose a useful puzzle
apartheid
for comparative
analysis.
as
I begin by assessing
earlier explanations
of race-making
being
3
For other comparative
studies of these cases, see Pierre Van den Berghe, Race and Racism (New
York: JohnWiley
and Sons, 1967); Stanley B. Greenberg, Race and State in Capitalist Development
(Jo
hannesburg: Ravan, 1980); George M. Fredrickson, White Supremacy (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1981); John W. Cell, The Highest Stage ofWhite Supremacy (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1982); Carl N. Degler, Neither Black nor White (New York Macmillan,
1971).
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182
POLITICS
WORLD
on differences
based
colonial
of slavery, culture,
rule, miscegenation,
influences must be incorpo
While
such
development.
and economic
I dispute
into the present analysis,
the argument
that these lega
a more
interests
tolerant
racial order in Brazil.
preordained
their past to reinforce
Brazilians
may have retrospectively
interpreted
on
an
was
as evident
in
but
fact racism
early
image of racial tolerance,
rated
cies
and
in Brazil as itwas in the United States or South Africa (though it dif
fered in form), and the inequality in Brazil continued. By contrast, in
the United
States
and South Africa
past discrimination
was
embraced
and used to justify segregation and exclusion. This difference in kind is
not
by comparable
explained
or
of discrimination
degrees
exploitation.
The official projects of Jim Crow in theUnited States and apartheid
in South Africa were shaped by distinct paths and challenges to build
over the treatment
of blacks and slaves
ing the nation-state.
Disputes
to tensions
in the Civil
had contributed
whites
that
culminated
among
War
and the Boer War,
Consolidated
these
conflicts
by
respectively.
and
their
to labor coercion,
commitment
Southerners
and Afrikaners
had proved themselves a threat that had to be reckoned with if stability
were
and development
to be restored.
Blacks
had not proved
compara
bly disruptive, had already been distinguished by earlier racism, and
to appease Southern
could be excluded
and Afrikaner
demands. Agree
on a
as a common
"other"
defined
enemy defined and en
racially
same
race
issue
the
of
white
that had exacerbated
unity. Thus,
couraged
ment
was
prior conflict
formed a potential
it, as racial domination
triadic conflict among white
factions
used
to heal
more
dyadic
manageable
can be described
justment
that appears
form
as
intrawhite
a unified
polity. Racial
the nation-state.
consolidate
Brazil
provides
or
ethnic
over black."
trans
into a
Such
strategic ad
unity. But policy
schematically
bolstering
in retrospect
from ongoing
actually
emerged
to
and maneuvering
of actors seeking
solutions
functional
conflict,
competition,
real problems. Although
within
of "white
gradually
and blacks
tension
domination
itwas contained
remained,
was
to
reinforced
repeatedly
an essential
conflict
for there no equally
comparison,
nation-state
consolidation.
impeded
violent
regional
Unity
a racial crutch of formal discrimination;
"racial
rather,
require
as an
a state anxious
there
of
democracy"
emerged
ideological
project
to
formal exclusion. As a result, explicit
support without
unify popular
were not
of racial domination
and im
constructed
categories
officially
did not
ages of past
tolerance
were
encouraged.
Iwill conclude by discussing how state policies provoked and shaped
black
protest,
eventually
forcing
the abandonment
of official
discrimi
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AND THE NATION-STATE
RACE-MAKING
it had been enacted. In South Africa
nation where
States
racial domination
the unintended
one
conflict
183
and the United
whites
unifying
proved double-edged,
having
to resolve
of inciting black protest. Efforts
consequence
and Jim Crow were
exacerbated
another. Apartheid
then
as black protest
conflict as the most pressing
replaced intrawhite
to the nation-state.
In Brazil, with no clear target of state ideol
or Jim
to
ogy and segregation
organize
against?no
policy
apartheid
or
to
Crow
reform?little
Afro-Brazilian
protest
emerged,
challenge
and racial conflict was
socioeco
avoided
considerable
largely
despite
ended,
threat
nomic
inequality.
and Cultural
Historical
The
of Race
Explanations
lack of explicit racial categorization, domination, and conflict in
Brazil
postabolition
imported
has been
by Portuguese
explained
colonialists.
The
as the result of racial tolerance
of racial domina
imposition
tion and conflict in the United States and South Africa would then be
explained by the extent towhich the British and Dutch had a contrary
set of influences.
To
assess
this argument
must look to the historical record. Did
racial
tolerance
to Brazil,
or is this claim
pretation?
In Brazil,
the U.S.,
and South
ism established
the fundamental
about
colonial
one
influences,
the Portuguese in fact import
an instance
of ex post
inter
Africa
slavery begun under colonial
of race relations. Gilberto
pattern
Freyre in the 1930s and other analysts have suggested that slavery in
was
Brazil
into more
was carried over
they contend
race relations.
to the "Tan
According
was notable for its
of the
recognition
slavery
relatively benign,
tolerant postabolition
nenbaum
a tradition
thesis," Brazilian
were
to marry, own property,
slaves' humanity:
allowed
and even
they
own freedom.4
to this argument,
however, was the
buy their
Contrary
was
were guaran
fact that Brazilian
brutal.
Slaves
slavery
particularly
teed the right to buy their own freedom only after 1871 (and even then
the practice was difficult),
slaves was
among
marriage
held by slaves was
in constant
jeopardy, and manumission
ductive
not
that the elderly and sick were
of work.5 Compared
with other slave powers, Brazil
on continued
and more
fully dependent
importation
slaves meant
fate after years
mained
longer
new
rare, property
of less pro
to their
abandoned
slaves because
allow
the harsh
for reproduction
conditions
of their
4
Slave and Citizen
Frank Tannenbaum,
5
(fn. 3), chap. 2.
Degler
under which
numbers.
(New York: Knopf,
Mortality
1946).
slaves
of
lived did
slave
among
See van den Berghe
re
(fn. 3), 67.
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WORLD POLITICS
184
children was
to be 80 percent, with slaves
in the mines
working
seven
no
to
ten
free region to
surviving for only
generally
years.6 Having
which
slaves revolted
in dramatic
numbers.7
they could flee, Brazilian
of the
Tannenbaums
thesis rests on an overly generous
interpretation
es
true that the
is
real conditions
of Brazilian
It
did
slavery.
Portuguese
a
was
tablish
less strict divide between
slave and free than
somewhat
estimated
a
in the U.S.,
enforced
but they also established
deadly
particularly
a Brazilian
was a
form of bondage. The
of
image
"benign master"
myth.
to
of paternalism
Tannenbaum
also ignored the
imagery
comparable
ward slaves in the Southern United States.8 Such paternalism did not
preclude
racial domination
postabolition
in the U.S.,
as it
purportedly
did in Brazil. Nor did early abolition in South Africa preclude segrega
tion and exclusion. Though slavery took different forms in Brazil, the
U.S., and South Africa, in all three it fostered attitudes of a primordial
black
This
and established
inferiority
account
cannot
similarity
and inequality.
patterns of domination
in
for the difference
racial
postabolition
orders.
A
the
specific
influence
feature
concerns
of the argument
about Brazilian
slavery
that
"the
Tannenbaum
Catholic
argues
of Catholicism.
doctrine of the equality of allmen in the sight of God" produced better
treatment
more
of slaves
exclusive
Dutch
and generally
or British
racial
greater
Protestantism.9
tolerance
The
than did
the
of the
hierarchy
an
bira
against
exclusively
considers
the history of the Crusades,
cial divide. Of
the Inquisition,
and the rapacious
colonialism
pursued by the Spanish
to avoid
it is difficult
the support of the church,
with
and Portuguese
church also enacted
about official Catholic
tolerance. The
skepticism
Catholic
its own
church
internal
as the Catholic
also purportedly
one
course, when
policies
church
tion, it "could never
slave regime."10 That
militated
of racial discrimination
in Brazil was
not
in Brazil.
Furthermore,
to force aboli
strong enough
as a force
the
live up to its early promise
against
a
or
more
Catholicism
inclusive
toler
projected
6
Robert Conrad, "Nineteenth Century Brazilian Slavery," in Robert Brent Toplin, ed., Slavery and
in Latin America
Race Relations
Press, 1974), 150; Cl?vis Moura,
(Westport, Conn.: Greenwood
Historia doNegro Brasileiro (S?o Paulo: Ed Atica,
1989), 14.
7
Moura
(fn. 6), 15-32.
8
See Eugene D. Genovese,
Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made
(New York: Random
House,
1972).
9
Tannenbaum
(fn. 4), 53. The same argument is put forward in Louis Hartz, The Founding ofNew
in the emergence
Societies (New York: Harcourt,
1964), 152. For a discussion of the role of Calvinism
in South Africa, see Jonathan N. Gerstner, The Thousand Generation Covenant
(Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1991).
10
Genovese
(fn. 8), 177; Caio Prado, Jr., The Colonial Background ofModern Brazil (Berkeley: Uni
D. Jordan, White over Black (New York: W. W. Nor
of
California
Press, 1969), 327;Winthrop
versity
ton, 1968), 206.
of racial discrimination
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RACE-MAKING
ant
is therefore
image
AND THE NATION-STATE
a reflection
more
185
of retrospective
interpretation
than of historical reality.
Colonialism in Brazil was most distinguished by the direct role of
relied on pri
crown
in
the
colonies,
Portuguese
colonialism
Portuguese
early,
developed
state. Whereas
the Portuguese
vate
to
vested
companies
on its own
before
a strong
deed, Portugal's
that of the Dutch
the Dutch
and the British
their
develop
behalf.11
sector
private
own economic
had
in the home
emerged
In
country.
behind
lagged
consistently
development
so there was never an
and the British,
equally strong
crown had little choice but to use its own
Portuguese
sector. The
private
resources,
establishing
tralized power.
a pattern
state consolidation
of strong
state
of direct,
the greater degree
centralized
colonialism
tolerance?
racial
Portuguese
produce
early
Did
It was
suggests not.
in one of the greatest
record
after
slave trades
and cen
in
involvement
The
historical
state that
all the Portuguese
engaged
in history. The early abolition
of slav
erywithin Portugal in 1773 explicitly did not preclude the much more
slave trade
slavery in its colonies. The
pervasive,
stubbornly maintained
to
to Brazil was ended
under
from
Britain,
pressure
grad
only
leading
own
state
its
ual but late abolition. The Portuguese
enacted
"color bar"
at home
and
"darker-skinned"
the
abroad, with
state officials.12
similarly discriminatory: with
absolute
that
literal
of African
nadir
"the falsity
of Portuguese
result
that
there were
colonialism
Portuguese
relatively
in Africa
few
was
its use of forced labor, it produced "the
misery."13 Perry Anderson
claims of special tolerance
concludes
is evident,"
with the myth of such tolerance having been deliberately projected to
obscure
"economic
and
stronger
than
state was
project
The
an
social
retardation."14
its private
sector,
of
tolerance.
image
exaggerated
absence of official
racial domination
as the result of
been explained
Portuguese
of Catholicism.
tarian" slavery?or
But
Brazilian
were
The
and
colonial
Portuguese
to
it used that strength
in postabolition
Brazil
colonial policies?"humani
has
colonialism
and
Portuguese
was
not
state
color
the
Brazilian
vicious,
early
church was at best ambivalent
toward blacks
slavery
blind, and the Catholic
to force
and certainly
unable
better
treatment
of them.
Brazils
early
11
16 (July-Au
2,"New Left Review
Perry Anderson,
"Portugal and the End of Ultra-Colonialism
1962).
12
1415-1825
of Califor
C. R. Boxer, Four Centuries ofPortuguese Expansion,
(Berkeley: University
nia Press, 1969), 42.
13
Anderson
(fn. 11), 93. See also Gerald J. Bender, Angola under the Portuguese: The Myth and the
of California Press, 1978).
Reality (Berkeley: University
14
Anderson
(fn. 11), 110,113.
gust
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186
racism
WORLD
was
distinctive
but
still
POLITICS
to that
comparable
of the U.S.
and
South Africa. The latter two justified their explicit racial domination on
the basis
After
of early beliefs
abolition
Brazilians
and embraced
and patterns
abandoned
historical
of slavery
the official
and discrimination.
discourse
consistent
of racism,
"racial democ
with
interpretations
camou
in Brazil was
legacy of inequality
racy." The historical
merely
and
Afro-Brazilians
among
quiescence
flaged,
thereby
encouraged.
racism was not wiped
Earlier
Said has suggested
away, for as Edward
re
in another context,
and the reality of inequality
images of inferiority
mained
ceived
Instead,
quent
beneficial
a
into
to whites.15
benign
varying
processes
image,
But
one
interpretations
building
upon
unlike
the past was
reflect historical
elsewhere
that did
not
recon
fact.
were
and outcomes
shaped by subse
the past, in a conjunctural
process.
The Miscegenation
Argument
Carl Degler provides one of the most widely held explanations of dif
in how
ferences
race has
been
socially
constructed.
He
argues
that
Brazil could not develop a biracial ideology or formalize rigid racial
classification and domination because of the high level of mixing be
tween
races.
had purportedly
also provided
for greater
Miscegenation
race
move
to
in Brazil, with
social fluidity
able
up to a
people of mixed
status via a "mulatto escape hatch." As a result,
socioeconomic
higher
race relations were
less polarized
than in the U.S., or for
and conflictual
In those cases, more
stark physical
that matter
than in South Africa.
re
the basis for official race categories
differences
supposedly
provided
socioeconomic
discrimination.
inforcing
The
nificant
rests on the historical
fact of sig
of Deglers
argument
came
to Brazil
in Brazil. Portuguese
colonialists
miscegenation
strength
as
to settle,
the Dutch
particularly
compared with
as
to the U.S.
and South Africa. And
compared
two cases,
colonialists
included
few
with
the other
Portuguese
men
a
in
women.16
As
result, Portuguese
higher
engaged
significantly
and sexual tastes and practices
Social mores
levels of miscegenation.
for trade more
and British
who
than
came
a
that remains notable
accordingly,
producing
population
developed
census
the Brazilian
variation.
its
continuum
of
1872
for
By
physical
as
with
this group
of the population
42 percent
mulatto,
registered
15
1978).
(New York Random House,
Said, Orientalism
16
Prado (fn. 10), 119; E. Bradford Burns, A History of Brazil
1970), 37.
(New York: Columbia
University
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All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Press,
RACE-MAKING
on
relied
to serve
AND
intermediary
THE NATION-STATE
functions
of
control
187
over
"darker"
slaves.17
Although miscegenation
have
lattoes
disputed
remained
were and remain
mulattoes
exceptions,
largely underprivi
the escape hatch has closed or it never existed.
Indeed,
few notable
Either
leged.
in Brazil is a historical fact, Degler's critics
mu
of this fact. Even during
interpretation
slavery,
to reenslavement
a
and discrimination.18
With
subject
his
Degler himself did not provide any statistical evidence of black mobil
ity, beyond
the level of miscegenation.
simply demonstrating
has established
that the difference
in socioeconomic
scholarship
between mulattoes
relative
status
is insignificant
in comparison
the
with
"The average income for whites was found
and blacks
of whites.
privilege
Recent
to be about twice that for nonwhites both in 1960 and in 1976."19
an informal
racial order that was highly discrimi
and
such that earlier patterns
of in
browns,"
natory
against
were maintained.
a few mulattoes
to
equality
Only
advanced?enough
mu
in
belief
continued
in
belief
the
Thus,
encourage
mobility.
popular
Brazil
constructed
"blacks
latto escape hatch
on an
ideological
appears
project
to be based
less on material
encouraging
assimilation.
conditions
than
in
Miscegenation
itself did not produce the myth of mobility, but this image did dilute
conflict.
potential
In the United
States
classified
according
to
and South Africa,
varying
categories
were
people of "mixed race"
and policies. Miscegenation
never approached the levels of Brazil; indeed it remained
illegal in the
United
States
and
did
occur
genation
United
States,
South
Africa
until recently. Nevertheless,
in large numbers,
outcomes.
with
varying
in 1860 were
13 percent
of blacks
categorized
misce
In the
as mu
latto, rising to 21 percent by 1920. This category eventually disappeared
with
the refinement
of the "one drop of blood" rule, with whites
confi
over a "black-brown"
that they could impose biracial domination
Recent
has demonstrated
of
that the majority
minority.20
scholarship
dent
17
Charles
H. Wood
and J. A. Magno
de Carvalho, The Demography
of Inequality in Brazil (Cam
Press, 1988), 141; Marvin Harris, Patterns ofRace in theAmericas (New
bridge: Cambridge University
York: Walker,
1964).
18
Robert Conrad, The Destruction
of California
Press,
of Brazilian
Slavery (Berkeley: University
E. Skidmore,
"Bi-Racial U.S. versus Multi-Racial
Brazil: Is the Contrast
Still
1972), 12; Thomas
Valid?" (Manuscript, June 1992), 15.
19
Nelson
do Valle Silva, "Updating
in Brazil," in Pierre-Michel
the Cost of Not Being White
Fontaine, ed., Race, Class, and Power in Brazil (Los Angeles: Center for Afro-American
Studies, Uni
1985), 54. See also Nelson do Valle Silva and Carlos A. Hasenbalg,
Rela??es Raci
versity of California,
ais no Brasil Contempor?neo
(Rio de Janeiro: Rio Fundo, 1992).
20
Genovese
(fn. 8), 414; Fredrickson
(fn. 3), 134; F.James Davis, Who Is Black? One Nations Defin
ition (University Parle Pennsylvania
State University
Brazil
Press, 1991), 40; Abdias do Nascimento,
orMassacre?
Mixture
(Dover: Majority
Press, 1979), 65.
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WORLD POLITICS
188
African
a
have
Americans
significant
of white
proportion
ancestry, with
better off economically.21 In
those having "lighter" skin marginally
of more
a "colored"
attests
than three million
population
were re
and
rules
significant miscegenation
Explicit
immigration.22
to demarcate
did enjoy some greater privilege
coloreds, who
quired
South Africa
to
thanAfricans, thereby diluting the "black threat" to thewhite minority.
Such
was
privilege
Miscegenation
but this pattern
as white
eroded
was
was
celebrated
not
power was consolidated.
and mulattoes
assimilated
followed
in Brazil,
In the U.S.
cases.
two
in the other
and South Africa, mobility was officially blocked, provoking "non
white"
and resistance.
unity
self diminishes
Degler,
resolved physical ambiguities
boundaries,
limiting
and
South
Instead,
authorities
mobility,
in it
miscegenation
of such strict racial domination,
conflict.
and resulting
discrimination,
to
According
the possibility
stirring
African
and U.S.
strict racial
by drawing
Substantial
up antagonism.
miscegenation did not preclude the development of apartheid or Jim
Crow as it purportedly did in Brazil. Even thewhite South African mi
nority
eventually
colored
allies.
people often believe and act as if race is physically deter
Though
shifts
mined,
its potential
alienated
of beliefs,
categories,
and practices
trary.No doubt, Brazils higher level of miscegenation
it more
made
Without
mulattoes.
U.S.
difficult
to
impose
such a demarcation
did
and South Africa
ulations,
and conflict
tion was
interpreted
strict
impose
categories
conflict was
such categories
the con
demonstrate
would have
over
of domination
less likely. But the
on their mixed
pop
was
differences,
Physical
accordingly
provoked.
were
not pre
but
did
and
mixing,
proportions
significant
demographic
or lack
racial categorization,
and
ordain
domination,
conflict,
specific
outcomes
thereof. To explain
these divergent
requires looking beyond
to
the biological
fact of miscegenation,
why continuous
physical varia
as such or forced
Economic
Race-making
velopment.
migration
segregation
into strict categories
Explanations
of race.
of Race
cannot
from the process of economic
de
be disentangled
in tandem with
im
increased
Industrialization,
coming
also coincided
with
the rise of formal
and urbanization,
in the U.S.
and
South
Africa.
The
development
of Jim
21
in the Black Community,"
Verna M. Keith and Cedric Herring,
"Skin Tone and Stratification
American Journal of Sociology 97 (November
1991).
22
Central Statistical Services, South African Statistics, 1988 (Pretoria: Government
Printer, 1988),
tables 1.7, 7.7.
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AND THE NATION-STATE
RACE-MAKING
189
Crow and apartheid has been described as an effort to protect whites
from
black
tion would
cific
competition.
then account
economic
and
segregation
Lesser
for Brazil
explanations
served the
have
and competi
development
s lack of similar
spe
policies.23 More
that
racial
categorization
suggested
economic
interests
of capital
in providing
for cheap
black labor, or served the interests of privileged white labor by reserving
is that state
jobs and ensuring
higher wages.24 The
implication
race were not autonomous
but were determined
policies
regarding
by
of the U.S.,
class
interests.25
South
particular
analysis
Comparative
better
Africa,
and Brazil
allows
for an assessment
of these
arguments.
In South Africa segregation and apartheid fed the process of eco
nomic development and proved highly profitable. British capital first
over the
in order to gain control
the Boer War
provoked
country's
state
to ensure
riches and then encouraged
policies of racial domination
a
supply of cheap black labor in the mines.26 But persistent
segregation
to
cannot be attributed
and divided business
pressure. Begin
varying
ning with the fall of gold prices in the early 1920s, mining capital was
in order to displace more
white
eager to relax segregation
expensive
labor. By the 1970s manufacturing
the
of
advocated
end
capital
an
to ensure more
in
order
skilled
labor
and
black
apartheid
expanded
market
by
the
among blacks.27 But capital's pressures for reform were
of white,
acted to protect
the interests
state, which
Afrikaner
rebuffed
largely
labor. Indeed, after the 1922 Rand Revolt of emerging
miners
efforts to
business
protesting
capital and of Afrikaner
new
rein
blacks, Hertzog's
government
replace them with
lower-paid
to white workers.28 The National
forced the color bar preferential
Party
Afrikaner
government
of Afrikaner
in power
workers
of the Rand
Revolt
acquiesced,
Neither
23
after 1948
remained
as the
majority
white
workers
by
dedicated
of the electorate.
protecting
appeased by continued
profits.29
the interests of South African
capital
to such
protection
a
repeat
Fearing
their privilege,
nor
general
capital
economic
See van den Berghe
(fn. 3), 27-30; Cell (fn. 3), 104; Susan Olzak, The Dynamics
of Ethnic Com
(Stanford, Calif: Stanford University
Press, 1992).
"ATheory of Ethnic Antagonism:
The Split Labor Market," American Sociolog
and Conflict
petition
24
Edna Bonacich,
icalReview 37 (October 1972).
25
Michael
Zeitlin, ed., Political Power
Burawoy, "The Capitalist State in South Africa," inMaurice
and Social Theory (Greenwich, Conn.: JAIPress, 1981), 2:282.
26
in South Africa," Econ
Cell (fn. 3), 62-67; Harold Wolpe,
"Capitalism and Cheap Labor Power
omy and Society 1, no. 4 (1972).
27
Deborah
Posel, The Making
(Oxford: Clarendon,
1991).
ofApartheid
28
Fredrick A. Johnstone, Class, Race and Gold (London: Routledge,
1976).
29
Labour in the South
1911-1969
Francis Wilson,
(Cambridge: Cambridge Uni
African Gold Mines,
(fn. 3), 129,151.
versity Press, 1972), 11; Greenberg
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WORLD POLITICS
190
rationality
were
as determinant
as the interests
of white
labor. The
South
African state reinforced segregation while still under formal British rule
1948 the state pur
and despite
later business pressure for reform. After
cost of
sued apartheid despite
the tremendous
and the mani
regulation
fold inefficiencies. Throughout, white workers' demands for privilege
were
met.
To
going, however,
keep development
to be balanced
of
against the demands
labor. Various
"reforms,, were
implemented
labor, for instance, with cheaper black labor
labor had
black
white
the interests
of white
and
capital, efficiency,
over the
of
objections
gradually
filling
more
jobs andwith black unions legalized in the late 1970s.30
The
overriding
conclusion
was
tionist
ideology
internal
whites,
subordinating
did
race."31 Class
antagonism
and
Afrikaner
workers.
capital
service
is that "the principle
class and ethnic
to soften
reinforce
the
state was
not
class and
side of this overlapping
the state imposed
embedded.
Instead,
of either
it was
of segrega
among
antagonism
to the
of
unifying
conception
the conflict between
English
conflicts
But
function
in the exclusive
ethnic
conflict
in
forms of
varying
to diminish
and
whites
conflict, compromis
unify
was thus
interests.
and
Stability
ing between
conflicting
encouraged,
revenues
to
state.
the
economic
providing
development
proceeded,
In the United
States "the golden
age of racism" paved the way for in
which
racial domination
to
from segregation,
benefited
employing
Capital
expansion.32
to break strikes
to increase
and
black
labor
by white work
profits
cheap
was elaborated
ers. But
cannot
be
explain why Jim Crow
profit alone
in
and
the
less
industrialized
of
industrialization
fore the greatest
spurt
dustrial
more
served the interests of
directly
segregation
Apparently
were
more
numerous.
Yet many
blacks
white
labor, especially where
that their interests might
be better
understood
Southern white workers
South.33
across race lines, as advocated
unity
by the
by working-class
was defeated
movement
white
This
movement.34
by
planters'
Populist
in the
Poor whites,
racism, embraced by workers.
immigrants
including
in order to
North, were "prepared to pay the price of their own distress
were
interests
defined
the
lower."35
Labor's
still
narrowly
Negro
keep
status of
not
social
but
the
relative
served
consistently
by segregation,
served
its white
The
members
American
was
bolstered.
racial order
appeased
white
workers
and Southerners,
30
David Yudelman, The Emergence ofModern South Africa (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood
31
Cell (fn. 3), 234.
32
Wilson
(fn.l), 56.
33
Fredrickson
(fn. 3), 215-16.
34
Olzak
(fn. 23), 110-11; David R. Roediger, The Wages ofWhiteness (London: Verso,
35
Gunnar Myrdal, Am American Dilemma
(New York: Harper and Row, 1944), 457.
Press, 1983).
1991).
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RACE-MAKING
AND THE NATION-STATE
191
also meeting
interests of Northern
the general
capital in main
and violence
business
taining order. "Disorder
destroys
altogether,"36
to contain
after all, and Jim Crow helped
such conflict. Racial domina
while
tion encouraged
own class
one's
cross-class
interests.
to
unity, rather than exclusive
loyalty
Intrawhite
conflict was diminished,
and
white
growth proceeded.
Brazil appears to confirm
the more
economic
A
level
of
lower
planations.
general
pattern
development
of economic
ex
and competition
coincided with the absence of apartheid or Jim Crow.37 But if "racial
then ris
the early lack of economic
development,
more
of
should have produced
explicit patterns
at least in the more
racial domination,
Southeast
and
during
developed
times of economic
boom.38 But that did not happen.
of white workers
and capital were both ad
the interests
Rather,
of white
relative privilege
"racial democracy." The
vanced under Brazils
reflected
democracy"
industrialization
ing
an official racial
by higher wages without
in 1960, in the relatively developed
For instance,
order and segregation.
area of Rio de Janeiro,
income
of blacks was
the average monthly
has been maintained
workers
Cr $5,440; for mulattoes
itwas Cr $6,492; and itwas almost double
the pattern of inequality had been
for whites.39 Once
$11,601,
to
not
did
such
established,
require explicit racial domination
privilege
from cheap black labor. Moreover,
also profited
sustain itself. Business
that advancement
absent official
poor blacks could believe
segregation
was
cross-class
tolerance
thus
of
racial
The
encouraged
image
possible.
in
this
and
instance, by avoiding
explicit racial
unity, stability,
growth,
and conflict altogether.
domination
The racial order in each of the three cases certainly reflected and en
and
but in complex ways. Apartheid
economic
hanced
development,
that, Cr
Jim Crow diluted intrawhite competition that threatened stability and
growth, yet growth and competition did not lead to such policies in
or consis
interests were not unified
capital's
as the de
was forced to
with
comply
apartheid
tently
met.
of white
mands
labor for racial preferences were more consistently
race
was
disad
division
But resulting working-class
economically
by
Brazil.
In South
Africa
served. Business
36
A Rage for Order (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1986), 250. See also Karl
JoelWilliamson,
(Boston: Beacon, 1994), chap. 1.
Polanyi, The Great Transformation
37
of Chicago Press, 1985), 55;
Emilia Viotti da Costa, The Brazilian Empire (Chicago: University
Cell (fn. 3), 11; Harris
(fn. 17), 96-98.
38
in Post-Abolition
Brazil" (Ph.D. diss., Uni
"Race Relations
(fn. 3), 99; Carlos Hasenbalg,
Degler
versity of California, Berkeley, 1978), x, 240.
39
Income Differentials:
Nelson do Valle Silva, "Black-White
Brazil, 1960" (Ph.D. diss., University
ofMichigan,1978),99.
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WORLD POLITICS
192
to labor, for instance, when
blacks were
vantageous
or to break strikes.
whites
By the 1930s many American
cross-race
advocated
to
displace
trade unionists
and organization,
unity
working-class
used
which
em
resisted.40
ployers
Since
often had contrary
both
interests,
capital and white workers
not
could
be served exclusively.
In South Africa
and the U.S. varying
state
to reconcile
interests
among whites
policies
conflicting
sought
by
unifying them as a race. If racial domination
across
plain
count
class
lines,
this outcome.
for
"racial
then narrow
interests
class
can class assertions
Nor
which
democracy,"
also
served to unify whites
ex
cannot
by themselves
in Brazil by themselves
appeased
such
ac
interests.
Brazilian capital profited from low black wages, higher wages forwhites
were
was
of black mobility
and the prospect
maintained,
exaggerated.
In all three cases, real or potential
class conflict had to be resolved to
ensure
most
for both economic
fundamental
requirement
stability?the
and
consolidation
of
the
nation-state.
interests had
Class
development
in South Africa
the ethnic division
and the regional tension
in the U.S.,
and they posed a potential
threat to national unity in Brazil.
In all three cases, states were not simply captive of one interest, but in
to contain and
to
stead acted with relative autonomy
conflicting
respond
or avoided within
interests. To explain how conflict was so diminished
exacerbated
distinctive
racial orders
requires
and
Race-Making
The
construction
of
racial
analysis
the
domination
of the political
dynamics.
Nation-State
requires
clearly
established
boundaries of physically distinct categories. History, physical differ
ences,
ination,
policy
and economic
but
development
not
they do
preordain
that officially
categorizes
such categorical
dom
may reinforce
it or the form itwill take. It is state
people
as black, white,
or mulatto
and
that enforces legal discrimination. As Justice John Marshall Harlan
arouse race hate,
in 1896, "What can more
certainly
rhetorically
more
a
create and perpetuate
of
distrust between
certainly
feeling
state
recent
these races, than
has
enactments[?]"41
Indeed,
scholarship
ar
to the state as the central actor in
Of
course,
race-making.42
pointed
asked
what
40
(New York: Praeger, 1974),
Philip S. Foner, Organized Labor and the Black Worker, 1619-1973
chaps. 14-16.
41
As quoted in Burke Marshall, Federalism and Civil Rights (New York: Columbia University
Press,
1964), 85.
421 am here applying arguments about ethnicity to the more specific case of race. See, for example,
ofWisconsin
Crawford Young, The Politics of Cultural Pluralism
Press, 1976);
(Madison: University
Cynthia
Enloe,
"The Growth
of the State
and Ethnic Mobilization:
The
American
Experience,"
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AND THE NATION-STATE
RACE-MAKING
193
guing that it is the state which defines and enforces racial boundaries
does not explain why
the state should
or should not do so. The
state may
have the capability of "making" races, but it remains to specify the situ
that may or may not lead the state to exercise its power in this way.
In all three of the cases examined
here, the state faced an extended
ation
historical
moment
ured, with divergent
came with
moment
tion was
formally
race relations were
config
during which modern
outcomes.
For the United
States and Brazil
that
the abolition
of slavery. Earlier
racial discrimina
so
not
in Brazil.
in the U.S.
and
enacted
reinforced
Slavery (or abolition of it) cannot in itself explain these divergent out
was abolished
where
earlier amid con
slavery
came
moment
the
when
the country
discrimination,
comparable
race
were enacted.
was unified for the first time and national
In
policies
or united state raised
all three cases the consolidation
of a postabolition
those of African
de
of whether
and how to incorporate
the dilemma
comes.
For South Africa,
tinued
scent. This dilemma had to be addressed to avoid or at least diminish
that
conflict
could
and development.
later refined.
divide
Policies
the nation
evident
and thereby disrupt
moments
in transitional
central
rule
were
then
The history of South African racial domination began with the first
arrival of whites
used
to
on the
Cape
discrimination
was
century. Religion
most
histo
However,
was elab
racial discrimination
in the seventeenth
"heathens."
against
justify
rians agree that explicit and formalized
two
orated two centuries
later, forged by the conflict between
European
in
the British
their
the
After
Wars,
victory
Napoleonic
"fragments."43
took control of the Cape Colony from the descendants of the Dutch,
the Afrikaners. The British enforced early abolition and more liberal
their "determination
of selective discrimination.44
racial policies
Citing
...
master
between
relations
and
servant,"45 thou
[to] preserve proper
to
trekked north
sands of Afrikaners
rule, establishing
escape British
and
racial domination
their own republics during the 1850s, reinforcing
labor coercion. No single policy toward the natives could emerge under
was
discrimination
such circumstances,
prevalent.
although
soon
a
was
Britain's
divided
stasis of
The uneasy
country
disrupted.
"The Political Construction
of Eth
and Racial Studies 4 (April 1981), 123-36; Joanne Nagel,
nicity," in Susan Olzak and Joanne Nagel, eds., Competitive Ethnic Relations (Orlando, Fla.: Academic
Press, 1986).
43
Hartz
(fn. 9), 3.
44
Thomas Karis, "South Africa," in Gwendolen
Carter, ed., Five African States (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cor
nell University
Press, 1963), 48(K81.
45
inAfrica: A History
W. A. de Klerk, Puritans
(Middlesex,
England: Penguin,
ofAfrikanerdom
1975), 23. De Klerk is here quoting Piet Retief, from 1837.
Ethnie
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194
WORLD
POLITICS
aspirations expanded, fed by the discoveries in the north of diamonds
in 1877 and of gold in 1886, and by resulting pressures for a unified
railroad system.46 The ensuing conflict between the British and
Afrikaners
came
to a head
at the turn of the century,
with
the costly
British victory in the BoerWar. This conflict solidified distinct English
and Afrikaner group solidarity, both of which had been riven by inter
In the war
nal divisions.
s aftermath
to undermine
threatened
imosity
and economically
coherent united
to reconcile
The British
impetus
an
Afrikaner-English
British
efforts to shape a militarily
South African
polity.47
exacerbated
with
the Afrikaners
after
the Boer
that was
cen
set the terms for the
to become
of blacks
segregation
state
tral to South African
making. As the British high commissioner,
...
as 1897, "To win over the Dutch
as
Sir Alfred Milner,
argued
early
to
sacrifice 'the nigger absolutely
and the game is easy....
you have only
. . and colonial
. . .
the abandon
(S)elf government.
loyalty
(required)
ment
of the black races."48 Encouraging
and
white
peace took
unity
War
precedence over English
themselves
capable
liberalism, for the Afrikaners
violent
of protracted
disruption,
had proved
while
blacks
re
mained divided. The British concluded thatUnion was achievable only
on the "Boers'
African
The
to
the colored and
among
contrary
expectations
a British
would
that
consolidate
reforms.49
victory
populations
a
moment
historical
record preserves
symbolic
revealing the im
terms,"
plications of the whites' nascent coalition. The first draft of the 1902
peace
forces promised
the subse
and British
treaty between Afrikaner
was
of the franchise
extension
"to natives." This
clause
crossed
quent
out
by Boer
commitment
Generals
Smuts
to later discussions
a vague
and Hertzog
and replaced
by
was
of the issue.50 This
amendment
apparently
accepted by the British,
the imperial hands
South Africa,
in back.
regal posture,
clasped
Exclusion
forced
during
of the "natives"
subsequent
and
decades
without
discussion.
Having
grabbed
to a
of liberal uplift were withdrawn
later of the "coloreds" would
of continued
political
be rein
competition
46
The War in South Africa (London: George Allen,
1900).
See, for example, J. A. Hobson,
47
(London: Oxford University
ed., The Shelhorne Memorandum
See, for example, Basil Williams,
and Leonard
Press, 1925); Thomas Pakenham, The Boer War (New York: Avon, 1979); Monica Wilson
Press, 1969).
eds., The Oxford History of South Africa, vol. 2 (New York: Oxford University
Thompson,
48
G. H. L. LeMay, British Supremacy in South Africa, 1899-1907
Press, 1965),
(Oxford: Clarendon
11-12.
49
of California
in South Africa (Berkeley: University
Peter Walshe,
The Rise ofAfrican Nationalism
Press, 1971), 16. See also Ian Goldin, Making Race: The Politics and Economics of Coloured Identity in
South Africa
1987), 32; Gavin Lewis, Between the Wire and the Wall (Cape
(Cape Town: Longman,
Grand Illusion (London: Longman,
Town: David Philip, 1987), 15; Donald Denoon,^
1973), 4, 111.
50
(London: Clay, 1912), 112.
J. D. Kestell and D. E. van Velden, The Peace Negotiations
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AND
RACE-MAKING
THE NATION-STATE
195
the "game" was not as
Nevertheless,
as
Policies
different
"solutions"
varied,
"easy"
expected.
on
were tried and
was in
interests
acceded
who
to, depending
divergent
between
power.
some
and Afrikaners.
English
asMilner
Some
had
"natives" would
preferential
and rule. But these
still be advanced,
and "coloreds" enjoyed
as instruments
of a policy of divide
were
to
discrimina
subject
overarching
both
treatment,
exceptions
were not
Still many Afrikaners
ued Afrikaner
nationalism,
suspicion
tion.
appeased,
of English
as indicated
liberalism,
by contin
and efforts
to further racial domination. By 1936 Afrikaners forced the removal of
voters
African
from
the common
rolls in the English-dominated
Cape.
imposed apartheid and then sought to fur
After 1948 the Afrikaners
communism
ther unify whites
against
this variation,
"deal" was
the original
tern that "the process of
pact-making
and
"the black
threat."
For
all
the pat
elaborated,
establishing
the whites
between
[was] at the
of the blacks and browns."51
expense
competition
English-Afrikaner
in a
but was contained
continued
single polity of racial domination.
as South African
state consolidation
Much
faced the impediment
of
a
corre
state
in
ethnic conflict,
consolidation
the United
States faced
sponding impediment of regional conflict between North and South.
The indigenous population of Native Americans would be largely
wiped
out, but slaves remained
contention.
This
conflict
numerous
and
their fate a bone
of re
was
in the Constitu
initially finessed
was
left unresolved,
deliberately
slavery
with
Slaves were not freed
the South able to insist on a compromise.52
or
was bolstered
vote. The
Souths
given the
representation
by includ
as three-fifths
as
incentive
of a person?a
ing each adult slave
political
over the fu
to maintain
well
slave
labor.53
Sectional
tension
profitable
gional
tion. The
future
of Southern
ture and extension
of slavery remained
series of compromises
and concessions
of 1857, for example,
Scott decision
but was
deemed
a further
by
interests. The Dred
contained
to Southern
formal
guarantees
of
equality and citizenship rights inapplicable to blacks.54
of slavery came to a head in the
to
and use the
century. The North
sought
strengthen
to support its
to
federal government
extend the
early industrialization,
most
to
limit
of
the
and
railroads,
expansion
slavery.55
significantly
Regional
mid-nineteenth
conflict
over
the future
51
Pakenham
(fn. 47), 612.
52
Jordan (fn. 10), 332; Richard Kluger, Simple Justice (New York: Knopf, 1980), 33.
53
of Michigan
Lowell Dumond, Anti-Slavery
(Ann Arbor: University
Press, 1961),45.
54Dwight
Eric Foner, Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men
(London: Oxford University
Press, 1970), 292-93.
55
and Democracy
(Boston: Beacon,
1966), 125,
Jr., Social Origins ofDictatorship
Barrington Moore,
and Dunlap,
136; Paul Lewinson, Race, Class and Party (New York: Grosset
1932), 26.
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POLITICS
WORLD
196
Abolitionists
in
joined
for greater
pressing
political
as a
centralization
means of forcing the end of slavery.The South defended the federalist
division of power, which had preserved states' rights, including those
and
slavery
regarding
to ensure
its extension
agricultural
profits.56 As
John Quincy Adams had predicted, this conflict could be "settled only
at the
cannon's
after
mouth,"57
failed. America's
"genius
institutional
for compromise
the "bloody gash" of the ensuing Civil War,
conflict
in American
a shift
toward more
the Civil War
and exercise
was
accommodations
and conciliation''
was
had
cut
the way
victory opened
history.58 The North's
centralized
federal power. Indeed, mobilization
a
in the state's
turning point
of resources as an emerging
by
the most violent domestic
global
for
in
consolidation,
control,
In
the
process,
power.59
both the North and the South had become increasingly united inter
the interregional
conflict.60
nally, and that exacerbated
the legal preservation
of the Union
The North's
ensured
victory
res
but
nation's
wounds"
the
Lincoln,
sought by
"binding up
required
olution of the regional conflict and of the status of freed slaves. An ef
as
fort to deport
blacks was attempted
but abandoned
impractical.
Black
enfranchisement
conflict,
raising
under
Reconstruction
fears of a renewed
Southern
exacerbated
rebellion
regional
and encouraging
another shift of federal policy in search of a "solution." By 1877 com
was aban
The
of blacks'
had reemerged.
promise
imposition
rights
were withdrawn
from the South, which
doned
and federal
troops
resistance
reduced
to national
Reconstruction
After
reinforced
racial
unity.61
a coalition
of North
domination,
ignored. Further
as Fourteenth
and South was
fostered
by
Amendment
guarantees
were
the
the
South,
Plessy deci
effectively
appeasing
sion of 1896 reaffirmed
states' rights to enact their own rules of racial
was en
also to mulattoes.
exclusion
Jim Crow
segregation
applicable
forced throughout the South by the 1890s, in particular after the defeat
of the Populist movement.
used their elec
Later, Southern Democrats
reinforce
states' rights in issues of
toral power and vetoes to continually
56
Kenneth M. Stampp, ed., The Causes of the Civil War (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1959), 63.
57
Ibid., 59.
58
Moore
(fn. 55), 113.
59
aNew American State
Press,
(Cambridge: Cambridge University
Stephen Skowronek, Building
Press, 1990), ix;
1982), 30; Richard F. Bensel, Yankee Leviathan
(Cambridge: Cambridge University
Ira Katznelson
and Aristide Zolberg,
(Princeton: Princeton University
eds., Working-Class Formation
(New York: Harper and Row, 1988), 23.
Press, 1986), 212; Eric Foner, Reconstruction
60
(New York: Knopf, 1949).
See, for instance, V. O. Key, Jr., Southern Politics in State and Nation
61
Reunion and Reaction (Boston: Little Brown, 1951); Barbara J. Fields, "Ide
C. Vann Woodward,
in J.Morgan
Kousser and James M. McPherson,
eds., Region,
ology and Race in American History,"
Race and Reconstruction
(New York: Oxford
University
Press,
1982).
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AND
RACE-MAKING
race. The
197
THE NATION-STATE
also practiced de facto segregation. As in South Africa,
a
so that whites
in a
could be reunited
heavy price
paid
some
More
than four thousand
blacks
(and
nationality."62
seen to violate Jim Crow were
who were
the
lynched, while
North
"the Negro
common
whites)
federal government stood idly by63As described byW. E. B. Du Bois,
"Allhatred that thewhites after the CivilWar had for each other grad
ually
itself on
concentrated
[blacks]."64
Comparison of South Africa and the United States suggests impor
tant dissimilarities.
South
Africa's
newly
state
forged
bol
authority,
stered by the strength of the British Empire, enforced segregation from
the center
in varying and increasingly
harsh forms. The potential
threat
the African
intervention.
such
Neither
strong
majority
impelled
nor
or centralized
Afrikaner
racial domination
English
disputed
over such power.
for control
In the
power?rather,
they competed
from
States
United
of power
the division
to be contested
continued
and en
tangled with disputes over racial domination. After the Civil War the
North confidently foisted reforms on the South, but by the end of Re
construction
the North
conceded
was
that the Union
still too weak
to
impose itswill and itwas unwilling to provoke further conflict by in
in locally
terfering
enforced
segregation.
With
"no real fear of a mili
tary threat from the black (minority) population,"65 appeasing the
was
preferable
federal balance
South
by tolerating Jim Crow
resistance. The
ued Southern
toward
Mobs
were
the
states, which
in turn reinforced
to the prospect
of contin
of power was shifted back
their own racial order.
left to impose
that racial order when
states did not or could
in
of equality were unenforced,
whereas
guarantees
no such
state
existed
and
the
acted
with
force
guarantees
not. Constitutional
South Africa
and
impunity.
The
reinforcement
U.S.
Major
followed
conflict
English,
or
ments
of racial
different
had
South
regions
domination
but
paths,
reinforced
distinct
and North.
was
The
gradually
in South
Africa
the result was
and
remarkably
solidarity among Afrikaners
these ethnic
conflict
between
contained
at the expense
the
similar.
and
frag
in
of blacks,
62
The Strange Career ofJim Crow (New York:
Fredrickson
(fn. 3), 191. See also C. Vann Woodward,
Oxford University
Press, 1955), 65; Moore
(fn. 55), 132,146.
63
Williamson
(fn. 36), 85.
64
inAmerica, 1860-1880
W. E. B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction
(New York: Athenaeum,
1992),
125.
65
"Review Essay: Comparing
the Comparers: White
in the
George Reid Andrews,
Supremacy
United
States and South Africa," Journal of Social History 20 (1987), 589; Richard M. Valelly, "Party,
of the Souths Electoral Politics," Politics and Soci
and Inclusion: The Two Reconstructions
Coercion,
ety 21 (March
1993).
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198
WORLD
POLITICS
that every white bargain must
law...
accordance with Denoor?s
"golden
be sealed by an African
sacrifice."66 In the "moments of madness"67
cap
was enforced or
and
violent
racial
segregation
change,
ping cataclysmic
in the past were prominently
allowed.
Racial
distinctions
imbedded
that impeded con
encour
discrimination
Reinforcing
legal
as dominant
over blacks. Continued
intrawhite
"available"
to diminish
solidation
of the nation-state.
aged the unity of whites
tension
reinforced
this "solution."
and blacks was
whites
progressive
The contrast
with
or ethnic
the regional
for a coalition
potential
or abandoned.
ignored
The
is here particularly
Brazil
conflict
useful.
among
Portuguese
colo
nialism had imposed on Brazil amore unified central authority than
thatwhich developed in South Africa or the United States. The with
drawal
ment
of Dutch
invaders
after
to the Afrikaners
akin
left no competing
European
frag
in South Africa.
nationalism
Emerging
1654
and tensions within Brazil were muted by the arrival in 1808 of the
of
court, forced to flee from Napoleon.
Portuguese
Popular descendants
crown continued
to rule over Brazil for
the Portuguese
eighty years,
a
transition
from colony to independent
peaceful
to avoid direct conquest.
British
interests enough
overseeing
appeasing
remained
empire and
Economic
retained their centralized
focus, and
a result,
and
abolished.
As
slavery
gradually
peacefully
for conflicts
that might
there was relatively
little impetus
otherwise
state consolidation
and capacity. The occasional
small
have undermined
development
nationwide
revolt was
provincial
rimonial"
rule was
In Brazil
slow, elites
was
contained
a
conflict
political
internal
Africa.
over
to abolition,
in regional
war
comparable
Indeed, Brazilians
and
coalition
and an explicit
in 1888-89.69
Race did not be
or ethnic conflict. There was no
to that of the United
were
to avoid
States
or
the sort of
eager
seen
tear apart the
had
they
nearly
there was no need
avoided
such a conflict,
a white
elsewhere
encouraged
through
race that
slavery
States. And having
the sort of reconciliation
United
for
and "pat
prefabricated
hit. As a result,
football
cataclysmic
later South
"Clientalist"
seriously challenged.68
central state was in place when
the winds
of
or
"Brazil is famous for its white,'
peaceful
to re
smooth
transitions
from empire
managed
a
modernity
revolutions,"
having
and
from
slavery
public,
come
by compromise.
never
ideology
of racial discrimination.70
66
Denoon
(fn. 49), 158.
67
Politics and Society 2 (1978).
"Moments of Madness,"
Aristide Zolberg,
68
See Riordan Roett, Brazil: Politics in a Patrimonial
Society (New York: Praeger, 1984).
69
Gilberto Freyre, Brazil: An Interpretation
(New York: Knopf, 1945), 120.
70
of Chicago Press, 1942), 335.
See Donald Pierson, Negroes in Brazil (Chicago: University
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RACE-MAKING
The
postabolition
AND
state eschewed
Brazilian
199
THE NATION-STATE
legal discrimination
and
encouraged unity among Brazilians of any color (ostensibly including
native
"Indians"). Having
experienced
elite was more fearful of blacks than
larger slave revolts, the Brazilian
coun
their U.S. or South African
were
racial conflict
under
eager to submerge
terparts. They
potential
the myth
of "racial democracy'
and images of an inclusive nation and
state.71 This process was debated
and blacks were excluded
corporatist
But within
the country, no rules of racial exclusion
immigration.72
than reinforce
past images of racial inferiority
imposed. Rather
as a
and domination,
this legacy was reinterpreted
benign Luso-tropi
or
cal tolerance.
Inherited
and continued
racial inequality was denied
as
but
unavoidable
fluid
class
distinctions.
camouflaged
reflecting
from
were
In the absence
aged. A
of formal
few Afro-Brazilians
miscegenation
were
Mulattoes
Racial
tion
was
was
encour
Further
was
to "whiten" and unite the
encouraged
population.
not forced
into black unity by official
segregation.
were removed from the census and studies of discrim
categories
ination were outlawed,
racial democracy. Many
the
was
accommodation
segregation,
were able to advance
themselves.
so as to obviate
to the
of
any challenges
myth
were
on
of the franchise,
blacks
but
deprived
basis of illiteracy, not race per se. Eventually
this voting qualifica
was abandoned,
after literacy rates had risen. Racial discrimination
no violations
were
later outlawed,
Conflict
although
prosecuted.
avoided and development
proceeded.
that the Brazilian
idea of "racial democracy" was
noting
in the United
for adoption
States during the early twentieth
It is worth
advocated
century, but found inapplicable. No less a figure thanTeddy Roosevelt
to Brazil,
noted
that the U.S.
and Brazil both had "mixed"
on "the
to absorb the
and
commented
of Brazil
populations,
tendency
. . .
men
no
white
draw
line
the
Roo
[TJhese
against
Negro.
Negro."
a
sevelt approvingly
cited the remarks of
Brazilian:
"You of the United
. .
States are keeping
the blacks as an entirely
separate element..
They
. . .
will remain a menacing
in your civilization.
element
[The alterna
in the long run, from the national
have chosen will
tive] we Brazilians
traveled
But the United
States was
prove less disadvantageous."73
standpoint,
not then free to choose this alternative,
for the die had already been cast
in a bloody mold. Abandoning
very well
have
reopened
the ideology of racial domination might
the wounds
that had
already
once
torn apart
71
See Thomas E. Skidmore, Black into White: Race and Nationality
in Brazilian Thought (New York:
Oxford University
Press, 1974).
72
de Azevedo,
Onda Negra, Medo Branco (Rio de Janeiro: Paz eTerra, 1987).
Celia Marinho
73
Theodore
"Brazil and the Negro," Outlook 106 (February 21,1914),
409-11.
Roosevelt,
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200
the
threatened
and then
republic
Poor whites
on
insisted
asserting
to do so
again during Reconstruction.
their racial superiority,
and elites
in
and South were eager to avoid class conflict by projecting
the North
white
POLITICS
WORLD
of explicit
of the "disadvantages"
racial unity. Acceptance
racial
domination had been established by the trajectory of American history,
as it also had been in South Africa.
to Race-Making
Responses
Mobilization
to demonstrate
that official postabo
primary focus of this paper is
was
or
it
lition racial domination
connected
the absence of
prominendy
an
to
to the
nation-state.
if
such
for
the
But
analysis is
building
impetus
variations
in
mobi
it
should
also
prove robust,
resulting
help explain
of explicit racial domi
lization and conflict;
that is, social construction
The
nation
and social movements
by the victims
should
of such domination
logically be connected. Iwill now consider whether that indeed is the
and conflict
mobilization
case?whether
to
of domination
according
policies
Institutionalized
consolidates
domination
racial
subordinated
tance.
legal
as a
potential
basis
for resis
encourages
group
among
solidarity
is so linked.74 This process of identity formation
log
resources
and polit
and then shapes the logic by which
are acted
In Karl Marx's
terms, a group must
upon.75
can
act
it
"for
itself."76 State pol
exist "in itself" before
self-consciously
icy helped
forge such group
the
"who" that then
lishing
conditions
identity
discrimination
Imposed
blacks whose
fate
ically precedes
ical opportunities
imposed
setting
can be
explained
"from above."
of race also
boundaries
"from below"
But
self-consciousness
among
and
estab
blacks,
to structural
responded
interpreted
race becomes
a salient
even when
identity,
And
its form varies wher
it does not necessarily
lead to mobilization.
ever or whenever
Such uncertain
and fluid
such mobilization
emerges.
accordingly.
are connected
responses
Racial
exclusion
in the
countermobilization
clusion
curtails
to variations
beneficial
mobilization
to whites
in racial domination.
run may
provoke
lack of such formal ex
in the short
long run, whereas
and leaves inequality
unchallenged.
For
instance, apartheid in South Africa and Jim Crow in theUnited States
encouraged
black
solidarity,
with
forms
of protest
varying
according
74
to
See Michael
Press, 1994).
(Princeton: Princeton University
Dawson, Behind theMule
75
See Sidney Tarrow, Power inMovement
Press, 1994).
(Cambridge: Cambridge University
76
in David McLellan,
Selected
"The Poverty of Philosophy,"
Karl Marx,
ed., Karl Marx:
Writings
Press, 1977), 214.
(Oxford: Oxford University
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AND
RACE-MAKING
in state
shifts
often
aimed
more
militant
at
invited
Reforms
policy.
THE NATION-STATE
The
reversal
integration.
and often
protest
more
201
moderate
mobilization,
of reforms provoked
in
"Racial democracy"
or absence
separatism.
Brazil elicited more muted racial identity andmobilization,
even during
of reform
and despite evident
and oppor
resources,
inequality,
for protest. Yet even in Brazil limited forms of protest
reflected
state rule. The
in
of
official
racial
variable
previous
changes
dependent
can be
an
to
into
domination
variable
reconfigured
independent
explain
and various forms of mobilization.
such emergence
periods
tunities
In South Africa early and less rigid forms of state discrimination
limited and moderate
with more militant
mobilization,
pop
produced
with
the
reinforcement
ular opposition
of
emerging
increasing
only
resistance
divided.
Before
remained
Union,
segregation.
indigenous
(ANC)was founded to unify Africans
The African National Congress
after
the newly
shortly
But the ANC remained
created Union
small,
elitist,
strictly
segregationist
to refine
discrimination.
in its petitioning.
Con
speakers and Afrikaners ushered in a
tinued conflict between English
more
began
and polite
in 1924
government
under Hertzog,
who
later deprived coloreds of much of their relative privilege. Like later
Afrikaner
nationalists,
Hertzog
sought
to trump
the racial
segregation
of the English and their allies in order to further consolidate Afrikan
erdom.
class
across
unified Africans
and coloreds
segregation
as common
victims
of racial domination,
provoking
Tightening
and region
resistance.
greater
After 1948 the Nationalist
and even
Africanist
aimed
stricter
racial
ordinate
further solidifying
sub
apartheid,
Pan
and its more
radical offshoot,
more militant
support for
protests
gained massive
not
the
state.77
In the 1970s
the
just reforming,
segregation
identity. The
Congress,
at
defeating,
Consciousness
government formalized Afrikaner rule
under
ANC
to a
of apartheid
responded
tightening
unite "Africans, coloreds,
with calls for black separatism
that would
and
to halt
In the 1980s the United Democratic
Front responded
Asians."
Black
movement
more
no consti
mass mobilization.
With
ing reforms with
integrated
more
to
of the state demanded
tutional guarantees
appeal to, opponents
radical change. In 1990, under pressure from continued mass mobiliza
and the end of the
sanctions,
tion, internal splits, economic
dislocation,
cold war,
the state announced
77
See Saul DuBow,
Racial
shire, England: Macmillan,
Ravan, 1983).
its intention
to abandon
apartheid.
The
in South Africa, 1919-36
(Hamp
Segregation and the Origins ofApartheid
1989); Tom Lodge, Black Politics in South Africa since 1945 (Johannesburg:
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WORLD
202
of the opposition
majority
POLITICS
to engage
took up the invitation
in negotia
tions.78
in the United
Racial mobilization
pattern,
with
though
discrimination
complex
Repression
modationism,
Early
provoked limited mobilization.
constant
unaltered
remained,
States followed a similar overall
differences.
post-Reconstruction
Regional
differences
federal
of neglect.
by relatively
policies
accom
in the South encouraged
Booker T. Washington's
areas
more
in
while
urban
of the
liberal
deprivation
North evoked the militant views ofW. E. B. Du Bois. Disappointment
over the lack of reforms after the FirstWorld War provoked the mass
movement
of Marcus
the South.79With
in the North
Garvey
but nothing
comparable
in
the New Deal and the SecondWorld War, the cen
its social intervention,
authority
expanded
raising the
of reform. The cold war also raised concerns
about the inter
tral United
States
prospects
national
of the U.S.
reputation
federal reform at midcentury
class and region. Having
developed
U.S.
eral authorities
hesitantly
began
decision,
Brown
black solidarity across
encouraged
to
the capacity
impose its will, fed
to revisit the contentious
issues of re
forming Jim Crow. The most notable signal of this shift was the 1954
Supreme
Court
v. Board
Education.
of
Such
state action
provided an opening for the civil rights movement, which gained its
initial mass following in the legally segregated South. Calling on the
nation
forms
to live up to the ideals of the Constitution,
of mobilization
for further federal
pushed
relatively moderate
intervention
against
Jim Crow. Southern activism then inspired blacks in the North. Their
anger
at continued
less easily alleviated
deprivation,
forms of black
led to riots and more militant
vention,
inter
by federal
nationalism.80
The Brazilian case is striking for its lack of significant race-specific
and informal
discrimination
inequality
to
continued
after slavery but were not
differences
according
physical
or massive
to
racial identity
sufficient
strong subordinate
engender
an official
was cru
and
of
racism
of
The
lack
protest.
ideology
policy
even
that constraint,
the limited forms of Afro
within
cial. However,
Socioeconomic
mobilization.
78
See Anthony W. Marx, Lessons of Struggle (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1992); Heribert
of California
The Opening of theApartheid Mind
and Kogila Moodley,
(Berkeley: University
Press, 1993).
79
et al., eds., Black Protest Thought in the Twentieth Century (New York: Macmil
See August Meier
Adam
lan, 1971).
80
Black In
Political Process and theDevelopment
The literature here is vast. See Doug McAdam,
of
The Origins of
of Chicago Press, 1982); Aldon D. Morris,
surgency, 1930-1970
(Chicago: University
Black Power Ideologies
the Civil Rights Movements
(New York: Free Press, 1984); John T. McCartney,
(Philadelphia:
Temple
University
Press,
1992).
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RACE-MAKING
Brazilian mobilization
the Vargas
AND THE NATION-STATE
responded to shifting state policy. In the 1930s
reconsolidated
regime
203
central
state
authority,
had di
which
minished during the Federal Republic after 1889. Vargas affirmed his
to racial
Frente Negra
democracy. The relatively moderate
the
In
the
when
socioeco
continued
1970s,
regime.
supported
commitment
largely
nomic deprivation among blacks flew in the face of the official doctrine
images of the U.S.
to Brazil. The more
of "tolerance,"
ments
spread
civil rights and black power
militant Movimento
Negro
move
Unifi
cado emerged, though it still had only limited popular support.81
"Unmaking"
Racial
Domination
The recent demolition of the legal edifice of racial discrimination in
South Africa and theUnited States also can be explained, albeit briefly,
by reference
crimination,
to the
of race-making.
dynamics
international
pressures,
changing
Economic
costs
prominently
to
the end of legal segregation.
protest all contributed
forcing
in both cases reform would
have been stymied had militarily
an
state
and strategic
central
retained
ideological
authority
popular
However,
strong,
commitment
to
resolution
greater
enforcing
of prior
or
racial
allowing
and
ethnic
regional
domination.
white
but only
With
the
to
the impetus
conflict,
had become
less pressing.
unity via racial domination
the
"black-white"
conflict
became more
Defusing
resulting
The
end of legal subordination
thus came despite
continued
encourage
sistance,
of dis
and most
after the logic of race-making
was
reversed
pressing.
re
white
by further
developments.
In the United States the South had been appeased by allowing for
mal
on the local
racial discrimination
ization
and prosperity
had begun
to
level. By midcentury
industrial
to the South,82 which
had
spread
earlier regained its political foothold inWashington
thought
of
secession.
The
South
had
been
and abandoned all
"Americanized."83
This
state consolidation
central
for greater
and white
process
national unity to be largely achieved. The federal balance of power was
toward the center. Meanwhile,
reconfigured
gradually
despite Southern
increased black protest
for fur
and
resistance,
encouraged
by
pushing
had
allowed
81
See L?lia Gonzalez
and Carlos Hasenbalg,
(Rio de Janeiro: Marco Zero, 1982);
Lugar deNegro
and Power (Princeton: Princeton University
Michael Hanchard,
Press, 1994).
Orpheus
82
of the Census, Historical
Statistics of the United States (Washington, D.C.: U.S.
U.S. Department
Old South,
Government
295; Gavin Wright,
1975), series F-297-348,
pp. 243-45,
Printing Office,
New South (New York: Basic Books, 1986).
83Myrdal(fn.35),1011.
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204
POLITICS
WORLD
ther reforms,
pressed
for the application
of central
power
local
against
ized racial policies.
By midcentury the centralized American polity had become strong
to intervene
enough
most
in the historically
contentious
and
last bas
tion of states' rights. The Union victory in the Civil War was finally
a century
a "second Reconstruction,"
in which
later with
the die of racial order was remolded.
Black Southerners
this
recognized
consolidated
shift
renewed
toward
U.S. Commission
federal
action, welcoming
representatives
of the
on Civil Rights in 1958 with the remark that at last
has come."84 Regional
"the Big Government
tensions
that had
a white
coalition
remained.
But this conflict
supremacist
aged
encour
among
whites was gradually diminished by racial domination and replaced as
the most
pressing
threat
to national
unity
by the "black-white"
conflict
it had engendered. To curtail the rising political and economic disrup
tion of black
official
tion from
social discrimination
protest,
the center;
racial domination
was
ended
persisted,
by strong
however.
ac
Conflict among whites also diminished in South Africa, albeit later
than
in the U.S.
South
African
State
intervention
greater
economic
Post-1948
state had
Afrikaner
reinforced
control
Afrikaner
of an increasingly
strong
culture and language.
and employment
(to administer
brought
apartheid)
with
For example,
the proportion
the
parity
English.
of Afrikaners working inwhite-collar jobs rose from 29 percent in 1946
a result, "the Afrikaner
and Afrikaner
have grown
to 65.2 percent
in 1977.85 As
self-confidence;
English
had acquired more
together,"
thereby
diminishing Afrikaner "fear of the English using non-white votes to
their position."86 Conflict
between Afrikaners
and English
strengthen
as a central
en
thus lessened
had
which
concern,
political
previously
use of
as a means
of
the
whites.
couraged
segregation
unifying
eventu
As the costs of legal segregation
South Africans
rose, white
a more
to end
fundamental
ally agreed
apartheid,
requiring
political
sanc
transition
than in the U.S. Major
black protest,
elite division,
lost
for
and
market
had
all
taken
their
toll.
tions,
opportunities
growth
on
With
whites
blacks, these costs became un
increasingly
dependent
bearable. By 1992 F.W.
percent
of the combined
supporting
negotiations
de Klerk was able towin an astonishing 68.7
and English
Afrikaner
aimed
at
ending
vote
minority
for a referendum
rule. Whites
em
84
Harris Wofford,
1980), 467.
Of Kennedys and Kings (New York: Farrar, Strauss and Giroux,
85
Heribert Adam and Hermann
Ethnic Power Mobilized
(New Haven: Yale University
Giliomee,
A Democratic South
L. Horowitz,
See also Donald
Press, 1979), 169-75.
Africa} (Berkeley: University
of California Press, 1991), 79-81.
86
Author
interview with Gerrit Viljoen, Pretoria, April 28,1994.
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RACE-MAKING
braced
the reassuring
AND THE NATION-STATE
205
of a de Klerk-Mandela
prospect
"partnership,"
with English voters increasingly supporting a reformist National
Party.87The white coalition had taken hold, and white privilege was
further
consolidated.
Afrikaner
conflict
ination
despite
Black protest
as the dominant
had worked
white
and
had by then replaced
to peace. Official
threat
and was
backfired,
resistance.
Furthermore,
then
right-wing
a new
this transition
domination,
required
United
States central authority
had imposed
stitutional
and edict.
interpretation
Brazil,
abandoned,
finally
the South
because
state had been more explicitly designed on the basis of racial
African
The
the English
racial dom
same process
no
because
of ending
comparable
constitution.
reform
racial domination
was
racial order had been
By
according
contrast,
to con
not
to
applicable
constructed.
Sub
ordinate racial identity had no unifying target of official policy against
to mobilize,
formed. This does
which
was
and
not mean
less evident
equality
official racial order
no
racial
had
domination
to be
re
or economic
that social discrimination
in
the contrary?the
lack of an
have provoked
has
stronger mobilization
in Brazil.
that might
left such discrimination
formal
To
largely unchanged.
Implications
and conse
had no single determinant,
but its origins
Race-making
can
cases
In
be
the
three
here, pervasive
quences
compared
specified.
inequality and images of primordial inferiority were the heritage of
were
slavery but
tion influenced
continuum
in varying forms after abolition. Miscegena
encoded
for conflict,
racial distinctions
and the potential
but
to
of skin colors was
official
categories.
subject
shifting
a
class interests were appeased by various forms of discrimi
Competing
nation. Race then appears less fixed than if it were preordained
by cul
or
economic
interests.
of
ture, slavery, ancestry,
specific
Interpretations
to
have varied according
racial
historical
evolving
legacies and interests
nation-state
and
consolidation,
reinforcing
stability,
develop
and
Racial domination,
conflict
appear to be as fluid
categories,
as those
of coalition
that shaped them.
emerging
dynamics
building
orders
ment.
The
help
Brazil
of race-making
lies in its ability to
power of this explanation
account for extensive
in social constructions
variations
of race. In
the lack of regional
or ethnic
87
Adam
and Moodley
(fn. 78), 2; Timothy
Princeton University
Press, 1995), 137.
D.
conflict
is consistent
Sisk, Democratization
with
in South Africa
the rela
(Princeton:
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WORLD POLITICS
206
tive absence
South
of racial
Africa
and
ideology,
the United
official
or conflict. For
categorization,
the state's elaboration
of racial
States,
who
among whites,
shaped by conflict
gradually
as whites
to reconcile
their
conflict
and
sought
by unifying
reinforcing
of blacks. "War (was) continued
exclusion
by other means." To instill
... re-inscribe
.. .
in civil society,...
powers
"peace
political
inequali
lines
of
race.88
Continued
iterations
of
ties," in these instances
along
was
domination
or economic
reinforced
competition
political
repeatedly
out
domination.
These
themselves
the
processes
during
played
era of nation-state
amid
variations
of
century-long
building,
policy.
"intrawhite"
racial
follow more general patterns.
For instance, Rogers
dynamics
was
has argued
that historical
German
resolved
disunity
of an exclusive
ethnic
Earlier
the construction
citizenship.
These
Brubaker
through
French
state
nationalism,
South Africa,
consolidation
evident
for a more
allowed
in state
the United
if not
inclusive
current
policy
States, and Brazil,
social
civic
of
form
In
practice.89
colonialism,
slavery,
and
geography had left a substantial and historically differentiated black
population.
solidation
was
Race
then figured
of the nation-state.
resolved
through
exclusive
Disunity
and con
in the definition
prominently
in South
race-specific
Africa
nationalism
and
the U.S.
and citizen
ship, which did not develop in relatively unified Brazil.War played a
wars
con
In Europe,
processes.
foreign
requiring
demands
the
of
Resolu
for
scription produced
expansion
citizenship.90
in the U.S.
tion of internal wars
and South Africa
similarly extended
central
role
in these
citizenship rights for whites
black
in a unified polity, but it also reinforced
exclusion.
as it is the sub
as a central actor in
state emerges
race-making,
to various
contestation
from
the society
of
and
ject
responds
challenges
na
in which
it is embedded.
To dilute internal conflict and encourage
The
was
tional unity, racial domination
and the U.S.,
and racial antagonism
in South Africa
reinforced
officially
was
in Brazil.
avoided
consistently
Apartheid or Jim Crow then provoked the antithesis of black protest.
Conflict among whites had gradually diminished at the cost of rising
black-white
to
conflict. To
a more
contain
this new
conflict,
the state then moved
racial
racial
official
inclusive
order, abandoning
synthesize
re
domination.
these states acted with
relative autonomy,
Throughout,
or
to assertions
interest with
of
appeasement,
compromise,
sponding
88
Michel
Foucault, Power/Knowledge
(New York: Pantheon,
1972), 90.
89
in France and Germany (Cambridge:
and Nationhood
Brubaker, Citizenship
Press, 1992).
90
Charles Tilly, Coercion, Capital and European States (Cambridge: Blackwell,
Harvard
University
1990).
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AND THE NATION-STATE
RACE-MAKING
state-led
The
co-optation.
of citizenship)
of nation-building
process
207
(and the defining
shaped and reshaped the racial order. Amid missteps,
local and national
division,
and unintended
state actions
consequences,
concerns.
to
responses
pressing
to be misunderstood
about the implications
of this analy
hope
an
sis. That
conflicts
intrawhite
and rule
encouraged
ideology
explicit
mean
not
of discrimination
that with
the greater
against blacks does
or will do so.Whites
resolution
of such conflict racism has disappeared
reflected
intentional
not
I
in South Africa and the United States benefited from defining them
as such, with
state
in varying
racism
forms of
reinforcing
once
race
so
But
has been
the
constructed,
segregation.
postabolition
state cannot
its
creation.
dismantle
awful
"Social
structures,
types
easily
are coins that do not
are formed
and attitudes
readily melt. Once
they
selves
the
they persist."91
Racial identities, ingrained through painful experience and imbed
ded in everyday life, do not quickly fade even if the conditions that re
inforced them change. In the United States legal discrimination has
remains and race reforms have recently come
ended, but discrimination
identi
under threat as a concomitant
of resurgent
states' rights. Racial
not
mi
ties have remained
African
least
because
the
American
salient,
as a vital resource. The
same may now come
its solidarity
nority views
to be true in
South Africa. The previous
pro
postapartheid
ideological
economic
of
and
interests
culture, ancestry,
ject
according
interpreting
scars. Even
to race has left
in Brazil nascent
racial identity
and
deep
cases
two
remains
about the former
conflict encouraged
by information
evident.
That
not mean
whites
race as a means
constructed
cannot
that racial
of domination
then be embraced
does
by subordinates
identity
that has been the case.
Indeed,
advantage.
a
What
is consistent
emerges
pattern of efforts at conflict resolution
as a central component
of racial dynamics.
and coalition
Na
building
for their own
tion-state
builders
solve conflict
in the United
among whites
blacks,
by building
the most
thereby diminishing
Boundaries
of racial
economy.
were
constructed
and historical
nation
excluded
emerged
did not
as an
States
viable
threat
legacies
interpreted
community/'92 Who
spontaneously,
to the
and enforced
category
"imagined
emerge
and South Africa
sought
a coalition
of domination
however,
but
to re
over
state
and
discrimination
The
accordingly.
was
included or
rather was
rein
forced by official policy. The unintended resultwas heightened mobi
91
Joseph Schumpeter,
12-13.
92
Benedict Anderson,
Capitalism,
Socialism and Democracy
Imagined Communities
(New York: Harper,
(London: Verso,
1947),
1983).
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WORLD POLITICS
208
eventu
by blacks unified by their exclusion, with black protest
a
as inclusive,
of
nation-state
the
albeit
still
ally forcing
reconfiguration
torn
re
Institutions
of domination
by the legacy of racial antagonism.
lization
inforced
assertions
of racial
identity, which
then
forced
a
reconfigura
confirms
this
identity
resulting
its avoidance
of racial
conflict,
pattern by its relative lack of "intrawhite"
or conflict,
domination
and the lower salience of racial identity. Stra
tion of institutions.
But
remains.
Brazil
either encouraging
racial domination
differed,
tegic calculations
or not, but the
conflict
of
nation-state
consolidation
imperative
evident
in each
situation.
The
evolution
line" during this century was
cal dynamics
of conflict
resolution
color
of Du
inextricably
or avoidance
Bois's
and
was
"problem of the
to the
politi
framed by the ideal of
connected
the nation-state.
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