Civil Rights and Race Relations in the Post Reagan-Bush Era

Insightful essays from leading scholars and writers on civil rights and race relations focus on the retrenchment from the ideal of racial equality. A common theme emerges: the new civil rights agenda must embrace radically different perspectives in order to be successful in eradicating racial and ethnic economic inequality.

This volume combines insightful essays from leading scholars and writers on civil rights and race relations with provocative discussions by business professionals and community leaders on retrenchment from the ideal of racial equality. It reviews what Americans really think about race and race relations while providing definitive assessments of the status of affirmative action. The writers put forth convincing evidence that white privilege lies at the root of both current racial inequality and opposition to conventional approaches to remedying inequality.

The essays provide a backdrop for understanding the reversals in support of remedies to racial and ethnic inequality and for understanding why the new agenda that must be forged will need to account for the changing demographics of the minority population. Essays in the volume also underscore how major demographic shifts and economic transformations have conspired with political reversals to make the agenda of the 1960s and 1970s civil rights movement obsolete. Any new approach to racial and ethnic inequality must account both for the coloring of America and the persistence and entrenchment of white racism. The book's final assessment will be of great interest to opinion leaders and officials as well as researchers and scholars in political science, economics, sociology, and Black Studies.