Volume 25, Number 2, November 2015
A2 US politics
Race in the USA: what can we
learn from recent events?
Simon Lemieux
This article should be read alongside ‘Debate: Is race still a significant issue in US politics?’ in
POLITICS REVIEW Vol. 25, No. 2, pages 6–7
The election of Barack Obama in 2008 led to positive talk of a ‘post-racial’ USA, where race would be
an incidental rather than a defining characteristic of a US citizen. Many people believed that Obama’s
election had laid to rest the ghosts and wounds of the Civil War, slavery and segregation.
Events in 2014–15 have suggested a rather different picture. There were riots in November 2014 in
Ferguson, Missouri following the decision not to prosecute a white policeman, Darren Wilson, for the
shooting of black teenager Michael Brown. More recently nine African-American churchgoers were
murdered during a bible study at their church, Mother Emanuel, in Charleston, South Carolina by a
lone white gunman Dylann Roof who had posed in photographs with the Confederate flag.
At its worst, this looks like a throwback to the worst days of the 1960s. Incidents then included the
Watts riots in LA, police brutality in many Southern states during the civil rights struggle, and racially
motivated killings by white racists such as that of three civil rights workers in Mississippi in 1964. Has
the USA moved on at all in racial equality over the past 50 years?
What are the key issues?
There are probably three main themes thrown up by recent events:

the attitude to race and racial composition of the police forces in some parts of the USA

the issue of the black response to violence committed by some in their community

the Confederate flag: a symbol of hate or heritage?
Race and policing
The issue of policing and race is undoubtedly a sensitive one. The issue in Ferguson was partly that a
largely black neighbourhood was policed by a still predominantly white police force. This quickly
becomes a live issue when black teenagers are shot in controversial circumstances by a white police
officer. It re-ignited the argument that black lives don’t matter, that it would have been different
outcome had it been a black police officer or a white youth.
The shooting of unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin in 2012 and the acquittal of his killer, a white
neighbourhood-watch volunteer, in Sanford, Florida provoked a similar outcry. It led directly to the
creation of the pressure group Black Lives Matter. The group’s website makes reference to ‘police
brutality and other forms of state violence’. The Ferguson shootings and riots demonstrated that many,
Philip Allan Publishers © 2015
www.hoddereducation.co.uk/politicsreview
especially in the African-American community, remain deeply suspicious of what they perceive as
institutional racism in some areas of America’s police and justice institutions.
It is worth recalling that protests, albeit less violent, also took place in New York in December 2014
following the decision by a grand jury not to prosecute the white police officers who were involved in
the death of a black man (Eric Garner) alleged to have been held in a chokehold. The city authorities
have since agreed to make a $5.9 million settlement to Mr Garner’s family. The memories of Bull
Connor and the overtly racist policing policies in parts of the Deep South during the desegregation era
fade slowly for some.
Racially motivated protests
Yet the Ferguson riots and other less violent protests also show that such unrest is complex, and
cannot be seen purely through the lenses of race. Much of the looting and destruction of property
affected black-owned businesses and shops. It would be misleading to see the riots that erupted in
Ferguson and to a lesser extent elsewhere as simply a racially motivated outburst of anger at
perceived institutional racism. Some black Americans challenged fellow members of the black
community who felt that the violence was justified. The phrase heard alongside ‘Black Lives Matter’
was ‘So what's your excuse?’ — in essence a challenge to fellow blacks to stop making excuses and
seize the day, to make the most of the opportunities that were ripe for the picking. If an AfricanAmerican can go all the way to the White House, what's stopping you?
An economic dimension
So, while there is a racial dimension to these incidents, they are also partly to do with economics.
Would there have been so much rioting or looting by African-Americans in good jobs and with good
incomes? The stubborn income inequality between the USA’s different ethnic groups cannot be
omitted from any analysis of race. A Pew Research report in 2014 found that the net wealth of white
Americans was ten times greater than that of Hispanics and 13 times greater than that of blacks, and
that the gap was growing. Is there an emerging divide between African-Americans who have realised
some of the American dream, and those for whom it remains a just a dream?
Angry whites as well as angry blacks
Yet race in the US today is not just about ‘angry blacks’, it is also about ‘angry whites’ who feel
marginalised and squeezed out of what they see as ‘their country’. At its most extreme this is seen in
the survival and growth of white supremacist movements such as the various permutations of the KKK
and other such racist groups, and also in random shootings such as that in Charleston.
There is little doubt that for a small (tiny?) number of white Americans, again largely those whom
prosperity has bypassed, a multi-/post-racial America is a dangerous threat, not a welcome
opportunity. In larger numbers and less overtly, many white Americans on the broad right of politics
and most commonly found in the Deep South, are hostile to what they see as a broader liberal agenda
thrust upon them by cosmopolitan America. Some embraced ‘birther’ views, stating that Obama was
not constitutionally qualified to take the office of president.
Philip Allan Publishers © 2015
www.hoddereducation.co.uk/politicsreview
The Confederate flag
Amore common expression of this sense of marginalisation is the willingness of whites to embrace the
so-called Confederate flag (it is actually General Lee’s battle flag, to fly it from their homes and use it
as a bumper sticker. For them, it is a symbol of Southern (white) heritage. The issue is a racially
charged one — the original decision to fly the flag from the South Carolina statehouse was
deliberately taken in defiant response to the de-segregation laws passed in the early 1960s.
The campaign to have the Confederate flag lowered from outside the Columbia statehouse in South
Carolina was a direct result of the Charleston shootings and one of the more optimistic signs in racial
issues in the US today. The fact that the gunman posed in earlier photos with the flag, made it hard to
support the idea that the flag was an innocent symbol of regional patriotism of the flag. It undeniably
represented racial hatred, at least for some.
One of those shot in Charleston was a state senator. Paradoxically, the savagery and brutality of the
shootings caused sufficient numbers of white Republicans (who control the state government) to
revise their opinions and adopt a more progressive stance. The question remains however, how many
ordinary Americans in the South will be lowering or removing the flags from their homes, or ripping off
the bumper stickers from their 4x4s?
Some concluding questions
1
Do you think the USA has moved on in terms of racial equality since the 1960s?
2
How far is racial conflict also an economic issue?
3
How can the issue of policing and race best be resolved?
4
Should the Confederate flag still be proudly flown?
Taking it further
BBC report about deaths of black civilians involving the police: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-uscanada-30341927
Pew Research report into wealth inequality along ethnic lines: http://www.pewresearch.org/facttank/2014/12/12/racial-wealth-gaps-great-recession/
Black Lives Matter campaign website: http://blacklivesmatter.com/
White supremacist site: http://traditionalistamericanknights.com/index.html Be aware that this website
contains views that most would consider deeply racist. It does provide insight into the views/approach
of contemporary white supremacist groups.
Simon Lemieux is head of history and politics at The Portsmouth
Grammar School.
Philip Allan Publishers © 2015
www.hoddereducation.co.uk/politicsreview