Reverse racism

See also: Reverse discrimination

Reverse racism is a phenomenon in which discrimination, sometimes officially sanctioned, against a dominant or formerly dominant racial or other group representative of the majority in a particular society takes place, for a variety of reasons, often initially as an attempt at redressing past wrongs. It has been described as "preferential treatment, discriminating in favor of members of under-represented groups, which have been treated unjustly in the past, against innocent people".

The usage of the term is controversial, with many groups, especially those concerning the interests of ethnic minorities such as Africans and Jews in Western countries, denying its existence.

In the United States

Civil rights

The term "reverse racism" came into use as the struggle for African-American rights divided the white community. In 1966, Hosea Williams of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), publicly accused members of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) of reverse racism in their efforts to exclude or expel whites from local government in Alabama to make room for blacks. Williams argued that the SNCC's intended "all-black" campaign in Alabama would drive white moderates out of the civil rights movement. "Black racism" was a more common term in this era, used to describe SNCC and groups like the Black Panthers.

It was not until the 1970s that discourse surrounding reverse racism emerged most forcefully, especially in reaction to affirmative action, as an outgrowth against colorblind hegemonic approaches in the post-civil rights era.

Instances in which white minorities' right of franchise were threatened or denied include:

• The New Black Panther Party voter intimidation case in 2008 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which Attorney General Eric Holder refused to prosecute despite a default judgment.
• The case of the Noxubee County Democratic Executive Committee, in Macon, Mississippi, investigation and prosecution of which began in 2005 during George W. Bush's administration over allegations of violations of the Voting Rights Act in regard to the county's white minority.

Criticism of the "reverse racism" concept

Most supporters of "anti-racism" claim that reverse racism is just misinterpreted racial prejudice. Calgary Anti Racism Education (CARED) has stated that, "Racial Prejudice can be directed at white people (i.e. white people can't dance) but is not considered racism because of the systemic relationship of power." "Anti-racist" sociologists do not believe in the existence of reverse racism because of the hierarchy in which those who are in the subordinated position do not have the power to commit reverse racism without larger, institutional support. Based on David Wellman's definition of racism in Portraits of White Racism as "culturally sanctioned beliefs, which, regardless of intentions involved, defend the advantages whites have because of the subordinated position of racial minorities," reverse racism could not exist because it cannot defend advantages of racial groups who are disadvantaged in society.

Paul Kivel writes in Uprooting Racism: How White People Can Work for Racial Justice that instances of reverse racism are generally rare, and that many claims of reverse discrimination lack merit. According to Kivel, charges of reverse racism are "usually a white strategy to deny white racism and to counterattack attempts to promote racial justice". Race deniers have also claimed that reverse racism denies what they see as the existence of white privilege and power in society.

Admissions

The Supreme Court held in 2009 that racial preferences in university admissions for minority students do not necessarily violate Equal Protection in cases such as Grutter v. Bollinger. The term gained widespread use in debates and legal actions concerning affirmative action.

A 2011 study conducted at Tufts and Harvard sought to quantify perceptions of reverse racism by surveying Americans who identified as "White" or "Black". The study was titled White People See Racism as a Zero-Sum Game That They Are Now Losing. The study found that Whites feel as though they now suffer disproportionately from racism. (Blacks claimed that anti-black racism had decreased over time, but did not perceive or acknowledge increases in anti-white bias.) These results were constant for people of different ages and levels of education.

In South Africa

The term has been used actively by both black and white South Africans after the end of apartheid. Accusations of reverse racism have been leveled particularly at government efforts to transform the demographics of South Africa's previously white-dominated civil service.

Nelson Mandela in 1995 described "racism in reverse" when Black students demonstrated in favor of changing the racial makeup of staff at South African universities. Students denied Mandela's claim and argued that a great deal of ongoing actual racism persisted from apartheid.

Some charged that Mandela's government moved slowly in other areas of social change, due to fears of being perceived as "reverse racist".

Mandela was later himself charged with reverse racism, during 1997 proceedings of the national Truth and Reconciliation Commission and for supporting the 1998 Employment Equity Bill.

Claims of reverse racism continued into the 21st century. Helen Suzman, a prominent Jewish anti-apartheid politician, charged the African National Congress and the Mbeki administration with reverse racism since Mandela's departure in 1999. In 2004, a group of young white members of the trade union Solidarity locked themselves into a zoo to protest discrimination against whites.

South African critics of the "reverse racism" concept use similar arguments as those employed by Americans.

Mixed-race South Africans have also sometimes claimed to be victimized by reverse racism of the new Black government. Similar accusations have been leveled by Indian and Afrikaner groups, who feel that they have not been dominant historically but now suffer from discrimination by the Black government.

See also

• Anti-white
• Black power
• Black supremacy
• Cultural Marxism
• Double standard
• Racial formation theory
• Racism
• White guilt