The Race Dilemma: The American Non-Dilemma: Racial Inequality without Racism

There is no shortage of books examining racial inequality within the USA. With the large quantity of books already available, readers may wonder what more can a new book on the topic add to the conversation? Rutgers Business School Professor and Vice-Dean Dr Nancy DiTomaso's book, The American Non-Dilemma: Racial Inequality without Racism indeed adds valuable information to the conversation of racial inequality and race relations within the USA.

Dr DiTomaso is a distinguished scholar in the area of diversity management and this book offers an interesting wrinkle in the conversation surrounding racial inequality in the USA, namely, that it can be perpetuated in the absence of racism. Although the target audience for this book is scholars in various disciplines who do research in the area of race relations, diversity, discrimination, and the like, DiTomaso's book is well-written, easily comprehensible, and accessible to practitioners, consultants, and the general public.

The American Non-Dilemma (DiTomaso, 2013) is divided into nine chapters. The prologue offers a glimpse into DiTomaso's life and background and provides an explanation as to why this topic is of interest to her and why she was able to conduct the project. As a white woman growing up in a working-class family in the 1950s, DiTomaso admitted that conversations of race rarely came up in her home. However, when she went to college and graduate school, she began to engage in conversations surrounding race – usually in classes with liberal social science professors. She reveals, the (racist and political) picture that many of her professors and colleagues painted of working class white Americans was much different than her experiences growing up in the Midwest. Indeed, her identity as a white woman is likely to have greatly benefitted her during this project. She asked her interviewees (many times in their homes) many poignant and sensitive questions surrounding race, politics, and inequality that garnered many profound, enlightening, critical, and, at times, sexist and racists responses that few non-white academics would have been granted access and received such truthful responses. The honesty of responses from interviewees is a strength of the book as it provides us with a small window into the thoughts of some white Americans on race using a systematic and defensible methodology that is valuable from a research perspective.

The American Non-Dilemma is set up as a direct rejoinder to Gunnar Myrdal's thesis in his classic book, An American Dilemma (Myrdal, 1944) that America will solve its racial problem because the moral strings of white Americans will be so vexed by the inconsistency between the American creed (e.g. equality, liberty, justice for all, etc.) and government-sanctioned racism and discrimination that white Americans will be moved to end racial inequality. Although government-sanctioned racism and discrimination is no longer legal in the USA, DiTomaso explains that it had little to do with white Americans reacting from a place of a newfound moral awareness that informs their views on racial inequality. Instead, DiTomaso's thesis is that there is no moral dilemma for white Americans when it comes to racial inequality in the USA because racial inequality persists without them doing anything “bad” to black Americans. That is, white Americans, are mainly concerned with securing “good jobs” that pay living wages and benefits for themselves and their loved ones and friends. As such, they do not actively or intentionally discriminate against black Americans in the job market, but rather engage in favoritism where they use their social capital and networks to secure good jobs for themselves, family members, and friends. To come to this conclusion, DiTomaso conducted 246 semi-structured interviews (including quantitative surveys) with white Americans representing a broad range of social classes, educational levels, and professions. The age range of her sample was 25-55 and they lived in New Jersey, Ohio, and Tennessee. Despite the sound methodology that DiTomaso employed, a limitation of her sample was not including white Americans who lived in more western states (e.g. California, Nevada, Wyoming, etc.). It is important to note that DiTomaso's sample was limited to white Americans because she was interested in how racial inequality could persist without racism.

In chapter 1, DiTomaso introduces her thesis that racial inequality persists in this country without racism, but rather favoritism. She argues that scholars are missing an important point when they focus on racial issues through a lens of racism or discrimination. Instead, favoritism, which is legal, is when white Americans engage in opportunity hoarding such that when they know of good job openings, they pass that information on to their family members and friends who are seeking a job in an effort to reciprocate favors and build goodwill intra-network. Starting the conversation from a framework of discrimination or racism is a non-starter for white Americans, DiTomaso argues, because most white Americans do not see themselves as being racist. In fact, she argues that regardless of their attitudes and beliefs about black Americans (or any other racial minority), most white Americans think that racists are “that other group” of white Americans and generally believe “that other group” is a small group. After explaining her sample and study design, DiTomaso presents the seven groups that emerged based on the interviewees’ responses and backgrounds: religious conservative (n=46), working-class “racist” (n=30), middle-class conservative (n=11), apolitical majority (n=92), religious nonconservative (n=11), working-class liberal (n=14), and rich white liberal (n=42).

In chapter 2, DiTomaso goes through the career histories of her interviewees and uncovered that nearly all of the respondents relied on their social networks to obtain jobs that offered better pay and benefits. Despite each group's espoused beliefs in equal opportunity, fairness, and that the “best person” should get the job, DiTomaso states that no one actually stated that he or she was the “best person” for the job he or she received. “Instead, they often spoke of having been given a chance to “get in the door” and then learn the job after being hired” (p. 57). Interestingly, DiTomaso recounts help that included getting interview questions beforehand, test questions and answers beforehand, and getting exam scores readjusted in order to be better positioned for the open job (p. 57). Consistent with previous research, DiTomaso's analyses revealed that those who held more conservative politics were more racially resentful than those who held more liberal politics and men were generally more racially resentful than women.

In chapter 3, DiTomaso delves deeper into how the respondents used their social networks in their job searches. Only two interviewees indicated that they had never received any help from another person in obtaining jobs (p. 78). In addition to job assistance, DiTomaso shares that a large percentage of the respondents also received other help from their social networks to sustain and stabilize their living situations such as financial gifts, loans (with little or no interest), cars, and childcare to name a few (p. 81). Despite the generous assistance that most interviewees received throughout their lives, DiTomaso finds that most attributed their good fortune in life to their own efforts and achievements, felt that it was well-deserved, and most did not mention any of the help they received until DiTomaso probed deeper with specific questions (p. 85).

In chapter 4, DiTomaso reveals a strikingly consistent pattern among all the respondents in their belief in individualism and that anyone can make it regardless of the obstacles they face if they work hard and remain resilient (p. 101). Likewise, consistent patterns emerged in all groups regarding why people are rich and poor. Overwhelmingly, interviewees responded very favorably toward and admired rich people (p. 121). In contrast, personal shortcomings were most often given as a reason for why people were poor (p. 125). Structural explanations for poverty (e.g. poor schools, drugs, bad neighborhoods, etc.) were infrequently given, and when they were, respondents from the liberal groups generally offered them (pp. 126-127).

In chapter 5, DiTomaso does a great job explaining the political and historical context of post-civil rights politics in the USA. She explains how and why the shift occurred where the Democratic Party took over the mantle of Civil Rights from the Republican Party. Unfortunately, taking on Civil Rights presents a conundrum for both parties. DiTomaso offers Frymer's argument as an explanation, “ […] for either party, being associated too closely with black issues brings up the prospect of losing more white votes than it can gain in black votes […] ” (pp. 139-140). DiTomaso expounds, unfortunately for the Democratic Party, a biracial coalition is needed whereas the Republican Party can win national elections by appealing only to White Americans (p. 141). More in depth examinations into the White Electorate and their beliefs are provided in chapter 6. Most enlightening, DiTomaso explains that most white Americans support the principles of the Civil Rights Movement, but do not support the necessary policies that the Civil Rights Movement sought to achieve racial equality (p. 177). As a result, in an effort to reduce overt racist appeals, racial politics were replaced with religious politics (p. 194).

In chapters 7 and 8, DiTomaso queries the respondents about their attitudes toward the government, taxes, welfare, affirmative action, and increased access to jobs and education for women, African Americans, and immigrants. Consistent with previous research, respondents who held more conservative beliefs were more anti-government, displeased with the taxes they paid, and against welfare assistance, affirmative action, and increased job access to the aforementioned groups than respondents who held more liberal beliefs.

In chapter 9, DiTomaso ends her argument by juxtaposing Myrdal's assessment of the “race problem” with hers and admits that he was exceptionally prescient in many aspects, but limited in others. Namely, that it is not discrimination or racism, as Myrdal posited, that is at the root of continued racial inequality, but rather favoritism and opportunity hoarding (p. 316). DiTomaso argues:

DiTomaso presents a fascinating viewpoint and a comprehensive argument on continued racial inequality in the USA. While her study design, methodology, and analyses were sufficient, I think her conclusion that favoritism, and not racism or discrimination, is the most important mechanism that operates to perpetuate racial inequality is overreaching. Because of the need to publish novel findings, researchers constantly search for new explanations for long-standing phenomena. When it comes to racial issues, educational scholar, Dr Shaun Harper (2012) found that researchers have often pushed explanations other than racism for racial issues even when racism seems a more likely explanation than the ones given. Although, I agree with DiTomaso that favoritism can perpetuate racial inequality, I think she overstates its role in racial inequality and dismisses the larger role that institutionalized racism plays in racial inequality. Although the job market is an important area to evaluate racial inequality, it is not the only area that is important. Issues affecting racial inequality persist in areas such as health care, voting rights/identification laws, electoral maps/redistricting, racial profiling, prison sentencing and ex-convict disenfranchisement, and disparate educational access and resources are all examples of issues that are plagued with institutionalized racism. Bolstering the idea that racism is an inveterate contributor to the continued racial inequality in the USA were the racist and less than flattering answers about black Americans that DiTomaso's respondents gave in response to several of her questions. Albeit, most of the vitriolic responses came from those who held more conservative viewpoints, even 15 and 9 percent of rich white liberals stated that employers might prefer hiring immigrants over black Americans because black Americans “lack work ethic” and are “unreliable,” respectively (p. 299). In examining racial attitudes held by white liberals, sociologist Dr Matthew Hughey (2012) found in his work on white nationalists and white antiracists that despite their different political leanings and philosophies, there were many similarities between the two groups in terms of racist worldviews and maintenance of white supremacy.

Another limitation worth noting is that conspicuously missing from the conversation is an eighth group of white Americans whose responses would have been particularly fascinating. Following DiTomaso's nomenclature, this group would be the rich white conservatives. Part of DiTomaso's argument was based on the premise that White liberals had the “luxury” to have more benevolent views of African Americans because Civil Rights gains did not threaten their jobs or well-being as much as they did for the working class and middle class respondents (p. 209). In this regard, rich White conservatives would be just as protected from Civil Rights gains as rich White liberals, but they espouse much more overt racial resentment than rich White liberals. Based on their political positions, status, and power, I argue that this group is much more important and responsible for persistent racial inequality in the USA than working class racists. DiTomaso did not give any reason why this group of White Americans was not included in her study. Despite the limitations that I note, DiTomaso's book adds an important dimension to the conversation of racial inequality in the USA and I highly recommend it.